Ron's Worst Nightmare
A/N: THANX TO chimerical: Yes, Billy doll was deffinitely freaking out! *grin* And I'll try and have a good first day just for you, doll! Hana-chan: AAGH!! I didn't even think of clothes! JerseyPike: Does Harry have a hand? Rose: This is the reason for my e-mail lateness! Razberry: Ah, fellow freshman! Yay, feel the love! J@nine: I'll! Make! Sure! They! Hurry!!! *wink* Lulu-chan: Ooh!! Interesting! *blush* Eriol: *giggles* Here you are, love! Thief: I hope it won't be that bad... *shudders*
Chapter Thirteen: Shite Indeed, Billy Boy, Shite Indeed
Ron was aware of something cold and slimy pressing against his neck. Without opening his eyes he reached up and plucked it from his skin, tossing it as hard as he could away from him where the object landed with a wet splash. Then he cracked open one eye and hissed with pain as spears of white lightning crackled agonizingly over his nerves. His feet were completely numb, having lost both his socks in the process of getting knocked out, beaten, dragged around, cursed, yelled at, and checked for all sorts of protection charms and disarming them forcefully. Besides the unfortune of losing his poor lost socks, were that his nose and face were bloodied and scratched, hair tousled and matted with sweat and grime, arms blotched white and red between the ropes that bound him much too tightly. And as he focused on a small tin plate next to him, he realized he had just thrown his dinner into what he guessed to be his waste hole.
"Lovely," he murmured, trying to raise himself to his knees, and failing for what he bemusedly counted as the fiftieth time he'd tried since getting dumped in here by two brutal Death Eaters. As to where exactly 'here' was, he didn't have a clue. You-Know-Who's lair? Azkaban? Some VERY kinky sex shop he had sleepwalked into?
There was a loud screeching creak that set his teeth on edge as the door to his cell was opened and a cloaked figure slipped inside, making not one noise as it glided over to him. Half expecting a Dementor, Ron curled up as best he could. But the cold never touched him and the hopeless feeling stayed the same as it had since he had woken the first time covered in blood hours ago.
"Young Weasly. I am sure you are finding everything most comfortable with your stay here?"
Ron rocked back and rolled over on his side, peering up groggily into the half light. The person's face was hidden in shadow, but Ron recognized the sharply pointed chin and perfect blonde goatee.
"Malfoy," he hissed with a vile passion, struggling all the more to sit up. But Lucius merely smiled coldly and planted a Dragon hyde boot firmly on Ron's chest, pinning him to the slimy ground. "Stay still, young one," he purred greasily, his eyes flashing. Ron pulled a face and grimaced as Lucius dug the sharp heel of his boot into the freckled and bruised skin. The boy bit his lip, refusing to make a sound and give this man what he wanted. He refused to let Lucius control him.
But he could not hold back a yelp of pain when Lucius leaned over and slapped him viciously across the face, snapping his head to the side and splitting the already shredded lips. Stinging tears burned trails down his cheeks, streaking the dirt covering his face. Then Ron gasped as Lucius squatted down next to him, twining his long delicate looking fingers with the grip of iron into his wiry red hair and yanking his head back, neck arching painfully and exposing the white throat.
Lucius traced a finger over Ron's bobbing Adam's apple and toyed with the ripped collar of the second hand pajama top. His mouth twisted into a malicious sneer and he jerked the boy's face up and dragged it to a stop only inches from his own fine features of coldness and cruelty. He then took the boy's chin and looked over the freckled face searchingly. "To think he cares so much for you. A simple wizard ranking below dirt...."
Narrowing his liquid brown eyes defiantly, Ron snarled and spat into Lucius' face, tearing himself forcefully from the man's grip and wriggling away as best he could. Lucius yelled and wiped the spittle from his eyes, brandishing his wand and bellowing, "Crucio!"
Ron's screams echoed up through the Malfoy dungeons, chilling the air.
~*~
"Your cloak, Potter," whispered Draco urgently, reaching out to take the silver garment Harry hesitantly held out for him. Hermione kept a sharp watch on the opposite tunnel of the underground passageway. Ginny was quietly hiding the brooms in some brush above ground before climbing back down the ladder to join her friends in the huge underground cavern Draco had shown them as their only way into the house.
After the blood had done its job, the three Gryffindors had stared with open awe at the complicated turrets and spires, endless webs of rooftops and chimneys of the legendary Malfoy Manor. Then Draco proceeded to lead them through an invisible maze of traps to get them here, to what Harry knew had to be something like a sewage pipe, even though Draco insisted it was nothing of the sort.
"It's just an underground passage that got flooded. Lucius," he spat the name bitterly, making Ginny jump, "never got around to fixing it. But it does amount to a nice secret way for his Death Eaters to meet up at our house without getting the villagers all riled up."
So there they went, splashing unhappily through the muck reaching to their thighs, Ginny whimpering on about the chunks of unknown in the water while Hermione tried to think of a nice levitating charm they could all use. In front, Draco and Harry walked side by side, silent. Their wands illuminated both the ceiling and the surface of the sickly green water. Once Harry thought he saw the flashing of eyes in the murky depths.
"Oh," Hermione fretted, finally giving up on the charm, "I forgot to feed Crookshanks!"
Harry grimaced. "I'm sure he'll manage, Hermione."
"Yes," she conceded heavily, "But he so does like his tuna on Thursdays-"
Draco suddenly whipped out his hand across Harry's chest, stopping the boy up short. Harry started to protest as Hermione walked right into him, but as he looked out before them, he saw a gaping cavity spanning the whole width of the tunnel and blocking their way. He stared down with amazement, noticing that the water had stopped as if against a wall of glass until it started again on the far end of the pit just the same way.
"I had almost forgotten about this," said Draco. He glanced at Hermione, who had inched forward to stand next to him, her eyes wide. Ginny refused to come a step closer, not trusting the slippery state of the rock beneath the water on such an edge. Harry knelt down and put his hand into the water, spearing it through the wall of water and watching with some amusement how his hand popped out on the other side into air. Draco rolled his eyes and looked around as if for an idea. But it was Hermione who spoke.
"I wish we hadn't of left the brooms behind. But it was probably for the best in the long run." Her brow furrowed. "I just know there's a simple charm! I know there's Wingardium Leviosa, but I'm hesitant about using it here. Aren't there any alarms set up for detecting magic use?"
"Down here? I doubt it. My father is the only one allowed to set them up and he wouldn't set foot down here if someone offered him all of England. So I think it'll be safe until we reach the mote. When we get there we'll have to swim up to the surface. Past Nettles as we go."
Hermione looked baffled, "Nettles under water?"
"No, not the plant. The sea serpent, Nettles." Draco gave her a small, empty smile. "I raised him from the size of a tadpole and when he got big enough, Lucius put him in the mote to guard. I'm pretty sure he'll let me through, but it might help if we had something to give him. That's the one loophole of having an especially friendly sea serpent guarding your mote, they tend to be suseptible to bribery with any type of food."
Ginny tapped her lips, thinking, then reached inside the pocket of her bathrobe and lifted out several lumps of cookie that Hermione had made for dessert after dinner that night. She had stuffed them in her pocket while they ate, not daring to eat any more after her first one. Afterwards she must've just forgotten to take them back out. The brunette fumed, "You said they were good!"
The redhead shrugged, "You seemed so excited to make them for us. I just couldn't let it down soft enough that they taste like tar."
Hermione started to growl something lethal, but Harry stopped her. "Will this be enough, Malfoy?"
Draco held out his cupped hands and Ginny emptied the cookies into them. He nodded, storing them in his own pocket, but not before handing one to each of them in turn. "Just throw these into the water to him. We'll only be able to pass one at a time. Now, the spell-"
Hermione nodded stiffly, being the best at charms, and brandished her wand, flicking it appropriately, "Wingardium Leviosa!"
Harry felt himself become weightless. At first he just spun upside-down, but then managed to start dog paddling through the air over the gaping abyss. Ginny, Draco, and finally Hermione herself followed. As they alighted on the other side, Hermione (while trying desperately to keep her nighty from rising, shouted, "Finite incantatum!" And Ginny, who had not quite touched the ground yet, squealed and fell onto her backside. Harry helped her up, trying not to laugh as the soon to be sixth year glared daggers at an innocently whistling Hermione.
"We best get going," Draco called back to them, already about a hundred yards ahead and still walking. The others ran to catch up, all lighting their wands and filling the long cavern with a dim, yellow light.
~*~
Chest rising and falling rapidly, eyelids fluttering with the aftermath of such harrowing torture, Ron flinched when Lucius spoke after the few minutes he had enjoyed watching the boy writhe in pain. "I wouldn't try and be so brave again, boy. Or you may be more foolish than I had always suspected." There was a slight scuffing as he made his way down to Ron's side, reaching out to flick a piece of scum off of the pale cheek. Then Lucius sat back on his heels and just watched with an expressionless face as Ron started to calm down and gather his wits about him.
When finally the boy had managed to pull himself up into a sitting position, Lucius had conjured up a goblet and a wet cloth. Ron regarded him warily, still not quite able to focus completely with both of his fading brown eyes. He couldn't stop a frightened gasp as he felt a hand slide beneath his chin and tip his face up, nor a small moan as the wet cloth was touched gently to a cut on his forehead.
Lucius Malfoy tilted his head to the side, a smile quirking the tips of his mouth when Ron aloud his wild eyes to slip shut, enjoying the feel of the cloth cleaning away at his cuts and the dirt on his face. But when those strangely gentle hands to went to remove his shirt, the boy's eyes flew open and he fell back, pushing away. The man arched an eyebrow. "I'm not going to strip you, boy. Just get that disgusting piece of cloth off you. We can't have you getting all infected now, can we?" Slowly he pulled Ron back to him, this time managing to slip the soiled shirt up over the scared face, revealing shockingly white skin beneath, dotted more with the trademark freckles of his bloodline.
This time when the cloth (now magically warmed and cleaned again) touched his skin, Ron shivered with pleasure and allowed Lucius to lean him back into his chest, drawing the cloth over the grimy flesh slowly and wiping it somewhat cleaner than before. Though when he drew it below the boy's naval, Ron stiffened considerably. But that melted away with another moan from the warmth of the cloth.
From the goblet of water, Ron drank almost greedily, draining it in seconds. It was after his second goblet that Lucius finally stood up, leaving the magically refilling goblet in the cell, and cast the boy one last cold smile.
Ron sat shivering in the middle of the cell, pulling the button up top of his pajamas tightly around his stiff fingers. He didn't look at the man gazing at him so piercingly. He didn't want to admit - to realize what had just happened. It could not have just been that he was in Lucius Malfoy's arms being bathed by the evil tyrant he had grown up hating with a deep passion.
"Go away," he whispered. Lucius did not change expression, just lightly tapped a cheery rythm on the bars down the row of cells on his way out.
~*~
"Alright, be careful now. Make sure you have a good grip on these bars, they're old and slimy." Draco looked up fitfully as Hermione started ascending up the old metal ladder which led to the bright green hole at the bottom of the mote and above their heads. Hermione cast them a reassuring smile and beside Draco, Harry thought it not the time to point out how much the Slytherin looked like a plucky mother sending her only daughter off to kindergarten for the first day.
When Hermione reached the top of the ladder and the port hole, she gasped and called down, "The water's just hanging over it!" Then they all saw a shadow pass over the hole and Hermione nearly fell with a cry of surprise.
"Don't worry," Draco yelled up to her, "It's only Nettles! Push the cookie through and wait. When you here him start to purr-"
"Purr!?"
"Yes, when he starts to purr, you know it's good to go through." Draco started wringing his wrists as Hermione did as she was told, pushing her hand through the suspended wall of water into the full murk of the mote. She drew it back sharply and then a low, melodious rumbling filled the cavern, echoing from through the hole in the mote. Without another second to wait, Hermione dove through with a slight splash, flailing upwards. Next Ginny started up the ladder, faster than Hermione and waited until Draco gave her the go ahead. When she was through, Harry began to climb. As he reached the window like pane of water he stared out in amazement. It was like looking through the window of a submarine out into the ocean deep. Except that the window was water. He nearly fell as he saw a huge head like that of a dinosaur pass the window, looking at him with one huge yellow eye. He heard Draco call from below to hurry and thrust his cookie through into the water, letting it float free. With a huge snap, Nettles had devoured the cookie and began purring like a gigantic scaly cat with flippers. Harry shot through and made his way, fighting, to the surface.
After Draco had climbed onto the shore to join the three soaking Gryffindors, all looking quite out of breath, he looked down into the water to see Nettles waiting expectantly by the mote bed for any more cookies. Grabbing the last remaining crumbs from his pocket, he tossed them into the water and whistled. Nettle heard him and the giant jaws closed around the crumbs, swallowing them down into the void of his stomach which Harry guessed could've held a car.
"Alright, the easy part's done. Let's get dried up and it'll be best if we just climb up the walls." He waved his wand, mumbling something, and four ropes appeared out of nowhere. With another flick of the wand, the ends of the ropes had sped up the side of the nearest tower, hitching to the highest window. Ginny performed quick drying spells and each of them grabbed their own rope. They all looked expectantly at Draco and the Slytherin took a deep breath and nodded.
Then they began to climb.
A/N: Next chappie we will get back to Bill. Dunno how long this story will continue to go on. Few more chapters perhaps, at least. ^_^ Au revoir, lovies!
~*Villain*~
A/N: THANX TO chimerical: Yes, Billy doll was deffinitely freaking out! *grin* And I'll try and have a good first day just for you, doll! Hana-chan: AAGH!! I didn't even think of clothes! JerseyPike: Does Harry have a hand? Rose: This is the reason for my e-mail lateness! Razberry: Ah, fellow freshman! Yay, feel the love! J@nine: I'll! Make! Sure! They! Hurry!!! *wink* Lulu-chan: Ooh!! Interesting! *blush* Eriol: *giggles* Here you are, love! Thief: I hope it won't be that bad... *shudders*
Chapter Thirteen: Shite Indeed, Billy Boy, Shite Indeed
Ron was aware of something cold and slimy pressing against his neck. Without opening his eyes he reached up and plucked it from his skin, tossing it as hard as he could away from him where the object landed with a wet splash. Then he cracked open one eye and hissed with pain as spears of white lightning crackled agonizingly over his nerves. His feet were completely numb, having lost both his socks in the process of getting knocked out, beaten, dragged around, cursed, yelled at, and checked for all sorts of protection charms and disarming them forcefully. Besides the unfortune of losing his poor lost socks, were that his nose and face were bloodied and scratched, hair tousled and matted with sweat and grime, arms blotched white and red between the ropes that bound him much too tightly. And as he focused on a small tin plate next to him, he realized he had just thrown his dinner into what he guessed to be his waste hole.
"Lovely," he murmured, trying to raise himself to his knees, and failing for what he bemusedly counted as the fiftieth time he'd tried since getting dumped in here by two brutal Death Eaters. As to where exactly 'here' was, he didn't have a clue. You-Know-Who's lair? Azkaban? Some VERY kinky sex shop he had sleepwalked into?
There was a loud screeching creak that set his teeth on edge as the door to his cell was opened and a cloaked figure slipped inside, making not one noise as it glided over to him. Half expecting a Dementor, Ron curled up as best he could. But the cold never touched him and the hopeless feeling stayed the same as it had since he had woken the first time covered in blood hours ago.
"Young Weasly. I am sure you are finding everything most comfortable with your stay here?"
Ron rocked back and rolled over on his side, peering up groggily into the half light. The person's face was hidden in shadow, but Ron recognized the sharply pointed chin and perfect blonde goatee.
"Malfoy," he hissed with a vile passion, struggling all the more to sit up. But Lucius merely smiled coldly and planted a Dragon hyde boot firmly on Ron's chest, pinning him to the slimy ground. "Stay still, young one," he purred greasily, his eyes flashing. Ron pulled a face and grimaced as Lucius dug the sharp heel of his boot into the freckled and bruised skin. The boy bit his lip, refusing to make a sound and give this man what he wanted. He refused to let Lucius control him.
But he could not hold back a yelp of pain when Lucius leaned over and slapped him viciously across the face, snapping his head to the side and splitting the already shredded lips. Stinging tears burned trails down his cheeks, streaking the dirt covering his face. Then Ron gasped as Lucius squatted down next to him, twining his long delicate looking fingers with the grip of iron into his wiry red hair and yanking his head back, neck arching painfully and exposing the white throat.
Lucius traced a finger over Ron's bobbing Adam's apple and toyed with the ripped collar of the second hand pajama top. His mouth twisted into a malicious sneer and he jerked the boy's face up and dragged it to a stop only inches from his own fine features of coldness and cruelty. He then took the boy's chin and looked over the freckled face searchingly. "To think he cares so much for you. A simple wizard ranking below dirt...."
Narrowing his liquid brown eyes defiantly, Ron snarled and spat into Lucius' face, tearing himself forcefully from the man's grip and wriggling away as best he could. Lucius yelled and wiped the spittle from his eyes, brandishing his wand and bellowing, "Crucio!"
Ron's screams echoed up through the Malfoy dungeons, chilling the air.
~*~
"Your cloak, Potter," whispered Draco urgently, reaching out to take the silver garment Harry hesitantly held out for him. Hermione kept a sharp watch on the opposite tunnel of the underground passageway. Ginny was quietly hiding the brooms in some brush above ground before climbing back down the ladder to join her friends in the huge underground cavern Draco had shown them as their only way into the house.
After the blood had done its job, the three Gryffindors had stared with open awe at the complicated turrets and spires, endless webs of rooftops and chimneys of the legendary Malfoy Manor. Then Draco proceeded to lead them through an invisible maze of traps to get them here, to what Harry knew had to be something like a sewage pipe, even though Draco insisted it was nothing of the sort.
"It's just an underground passage that got flooded. Lucius," he spat the name bitterly, making Ginny jump, "never got around to fixing it. But it does amount to a nice secret way for his Death Eaters to meet up at our house without getting the villagers all riled up."
So there they went, splashing unhappily through the muck reaching to their thighs, Ginny whimpering on about the chunks of unknown in the water while Hermione tried to think of a nice levitating charm they could all use. In front, Draco and Harry walked side by side, silent. Their wands illuminated both the ceiling and the surface of the sickly green water. Once Harry thought he saw the flashing of eyes in the murky depths.
"Oh," Hermione fretted, finally giving up on the charm, "I forgot to feed Crookshanks!"
Harry grimaced. "I'm sure he'll manage, Hermione."
"Yes," she conceded heavily, "But he so does like his tuna on Thursdays-"
Draco suddenly whipped out his hand across Harry's chest, stopping the boy up short. Harry started to protest as Hermione walked right into him, but as he looked out before them, he saw a gaping cavity spanning the whole width of the tunnel and blocking their way. He stared down with amazement, noticing that the water had stopped as if against a wall of glass until it started again on the far end of the pit just the same way.
"I had almost forgotten about this," said Draco. He glanced at Hermione, who had inched forward to stand next to him, her eyes wide. Ginny refused to come a step closer, not trusting the slippery state of the rock beneath the water on such an edge. Harry knelt down and put his hand into the water, spearing it through the wall of water and watching with some amusement how his hand popped out on the other side into air. Draco rolled his eyes and looked around as if for an idea. But it was Hermione who spoke.
"I wish we hadn't of left the brooms behind. But it was probably for the best in the long run." Her brow furrowed. "I just know there's a simple charm! I know there's Wingardium Leviosa, but I'm hesitant about using it here. Aren't there any alarms set up for detecting magic use?"
"Down here? I doubt it. My father is the only one allowed to set them up and he wouldn't set foot down here if someone offered him all of England. So I think it'll be safe until we reach the mote. When we get there we'll have to swim up to the surface. Past Nettles as we go."
Hermione looked baffled, "Nettles under water?"
"No, not the plant. The sea serpent, Nettles." Draco gave her a small, empty smile. "I raised him from the size of a tadpole and when he got big enough, Lucius put him in the mote to guard. I'm pretty sure he'll let me through, but it might help if we had something to give him. That's the one loophole of having an especially friendly sea serpent guarding your mote, they tend to be suseptible to bribery with any type of food."
Ginny tapped her lips, thinking, then reached inside the pocket of her bathrobe and lifted out several lumps of cookie that Hermione had made for dessert after dinner that night. She had stuffed them in her pocket while they ate, not daring to eat any more after her first one. Afterwards she must've just forgotten to take them back out. The brunette fumed, "You said they were good!"
The redhead shrugged, "You seemed so excited to make them for us. I just couldn't let it down soft enough that they taste like tar."
Hermione started to growl something lethal, but Harry stopped her. "Will this be enough, Malfoy?"
Draco held out his cupped hands and Ginny emptied the cookies into them. He nodded, storing them in his own pocket, but not before handing one to each of them in turn. "Just throw these into the water to him. We'll only be able to pass one at a time. Now, the spell-"
Hermione nodded stiffly, being the best at charms, and brandished her wand, flicking it appropriately, "Wingardium Leviosa!"
Harry felt himself become weightless. At first he just spun upside-down, but then managed to start dog paddling through the air over the gaping abyss. Ginny, Draco, and finally Hermione herself followed. As they alighted on the other side, Hermione (while trying desperately to keep her nighty from rising, shouted, "Finite incantatum!" And Ginny, who had not quite touched the ground yet, squealed and fell onto her backside. Harry helped her up, trying not to laugh as the soon to be sixth year glared daggers at an innocently whistling Hermione.
"We best get going," Draco called back to them, already about a hundred yards ahead and still walking. The others ran to catch up, all lighting their wands and filling the long cavern with a dim, yellow light.
~*~
Chest rising and falling rapidly, eyelids fluttering with the aftermath of such harrowing torture, Ron flinched when Lucius spoke after the few minutes he had enjoyed watching the boy writhe in pain. "I wouldn't try and be so brave again, boy. Or you may be more foolish than I had always suspected." There was a slight scuffing as he made his way down to Ron's side, reaching out to flick a piece of scum off of the pale cheek. Then Lucius sat back on his heels and just watched with an expressionless face as Ron started to calm down and gather his wits about him.
When finally the boy had managed to pull himself up into a sitting position, Lucius had conjured up a goblet and a wet cloth. Ron regarded him warily, still not quite able to focus completely with both of his fading brown eyes. He couldn't stop a frightened gasp as he felt a hand slide beneath his chin and tip his face up, nor a small moan as the wet cloth was touched gently to a cut on his forehead.
Lucius Malfoy tilted his head to the side, a smile quirking the tips of his mouth when Ron aloud his wild eyes to slip shut, enjoying the feel of the cloth cleaning away at his cuts and the dirt on his face. But when those strangely gentle hands to went to remove his shirt, the boy's eyes flew open and he fell back, pushing away. The man arched an eyebrow. "I'm not going to strip you, boy. Just get that disgusting piece of cloth off you. We can't have you getting all infected now, can we?" Slowly he pulled Ron back to him, this time managing to slip the soiled shirt up over the scared face, revealing shockingly white skin beneath, dotted more with the trademark freckles of his bloodline.
This time when the cloth (now magically warmed and cleaned again) touched his skin, Ron shivered with pleasure and allowed Lucius to lean him back into his chest, drawing the cloth over the grimy flesh slowly and wiping it somewhat cleaner than before. Though when he drew it below the boy's naval, Ron stiffened considerably. But that melted away with another moan from the warmth of the cloth.
From the goblet of water, Ron drank almost greedily, draining it in seconds. It was after his second goblet that Lucius finally stood up, leaving the magically refilling goblet in the cell, and cast the boy one last cold smile.
Ron sat shivering in the middle of the cell, pulling the button up top of his pajamas tightly around his stiff fingers. He didn't look at the man gazing at him so piercingly. He didn't want to admit - to realize what had just happened. It could not have just been that he was in Lucius Malfoy's arms being bathed by the evil tyrant he had grown up hating with a deep passion.
"Go away," he whispered. Lucius did not change expression, just lightly tapped a cheery rythm on the bars down the row of cells on his way out.
~*~
"Alright, be careful now. Make sure you have a good grip on these bars, they're old and slimy." Draco looked up fitfully as Hermione started ascending up the old metal ladder which led to the bright green hole at the bottom of the mote and above their heads. Hermione cast them a reassuring smile and beside Draco, Harry thought it not the time to point out how much the Slytherin looked like a plucky mother sending her only daughter off to kindergarten for the first day.
When Hermione reached the top of the ladder and the port hole, she gasped and called down, "The water's just hanging over it!" Then they all saw a shadow pass over the hole and Hermione nearly fell with a cry of surprise.
"Don't worry," Draco yelled up to her, "It's only Nettles! Push the cookie through and wait. When you here him start to purr-"
"Purr!?"
"Yes, when he starts to purr, you know it's good to go through." Draco started wringing his wrists as Hermione did as she was told, pushing her hand through the suspended wall of water into the full murk of the mote. She drew it back sharply and then a low, melodious rumbling filled the cavern, echoing from through the hole in the mote. Without another second to wait, Hermione dove through with a slight splash, flailing upwards. Next Ginny started up the ladder, faster than Hermione and waited until Draco gave her the go ahead. When she was through, Harry began to climb. As he reached the window like pane of water he stared out in amazement. It was like looking through the window of a submarine out into the ocean deep. Except that the window was water. He nearly fell as he saw a huge head like that of a dinosaur pass the window, looking at him with one huge yellow eye. He heard Draco call from below to hurry and thrust his cookie through into the water, letting it float free. With a huge snap, Nettles had devoured the cookie and began purring like a gigantic scaly cat with flippers. Harry shot through and made his way, fighting, to the surface.
After Draco had climbed onto the shore to join the three soaking Gryffindors, all looking quite out of breath, he looked down into the water to see Nettles waiting expectantly by the mote bed for any more cookies. Grabbing the last remaining crumbs from his pocket, he tossed them into the water and whistled. Nettle heard him and the giant jaws closed around the crumbs, swallowing them down into the void of his stomach which Harry guessed could've held a car.
"Alright, the easy part's done. Let's get dried up and it'll be best if we just climb up the walls." He waved his wand, mumbling something, and four ropes appeared out of nowhere. With another flick of the wand, the ends of the ropes had sped up the side of the nearest tower, hitching to the highest window. Ginny performed quick drying spells and each of them grabbed their own rope. They all looked expectantly at Draco and the Slytherin took a deep breath and nodded.
Then they began to climb.
A/N: Next chappie we will get back to Bill. Dunno how long this story will continue to go on. Few more chapters perhaps, at least. ^_^ Au revoir, lovies!
~*Villain*~