PART
5: DOBBY'S MESSAGE
She
was sitting in the Great Hall with her fellow Gryffindors when she saw a large,
tawny brown owl land in front of Draco Malfoy. It had a letter attached to its
leg, and from this distance, Ginny thought that there was something eerily
familiar about the parchment. Malfoy took the letter from the owl's leg, and it
flew off. Ginny watched him read the letter, and his expression changed from
curiosity, to glee, then to absolute joy, as if all his birthdays and
Christmases had come at once. He howled, read the letter to Crabbe and Goyle
(who were too thick to read it themselves), and both his cronies joined him in
fits of laughter.
Malfoy passed the letter to the person next to him.
She read it, and she too laughed. Soon the whole Slytherin table were laughing
hysterically and pounding their fists on the table. Malfoy spotted Ginny from
across the hall and pointed at her. All the Slytherins turned in their seats to
look at her. All of them red faced and with tears streaming down their cheeks.
By now everyone in the Great Hall had started
looking around in curiosity. First they looked at the Slytherins, and then
looked over at the Gryffindor table at Ginny, whom the Slytherins were pointing
at. Ginny quickly stole a glance at Ron, then Hermione, and finally, Harry.
Harry looked completely stumped. He looked from Malfoy to Ginny, shrugged, and
went back to his toast. Ron made rude gestures at Malfoy, and Hermione rolled
her eyes and tut tutted impatiently, and she too, went back to her toast.
Ginny watched as Malfoy got up from the Slytherin
table and walk swiftly to the front of the Hall. Once he got to the middle, he
took out his wand, pointed it at his throat and muttered, "Sonorus!" He coughed
to get everyone's attention, and his magically magnified voice filled the Great
Hall. Its echoes bounced up and down, and around the walls and the ceiling.
Hundreds of heads snapped in his direction, and even the professors at their
table stopped what they were doing and paid him their attention.
"Ladies
and Gentlemen," Malfoy began, hardly able to control his snicker.
"I have a letter here, that I would like to
share with you all." He cleared his throat importantly, and Ginny felt a sense
of terrible foreboding, like something really, really bad was going to happen.
Malfoy began to read the letter: "Dear
Harry – I don't exactly know how to put in words how I feel about you, but ever
since I first saw you, I had wanted you." Malfoy paused for dramatic effect. Every
head in the Hall turned in Harry's direction, and Harry, who was halfway
through munching his toast, suddenly became open-mouthed. A ball of chewed-up
toast fell from his mouth and splashed in his pumpkin juice. Ginny felt her
stomach drop.
Malfoy proceeded to read the letter line by line,
occasionally ad-libbing, adding details here and there which Ginny would never
in a million years ever say to anyone. The Great Hall rang with screeches of laughter.
Chairs scraped on the floor as people moved to get a closer look at Ginny.
Malfoy continued.
"I have sexual fantasies of you every night, Harry…"
Over
at the staff table, Ginny saw Flitwick fall off his chair from laughter.
McGonagall had taken off her glasses to wipe the tears from her eyes, and even
Dumbledore was bent over, banging his goblet on the table.
Fred and George let off some Filibuster's Fireworks,
and Ron clapped Ginny on the back in congratulations. Ginny was numb with
humiliation and anger. Harry had fainted.
When Ginny looked at Malfoy again, he had had his
last word. "I know I'm just Ron's little sister, but I
hope one day I can be more than that."
Malfoy
looked up with a malevolent glint in his eye and snorted in an amused tone,
"Dream on Weasley!" He made his way
back to the Slytherin table in a fit of hysterics. The Great Hall rang with
applause, whistles and cat- calls, and everyone turned to look at Ginny with
tears of mirth in their eyes. Ginny felt her body shake and convulse, like she
was having an epileptic fit. This must be what
it's like to die from humiliation. Literally. She couldn't breathe, and from far away
she heard Hermione's voice say, "Ginny! Ginny!"
*
"Ginny!
Ginny! Wake up!" Ginny opened her eyes and quickly sat up. She was drenched in
sweat and her throat was constricted. She was wheezing and trembling all over.
Clutching her chest, she looked up and saw Hermione standing over her. Hermione
had Ginny's shoulders in a tight grip.
"Is
everything OK Gin? Bad dream?"
Ginny
could hardly reply. She reached out and touched Hermione's hand, so tightly
that she saw Hermione wince.
"It
was horrible!" Ginny choked, "it was so horrible…"
Hermione
gathered Ginny in her arms, and Ginny sobbed quietly in her shoulder. When she
looked up again, Hermione whispered, "It's 6.30. I thought I'd wake you and we
can go to the laundry together."
"Thanks,"
Ginny stammered, wiping her eyes, "but how are we gonna get there?"
"I've
borrowed Harry's invisibility cloak and his map." Hermione held up a beautiful
silvery cloak, and a blank piece of old parchment. Ginny looked at the items in
Hermione's hands, bewildered.
"I'll
explain later," Hermione said, seeing the look on her face. "C'mon."
Ginny
slipped out of bed, put on one of her robes and went out of the dorm with
Hermione.
Hermione muttered, "I solemnly swear that I am up to
no good," and tapped the parchment with her wand. Green writing snaked their
way around the parchment, and Ginny was amazed to see a map with many secret
passageways, right in front of her. There were two dots labelled 'Ginny
Weasley' and 'Hermione Granger' on it. Hermione threw the invisibility cloak
over them and they disappeared in thin air.
"This
is a map of Hogwarts," Hermione explained. "It'll show us an alternative
entrance into the laundry, so we won't have to worry about passwords." She grinned
at Ginny.
"Are
you sure about this?" She asked Hermione. "What did Harry say?"
"Oh
relax Gin. Harry says it's OK for us to use it, but he doesn't know what we're
going to do with it," Hermione pointed out. Then she quickly explained the
importance of the cloak and the map to Harry, and made Ginny promise not to
tell anyone about them.
Ginny watched the map with amazement, and saw on it
the miniature Hermione stop in front of a wall, tap one of the bricks, and a
speech bubble appeared next to it, which read, "Alohomora!" She watched Hermione next to her, who
counted the bricks – ten up, six across – tap it, and say, "Alohomora!" The brick revolved around very fast, and
part of the wall slowly disintegrated. Ginny and Hermione stepped through, and
as she looked back, Ginny saw the wall re-appearing again. Hermione took the
cloak off them, wiped the map clear, and shoved both of them in her robe
pocket.
They were standing in an all-white room with giant
baskets everywhere, full of clothing. Dozens of elves were busily darting
around here and there. Some were putting clothes in a tub full of brightly
coloured, foamy water, swishing and swirling the clothes in it with their
magic. Others were drying clothes in mid air with an invisible dryer, while others
still were folding up the clean ones and putting them in a neat pile in a
trolley. Ginny saw that every trolley had a sign on them. The one nearest them
read, 'Ravenclaw Girls: First Years'. It was colour coded too. The yellow
trolleys contained clothes that looked messy and crumpled. Ginny supposed this
must be the dirty pile. The white trolley had clothes that were folded and
neatly stacked.
"That
must be the clean pile," she said out loud to Hermione.
Hermione
nodded and said in a business-like manner, "You search the white trolley and
I'll search the yellow one."
They
both walked towards the trolleys marked 'Gryffindor Girls: Fourth Years' and
proceeded to search through the pile. The elves around them bowed as they
passed and didn't object at all to their presence there.
Ginny dug through the mass of neatly folded black
robes, looking at the inside tags, until…the name 'Ginny Weasley' neatly
scrawled in green ink shone at her. Frantically, Ginny dipped her hands in its
pockets, but found no evidence of any parchment inside.
"There's
nothing here!" She called out to Hermione. Feeling a little better, that
perhaps the washing process might have destroyed the parchment to a pulp (A/N:
I am assuming that parchment gets destroyed by water), Ginny relaxed a little
and turned to Hermione.
"Maybe
I needn't worry after all," she said with a smile.
Hermione
had just finished her search and she too looked relieved for Ginny.
"Maybe
not," she said, "I didn't find anything either."
Smiling,
Hermione threw the cloak over herself and Ginny, and the two made their way up
to breakfast.
Breakfast passed by without incident, and the rest
of the day turned out to be quiet pleasant. Ginny earned ten points for
Gryffindor for perfecting her summoning charm, and she managed not to get
picked on by Snape in Potions. During lunchtime, Harry was looking and smiling
at her more than was usual (which thrilled Ginny to bits), and they even had a
pleasant conversation about Ron's prospects for trying out as Keeper for the
Gryffindor Quidditch team. The day went by without much of a hitch, except when
Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny made their way up to the common room after
dinner.
When the portrait of the Fat Lady slid open, a voice
coming from the direction of the staircase leading to the boys' dorm beckoned
them over.
"Harry!
Harry! Come here, there's someone looking for you!" It was Seamus Finnigan. He
was slightly out of breath and red-faced, as though he had been running.
"What
is it?" Harry asked curiously.
"Someone's
up in our dorm looking for you," explained Seamus. "I already told him you were
still down at the Hall, but he wouldn't listen. Said he really wanted to see
you."
Seamus
turned to go back up to the boys' dorm, beckoning Harry to follow. Before Harry
could ask who his visitor was, a small brown thing ran down the stairs so fast,
it almost knocked into Seamus as it passed him. When it reached Harry, it
slammed into his stomach so hard that all the breath was knocked out of him.
"Harry
Potter! Harry Potter!" it squeaked.
"Dobby!"
Harry laughed. Ron, Hermione and Ginny all laughed at the elf's enthusiasm.
"What're
you doing here Dobby?" asked Harry when he got his breath back.
"I
is visiting you, Harry Potter sir!" squeaked Dobby. A few people in the common
room were starting to stare at Dobby curiously. Some of them were smiling and
exclaiming,
"Isn't
he cute?"
"Harry?"
"No,
the elf!"
"I
has something to give you, Harry Potter sir!" exclaimed Dobby, looking pleased
with himself.
"
What? Socks? I don't know Dobby. It's not even Christmas yet, and his
birthday's already past," quipped Ron. Hermione elbowed him in the rib
good-naturedly.
"No
sir! Something much, much better!" squealed Dobby in delight. All four of them
looked at Dobby expectantly, but the elf didn't seem to want to reveal it in
the crowded room.
"Dobby
cannot be giving it to you here sir! Maybe…maybe if we goes up to your room
sir?" whispered Dobby timidly. His eyes travelled from Ron to Hermione, and
then to Ginny, where it widened to the size of saucers.
"Alright,"
shrugged Harry.
Ginny
watched Harry and Dobby make their way up to the boys' dorm.
Ten minutes later, Ron, Hermione and Ginny watched
as an ashen-faced Harry descended the stairs from the boys' dorm, with a
crumpled piece of parchment in his hand.
"What…?"
asked Ron, getting up and walking towards Harry.
Harry
handed him the letter and said, "Malfoy!" through gritted teeth.
"What
did Malfoy do?" asked Hermione, looking at the parchment curiously, which was
now in Ron's hand. Harry looked briefly at Ginny, then explained,
"Dobby
found this letter next to Malfoy's dirty robes in the laundry. It looks like
the git was trying to frame Ginny…" he trailed off, mainly because Ron was now
red-faced and spluttering beside him.
"Frame
me?" asked Ginny, herself leaping from the couch. Harry turned to Ginny.
"He…he…"
Harry didn't quite know how to put whatever it was into words.
"He
wrote a love letter addressed to me, and signed it with your name." Harry's
face went scarlet.
Ginny
fainted.
