A/N: Thanks to SJ Iolanthe and Moon Lantern for reviewing the last chapter :)
Please don't foregt to leave your thoughts in a review. It does really mean a lot to me!

Once again that evening, Ariella met with Harry in the Great Hall to eat early before they set off to Professor Umbridge's room for their detention. Neither said much as they walked up to Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom apart from to remind each other that no one else was to know what their detentions actually consisted of.

"Ah, there you are," the toad-like woman said as they knocked and entered. "Back to what you were doing yesterday please, you two." She indicated to the two desks laid out with the quills and parchment.

After a quick glance at Harry, Ariella went to sit down at the desk she was at the day before, yet she couldn't help but notice that there was another desk set up exactly the same on the other side of the room. She frowned, and then looked at Harry again, but he didn't seem to have noticed for he was too busy setting down his bag next to his desk so it wouldn't fall over. So, pushing it from her mind, Ariella looked back down at her own desk, placed the quill on the parchment and began to write.

Like the day before, the back of her hand started to tingle as she wrote, but she soon found that the pain came back a lot quicker than it had done the day before and a sneaky look at her hand told her that it wasn't just her imagination. The words were clearly spelt out on the back of her hand, not quite bleeding, but already blood red. They weren't fading either. She stopped writing for a few moments, the sting having made her wince in pain, but as soon as Umbridge looked up, her eyes snapped back to the page in front of her, not willing to take the chance of another detention.

"Taking a break, are we, Miss Granger?" her squeaky voice asked.

"No, professor," Ariella replied innocently.

"Good, then I don't expect to catch you looking up again."

However, her concentration was broken again a few minutes later when there came a knock on the door and a girl with frizzy black hair and freckles stepped into the room.

"Miss Vane, is there a reason you are so late?" Umbridge squeaked at her.

The girl stared at her arrogantly. "I had homework," she replied.

"You do your homework after the detention, Miss Vane. Sit yourself down, you're going to be doing lines for me today."

Ariella paused in her writing and looked up, curious as to what was going on, only to find herself caught in the gaze of the muddy, brown eyes belonging to Professor Umbridge.

"Better not let me catch you slacking, Miss Granger," she warned again, and Ariella jumped back to her lines, not daring to listen to any more of their conversation.

Hours later, she and Harry were called up for Umbridge to check their hands once more.

"I think the message has sunk in now, don't you, Miss Granger?" she said to Ariella, examining the letters that were bleeding profusely on the back of her hand. The young witch took a sharp intake of breath as the older woman let her pudgy fingers brush over the wound, not caring how much pain she was inflicting. "I only hope this has taught you a lesson."

"Yes, Professor," Ariella replied quietly.

"Good, well I don't expect you to end up back here. You may go."

The young witch left the room, not even sparing the other girl there a glance. She was just glad to get out. Her hand was throbbing painfully and she really didn't know what she was going to do with it.

"Ella, let me see your hand," Harry's voice came through the darkness.

"Harry, I'm fine," she started and then let out a little cry of pain when he grabbed her hand.

"No, you're not," he said. "You can't go without sleep and if mine hurts, yours is going to be hurting even more."

"Harry, it's fine, I still have to do an essay for Snape yet. It will have stopped hurting by then."

"You can't do an essay at this time of night!"

"I have to," Ariella retorted and stalked off in the direction of the common room, biting her lip to try and take her mind off the pain. Harry followed.

However, when they reached the common room, they got a big shock. There, sitting in the armchairs in front of the long-died-out fire were Ron, Hermione, Arcturus and Lottie.

"What are you doing up?" Ariella asked in horror as she clambered through the portrait hole and stopped, making Harry push her out the way to get in.

"Lottie said you had an essay for Snape due tomorrow that you haven't done yet, so we're going to help you, we got the books out," Arcturus explained.

"But we also noticed that you two have been acting a bit funny today," Hermione added. "What did she make you do?"

"Lines," both Harry and Ariella growled at the same time.

"Then why is there blood on your jumper, Ariella?"

"What?" Ariella looked down. "Oh, yeah, I cut myself on the way up here."

"Let me see then, I can heal it for you," Hermione said, clearly not believing her sister.

"I can heal it myself!" Ariella lied, digging herself into an even bigger hole.

"You've only being doing magic for two days. You don't know how to heal it yourself yet, you don't learn until just before Christmas in charms," Hermione said matter-of-factly and walked over, grabbing hold of her younger sister's wrist before she could pull away. Pulling back her sleeve, she suddenly gasped. "Ella! Why haven't you told anyone? She's torturing you!"

"This is why I didn't want you to know, Mione, I knew you would make a fuss." She yanked her wrist free and glared at her sister.

"But, Ella–!"

"No, Hermione, this cannot leave this room," Harry interjected.

"Professor McGonagall will know what to do, we can–"

"No, we can't. What could she do? Professor Umbridge has too much power in this school and that's likely to only get bigger with the Ministry behind her. You know that, Hermione."

She glared at Harry. "Fine, but I'm not happy about this. I thought you would have been more responsible, Harry, she's a first year and you didn't tell anyone! That's ridiculously irresponsible! Now tell me how she did this so I can heal it."

"She gave us a quill and told us to write lines," Ariella explained.

"The ink?"

"We didn't have any."

"Wait, so you wrote in your own blood?" Lottie put in before anyone else could. Everyone looked horrified. Ariella swallowed.

Hermione looked grave. "I've heard of those quills," she said. "I read about them last year. The marks they leave can't be healed. I thought that they were supposed to be illegal."

"Yet the Ministry seems to be supplying them for punishments for underage wizards and witches?" Arcturus asked.

"I don't think the Ministry knows about them. I can't imagine Fudge allowing such dark objects in a school. He'd be worried that people would get hold of them turn them into weapons against the Ministry," Hermione replied.

"What, killer quills?" Lottie giggled.

"If someone has the brains, then they'd be able to bewitch them to do such things. Now, I think I have something in my chambers that would help with the pain." And with that, she disappeared up the steps.

"You guys can go to bed, I'm fine. I can do this essay with Hermione's help," Ariella told Lottie and Arcturus when Lottie let out a large yawn.

"Are you sure, Ella? We've both done it, you can have our essays if you want?" Arcturus offered.

"It's alright, my sister will help me. I'll see you tomorrow."

Arcturus smiled before both him and Lottie went up the stairs to their dormitories. Ariella looked awkwardly at Harry and Ron before going to sit down at the table where a high pile of books were sat beside a foot of parchment and a quill and ink, all ready for her. She didn't dare ask the boys for help. From what she had heard from Hermione, they weren't the best of students, especially Ron. Instead, she picked up a book and started to read.