Chapter 3: Three Blind Mice

Breakfast at Hogwarts was normally a big to do. All the children would swarm the tables and soon mounds and mounds of food would appear. Breakfast was Rave's favorite time of the day, and normally she shoved her face and listened to everyone else talk.

Today was no different. Rave kept her ears open for any comments about the weird, new Slytherin girl. Leiko had said her powers were like none other, had she altered all of their minds to believe she was actually a real student?

Her purple eyes widened as she heard one of the Ravenclaw boys commenting on Leiko. Nothing he said made her think he thought her sudden appearance strange. In fact, the things he DID say made the tips of her ears burn and she had to avert her eyes.

Coughing, she picked up her glass of pumpkin juice and tried to calm herself. No, no one had a clue. Thankfully! She'd actually stayed up half the night trying to think of something to say, some kind of story, SOMETHING!

She stopped mid sip when she felt a hand on her shoulder. Turning slowly she looked from the hand to the person, and almost spit the juice out all over the boy. Harry Potter stepped back into a group of people, or, a trio of people, as she noted Ron Weasely and Hermione Granger.

"Hi, um, Ravindra... we were wondering if we could talk to you?"

Harry's hands fidgeted with his robe as he spoke, and he sounded as if he was so curious he was going to explode. Hermione had a superior look on her face that suggested she knew everything Rave was plotting and why. Ron, just peered over Harry's shoulder and waited a response.

Rave pointed at her chest in surprised.

"Me? Are you sure?"

She stopped and then looked at them narrowing her eyes. She was trying her hardest to throw them off the trail.

"You're not going to have moaning Myrtle give me a swirlie for Trelawney's prediction are you?"

Harry actually grinned, and Ron stifled a laugh behind his hand.

"No, we were just curious about something..and well..we think you have the answers."

Rave sighed inwardly. They must have followed her. They had a habit of doing that from what she had heard, and for some reason she got a sneaky suspicion that if they hadn't followed her, they at least walked in on a part of hers and Leiko's conversation that didn't quite make sense.

Harry still fussed with the hems of his robes as he spoke. She wondered why. It suddenly hit her like a board in the back of the head when she realized that Harry was the front man. Ron and Hermione both were slightly behind him as if for protection.

A wicked little voice inside her started cackling, and she suppressed a smile. Rave would have never thought that fear would make her so happy, but now that she was faced with the boy who lived, the same boy who faced down he who would not be named, and realized there was fear in all of them. Obviously not so much in Harry, but the other two looked as if they strained to keep from running away.

"Ok, um, well I'm finished so if you'd like, I need to go to the owlry and check on Mara."

The Trio nodded and stood back as she stood up and dusted crumbs off of her robes. Rave looked up at them oddly as they seemed to be holding their breath.

"Shall we?"

She swept her hand aside and smiled. She was REALLY having fun with this. Harry, Ron and Hermione all lined up beside her as they made their way out. Isis and Leiko both looked up from their table. Both a look of concern as Rave and Isis had debriefed Leiko on some of the things at school so she didn't sound too out of place. It might have been helpful for them if she'd told them of this little trick sooner. Rave rubbed her jaw remembering that she'd done most of the talking.

"So, we were wondering.. um."

Harry seemed at a loss for words, and any other day she'd have thought it disturbing. Today it was kind of cute.

Ron decided to speak up since Harry didn't seem to be finishing his sentence.

"Ravindra we saw you crash in the forbidden forest yesterday, and when we ran to see if you were ok, we saw you standing with the naked woman."

Ron's eyes were gleaming, and he seemed to be pretty enthused about the naked woman bit.

"Yes, and seeing as how she's OBVIOUSLY not a student, we want to know who she is and where she's from."

Hermione's tone was that of no nonsense, and Rave held her hand back from slapping the look off of her face.

"I don't know what you're talking about. Leiko's a Slytherin and has been here the whole time. You three are just too caught up in yourselves and adventures to know any better."

Her smile was a smug one, as she placed her hands in her robe pockets and walked a bit ahead of them.

The dark haired boy glared at Hermione over his glasses, and then exhaled as if he was about to drop the proverbial bomb on her.

"Her spell, or whatever it is didn't work. We looked into it this morning after asking others about it and realized that because we were in the vicinity, it didn't work."

As reluctant as his words were, he still sounded as if he were a cat with a mouse dangling from his teeth.

Rave stopped, dropped her head into her hand and sighed.

"If I told you, you wouldn't believe me..."