Liana looked up. Her emerald green eyes were shining with delight. This "incredible Mr. Wood" looked very kind to her. He seemed as though he was the perfect human, standing so tall and graceful.

From the Gryffindor table, a boy with red hair yelled out, "Wrong house, Ol!"

Dumbledore's eyes were twinkling as he went on. "Mr. Oliver Wood, a graduate of Hogwarts two years past, was not a Hufflepuff. You are correct, Mr. Weasley. However, his loyalty to Hogwarts in these dark times and his willingness to teach you children has touched me. He will be head of the Hufflepuff house."

Oliver Wood stood up then. "If I may, Headmaster?"

"Of course, Oliver."

"I'd just like to say that I'm happy to be here teaching flying lessons. Madame Hooch will definitely be missed by us all, of course. I would also like to say that I will not follow her example and attempt to drink ten bottles of vodka straight just for a bet. I realize that doing so is dangerous and life-threatening."

He paused a moment and continued. "I'd also like to thank Professor Dumbledore for allowing me to teach flying to everyone, even with my injury." He indicated his right eye, which was grey and sightless in comparison to the rich warmth of his brown left eye. "I will work as hard as I can to teach you all well. Thank you."

"Well," said Dumbledore. "Off to bed with all of you. For a special treat, I've had the sla--houselves set a lemon drop on each of your pillows. Enjoy!"

They all went to bed then and slept happily, each dreaming of different happy things...except for one.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*DREAM ACTION!!!!!!!*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The room was dark and cold and completely made of stone. The dreary atmosphere that our dreamer saw contained two others who seemed to be ignoring him.

"Hello, darling," a voice hissed. "Where are you, you wicked traitor?"

"I'm not a traitor," a girl's voice replied. There was a hint of a whimper in her voice. "I was never on your side."

Our dreamer was shocked for a moment when light flooded the room. The hissing man was not a man at all--or at least, he didn't look like one. He had a scaly face without a nose. The girl looked blurry...she was blonde, and that was all that our dreamer could discern about her.

Suddenly, a sound like a gunshot ricocheted through the room. In one corner, there were two figures surrounded by smoke. One was on their knees...

*~*~*~*~*~*~*END DREAM ACTION!!!!!!!*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Rene woke up in his bed. His long hair was draped in clumps around his sweating face and he was breathing very hard. "What was that?" he whispered quietly.

He stood shakily and whistled quietly for Apollinaire, who landed on his shoulder, careful not to gouge his shoulder. While he knew he looked absolutely ridiculous in his daisy boxers, but he thought that perhaps those would help him sleep. They WERE his lucky boxers, after all. He grabbed them from the bottom of his underwear drawer, where no one would notice them. Praying that none of his roommates would wake up, he quickly switched from his black silk boxers to the cotton daisy ones.

Feeling much more comfortable, Rene sighed. "You can go, Linners," he told his falcon. "I'll be all right, and your talons are NOT comfortable when I don't have a shirt on."

Linners flew over to his perch and fell asleep. Rene looked at him jealously. All of a sudden, Dexter McSmart-Smart, the guy who slept next to Rene, shifted as though he might wake up. Rene jumped. No one must see him, especially when he was wearing nothing but boxers with daisies on them!

Rene dashed into the closet, but he needn't have bothered. Dexter just turned over in his sleep and muttered something about Pythagorean triangles in bikinis.

In the closet, Rene noticed how dark it was. He took out his wand, a 12 1/2 inch cherrywood wand with the core of a salamander heartstring, and whispered, almost inaudibly, "Lumos." There was just enough light to see that there was nothing in the closet. He wondered why briefly until he noticed that he was wrong.

There was a key. Rene picked it up. It was an old key, but it was shiny...reeeaaaallllyyy shiny. Rene was fond of shiny things. It was also sharp, as far as old keys that are randomly left in closets go. Rene was fond of sharp things. The wall was bare. Rene wasn't fond of bare things.

He picked up the key and began to carve into the wall of the closet, his dark eyes gleaming in an unnatural sort of way........

In the morning, Dexter McSmart-Smart and his friends, Flanny MacFlanflan and Dirk Dirkson woke up to find that freaky kid with the girly hair gone. They looked everywhere--under the beds, in all the closets, on top of the beds. That freaky kid just disappeared.

However, when Flanny opened his closet to grab a school uniform. There wasn't anything in there except for a key. And some scratches on the far wall. They were hard to read from so far away. Flanny walked into the closet, only to have the door shut on him. He didn't notice and just lit the closet up with his wand so that he could read the scratches. They said:

"The darkness surrounds me

It's eating at me

Help!

Help!

Save me! Please!

It's Rene! Save Rene!

Where am I?

The night-worm is gnawing on my foot

My hand is gone

How am I writing this?

Where did the key go?

AUGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!"

"That's strange," said Flanny. He turned to leave the closet and decided to wear the uniform he wore yesterday. Linking arms with Dexter and Dirk, they left the room.

"So, did you find anything interesting in your closet?" asked Dirk.

"No," replied Flanny. "Just some strange poetry that was carved in the back of it. I never noticed that before. I wonder where that freaky kid with the falcon went."

Dexter shrugged, and they all forgot about it upon smelling the yummy, yummy smells of breakfast.

A/N: So, what'd you think? Rene's disappeared...it's getting darker now. The rating will be PG-13 in upcoming chapters now, so beware! And as always, review or feel the wrath! Have a nice day!

Della Diaz and Bree Jones