CHAPTER SEVEN: The necklace

Pansy Parkinson hated everyone but decided that sometimes she needed to pretend not to. She made her peace with Milicent Bulstrode, which was good – and didn't fight with Blaise anymore, at least not while they were going back to the castle. It was a very cold – almost freezing – day due to the terrible wind, but when they saw the commotion outside of the Three Broomsticks, they forgot all about that. Hagrid was hurriedly carrying some girl into the castle, but from a distance, it was hard to recognise her. Potter & co. were walking in the same direction, discussing something heatedly. One girl, crying uncontrollably, was walking with them. Neither Pansy nor Blaise knew her.

'Leave it to me, Zabini,' she said, putting her hand on his shoulder, noticing he wanted to go investigate.

And before he could protest, she added, 'Just trust me this once, okay?'

She hurried after the rest, noting that if they were controlled by emotions, it would be much easier to spy on them. Then, she noticed McGonagall speaking to them rather urgently. She sped up her pace – she figured that the professor asked them for a talk in her office since the four students followed her immediately. She hurried there as fast as she could, still remaining careful so that no one would realise she was following on them.

They were quite far away from her, so she didn't hear the beginning of the talk. Once she arrived at the office, she sat at the bench next to the door, took out a book and pretended to read. At the same time, she carefully charmed the door so that they opened slightly, enough for her to hear what they were talking about.

She strained her ears and finally heard McGonagall's firm voice, 'That's enough!'

Pansy scooped closer to the door and thanked Merlin they talked loud enough for her to hear anything.

'Potter, I appreciate you telling me this, but we cannot point the finger to blame at Mr. Malfoy purely because he visited the shop where this necklace might have been purchased. The same is probably true for hundreds of people –'

At this moment, a bunch of Hufflepuff idiots came through the corridor, talking loudly. Pansy still pretended to be reading and didn't let on how furious she was with them. She would've cursed them if that wasn't a stupid move. When they finally left, she strained her ears again.

'Mr. Malfoy was not in Hogsmeade today,' said McGonagall with a finality in her voice.

'How do you know, Professor?' asked Potter and Pansy just rolled her eyes.

'Because he was doing detention with me. He has now failed to complete his Transfiguration homework twice in a row,' she explained.

Parkinson got worried at once since she knew Draco was always very serious about his school work.

'So, thank you for telling me your suspicions, Potter, but I need to go up to the hospital wing to check on Katie Bell. Good day to you all.'

She acted absorbed in reading again when McGonagall hurried past her. She got up only when the rest of them left the office.

It was much worse than she had previously thought. She had to find out what had happened to Katie Bell – but this shouldn't be too difficult – Hogwarts will have been boiling with gossips by the end of the evening. What terrified her the most, however, was the fact that Potter was suspecting something. It didn't matter that nobody seemed to believe him (she didn't even hear his friends backing him up), but it was problematic in every way. He'd always managed to get away with everything, so if he started spying on Draco, he might actually find something out. And she couldn't let that happen – but at the same time, she had no means to stop him. Snape would definitely be on Malfoy's side, but that was about it. It would be hard for him to get out of this one.

And he blew off Transfiguration! It was almost impossible – if she hadn't heard it from the teacher, she wouldn't believe it. Draco was always incredibly focused on getting the best grades possible, not only to impress his parents, but also to finally be better than Granger. And now he lets it go? That seemed ridiculous. Only it wasn't – there was a living proof that the task managed to keep him away from his studies, his greatest ambition.

After a couple of days of overthinking, she decided to listen to Blaise after all. They would lie low for a while until they could come up with another plan. Sometimes she even felt guilty, remembering Nott's words about how talking about it will only make things worse, and she was close to giving up. Maybe he did need help, but since he didn't want it, she couldn't force it upon him.

But she changed her mind when she was walking to the library one day to start working on her essay for Charms. Draco was walking down the corridor with two younger Slytherins she didn't know. Since she didn't really pay attention to people, it wasn't anything weird. They might've been in the second year, but it was hard to tell. Malfoy seemed to have been so lost in thought, that he didn't pay attention to anything. He really looked worse and worse day by day. And it was this what motivated her. She couldn't force her help onto him, but she could change his mind about needing help. It would be incredibly hard, but it could be done. Nevertheless, without really thinking it through, she followed them – far enough so that they wouldn't notice her. She got worried she might lose them, but thanks to Draco's height, his fair hair was clearly visible through the crowd.

They were walking up the stairs for so long, that it seemed like they didn't have any destination. The higher they got, the fewer people there were and so – it was harder to hide. When they reached the seventh floor, Pansy scolded herself in thoughts. How could she not have figured this out sooner?

They were obviously heading for the Room of Requirement, she'd spied on Dumbledore's Army here for almost half a year. Crabbe let it slip that Draco couldn't do everything in one room, which made him choose Moaning Myrtle's bathroom to store and make the potion. She'd already come to the conclusion that he used this room, so why didn't she figure out where they were going?

Then, another thought stroke her -she already knew what they used Polyjuice Potion for. Why would Draco slip away with two unknown Slytherins? Not to raise suspicions, of course. If he constantly snooped around the corridors with Crabbe and Goyle, it would be shady. As it would be if Crabbe and Goyle were seen guarding the entrance of the Room. The one puzzling thing was why Draco didn't use the potion as well. This way, they would've raised even fewer suspicions. Apparently, they must've not had enough.

She stopped near the staircase so that they wouldn't see her. She couldn't see them properly, but she watched as Draco went into the room and disappeared. He really did make guards out of them, she thought in disbelief. But what was he doing in there?

She had to go back. If Draco was in the room with two guards outside, there was nothing to gain anymore. She pulled out and went back to the Common Room with a plan to start the essay she was supposed to write in the library.

Unfortunately, as soon as she took a step inside, she ran into Zabini.

'Better spill it before I make you,' he greeted her coldly.

'No need to get so aggressive there,' she replied. 'Sit down.'

'You found out what he's doing with those girls, didn't you?'

'Well, I'll gladly tell you everything I know, once you tell me how you know it so quickly,' she said with a charming smile, making him frown.

'I saw you spying on them. Since you've made such a good job on Saturday, I decided to trust you again,' he admitted coolly.

'That's, like, the highest praise from you I'll ever get. Thank you.'

'Go on,' he waved his hand impatiently.

'Well, he's going to the Room of Requirement, as I've already told you. Crabbe and Goyle probably use Polyjuice Potion and stand guard at the entrance.'

'Are you sure?' he asked sceptically.

'Well, they have to use the potion for something, don't they, and it seems much more plausible than that he takes some random little Slytherin girls to watch the entrance, doesn't it?'

'I suppose,' he agreed reluctantly. 'Whatever he did to that Gryffindor girl had to start somewhere. What'd you reckon that was about?'

'Well, I'm not sure, but I don't think he wanted to curse HER. Maybe she was delivering it for somebody? At least gossips say she was taking it into the castle with her. Which is a bit stupid, considering Filch has got this new toy, with which he'd detect it right away,' she shrugged.

'But why would she do that? I mean… Why would she agree to do that?'

'Are you… No, no. No, you're not. Please, Blaise, don't tell me you're suggesting Imperius,' she whispered, hiding her face in her palms.

'Whatever he's doing is not good. Definitely not legal. It's work for… the Dark Lord, after all. And from gossips we've heard, she'd been quite determined to get this necklace somewhere, hadn't she?'

'So you think he's trying to curse somebody at school?'

'Not necessarily. It was a Hogsmeade weekend, Hogwarts gets guests sometimes,' he said matter-of-factly.

'That he would know of?' she asked sceptically.

'He does know a lot. He might be getting instructions, for all we know.'

They sat in silence for a second, Pansy was nervously tapping her fingers on the table.

'Listen, I think we should let this go for a while,' declared Blaise suddenly.

'Excuse me?'

'I've got a certain idea.'

'Well? Do you always have to be so mysterious? Spill it!' she demanded, waving her hand irritably.

'Draco has to think we'd given up.'

'But we can't!'

'Yes, but we also don't have a plan for now, and if they see we've given up, they might let their defences down,' he explained.

'So… do we have a plan for the future?'

'Yes. I've been invited to the Christmas party.'

'Slug Club?'

'Yeah and Draco's going to be there,' he smirked confidently.

'Why would he?' she asked, astonished. 'He's not in the Slug Club, is he, so he won't be invited to the party.'

'Exactly.'

Pansy just raised her eyebrows, puzzled.

'He can talk whatever he wants, he might insult them as much as he wants, but we both know him better than that.'

'He's furious he wasn't chosen,' she mumbled.

'Exactly.'

'So?'

'So he's going to come to the party, whether as a 'plus one' or he'll figure something else out,' he declared.

'So you're going to spy on him there?'

'Oh, no. We are going to spy on him there. You, Pansy Parkinson, are going with me.'