"Do you do this often?" Neville whispered as he followed Lavender. "Sneak out I mean?"

"Of course," said Lavender. "What, you think Dudley, Ron and Dean or the Weasley Twins are the only ones? We found this place in our second year. Well, Padma found it. And she told Parvati. And she told me.

She led the way to the fifth floor and down a corridor to a statue of Boris the Bewildered. "Relax," Lavender whispered. "We're not going to get caught. We come here every Friday!"

She led him to the fifth door, there was a dented suit of armor next to it.

"Squeaky clean!' she said to the door which swung open.

Wondering what Lavender was going to show him, Neville followed her inside. "Wow!" he said, in amazement. It was a bath—the biggest bath he had seen. The size and depth of a small swimming pool. Everything was made of white marble and lit by a chandelier. Covering one wall was a large picture of a ship at sea.

"The Ravenclaw Prefects bathroom," Lavender announced. She turned a tap and thick, soapy, pink water started to fill up the pool. She twisted another and bubbles came out.

"Wow!" Neville said again.

"Look away," Lavender demanded.

Neville did as he was told, turning to admire the painting of the ship.

"No peeking," Lavender said. A minute later, she said he could turn around.

When he did, he felt his eyes almost bulge out of their sockets. She was wearing a white bikini and her long brown hair was tied back. "Pick up your jaw, Nev," she said before jumping in.

She leant against the side, relaxing in the thick, soapy bubbles.

"How did you find this place?" Neville said, testing the water with his hand.

"I'll tell you when you join me. You did bring some swim shorts, didn't you?"

"Yeah," Neville had worn them under his robes. He had wondered why, expecting they were going to the lake.

"Then take your robes off and hop in."

Blushing a little, Neville did as he was told. He felt nervous about his body since, though he wasn't massive—the way Dudley had been during his first and second year—he was still quite plump.

"I'll look away," Lavender said. "I won't peek—promise." She covered her eyes.

Neville took off his shoes, socks and slid off his robes. He quickly jumped into the water before Lavender could see him. The pool was so deep he could only just touch the bottom with his toe. He was a good swimmer, Uncle Algie had taught him, so he swam over to join Lavender.

"Cool, isn't it?" Lavender said.

"Yeah! So, how …"

"Well, Padma –you know Padma?"

"Parvati's sister,"

"Yeah. Well, she heard a prefect talking about a secret bathroom in her second year and, well, Padma is very determined—she spent the rest of the year and part of her third year trying anything to find it out. She tried eavesdropping. She tried spells. She tried potions. She tried trickery. She tried flirting—but nobody would say. Eventually, she stole some veritaserum from Snape!"

"No!"

"Yep—I don't know if it was brave or stupid or both. And she put a drop—just a teeny drop—in Penelope Clearwater's pumpkin juice last year."

"Veritaserum?" Neville said, stunned. "But isn't that …"

"Illegal, yeah, but Padma thought it was worth it," Lavender said.

"And that's how you got the password?"

'Nope, that's how we found out that Anthony Goldstein has a crush on Terry Boot!"

"What?"

"Yeah, wrong person—worked out in Anthony's favor though, surely you saw them at the Yule Ball together?"

"Yeah, but … I thought they just didn't get dates," Neville muttered.

Lavender rolled her eyes. "Anyway," she said, moving on. "It was time for Plan B—Sue Li—you know Sue?"

"No,"

"Doesn't matter—anyway, Padma and Parvati got together and decided to have Sue follow the prefects when they next went out after hours. Sue's really sneaky, anyway, she followed Penelope to the bathroom and that's how we found its location—didn't hear the password though. She was too far away."

Neville was amazed at the goings on. He didn't know Padma well, but he had always thought she was a bit like Hermione—a stickler for rules and a bit of a goody goody. He had had no idea that Parvati and Lavender and their friends had been up to things like this.

"So, next—Padma came up with an idea. Why not disguise one of us as a suit of armor! And then listen. So, we drew straws—Padma, Parvati, myself, Sue Li and Mandy Brocklehurst. Parvati got the short straw."

"I bet she was pleased," Neville laughed. Parvati was very girly. The most girly girl in the year and he could just imagine her face at been told she had to get into a suit of armor.

"She was furious!" Lavender said, gleefully. "Tried bribing us. But, in the end, we put her in that suit of armor. Four hours she had to wait until she heard the password. It's why we call her Rusty now."

"Rusty?" Neville asked.

"Yeah, all of the Hex Girls have nicknames, it's sorta our thing," Lavender said. "Parvati is Rusty because she had to hide in armor. Mandy is Splash because she once fell into the lake. Sue is Spider because of how she can creep around …"

"What's yours?" Neville asked.

"Wart …" Lavender said with a sigh.

"Why …"

"Because I tried a skin-brightening spell and it gave me warts," Lavender said.

Neville laughed so Lavender splashed water at him.

"Luckily, Pomfrey got it all sorted. But the nickname stuck. Anyway, we come here every Friday—it is usually empty on Fridays as that's when the Ravenclaw prefects go on patrol."

"I had no idea you were doing all this," Neville said.

"Of course, it's just that unlike your friends, we're smart enough to not get caught," Lavender said, smugly.

Authors Note

I plan on possibly doing a couple more interludes in Book 5 about the goings on on other Hogwarts students. I figure it isn't just the main trio who were up to mischief and exploring the castle, so decided that I'll drop a few more hints and mentions of other goings on. I figured it would add a bit of color and life to the school if, while Dudley and his gang are doing their thing, there are also other little groups exploring and getting into trouble, mostly in the background but occasionally hinted at or appearing in an interlude. Hope you like the idea, and if there's any background students you would like an interlude for, I would be glad to do one :)

I plan on doing another Hex Girls interlude at some point because I like the idea of a group of bookworm Ravenclaw girls + Lavender and Parvati getting up to no good but being smart enough to not get caught.

Towards the end, a few Slytherins will get a small moment too, which I enjoyed writing.