Hiding Places
Neville realized he was getting tired of running into invisible people, his shoulder was throbbing with where he had hit the previous two and a knuckle was bleeding from accidentally clipping something.
"Accio Cloak!" Neville shouted, extending his hand.
Neville felt something fill his outstretched hand, something thin and almost flimsy, but definitely invisible. A man in underpants and holding a wand appeared before him, a shocked expression upon his face. Neville almost laughed at the sight, but there was no time.
"Stupefy!" Neville yelled. The other man was slow, still confused as to what happened to his cloak. The blast of light struck him square in the chest, he grunted and toppled to the floor, unfortunately he fell toward the staircase and rolled down it in a heavy thumping of an unconscious body striking marble stairs kind of way.
Neville groaned and quickly got to his feet. He heard shouting and looked back to see the Bodiless Man running down the corridor toward him, his face contorted with rage and a wand pointed at him. A wave of screeching light flashed by, sending an icy chill down Neville's exposed skin. Neville turned and ran.
He nearly tripped over the sprawled half naked man as he plunged down the stairs, leaping over the unconscious figure and plunging down the stairs again. Behind him Neville heard a curse and the sound of falling. He spared a glance back and saw the Bodiless Man had tripped over the unconscious person.
"Watch out!" Someone screamed.
Neville turned and collided heavily with someone. A grunt of pain, and a tangle of arms, hair, and Neville staggered back onto his feet.
"What's wrong with you?" Neville shook his head and looked down realizing he had just collided into Cho Chang. The girl was still sitting upon the floor, an angry expression upon her face and books and parchment scattered across the stair landing.
"Run!" Neville hissed, grabbing Cho's arm and nearly dragging her to her feet. Cho tried protesting, but there was something in his voice, an urgency mixed with fear and alarm. Cho looked behind him and saw the Bodiless Man, red faced, angry, and running down the stairs as fast as he could. She turned around and saw Neville was already heading down the stairs.
Neville skidded to a stop, the staircase below him swinging away from him, shifting position and leaving a very large gap of air. He cursed, quickly looking around for a route to escape. He heard cursing and looked back, seeing that his pursuer was trapped upon another flight of stairs that had begun moving around. He was staring down at him as the stairs swung elsewhere. Neville let out a sigh of relief, that would buy him some time, until the stairs swung back to their right places. The staircase he was one lead to a dimly lit corridor that stretched before him, Neville took it, running flat out.
"What's going on?" Cho suddenly demanded. Neville nearly skidded to a stop again, looking back and realizing that she had followed him. "What's that person want?"
What was she doing here? He had thought he told her to run, not follow him. Neville shook his head, grabbing the latch to one of the doors that lined the corridor and yanking on it. It didn't open. He could feel panic and fear beginning to bubble up in him. They had to get to a professor, they had to tell them what was going on. He ran to the next door and yanked on it, it too was locked.
He could feel the panic building. Thee was no escape. He would be caught and they would do something horrible to him. Kill him? Wipe his memory? Neville didn't know but he knew it wouldn't be good. There had to be a way to hide, to escape them. Neville yanked upon another door, again it was locked.
"Here. Let me." Cho said, tapping the door with her wand. It clicked and the door swung open. "Alohomora." Cho explained.
Neville nodded, feeling a surge of embarrassment and anger that he had forgotten the simple unlocking spell. He shoved the door open and entered the poorly lit room. It was a large room, Neville saw that it was surprisingly free of dust, and there were several crates and chests stacked around. On one wall was a large black wardrobe, beside it stacks of chests, empty cages, a few chipped busts of people he didn't recognize, and directly across from him a heavily curtain window.
He headed for that as Cho used a spell to lock the door. Neville yanked open the curtains and let out a cry of frustration. There were bars upon the window? Why? Why were there bars on the window? He looked toward the door. The Bodiless Man would be here soon and they were trapped.
"How about in the wardrobe?" Cho asked. "It's big enough to hold at least five people." She walked to it and opened the heavy wood panel doors and gasped in horror, staggering back from it.
Neville look and gaped, instead of cloaks, shelves, and the things one would expect in a wardrobe this one was filled with a darkness that was so deep it looked infinite. Neville felt a shudder of fear. What was this thing? He picked up a rusted candlestick and tossed it into the wardrobe. It vanished into the dark and Neville couldn't hear it strike anything. He glanced at Cho.
"Hide in there?' She asked horrified.
No. It didn't seem like a good idea. Who knew where it led. Neville looked around for another place to hide. There was none. The only way they could hide is if they managed to fit into a crate or a chest, but those were neatly stacked against the wall. Neville felt the whine of panic again. They had trapped themselves in this room. There was no escape.
"What happened to your hand?" Cho asked.
Neville looked down at his hand and realized that it was gone. For a moment he almost cried out in horror, but then he realized that he felt no pain and that he could still feel the hand. He realized he was still holding on to the invisible cloak that he had taken from the man on the stairs.
Shaking his head at his own stupidity Neville spread out the cloak. "Think we can both fit under here?" He asked.
There was a sudden scrabble at the door. Neville heard someone cursing and yanking on the door latch. Then they called out the unlocking spell. It would seem they would find out if they could fit underneath it. Neville quickly pulled the cloak over his head and grabbed Cho, pulling her underneath it.
The door pulled open and a wand was shoved it. "Stupefy!" The blast of red light splashed against the walls. Neville sighed in relief that they had stood away from the door and out of the path of the blast. Then came in the Bodiless Man.
Neville heard Cho let out a small gasp. He realized that he could feel her heart beating against him, that he could feel her trembling in fear. Neville closed his eyes, trying no to think of her hair that smelled of roses, and the light perfume she was wearing, or the fact that he was sweating from the exertion of running down the corridors and stairs, or his heart beating madly in his chest,
The Bodiless Man entered the room, his wand drawn and eyes scanning the room. He snarled when he saw nothing, stalking to the window and eyeing the bars across it, then puling apart the curtains looking. He cursed in anger again and walked to the wardrobe, pulling open the doors. He stopped and stared at that, pointing his wand into it.
"Lumos." The light flashed, but Neville could see that it showed nothing of the interior of the wardrobe, only darkness that seemed to continue forever. As he watched the man, a thought stuck Neville. The man's back was turned to them as he looked into the wardrobe. Neville released Cho and pulled off the Cloak.
He quickly crossed the short distance, but the man suddenly turned and saw him. With a snarl Neville shoved at where he assumed the man's body was, he felt it and the man was shoved into the wardrobe, arms flailing, crying out, and wand clattering to the floor. Neville felt something grab the sleeve of his robes and he was suddenly yanked forward, tumbling into the wardrobe after the man. Neville released his wand he was holding and shot out his hand, catching the edge of the wardrobe. He felt splinters dig into his unprotected skin, but he ignored it and clung on dearly. He felt the grip upon his sleeve loosened.
With a grunt Neville pulled up his other arm and hooked it over the edge of the wardrobe, managing to pull himself shoulders upward out of the wardrobe. He took a moment to glance back and saw that his torso and legs vanished into the bottom of the wardrobe, a moment of fear and panic coursed through him.
Cho was suddenly before him, grabbing at his robes and arms. Neville tried using his feet to push him out, but it caught no purchase from within, it felt he was hanging over a bottomless pit. The fear that filled him gave him strength and with Cho's help he was beginning to pull himself out of the wardrobe.
Cho let out a gasp and Neville's eyes looked up and saw a bloated pink thing moving their way. It vaguely resembled an arm. Neville realized it was the man he had cursed outside of the Gryffindor house.
"Run!" Neville yelled, but the other person closed the distance. Cho's head suddenly snapped back and her eyes rolled up in her head. Snarling Neville began pulling himself out the wardrobe. He saw Cho's body suddenly lift and watched in horror as it was tossed over him and into the wardrobe.
He tried grabbing for her, sliding back into the wardrobe, but all he caught was air. "No!"
"You've led a merry little chase, boy. But it's over now." A harsh voice said.
Something smashed into Neville's head, exquisite pain filled him. He gasped out, but didn't let go of the edge of the wardrobe. He felt a warm wetness trickling down the side of his face, but he ignored it. Instead he tried pulling himself out.
"Determined aren't you?" Bloated Arm said. Neville cried out as he felt some great weight descend upon his exposed fingers. For a moment all he could feel was the searing white pain and the screaming that filled the room.
He felt his hands releasing and then there was darkness.