A/n: Ok, the ninth ch. is here! And guess what! Its nine pages, isn't that sooo kewl! Ok, well I hope you enjoy it~

Disclaimer: I believe you guys know the drill…

Lori was, surprisingly, the first one up the next morning.

            "Come on, get up you guys, I wanna see who the first to go in the trophy room was!" she said extremely loud.

            "I'm up, I'm up," Jennifer said sitting up quickly. The others rose more slowly. All Alicia did was stand up and slept walked to the bathroom to take a shower. It was rather strange watching her pick her way through their messy dorm with her eyes shut. The others began to get ready as well.

            "Hey," Jennifer said turning to Morgan and Megan, "did ya'll find anything else about, um, oh, what was her name! Catasra, yeah, did ya'll find anything else about Catasra?"

            "Well, not much," Megan said.

            "Yeah, it only said she was born in the southeastern part of the United States, and that she went to a small wizarding school nearby," Morgan told her.

            "It also said that she hadn't really killed very many people, only that where she went witches and wizards seemed to disappear along with her," Alicia said as she approached them.

            "Wait a minute," Lori said, "we live in the southeastern United States."

            "Congratulations, Lori, you know where we live," Jennifer said.

            "No, I mean, it said she attended a small wizarding school nearby, right," she asked looking at the rest of them.

            "So?" Morgan asked.

            "Well if we live in the same general area, then why didn't we get letters from there? I mean, it would have been a lot closer than Hogwarts," Lori explained. The others were speechless. Why was that anyway?

            "Maybe it's one of those things that we'll 'understand when we're older'," Jennifer said. The others shrugged and they headed down to the common room.

~*!*~

            All chatter stopped as Professor Snape entered the Great Hall and screamed,

            "Yates and Thomas! DETENTION!"

            Then he head to the teachers' table, slipping every which way as he approached it. When he had seated himself the hall burst into chatter about what had just happened. Lori, Jennifer, Alicia, Megan, and Morgan were all laughing hysterically.

            "It (laugh) was Snape (laugh)!" Lori said in between her fits of giggles. They were still laughing as they headed out of the Great Hall for Charms. The boys were giving them very strange looks.

            The rest of the day went smoothly.

            Ok, fine so maybe it didn't, but hey, it was worth a try.

            "NO MORGAN! YOU HAVE TO SWISH THE WAND LIKE THIS, AND CONCENTRATE VERY HARD! OH, WAIT, YOU'RE TOO BLONDE TO DO THAT!" Megan screamed at Morgan during Transfiguration.

            "I'M NOT EVEN BLONDE!" Morgan screamed back. They weren't really mad at each other, just having some fun, you know, a little ha ha ha. (a/n: ok, I had to put that in there, lol)

            "Miss Brightt and Miss Cherry, I expected a little more self control out of you two," Professor McGonnagall said, "You will be joining Miss Yates and Miss Thomas in detention." Then the bell rang for lunch.

            "Ok, Alicia, now we only have to get you a detention," Lori said. Alicia shook her head.

            "There is no way I am getting a detention."

~*!*~

            "I can't believe I got a detention, my mom is going to kill me," Alicia said that night as she entered the common room.

            "You got a detention?" Joseph asked. Alicia nodded numbly.

            "Filch was being completely unfair, you had every right to be owling your mom, he was just in a bad mood," Jennifer said. She took Alicia up to their dormitory to make sure she would be ok.

            "I have definitely had a bad influence on her," Lori said as she sat down on one of the squishy couches. Morgan and Megan sat down as well. All the boys were already there.

            "Do any of you know when we have flying lessons?" Megan asked.

            "Probably some time in November," Kevin said.

            "It's too bad we can't be on the team until next year," said James.

            "I know, what a bummer," Megan agreed.

            "Hey, you know they should have cheerleaders," Morgan said.

            "Why?" Megan asked.

            "Because, every sport needs cheerleaders," Morgan answered.

            "Baseball and softball don't," Lori pointed out.

            "That's not the point," Morgan said.

            "I thought it was," Kevin joined in.

            "Well it's not, the point was that Quidditch should have cheerleaders," Morgan said.

            "Well you can talk to McGonnagall about that one then," Megan told her. Just then Jennifer and Alicia came down the stairs.

            "I think I'm going to go to the library, I'll see you guys later," Jennifer said, and then she turned and walked out the portrait hole.

            "What's she going to do?" Joseph asked Alicia.

            "I don't know, she muttered something about how she almost forgot about the wands, and wanted to go research something," Alicia replied. The rest shrugged and they continued their conversation about Quidditch.

~*!*~

            "Well we must be going to our detention now," Alicia said. The girls stood up and headed for the dungeons where all their detentions were taking place. Jennifer was already there when they arrived. Unfortunately, so was Professor Snape.

            "Alright, tonight you will be cleaning the dungeons, and I'll be in the next room to monitor your actions," he looked pointedly at Lori and Jennifer, "You may leave when I say you can. Get to work." Then he went into his office.

            "I guess we have to use those," Morgan said pointing to a few buckets and mops and rags and such.

            "Guess so," Jennifer said. They began to scrub everything, every now and then breaking into an extremely quiet water war. They had been cleaning for about an hour when Megan, who was mopping, spoke up.

            "I have the best idea!"

            "What?" Jennifer asked getting up from scrubbing the floor.

            "Do ya'll remember that lovely little charm we learned today?" she asked.

            "You mean the one that dyes things?" Morgan asked. Megan nodded.

            "I've just thought of a perfect way to put it to use."

            "I get it, who will it fall on though?" Lori asked. She and Alicia moved to the front of the room where the rest of them were standing.

            "Snape, duh," Megan said.

            "I dunno, Megan, getting him once was risky, twice is even riskier. I think, even though it'd be great to get back at Snape, he is a professor, we should set our sights a little lower," Jennifer reasoned.

            "She's right," Alicia agreed.

            "Well then, who?" Megan asked.

            "What about that girl, oh what's her name?" Lori asked.

            "You mean the one that called us mudbloods today?" Morgan asked.

            "Yeah, her," Lori said.

            "Wasn't her name Able or something?" Alicia asked.

            "Danielle Able," Jennifer said.

            "Oh yeah, she'd be perfect, she loves her perfectly blonde hair," Megan said.

            "So how are we going to get this to work?" Lori asked.

            "Easy, we put a bucket in the rafters up there," here Megan pointed, "and we charm the soapy water in it, then we charm it to land exactly on her."

            "Simple as that," Jennifer agreed. They all smiled and put their plan into action.

            When they had finally finished they got Snape to inspect the room. Even he had to admit it was as good as it was going to get and allowed them to go.

            No one was up when they got back to the common room, so they headed up to their dorms.

            "Potions is going to be fun tomorrow," Megan said as climbed into bed.

            "Yep," Morgan agreed. Four of the girls drifted into a seemingly peaceful sleep, Jennifer, on the other hand, went to the balcony with Karrots.

            "Ok, Karrots, the mysteries stand thus: Why were we accepted to Hogwarts, and not the school closer to us? And who is the person who has the seventh Naturall? And, what are you? I know there has to be tie between them all, I just don't know what." Then she went back inside and drifted into very confused slumber.

~*!*~

            The next morning in the Great Hall…

            "Jennifer, you seem very unlike yourself today," Lori said as she ate. Jennifer had barely said anything all morning. She had been the last one up as well, and if you knew Jennifer, you knew that she was a very early riser.

            "What'd ya mean?" she asked. She hadn't been eating much either, it was like she was in another world.

            "Well, you just seem sorta out of it today," Alicia said waving her hand in front of her friend's face.

            "It's nothing, really," she said unconvincingly, but her friends stopped bugging her about it. When breakfast was over and they were heading to DADA she began to cheer up a bit.

            "I hope we're the first to figure it out," she said.

            "What?" Morgan asked.

            "Duh, Catasra," Megan told her.

            "Oh yeah! I knew that."

            "Sure ya did, Morgan," Megan said skeptically.

            "You can be so blonde sometimes," Jennifer added.     

            "Yes, well, I'm not the only one good at that," Morgan replied. When they reached the DADA room, Professor Harrison was already there, but nobody else was, so they sat themselves in the front of the room. When the class had filed in the professor cleared her throat.

            "Alright, has anyone figured out who the arising witch and/or wizard is?" she asked them. She hadn't expected any of them to have found it so quickly and was about to say that that was fine, and if they hadn't found out by next lesson she would tell them, when five hands in the front row raised.

            "You know? All of you?" she asked surprised.

            "Well, we sorta worked together," Lori explained.

            "Oh, well then, who is it?" she asked.

            "Catasra," they all said at the same time.

            "Correct, five points each to Gryffindor for your alacrity," she said, and then went on to explain about Catasra. "As these ladies said, Catasra, no last name, is the evil witch that is rising in our society. There's only been one person to see her and live to tell about it. He said she had black hair and blue eyes, with tan-ish colored skin, not exactly as some would picture someone like her. She is a very mysterious character, never stays in the same place twice, always moving. She's not like Voldemort, however. There have been only three killings by her, but they are much worse than what Voldemort had ever done. I'm sure most of you know that Voldemort used the Unforgivable Curses quite often, well, Catasra hardly seems to use magic at all, especially when it comes to killing. No, no, she's much more vile. You see, if she wants to kill you, she hunts you down, then surrounds you by people you thought you could trust, then she captures you, and finally the ministry of magic finds your body tide to a tree half rotted, or at the bottom of a river, or scorched to death, all are perfectly characteristic of her." Here the professor paused, noticing the looks of disgust on most of the girls' faces, but then she saw one girl who was sheet white and visibly shaking.

            "Um, pro-professor, could I be excused please?"

            "Of course." Her friends watched her leave, slightly shocked, it was usually Alicia who would leave considering her having a weak stomach. Never would they have guessed that Jennifer would want to be excused.

            However, it wasn't because Jennifer was grossed out, or even shocked by what the professor had said, she wasn't one to become queasy that easily. No, she had left because she was scared. Scared because she had just found out that Catasra had been haunting all her dreams. She had seen those people, the three the professor had been talking about, she had seen Catasra, exactly as Professor Harrison described her, she had seen five gravestones, with her friends' names written on them, and then she had seen herself, older but it was still her, she had been standing beside Catasra, smiling.

            Jennifer sat down on the toilet in the girls' bathroom and cried until she had to leave for Potions.

~*!*~

            "Are you ok, Jennifer?" Morgan asked. The others were worried, they'd hardly ever seen their friend like this.

            "Fine," Jennifer said. The others didn't bug her about it, just headed to Potions, hoping that their prank would cheer her up.

~*!*~

            It was during the middle of the second part of Snape's class that Jennifer signaled Lori and Megan to dump the bucket. It was a complete and total success. The charmed water managed to not only get Danielle Able but also William Vladimier, her partner. Professor Snape was furious. Luckily for them the bell rang while he was trying to sort everything out, and never got to give them a detention or anything.

            "Ok, what was that?" Joseph asked as they went to History of Magic. The boys were all crowded around the girls to hear an explanation.

            "Just a prank," Lori said nonchalantly.

            "How'd you pull it off?" Michael asked.

            "We would tell you, but then we'd have to kill you," Megan said.

            "Please?" Kevin asked.

            "Nope, now if you ask anymore questions I will be forced to use magical violence," Jennifer said pulling out her wand. The boys backed off.

            "Thank you," Alicia said as they reached the History of Magic classroom. They all sat down in the same spots they'd had before. Not that Professor Binns would have noticed. As soon as the professor set into his boring lecture heads began to droop. There were, of course, the occasional Ravenclaws taking notes, but most of the class was trying to catch up on some sleep.

            Jennifer, however, did neither. She opened some library books and took out some parchment and began to write down, what looked like, notes. Morgan had been watching her curiously for some time when she finally decided to write her a note.

Jennifer,

            What are you doing?

Morgan,

            Do you remember what Mr. Ollivander told us about our wands?

Jennifer,

            Um, no.

            After we made our purchases he told us it was strange we had gotten these wands, because they were all Naturalls.

            Oh yeah! He said there were seven, but he wouldn't tell us who the other wand had gone to.

            Exactly, I'm trying to find out about the seven Naturalls, but I've not been able to, I don't think I will either.

            Why not?

            Haven't you heard that everything's happens for a reason?

            Yeah, so?

            I don't think we're suppose to find out about the seven Naturalls for a reason, not saying we'll never find out, just that we'll find out later.

            That stinks.

           

            Tell me about it.

~*!*~

            "I'm bored," Jennifer said. It was about three weeks later, and the first year Gryffindors were all sitting in the common room, doing basically nothing.

            "So'm I," Morgan agreed.

            "This game is so cool," Lori said, unaware of her friends' lack of interest. Ever since Michael showed her wizard chess she'd been addicted to it.

            "I can't wait 'til Halloween," Megan said. Jennifer sighed.

            "That seems forever away."

            "I dunno, it's only about a month away," Alicia said reasonably.

            "I know, a whole month!" Morgan said. Jennifer sighed again.

            "If you girls are so bored, why don't you go find something to do?" James asked absorbed in his game of chess with Lori.

            "What do you do on Saturday at Hogwarts?" Megan asked. They all shrugged. Jennifer jumped up, nearly falling on Morgan who was sitting on the floor.

            "Idea, idea!" she said jumping up and down causing Morgan to move out of the way.

            "What's your idea?" Alicia asked. They all looked at her expectantly, well, all but Lori and James who were too wrapped in their game to notice.

            "We search for the one-eyed witch!" she said.

            "Is that some sort of species?" Joseph asked.

            "No you idiot! It's a way out of the castle!" she said excitedly.

            "But Jennifer, it's not a Hogsmeade weekend," Morgan said.

            "Not to mention the fact that we're not old enough to go," Megan said.

            "Fine then, I'm going to go look for it, you all can stay here and be bored, I don't care," she said as she turned to leave.

            "Wait!" Morgan said, "All we have to do is look for it, not necessarily use it."

            "If we did use it, somebody would think something's up anyway because we'd be the only students there," Megan pointed out.

            "Exactly, so we find it now, use it later," Jennifer said.

            "It does give us something to do," Alicia said.

            "Who's with me!?"  The guys looked at each other. It was evident all the girls were going.

            "Huddle," Joseph said. After a few moments of whispering they turned to the girls.

            "Alright," Kevin replied.

            "GREAT! Lori, James, are you guys coming?" Jennifer asked.

            "Huh? Oh yeah, sure," Lori said, finally looking up from her game.

            "Yeah, ok," James said.

            "Aha! Checkmate," Lori exclaimed then asked, "By the way, how are we going to go about doing this?"

            "If we split up into groups it'll be faster," Alicia said.

            "And quieter," Morgan added.

            "Ok, we'll go in buddies," Megan said.

            "I'm going with Lori," Alicia said quickly, she was the first to realize one group would be boy-girl.

            "Morgan's my partner," Megan said catching on.

            "Hey! That is so not fair! It was my idea," Jennifer whined.

            "And a very good one at that," Lori said.

            "I don't wanna be partners with one of them!" she said.

            "Fine, we'll have a truddie," Morgan said.

            "Ok," Jennifer said.

            "Well then who am I going to be partnered with?" George asked.

            "You can be in a truddie with on of the other groups," Megan said. Then they headed out the portrait hole.

            "Fun fun fun fun fun!" Jennifer said.

~*!*~

            "We've been searching for forever!" Lori complained.

            "Is it my fault I don't know where it is?" Alicia asked.

            "Yes," Lori said.

            "No it isn't," Alicia complained.

            "We're lost," Lori said as they passed the same statue for the hundredth time.

            "We are not," Alicia said.

            "Yes we are, there goes that picture, again."

            "Ok, so maybe we are lost…"

~*!*~

            "Ow!" Joseph almost yelled.

            "Sorry there," George said.

            "That was my toe."

            "Stop arguing, do you guys know where we are?" Michael asked.

            "Um, yeah, we're…you know we're by…" George said looking around.

            "We're lost," Joseph said.

            "This is good."

~*!*~

            "Hello," Jennifer said as they walked by yet another painting.

            "Why good day dear," the woman in it said politely.

            "You wouldn't happen to know where a one-eyed witch is, would you?" Morgan asked.

            "Hmm…a one-eyed witch…oh yes! I know where she is," the painting replied after some thought.

            "Where?" Megan asked.

            "Ok, well when you get to the three way turn up there take a right, and then…"

~*!*~

            "Look, James, a picture of fruit," Kevin pointed out.

            "Oh, yeah, that's cool," James said looking at the painting.

            "Now why would you want a picture of fruit?" Kevin asked no one in particular.

            "Hmm, maybe to hide the kitchens," James answered. They thought about it a moment.

            "Nah."

~*!*~

            "Hey, Alicia, look at this painting," Lori said pointing at a peculiar looking picture. It was a giant portrait of a woman in a wedding gown. The woman had long, blonde hair, and crystal blue eyes.

            "What about it?" Alicia asked.

            "She looks a lot like you," replied Lori. Alicia shrugged.

            "So? She could be anybody," Alicia said unconvinced.

            "You know what else, we're not going in circles anymore," Lori said as she looked around.

            "How do you know that?" Alicia asked.

            "Because, one, we've never seen this painting before," pointing at the painting of the bride, "and, two, there's the one-eyed witch."

            "We found it!" Jennifer cried as they reached the one-eyed witch.

            "Finally," Megan said.

            "Hey guys, we beat you," Lori said. The three girls looked startled.

            "Darn, oh well. Do you know if the guys have been here yet?" Morgan asked.

            "Yes! We're not lost anymore!" Michael called. Joseph and George followed him.

            "Never mind," Morgan said.

            "Wait, Kevin and James still aren't here," Joseph said.

            "Yes we are," James said as they came around the other corner.

            "Does anybody remember how we got here?" Jennifer asked. They all thought a minute.

            "Um, hold on, wait…nope, I have no idea," Lori said. The others shook their heads.

            "Great! We find it, but we'll never be able to again," Megan complained sitting down.

            "Hey, look at the bright side," Jennifer said.

            "What bright side?" Joseph asked.

            "We found a picture of somebody that looks like Alicia," Lori said. She pointed behind her.

            "Oh, my, gosh," Morgan said. Lori turned around. The portrait had swung open.

            "How'd you do that?" asked George. Lori shrugged.

            "Let's go inside," Kevin suggested. The rest agreed and went in.

            The inside was very, very dark. They finally found a switch that looked very much like a Muggle light switch, which lit the torches that lined the walls. It was dusty, and covered in cob webs.

            "It seems like no one's been in here for forever," Joseph said as he took in the room. There were some chairs around a fire place, a small table that had books on it, and as Jennifer looked at the walls she noticed there were doors which must lead to even more places. Just then, however, Alicia checked her watch.

            "It's going to be light's out soon, and if we get caught, we'll get another detention," she said. They agreed, albeit reluctantly, and walked out of the portrait hole. As it shut Morgan realized something.

            "You idiots, we don't know the password."

            "It was something Lori said, because it opened after she finished talking," Megan pointed out.

            "What'd you say Lori?" James asked her. She shrugged.

            "It was something like, we found a picture of a person who looks like Alicia," she said. The portrait swung open again. George closed it.

            "I bet its Alicia," Jennifer said. Once again the portrait opened and once again George closed it.

            "Strange, very strange," Kevin said as they walked back to Gryffindor tower.

            "What?" Michael asked. The others looked at him.

            "Well, for one, isn't it strange that a portrait who looks like Alicia's password is Alicia? And then, isn't it also strange that that painting isn't moving, meaning it's not magical?"

            "That is weird," Lori said.

            "I bet it's just coincidence," Alicia said trying to veer away from the subject. It didn't work.

            "What if that person in the painting is, like, related to Alicia or something?" Jennifer said.

            "How could a painting of my relative be in Hogwarts, I'm Muggle born," Alicia asked getting annoyed.

            "Maybe you're adopted," Lori suggested.

            "Oh please, just drop it," Alicia said. The veering of the subject worked that time, for one because Alicia was getting annoyed (never a good thing) and two because they had gotten to Gryffindor tower and had to go their separate ways.

            "See you guys tomorrow," Megan said as the boys went to their dorms and the girls to theirs.

            Jennifer, Lori, Megan and Morgan all fell asleep as soon as they lay down; Alicia had a little more trouble. She didn't want to admit it, but the others were right. The painting did look a lot like her, and it was very strange that the password happened to be her name, not to mention the fact that the painting didn't move. After thinking for an hour or so, Alicia finally fell into an uneasy sleep. She woke up a few hours later, however, from the reoccurring nightmare she'd been having about all her friends getting mad at each other. Except now it was clearer than ever, and she could remember it vividly. She slowly fell back asleep, and pushed it into the back of her mind. She didn't remember it at all the next morning.

A/n: ok, there it's finished!! BTW, if you don't remember what the dream is about, look back at ch. seven, I think. Ok, now I have to thank all of my reviewers *ahem* drum roll please… Dixiechick; Katie Bell; Questionably Insane; morgaine; Medrelina the Weird (thank you soo much for noticing that!); GIR; ????; nycgal; Nataly Ravenlock; Saree; Scarlett-Dragon (thanks for the suggestions, they gave me something to think about); and last, but definitely not least, megan. Thank you all soooooo much for reviewing, whenever I get a new review saying that my story is great I just have to write more, you guys are wonderful, without you I'd probably only have five chapters…n e way…I'm learning Spanish, not a lot of course, b/c the teacher doesn't have a lot of time to teach, but I can say review por favor!!!! Lol, cya~

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