Seamus' attack was all over the school by the end of the day, it was all anyone could talk about at lunch and dinner. I sat quietly at dinner, pushing my food around my plate, I had no appetite after the events of the day. I was still mulling things over as I considered the evidence I had seen, I was sure it was a monster of some kind, or at least something unnatural, the evidence pointed to that much. The cuts could only have been an animal, most likely a monster, but it did not make sense. Why were there no footsteps? To do that much damage the monster would have to have been there for long enough for blood to have splattered over its paws, in fact, there was no blood splatter at all. The violence of the attack should have splattered blood everywhere, but there was none. The attack had happened where Draco had come from, but he looked too horrified at the attack to have done it, apparently he had flat out fainted when he retrieved Snape. Either Draco was not involved, or he was a far better actor than I gave him credit for, but it all looked too genuine. I growled to myself in annoyance.
I was pulled from my thoughts by Alice poking me, "Janet," her voice was hesitant, I looked at her, she was looking at me with concern in her eyes. "Janet, you need to keep up your strength, eat something and stop dwelling on the attack, just for now."
I sighed, "this doesn't make sense," I declared.
"Janet, I'm sure you'll get this, but you need your strength, eat, you didn't eat at lunch, please, for me?" She asked it so sweetly I could not say no, I hesitated, but I ate, everything tasted of dust.
"Alice, this mystery makes no sense!" I declared as I flopped down on my bed, "it's so infuriating." Mrs O'Leary padded over and prodded my leg with her nose, I absent-mindedly stroked her head, "footprints, there's got to be footprints! Why are there no footprints?" I sat up.
"I don't know, maybe it flew?" She questioned.
I jumped to my feet, "I'm going to give it another look over."
"Filch will have cleaned it up by now," Alice said dismissively.
"It's worth a look," I left the room and walked, Mrs O'Leary close behind, to the dungeons, careful to avoid detection. I found the corridor again, Filch had indeed started cleaning up, but there was still a lot of blood. Mrs O'Leary whined, "what is it girl?" She started growling at the remaining blood slick, now a congealed stain. Mrs O'Leary sniffed loudly and growled at the puddle, "I don't…" I froze and sniffed. The corridor smelt of mould, soap, dust and dog, but not blood, I frowned and walked over to the stain and knelt over it, I sniffed, still did not smell like blood, that was the missing key to my puzzle. "Fake blood, he wasn't attacked here, that's why there is no splatter, that's why there are no footsteps, he was placed here to be found." I recoiled as I came to a sudden realisation, "but, that means there is a person behind these attacks, someone set a creature on Seamus, this was done on purpose." I shivered and ran back to the Common Room, Mrs O'Leary at my heels.
"How'd it go?" Alice asked as I entered the Common Room, panting from running through the castle.
"Fake blood," I said between pants.
"Fake blood to you too," she said, raising an eyebrow.
"No, Seamus was lying in a pool of fake blood, he was attacked somewhere else," I said when I regained my composure.
Alice gawked, "but you said it was a monster attack, monsters don't use fake blood."
"It was a monster," I replied, "but I think it was either serving someone, or it was caged and given Seamus as a toy before he was dumped for us to find."
"Us in general? Or us as in, you know, Halfbloods," she said the second part very quietly, glancing around the empty room.
"That still awaits to be seen, if it is the former then I am more than a little concerned, if it is the latter, we have a serious problem. Either way, the wards around the school have probably been breached, or worse yet we have a traitor at the school."
Alice frowned, "if it is a traitor, my money is on Draco, I think we should visit him in the morning."
I shook my head, "if it is Draco I don't want him to think I suspect him, besides, we suspected him in the past and were wrong, I am hesitant to make a leap of reason like that again. I want to get a closer look at Seamus' burns, I want to know what caused them, if they are magical in origin or not, what spell caused them, that might give me a clue."
"We can check up on him in the morning, if Madam Pomfrey will let us," Alice patted me on the back, "go to bed Janet, you're no use to Seamus if you're too tired to keep awake." I kissed her and went to bed.
I knew I was dreaming as I floated in the void, I knew I was dreaming because I was floating in a void, it is a good rule of thumb that when gravity stops working you are probably asleep. Soon I was joined by Thanatos, still mahogany coloured skin, still handsome, still dressed like the grim reaper, scythe and all. "Hello again Janet, I don't have much time, your headmaster has left the school to report to the minister, this has weakened the wards even further than events today have, which was just enough to send you a dream message. I am not allowed to intervene or help you directly, but what I will tell you is this: not all monsters are animals, some are humans we have not been there to save."
"What do you mean?" I asked, but the dream was already fading, but I heard a female voice.
"This pre-recorded dream message has been brought to you by Morpheus Dream Messaging, Morpheus DM, an experience so dreamy you would have to be asleep to use it."
'Thanks adverts,' I thought to myself as I was whisked away by the currents of dreams.
I was back on Mount Tam, which now had a full palace built on it, with massive statues carved with such care you could almost see them breathe, wait, no, they were breathing. The statues were alive, they were monsters in grey armour, I was pulled inside the palace. Tala and Drake were standing in a room made entirely of black marble, floor, ceiling and walls, it was so highly polished I could see the two of them reflect into a black eternity. The room was rather plain, it had arrow slit like windows to the mists of the outside. There was no carpet or rug, just a table with a jug of water on it and two chairs, neither of them sat. Tala was in a dress that was only just be described as a dress, it was split up to the top of her left thigh and cut low to her bellybutton. It was revealing enough to make me blush. Drake was dressed far more sensibly, he was in the same armour he was in before, when he had appeared before me, the armour with mother's symbol on the helmet. He pressed the symbol, the armour retreated and he threw the helmet into a chair, a useful weakness to know.
"You missed Tala, now what am I going to tell Lord Kronos!" Drake shouted.
"You try throwing something many thousands of leagues, see how you do," she replied, frowning at my traitorous half-brother.
"It was not my job! My job was procurement, I got the beast from the obscure end of no-where where that idiot Egyptian sent it, you were meant to send it where it was needed, and you missed and got some unimportant moron instead. You're lucky our agent was able to salvage anything."
"I'm just satisfied I got it in the same country," she replied in her unplaceable accent, her voice calm, but with an angry undertone. "If I were allowed to take it where it was meant to go in person and just send it the last few leagues I would have hit the target exactly, rather than having to guess timings and shove it through a magic barrier. That would have been more efficient, but no, you would not let me leave your sights because you still think that I am after your job as number one magic lapdog. Pathetic."
"Do you want to solve this outside?" Drake growled.
"You could not hurt me if you tried puny mortal, your magic is not strong enough to hurt me, even your sister could not hurt me with magic," she gloated proudly.
"I am far more powerful than my sister! I am far stronger than she will ever be!" Drake shouted.
"No, you are still weak, you increasing your magical strength is just compensating for a lack of something in your head and pants," Drake turned red with rage and put his helmet back on, Tala ignored him and carried on. "You still cannot hurt me, you do not know my weakness and without that I would tear you to shreds when your magic runs out, like it has to with all mortals," Drake growled under his helmet, which distorted the sound until it sounded like bees in a metal bin.
The door to the room was flung open and Luke strode in, his eyes glowing gold, "stop arguing you two, it is giving me a headache. If either of you starts something, I will end it with one of you in the ground. Understand?!" He roared, they visibly shivered.
"Yes, of course Lord Kronos!" They both said quickly, bowing respectfully.
"Good," he turned to leave, "and for the love of me, ward your conversations in the future, you have a fly on the wall," the two of them blushed and looked around the room. The currents of my dreams pulled me away and swept me to dreamless slumber.
"Janet, Janet," I was woken by Alice rocking my shoulder and saying my name, "get up, breakfast time."
"Sometimes Alice I wonder what I would do without you," I said as I sat up.
"Probably starve, or collapse out of exhaustion, you do tend to forget minor things like food and sleep," she kissed my cheek. "Come on, breakfast to eat, lessons to attend, mysteries to solve, love interests to win, oh wait, we've already done that bit," I laughed and swung myself out of bed.
"I had a weird dream last night, I was a space hopper, you know, one of those elastic inflatable balls muggles like, and I was bouncing around in a field of unicorns, then one burst me and I woke up." She smiled at me, "it was fun until the end, what did you dream about? I bet you were a knight in shining armour or something like that."
"You're in a strange mood today Alice," I said as I thought over my dreams from the night before.
"Yeah, it's really sunny, today is the perfect day for a frolic with a horse in a meadow followed by a picnic. I just wish we had a horse and a picnic," it was indeed very sunny outside, the warmth was streaming in through the window. "It's just a shame we'll spend today in lessons and then investigating Seamus' attack, I know that's very important and everything, but look at that sunshine." I laughed at my girlfriend's antics, it was still kind of strange to think about that, this beautiful, intelligent, wonderful girl was my girlfriend, "what?" She asked, turning to me.
"What?" I asked back.
"You were staring," she smiled, "anyway, come on, we've got stuff to do."
"Yeah, let's go," I said.