A/N: You know, when you write these you don't realize how long you make the readers wait. So I'm really, really sorry for the delay- did you know I'm writing four stories at the same time? It's insane. Trapped! (Hogwarts students stuck in a train carriage of the Hogwarts Express) was updated a couple days ago. Truly Whipped (my newest one- Ron/Pansy, pretty funny if I do say so myself) was updated yesterday, not even, and Too Late (future D/G)…eek, I don't want to think about when I last updated that. But anyway, here's your next chapter…and hey, maybe if you're getting bored while waiting for the next chapter you can check out my others.
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"Hermione, we've been here for hours," Ron moaned, hitting his head on the ancient book repeatedly and causing a riot of dust to come out of it. Hermione rolled her eyes and motioned toward the clock. Harry looked up from his book, amused, as Ron looked slightly abashed. "All right, so twenty minutes isn't so bad. But honestly, what are you expecting to find?!?"
"Side effects of that thing," Hermione replied without moving her head from the tiny print. Ron sighed in exasperation and brought his head up from the book; the words blurred together and swam in front of his eyes.
"This is ridiculous! I can't do it!" he declared loudly, resulting in an icy glare from Madam Pince.
"Do you want to help Ginny or not?" Hermione snapped suddenly. Harry raised an eyebrow over his glasses at the gobsmacked look on Ron's face. He narrowed his eyes slightly, but returned to poring over the book.
"That's what I thought," she muttered sighing, leaning back and rubbing her temples wearily.
"Are you sure you don't want to come tomorrow, when we're on a full night's sleep?" Harry asked warily, afraid she'd explode or something.
"Positive. If you don't want to be here, then by all means piss off." This made both Ron and Harry astounded- Hermione never cursed like that, especially in the library which was sort of her holy chapel. They sighed and resigned to the fact that it would be a very long, very musty night of searching.
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"Hi Drucie!" a Slytherin seventh year taunted, waggling her fingers in a mocking tone as she went up the girl dormitory steps. Her friends shrieked with giggles as Draco glared at their backs.
"I hate this," he said in a low tone to Blaise, sitting next to him.
"Too fucking bad. It's not my fault you were too thick to duck when you saw the bloody owl," was the blunt response.
"Well that made me feel better. Breakfast?" Draco said sarcastically. Blaise just laughed and began inspecting her shiny red nail once again.
"Too full from sausages last night." Suddenly, a flash of the Great Hall went before Draco's eyes- the golden yellow walls, the staring faces…the girl exclaiming about her probable love of sausages. He scowled and shook his head. Blaise gave him an annoyingly all-knowing look. "It's coming back, isn't it?" she asked with relish.
"Sod off."
"I knew it!" she crowed triumphantly, putting her nail down at long last. "You're going to remember it all now…can I watch?"
"NO!" Draco roared, snapping. "This is so ridiculous, just-just go away Blaise!" Blaise got up huffily.
"Well fine! See if I offer you any more helpful advice!" Draco snorted at her bouncing backside.
"Helpful advice?!? More like idle death threats, you pansy!" he yelled after her heatedly, only to hear a simpering whine from behind him. Slowly, he turned around and gasped with horror.
"Did you say 'Pansy'?" Pansy Parkinson batted her eyelashes furiously, not seeming to notice Draco's terrified expression.
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Hermione yawned and looked over at her friends: Harry fought to keep his eyelids open while Ron was unabashedly snoring loudly on one of the open books. She scowled and prodded him with her wand. "Get up you lump!" He snorted and flicked open his eyes.
"Whaa…" he began, but met Hermione's annoyed look and closed his mouth. Harry looked up at his friends and shut his book loudly, causing them both to jump.
"I'm tired Hermione," he stated wearily, leaning his elbow on the closed volume in exhaustion. Hermione sighed and closed hers as well. Ron grinned and followed suite gladly.
"This is getting us nowhere," she said sadly. "I'm worn out."
"I second the excellent notion of sleep," Ron cut in, getting up and stretching out as he yawned. Hermione, getting up, looked over her shoulder at the now resting books.
"There has to be something in this library…" she muttered in disbelief, as she ran her hands through her hair and trudged out with Harry and Ron at her side.
There was…but then Draco Malfoy checked it out.
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It was with a very aggravated temper that Draco woke up the next morning. It had taken a good twenty minutes to pry Pansy off of him and then escape quickly and quietly up the stairs. It didn't help that Blaise was having her own little snigger as she watched Draco in his desperation. "Oh I was such a prat," he muttered, swinging his legs over the side of his bed as he thought of his sudden whim the year before to invite Pansy to that daft ball. He rubbed his temples wearily and sighed, leaning against the bedpost in exhaustion. He was never a morning person.
The window, slightly open, ruffled a chilling breeze on his bare legs, causing him to curl up in agony under the duvets. "Christ it's bloody cold!" Shivering, he got up and latched it shut. A black silhouette on the pale yellow horizon made him freeze mid-latch. Draco narrowed his eyes, squinting to try and make it out and nearly had a heart attack when he pinned it in his brain. Another Doomrae.
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"I don't understand, Dumbledore didn't even know, it has to be something very, very bad," Hermione was saying as Harry and Ron, slouched on a Common Room couch in front of her, nodded politely at intervals.
"Yes Hermione, it's a terrible, terrible thing," Ron sympathized, yawning broadly. Hermione rolled her eyes at his obvious lack of interest and instead opted to harass Harry.
"You understand, don't you Harry?" she implored, looking at him desperately. He started, looked at her, and blinked behind his glasses.
"Pardon?"
"Oh honestly!" Hermione huffed, getting up and stalking away. Ron and Harry looked at each other and shrugged before lapsing into tired silence once more.
Hermione fumed as she walked to her window seat in the dorm she shared with the other girls and looked out the window. "Boys," she sighed, not for the first time wishing that she had a female friend she could gripe to. Suddenly, a tar black wing grazed her window as it soared. Hermione shrieked at the abruptness and fell off of her chair with a CLUNK. That wing looked very familiar…
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This is incredibly short, but I need it uploaded. Cheers!