As much as I love the books, I regret to say that all of Harry Potter belongs to J K Rowling. This includes all of the characters except for Ryua (who's mine) most of the places, and an awful lot of the spells. Oh, and if you see something that looks like one of your stories, I'm really, really sorry. I don't mean to plagiarize. I've just read a lot of really cool fanfics, and they melt into my brain, but I'll try not to use any of it.

Back to School

Ryua was ecstatic. School was starting up tomorrow, and she and Draco were already being loaded up onto the train. Even though she was stuck with the wonder dummies Crabbe and Goyle laughing at every dumb joke Draco made, the ride back was wonderful. School, of course, was just the same as ever, although Slytherin was preparing for their match against Ravenclaw. This of course had nothing to do with Ryua yet, but it got the Slytherin prefects out of the common room (anyone with enough ambition and skill to be a prefect was on the team) so she could study properly.

And then one day, her brother came down and pulled Magical Drafts and Potions right out of her hands. "Guess what?" he said with a nasty grin.

Ryua sighed and replied, "You've decided to actually study? You'll have to get your own book, I'm using mine."

"No, you nitwit," Draco replied scathingly, "That oaf Hagrid? He's got himself a dragon."

Ryua stared back, trying to decide if he was trying to pull a really bad joke. "You can't be serious. A dragon? Where would he get it? And for that matter, what were you doing at the gamekeeper's hut anyways?"

"I followed Potty and The Weasel after Herbology. They were trying to sneak off, and what do you know? There was a dragon egg hatching on the table." Draco looked very smug. "They might have seen me, but I was gone before they could do anything about it. And they can't go to anyone about it, I mean, it's an illegal dragon."

Unfortunately, Ryua had an idea of where this was going. "You're going to try and get them in trouble aren't you? You know, you could just leave well enough alone. It'll be too big to hide soon, or they'll get rid of it somehow."

"Trying to defend the scum of the earth, now are we? Why do you care?" It was pointless to continue. Even in a less dangerous topic, Draco was an impossible conversationalist. Ryua pointedly took her book back and resumed reading.

A week or so later, Ryua felt a peculiar sense of restlessness. She figured it had to be Draco getting up to do something, as she could sometimes feel his actions and emotions. She slipped out of bed and pulled her declawed lethifold out of the bottom of her trunk. Sure enough, five minutes later, Ryua cloaked in a black shadow saw her brother sneaking out of the common room. Following him silently they winded up towards the astrology tower. Unfortunately for Draco, he was not wearing any camouflage, and walked right into Professor McGonnagal. "Detention! And twenty points from Slytherin..." her clear stern voice rang out, drowning out Draco's protests. And off they went.

Ryua was ready to head back to the dungeons when she caught movement down a corridor. She ducked quickly into the shadow behind a suit of armor, just in time to avoid Filch, who looked around like he had heard something. Ryua held her breath, but just as he was about to shine his lantern, thereby making Ryua stand out as a black shadow, there were footsteps on the stairs. Sure enough, Potter and Granger came down the stairs (Now how did they get up there without me noticing?) "Well, well, well, we are in trouble." came his oily voice.

After he marched them off, Ryua walked up the tower. Sure enough, at the top of the stairs, there lay a pool of silvery cloth. A real invisibility cloak, harder to detect than her lethifold, and Draco knew nothing about it... no. She shouldn't keep it. Although unwittingly, Potter had saved her from detention, and the cloak looked well worn. It must have come from his parents, likely the only memento he had. Ryua couldn't resist putting it on for the trip down to the dungeons, however.

Three days later, Ryua made a side detour to the kitchens on her lunch hour. She pulled a house elf over, and told it to deliver the folded cloak to Harry Potter's bed in the Gryffindor dorms. It had taken her this long to find enough private time to write a simple note, attach it to the cloak, and get it out of the common room without anyone noticing it. She hoped the words "Just in case" wouldn't be enough to identify her script. That would just be too embarrassing.