Chapter 12: Annabeth
My first day at Hogwarts was quite terrible. We had History of Magic, which was terribly boring and I forced myself to listen and pay attention. Then we had Potions. I was good at potions, and did well, but Percy smashed me at Potions. It was probably one of the first times he beat me at anything. Then, we had that fiasco of a Divination lesson. Trelawny had recited, literally every prophecy any of us had been a part of. I had the ominous feeling that we weren't done with Trelawny. Then, we had that toad as our Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. She wasn't letting us do any magic in her class, whatsoever. Then, Harry lost his temper and shouted at Umbridge about Voldemort being back. Then, he got sent out and had detention for the whole week. I could literally feel hate radiating off of the demigods, we all hated that toad. Today, I hoped that today would be better.
I was sharing a room with Padma Patil, who I really connected with. I also shared with Mandy Brocklehurst and Laura Rose (Just a random name I made up.) They were all nice and didn't bother me much. I grabbed the books that I needed for the day and ran out of the portrait hole after answering the riddle. I sprinted down the the Great Hall because I was starving. I was quite late as most people were wrapping up and walking out to lessons. I waved to Percy and he waved back, flashing me his lopsided grin. I ran and sat in between Leo and Padma.
"Long night Annabeth?" Padma asked.
"Not really, I just slept in. Why didn't you wake me?"
"We seemed to think it was safer to let you sleep. We didn't need you to try to kill us." She said, smiling. I thought that was fair as I believed I probably would've stabbed them with my knife, concealed as a bead. I gulped down my food ravenously and realised that we had Double Charms, then Double Transfiguration. After that we had Care of Magical Creatures, then Herbology. Once we went to double charms, I met up with the rest of the demigods and we sat at the back. The first fifteen minutes were occupied with Flitwick lecturing us about the importance of our OWLS.
'What you must remember,' said little Professor Flitwick squeakily, perched as ever on a pile of books so that he could see over the top of his desk, 'is that these examinations may influence your futures for many years to come! If you have not already given serious thought to your careers, now is the time to do so. And in the meantime, I'm afraid, we shall be working harder than ever to ensure that you all do yourselves justice!'
They then spent over an hour revising Summoning Charms, which according to Professor Flitwick were bound to come up in their OWL, and he rounded off the lesson by setting them their largest ever amount of Charms homework. I found summoning charms easy. Piper did it first try and I did it on my third, along with Hermione. Percy took quite a while, but soon got the hang of it, as well as everyone else. Hazel also did it on the fourth try, as she was overall decent at almost everything.
It was the same, if not worse, in Transfiguration.
'You cannot pass an OWL,' said Professor McGonagall grimly, 'without serious application, practice and study. I see no reason why everybody in this class should not achieve an OWL in Transfiguration as long as they put in the work.' Neville made a sad little disbelieving noise. 'Yes, you too, Longbottom,' said Professor McGonagall. 'There's nothing wrong with your work except lack of confidence. So ... today we are starting Vanishing Spells. These are easier than Conjuring Spells, which you would not usually attempt until NEWT level, but they are still among the most difficult magic you will be tested on in your OWL.' Sure enough, Vanishing Spells were quite difficult. Percy didn't have that much of a problem, and did it right at the end of the lesson. However, Frank did it first try and Hermione and I did it soon after. After the lesson, many hadn't even successfully vanished their snails, but most of the demigods had done it right at the end. Jason and Piper were the only demigods, who didn't vanish anything. Frank, Hermione and I were the only ones, not given Homework as we did ours extremely quickly. Everyone else was instructed to practice the spell, ready for a fresh attempt on their snails, tomorrow. Most of us started panicking about the homework, and everyone headed to the library during lunch to finish their giant wars essay. We all made a start on our transfiguration practice aswell. Practicing vanishing spare pieces of parchment. We all hurried down to Care of Magical Creatures soon after. The day had become cool and breezy, and as they walked down the sloping lawn towards Hagrid's cabin on the edge of the Forbidden Forest, they felt the occasional drop of rain on their faces. Professor Grubbly-Plank stood waiting for the class some ten yards from Hagrid's front door, a long trestle table in front of her laden with twigs.
"Everyone here?" barked Professor Grubby-Plank. Once everyone had arrived. "Let's start. Who can tell me what these things are called?" she asked, indicating the pile of twigs in front of her. My hand shot in the air, along with Hermione's but Grubby-Plank picked me. "Yes, Chase."
"They're bowtruckles!" I exclaimed. 'They're tree-guardians, usually live in wand-trees.'
'Five points for Ravenclaw,' said Professor Grubbly-Plank. 'Yes, these are Bowtruckles, and as Miss Chase rightly says, they generally live in trees whose wood is of wand quality. Anybody know what they eat?'
'Woodlice,' I said promptly, 'But fairy eggs if they can get them.'
'Good girl, take another five points. So, whenever you need leaves or wood from a tree in which a Bowtruckle lodges, it is wise to have a gift of woodlice ready to distract or placate it. They may not look dangerous, but if angered they will try to gouge at human eyes with their fingers, which, as you can see, are very sharp and not at all desirable near the eyeballs. So if you'd like to gather closer, take a few woodlice and a Bowtruckle-I have enough here for one between three-you can study them more closely. I want a sketch from each of you with all body-parts labelled by the end of the lesson.'
The class surged forwards around the trestle table. We all picked a bowtruckle, but the bowtruckles ran away from Hazel, probably the whole Daughter of Pluto thing. Finally, a particularly greedy bowtruckle managed to be lured into Hazel's hands and she began sketching. Sketching a bowtruckle was similar to drawing plans for any building. I handed mine in early and Grubby-Plank was very impressed. Harry was arguing with Malfoy about something, I approached them, trying to placate them before anything escalated. I glared at Malfoy, he paled and fell over. The Gryffindors roared with laughter and the demigods shot me appreciative glances. We were all in good moods as we walked up to Herbology.
To nobody's surprise, Professor Sprout started their lesson by lecturing them about the importance of OWLs. I wished all the teachers would stop doing this; I was starting to get an anxious, twisted feeling in my stomach every time I remembered how much homework I had to do, a feeling that worsened dramatically when Professor Sprout gave them yet another essay at the end of class. Tired and smelling strongly of dragon dung, Professor Sprouts preferred type of fertiliser, the students trooped back up to the castle an hour and a half later, none of them talking very much; it had been another long day.
Harry ended up bidding us farewell as he had his first detention with Umbridge and dashed off to the Great Hall to have an early dinner. The rest of us decided to work on the Charms homework. We finished in about an hour and decided to work on that Herbology essay we just got. The divination could wait. Harry returned right after we started the Herbology essay and we finished it together. At Five to Five, he bade us farewell and marched off to have detention with Umbridge.
Harry: From 3rd Person. Bet you didn't expect that one.
Harry set off for Umbridge's office on the third floor. When he knocked on the door she called, 'Come in,' in a sugary voice. He entered cautiously, looking around.
He had known this office under three of its previous occupants.
In the days when Gilderoy Lockhart had lived here it had been plastered in beaming portraits of himself. When Lupin had occupied it, it was likely you would meet some fascinating Dark creature in a cage or tank if you came to call. In the impostor Moody's days it had been packed with various instruments and artefacts for the detection of wrongdoing and concealment.
Now, however, it looked totally unrecognisable. The surfaces had all been draped in lacy covers and cloths. There were several vases full of dried flowers, each one residing on its own doily, and on one of the walls was a collection of ornamental plates, each decorated with a large technicolour kitten wearing a different bow around its neck. These were so foul that Harry stared at them, transfixed, until Professor Umbridge spoke again.
'Good evening, Mr Potter.'
Harry started and looked around. He had not noticed her at first because she was wearing a luridly flowered set of robes that blended only too well with the tablecloth on the desk behind her.
'Evening, Professor Umbridge,' Harry said stiffly.
'Well, sit down,' she said, pointing towards a small table draped in lace beside which she had drawn up a straight-backed chair. A piece of blank parchment lay on the table, apparently waiting for him.
'Er,' said Harry, without moving. 'Professor Umbridge. Er-before we start, I-I wanted to ask you a ... a favour.'
Her bulging eyes narrowed.
'Oh, yes?'
'Well, I'm ... I'm in the Gryffindor Quidditch team. And I was supposed to be at the tryouts for the new Keeper at five o'clock on Friday and I was-was wondering whether I could skip detention that night and do it-do it another night ... instead ...'
He knew long before he reached the end of his sentence that it was no good.
'Oh, no,' said Umbridge, smiling so widely that she looked as though she had just swallowed a particularly juicy fly. 'Oh, no, no, no. This is your punishment for spreading evil, nasty, attention-seeking stories, Mr. Potter, and punishments certainly cannot be adjusted to suit the guilty one's convenience. No, you will come here at five o'clock tomorrow, and the next day, and on Friday too, and you will do your detentions as planned. I think it rather a good thing that you are missing something you really want to do. It ought to reinforce the lesson I am trying to teach you.'
Harry felt the blood surge to his head and heard a thumping noise in his ears. So he told 'evil, nasty, attention-seeking stones', did he?
She was watching him with her head slightly to one side, still smiling widely, as though she knew exactly what he was thinking and was waiting to see whether he would start shouting again. With a massive effort, Harry looked away from her, dropped his schoolbag beside the straight-backed chair and sat down.
'There,' said Umbridge sweetly, 'we're getting better at controlling our temper already, aren't we? Now, you are going to be doing some lines for me, Mr Potter. No, not with your quill,' she added, as Harry bent down to open his bag. 'You're going to be using a rather special one of mine. Here you are.'
She handed him a long, thin black quill with an unusually sharp point.
'I want you to write, I must not tell lies,' she told him softly.
'How many times?' Harry asked, with a creditable imitation of politeness.
'Oh, as long as it takes for the message to sink in,' said Umbridge sweetly. 'Off you go.'
She moved over to her desk, sat down and bent over a stack of parchment that looked like essays for marking. Harry raised the sharp black quill, then realised what was missing.
'You haven't given me any ink,' he said.
'Oh, you won't need ink,' said Professor Umbridge, with the merest suggestion of a laugh in her voice.
Harry placed the point of the quill on the paper and wrote: I must not tell lies.
He let out a gasp of pain. The words had appeared on the parchment in what appeared to be shining red ink. At the same time, the words had appeared on the back of Harry's right hand, cut into his skin as though traced there by a scalpel - yet even as he stared at the shining cut, the skin healed over again, leaving the place where it had been slightly redder than before but quite smooth.
Harry looked round at Umbridge. She was watching him, her wide, toadlike mouth stretched in a smile.
'Yes?'
'Nothing,' said Harry quietly.
He looked back at the parchment, placed the quill on it once more, wrote I must not tell lies, and felt the searing pain on the back of his hand for a second time; once again, the words had been cut into his skin; once again, they healed over seconds later.
And on it went. Again and again Harry wrote the words on the parchment in what he soon came to realise was not ink, but his own blood. And, again and again, the words were cut into the back of his hand, healed, and reappeared the next time he set quill to parchment.
Darkness fell outside Umbridge's window. Harry did not ask when he would be allowed to stop. He did not even check his watch. He knew she was watching him for signs of weakness and he was not going to show any, not even if he had to sit there all night, cutting open his own hand with this quill ...
'Come here,' she said, after what seemed hours.
He stood up. His hand was stinging painfully. When he looked down at it he saw that the cut had healed, but that the skin there was red raw.
'Hand,' she said.
He extended it. She took it in her own. Harry repressed a shudder as she touched him with her thick, stubby fingers on which she wore a number of ugly old rings.
'Tut, tut, I don't seem to have made much of an impression yet,' she said, smiling. 'Well, we'll just have to try again tomorrow evening, won't we? You may go.'
Harry left her office without a word. The school was quite deserted; it was surely past midnight. He walked slowly up the corridor, then, when he had turned the corner and was sure she would not hear him, broke into a run.
He had not had time to practise Vanishing Spells, had not written a single dream in his dream diary and had not finished the drawing of the Bowtruckle. Thankfully, thanks to the Americans, he had done all of his essays. He owed them a lot.
He skipped breakfast next morning to scribble down a couple of made-up dreams for Divination, their first lesson, and was surprised to find a dishevelled Ron keeping him company.
'How come you didn't do it last night?' Harry asked, as Ron stared wildly around the common room for inspiration. Ron, who had been fast asleep when Harry got back to the dormitory, muttered something about 'doing other stuff, bent low over his parchment and scrawled a few words.
'That'll have to do,' he said, slamming the diary shut. 'I've said I dreamed I was buying a new pair of shoes, she can't make anything weird out of that, can she?'
They hurried off to North Tower together.
'How was detention with Umbridge, anyway? What did she make you do?'
Harry hesitated for a fraction of a second, then said, 'Lines.'
'That's not too bad, then, eh?' said Ron.
'Nope,' said Harry.
'Hey-I forgot- did she let you off for Friday?'
'No,' said Harry.
Ron groaned sympathetically.
It was another bad day for Harry; he was one of the worst in Transfiguration, not having practised Vanishing Spells at all. The Americans, especially Frank tried to help him here. Annabeth gave him her drawing of a browtruckle so he didn't have to give up his lunch hour to complete the picture of the Bowtruckle. Meanwhile, Professors McGonagall, Grubbly-Plank and Sinistra gave them yet more homework, which he had no prospect of finishing that evening because of his second detention with Umbridge. To cap it all, Angelina Johnson tracked him down at dinner again and, on learning that he would not be able to attend Friday's Keeper tryouts, told him she was not at all impressed by his attitude and that she expected players who wished to remain on the team to put training before their other commitments.
'I'm in detention!' Harry yelled after her as she stalked away. 'D'you think I'd rather be stuck in a room with that old toad or playing Quidditch?'
'At least it's only lines,' said Hermione consolingly. Percy and Jason glared at him, as though they knew he was concealing something. Harry sank back on to his bench and looked down at his steak and kidney pie, which he no longer fancied very much. 'It's not as it it's a dreadful punishment, really ...'
Harry opened his mouth, closed it again and nodded. He was not really sure why he was not telling Ron and Hermione exactly what was happening in Umbridge's room: he only knew that he did not want to see their looks of horror; that would make the whole thing seem worse and therefore more difficult to face. He also felt dimly that this was between himself and Umbridge, a private battle of wills, and he was not going to give her the satisfaction of hearing that he had complained about it.
'I can't believe how much homework we've got,' said Ron miserably.
'Well, why didn't you do any last night?' Hermione asked him. 'Where were you, anyway?'
'I was ... I fancied a walk,' said Ron shiftily.
Harry had the distinct impression that he was not alone in concealing things at the moment.
The second detention was just as bad as the previous one. The skin on the back of Harry's hand became irritated more quickly now and was soon red and inflamed. Harry thought it unlikely that it would keep healing as effectively for long. Soon the cut would remain etched into his hand and Umbridge would, perhaps, be satisfied. He let no gasp of pain escape him, however, and from the moment of entering the room to the moment of his dismissal, again past midnight, he said nothing but 'good evening' and 'goodnight'.
Harry got back to the Common room and instead of going to bed, decided to do some Homework. He caught up to date on his Dream Diary and decided that he might as well practice some spells for Transfiguration. He also did more of his Herbology homework on the proper handling of bowtruckles. He stumbled back up to bed and passed out on his bed. Thursday passed in a haze of tiredness. Ron seemed very sleepy too, though Harry could not see why he should be. Harry's third detention passed in the same way as the previous two, except that after two hours the words 'I must not tell lies' did not fade from the back of Harry's hand, but remained scratched there, oozing droplets of blood. The pause in the pointed quills scratching made Professor Umbridge look up.
'Ah,' she said softly, moving around her desk to examine his hand herself. 'Good. That ought to serve as a reminder to you, oughtn't it? You may leave for tonight.'
'Do I still have to come back tomorrow?' said Harry, picking up his schoolbag with his left hand rather than his smarting right one.
'Oh yes,' said Professor Umbridge, smiling as widely as before. 'Yes, I think we can etch the message a little deeper with another evenings work.'
Harry had never before considered the possibility that there might be another teacher in the world he hated more than Snape, but as he walked back towards Gryffindor Tower he had to admit he had found a strong contender. She's evil, he thought, as he climbed a staircase to the seventh floor, she's an evil, twisted, mad old-
'Ron?'
He had reached the top of the stairs, turned right and almost walked into Ron, who was lurking behind a statue of Lachlan the Lanky, clutching his broomstick. He gave a great leap of surprise when he saw Harry and attempted to hide his new Cleansweep Eleven behind his back.
'What are you doing?'
'Er-nothing. What are you doing?'
Harry frowned at him.
'Come on, you can tell me! What are you hiding here for?'
'I'm-I'm hiding from Fred and George, if you must know,' said Ron. 'They just went past with a bunch of first-years, I bet they're testing stuff on them again, I mean, they can't do it in the common room now, can they, not with Hermione there.'
He was talking in a very fast, feverish way.
'But what have you got your broom for, you haven't been flying, have you?' Harry asked.
'I-well-well, OK, I'll tell you, but don't laugh, all right?' Ron said defensively, turning redder with every second. 'I-I thought I'd try out for Gryffindor Keeper now I've got a decent broom. There. Go on. Laugh.'
'I'm not laughing,' said Harry. Ron blinked. 'It's a brilliant idea! It'd be really cool if you got on the team! I've never seen you play Keeper, are you good?'
'I'm not bad,' said Ron, who looked immensely relieved at Harry's reaction. 'Charlie, Fred and George always made me keep for them when they were training during the holidays.'
'So you've been practising tonight?'
'Every evening since Tuesday ... just on my own, though. I've been trying to bewitch Quaffles to fly at me, but it hasn't been easy and I don't know how much use it'll be.' Ron looked nervous and anxious. 'Fred and George are going to laugh themselves stupid when I turn up for the tryouts. They haven't stopped taking the mickey out of me since I got made a prefect.'
'I wish I was going to be there,' said Harry bitterly, as they set off together towards the common room.
'Yeah, so do- Harry, what's that on the back of your hand?'
Harry, who had just scratched his nose with his free right hand, tried to hide it, but had as much success as Ron with his Cleansweep.
'It's just a cut -it's nothing-it's-'
But Ron had grabbed Harry's forearm and pulled the back of Harry's hand up level with his eyes. There was a pause, during which he stared at the words carved into the skin, then, looking sick, he released Harry.
'I thought you said she was just giving you lines?'
Harry hesitated, but after all, Ron had been honest with him, so he told Ron the truth about the hours he had been spending in Umbridge's office.
'The old hag!' Ron said in a revolted whisper as they came to a halt in front of the Fat Lady, who was dozing peacefully with her head against her frame. 'She's sick! Go to McGonagall, say something!'
'No,' said Harry at once. 'I'm not giving her the satisfaction of knowing she's got to me.'
'Got to you?You can't let her get away with this!'
'I don't know how much power McGonagall's got over her,' said Harry.
'Dumbledore, then, tell Dumbledore!'
'No,' said Harry flatly.
'Why not?'
'He's got enough on his mind,' said Harry, but that was not the true reason. He was not going to go to Dumbledore for help when Dumbledore had not spoken to him once since June.
'Well, I reckon you should-' Ron began, but he was interrupted by the Fat Lady, who had been watching them sleepily and now burst out, 'Are you going to give me the password or will I have to stay awake all night waiting for you to finish your conversation?'
Friday dawned sullen and sodden as the rest of the week. Though Harry automatically glanced towards the staff table when he entered the Great Hall, it was without any real hope of seeing Hagrid, and he turned his mind immediately to his more pressing problems, such as the mountainous pile of homework he had to do and the prospect of yet another detention with Umbridge.
Two things sustained Harry that day. One was the thought that it was almost the weekend; the other was that, dreadful though his final detention with Umbridge was sure to be, he had a distant view of the Quidditch pitch from her window and might, with luck, be able to see something of Ron's tryout. These were rather feeble rays of light, it was true, but Harry was grateful for anything that might lighten his present darkness; he had never had a worse first week of term at Hogwarts.
At five o'clock that evening he knocked on Professor Umbridge's office door for what he sincerely hoped would be the final time, and was told to enter. The blank parchment lay ready for him on the lace-covered table, the pointed black quill beside it.
'You know what to do, Mr. Potter,' said Umbridge, smiling sweetly at him.
Harry picked up the quill and glanced through the window. If he just shifted his chair an inch or so to the right ... on the pretext of shifting himself closer to the table, he managed it. He now had a distant view of the Gryffindor Quidditch team soaring up and down the pitch, while half a dozen black figures stood at the foot of the three high goalposts, apparently awaiting their turn to Keep. It was impossible to tell which one was Ron at this distance.
I must not tell lies,Harry wrote. The cut in the back of his right hand opened and began to bleed afresh.
I must not tell cut dug deeper, stinging and smarting.
I must not tell trickled down his wrist.
He chanced another glance out of the window. Whoever was defending the goalposts now was doing a very poor job indeed. Katie Bell scored twice in the few seconds Harry dared to watch. Hoping very much that the Keeper wasn't Ron, he dropped his eyes back to the parchment shining with blood.
I must not tell lies.
I must not tell lies.
He looked up whenever he thought he could risk it; when he could hear the scratching of Umbridge's quill or the opening of a desk drawer. The third person to try out was pretty good, the fourth was terrible, the fifth dodged a Bludger exceptionally well but then fumbled an easy save. The sky was darkening, and Harry doubted he would be able to see the sixth and seventh people at all.
I must not tell lies.
I must not tell lies.
The parchment was now dotted with drops of blood from the back of his hand, which was searing with pain. When he next looked up, night had fallen and the Quidditch pitch was no longer visible.
'Let's see if you've got the message yet, shall we?' said Umbridge's soft voice half an hour later.
She moved towards him, stretching out her short ringed fingers for his arm. And then, as she took hold of him to examine the words now cut into his skin, pain seared, not across the back of his hand, but across the scar on his forehead. At the same time, he had a most peculiar sensation somewhere around his midriff.
He wrenched his arm out of her grip and leapt to his feet, staring at her. She looked back at him, a smile stretching her wide, slack mouth.
'Yes, it hurts, doesn't it?' she said softly.
He did not answer. His heart was thumping very hard and fast. Was she talking about his hand or did she know what he had just felt in his forehead?
'Well, I think I've made my point, Mr. Potter. You may go.'
He caught up his schoolbag and left the room as quickly as he could.
Stay calm, he told himself, as he sprinted up the stairs. Stay calm, it doesn't necessarily mean what you think it means ...
'Mimbulus mimbletonia!' he gasped at the Fat Lady, who swung forwards once more.
A roar of sound greeted him. Ron came running towards him, beaming all over his face and slopping Butterbeer down his front from the goblet he was clutching.
'Harry, I did it, I'm in, I'm Keeper!' At the same moment Jason rushed towards me and exclaimed
"Harry, I'm the new chaser!" Harry congratulated both of them, and realised that he hadn't seen Jason play. Jason went into depth on how he scored fifteen goals more than the person who was going to be in second place. 'Sorry I was a bit short with you earlier, Potter,' she said abruptly. 'It's stressful this managing lark, you know, I'm starting to think I was a bit hard on Wood sometimes.' She was watching Ron over the rim of her goblet with a slight frown on her face.
'Look, I know he's your best mate, but he's not fabulous,' she said bluntly. 'I think with a bit of training he'll be all right, though. He comes from a family of good Quidditch players. I'm banking on him turning out to have a bit more talent than he showed today, to be honest. Vicky Frobisher and Geoffrey Hooper both flew better this evening, but Hooper's a real whiner, he's always moaning about something or other, and Vicky's involved in all sorts of societies. She admitted herself that if training clashed with her Charms Club she'd put Charms first. Anyway, we're having a practice session at two o'clock tomorrow, so just make sure you're there this time. And do me a favour and help Ron as much as you can, OK? Also, your friend Jason, tell him that he's an amazing chaser, we're really depending on him, now that Alicia can't play'
He nodded, and Angelina strolled back to Alicia Spinnet, who was now injured, and couldn't play Quidditch. Harry moved over to sit next to Hermione, who awoke with a jerk as he put down his bag.
'Oh, Harry, it's you ... good about Ron, isn't it?' she said blearily. 'I'm just so-so-so tired,' she yawned. 'I was up until one o'clock making more hats. They're disappearing like mad!'
And sure enough, now that he looked, Harry saw that there were woolly hats concealed all around the room where unwary elves might accidentally pick them up.
'Great,' said Harry distractedly; if he did not tell somebody soon, he would burst. 'Listen, Hermione, I was just up in Umbridge's office and she touched my arm ...'
Hermione listened closely. When Harry had finished, she said slowly, 'You're worried You-Know-Who's controlling her like he controlled Quirrell?'
'Well,' said Harry, dropping his voice, 'it's a possibility, isn't it?'
'I suppose so,' said Hermione, though she sounded unconvinced. 'But I don't think he can be possessing her the way he possessed Quirrell, I mean, he's properly alive again now, isn't he, he's got his own body, he wouldn't need to share someone else's. He could have her under the Imperius Curse, I suppose ...'
They continued talking for another half hour or so, about possible ways that Voldemort could be manipulating Umbridge. Suddenly, Percy interrupted him.
"Harry? Can I please talk to you?" Harry wandered into the corner and started talking with Percy in whispers.
"Harry, I know that Umbridge is making you do something foul in those detentions."
"Uh… I don't know what you're talking about!" Harry exclaimed.
"Harry, show me your arm. You were twitching and scratching it earlier." Reluctantly, Harry pulled back his sleeve, and showed Percy his arm. "Holy Hades." Percy shouted, I though Holy Hades was a weird insult but I let it slide. "She's making you write lines on your hand?"
"No, she's using a quill that uses my blood as ink. It carves the words into the back of my hand." I replied. Percy scowled at the ceiling.
"Harry, you need to tell someone, the woman's torturing you!"
"I'm fine Percy, really." I caught some mumble from Percy. Something like
"I… IM…. Nico." That garbled sentence made no sense, but I didn't judge him. I trudged upstairs, and I thought that this week was inexcusably long. It felt like one incredibly long History of Magic Lesson."
Okay. That's chapter 12 done. Hope you all enjoy these longer chapters that I'm writing. I need some people to vote on whether the god aiding Lord Voldemort will be Ares, or some other god. I'm not sure. I need to introduce the big bad sometime soon. So, please review and give your opinion. In other news, we passed 2000 views, earlier today. Woo! I'm happy anyways. Thanks for everything. Don't forget to Read and Review. Also, I'll be leaving the link to a strawpoll to vote on the big bad. Ares, or Nemesis probably.
/r5x232w4. That's the strawpoll. Ares, Nemesis or some other god.
~RedGods