Heaven Tastes Sweeter
Chapter One
Being back at Hogwarts was, to say the least, surreal. To start with, for the first time in years, the Hogwarts Express had been left at Hogsmeade station and everyone had had to make their own way to the school. It was deemed to be safer, given the current situation in the magic world, that every parent was to take their children directly to the school, muggleborns were picked up from the muggle world by appointed witches and wizards who had volunteered for the task.
This was of course highly inconvenient and, together with the fact that many of the parents were too scared to part from their children, meant that, for the first time in years, Hogwarts could no longer count a thousand children in its student body.
In fact, Dumbledore was having a meeting with the staff trying to decide what to do with the classes that, from the usual thirty-six, had gone down to fifteen students or less.
Many things were going to be different this year…the sorting ceremony, for instance, was to take place in private with each of the first years being sorted into their houses as they arrived to the school. Naturally, the graveness of the affair called for austerity and no feast was to be celebrated so every student was directed by the prefects to their common room to leave their stuff and start unpacking.
Pansy was, yet again, one of the school prefects trying to keep the younger students under some sort of control. She felt much older than the seventeen years of age she truly was, specially seeing the younger kids.
She felt pity for them. Remembering her first year at Hogwarts and how happy she had been…how peaceful everything was. She missed those serene years where their biggest worry was to get all the homework done on time. These younger students, however, seemed to have anything but the homework in their little, naïve heads.
Pansy was saddened with the thought that these kids, brought up in the middle of the war, would probably relinquish their childhood much sooner than they ought to. She felt anger rising within her…and this renewed the vow she had made to herself: no matter what, this war would have to be over before the end of her seventh year.
The Slytherins were about to finish unpacking when Professor Severus Snape came into their common room and called all students to him.
Pansy followed her friends to the room and took a seat on one of the settees.
"As you all know, the peace of our world has been challenged once more by You-Know-Who," the Potions master started, "this means, as you will have realised by now, that new rules are needed to ensure the safety of us all. I will now list those new rules and I expect blind obedience to them. There will be no understanding for those who choose to break them…they will be expelled and sent home straight away."
Taking a brief pause, Professor Snape pulled out a piece of parchment from somewhere in his robe, then started reading:
"First of all, all Hogsmeade trips and walks on the grounds are forbidden. Second, all students will have to be accompanied by at least two others at all times, students found wandering by themselves will be expelled. Third, at seven pm, every day, every student, regardless of the year, will have to be in their common room. I will personally check that this curfew is respected and I will tolerate no delays from anyone. Note that after that time the common room's door will be locked and sealed magically. When possible, a teacher will accompany you to each lesson, unfortunately the staff has more important things to take care of, so we are forced to trust your common sense and hope you do nothing stupid."
Professor Snape took another pause and looked around the students. It was appalling to see how few of them there were. Visibly sighing, the professor closed his eyes, as if preparing for something unpleasant. Then, reopening them, he said:
"I also need to announce that this year's Head Boy and Girl are two Gryffindors…you probably know them well since they are 'celebrities'," the sarcasm behind those words was unmistakable, "Mr Ronald Weasley and Miss Hermione Granger..."
There was a brief exchange of whispered words among the oldest students and Snape found, with shock that not everyone was against that decision.
"Also, Professor Dumbledore has informed me that, this year, Harry Potter will be in charge of a group of students that will assist the staff in the event of another attack to the school…I have been told that Mr Potter will be having a meeting with the students involved to discuss the training schedule."
With this, the Potions master seemed to have finished and the students started talking once more, then they stopped seeing that the professor had no intention of leaving.
"Slytherins, remember that we are at war. Extreme caution is needed if we are to survive. I trust everyone will pull their weight, however small, towards victory. The survival of our world depends on it."
This definitely shocked the students. Pansy, and a few others that had known Snape for the longest realised that the professor, for once, had let his usual cold mask slip off and was genuinely concerned. Pansy felt a cold shiver run through her spine.
"Things must be horribly bad if Snape is like this…" Pansy heard Sonia, her best friend, say in the lowest whisper.
Pansy looked at her and saw Sonia's eyes full of fear and the deepest of concerns. Pansy put one hand on her classmate's shoulder and said:
"We haven't seen anything yet…I fear that the worse is still to come…"
Then, looking up, Pansy realised that Snape had left the common room. The students had been left to discuss the news and Pansy, after a reasonable amount of time, got up and said:
"Everybody…it's bed time…tomorrow will be a hard day so we better get some sleep while we can…"
Following her own piece of advice, Pansy started walking towards her bedroom closely followed by Sonia.
Once there, Sonia sat on her bed while Pansy started putting on her pyjamas.
"So…have you heard from Draco?" the girl asked.
Pansy sighed heavily before replying already answering Sonia's question without uttering a single word.
"I take that's a no…" Sonia cleverly interpreted.
"I only got the letter he wrote to me before he left…" Pansy confirmed.
"Ah…I see…" Sonia said clearly not knowing what else to say.
"He didn't promise he would write…he only said he would try to…" Pansy justified.
"Yeah…of course…it mustn't be easy for him…you know…hiding and…you know…" Sonia stammered making Pansy smile.
"Sonia…do me a favour, will you? Let's not talk about Draco…I mean, I already think about him around the clock…and I really need to stop doing so…let's talk about something else…shall we?" Pansy asked.
"Sure…no problem…so, tell me, have you heard that…" Sonia started rambling about the latest gossip while Pansy thought how lucky she was having such a great friend…
And for the first night since they had left the school the previous term, Pansy went to bed without thinking of Draco. Alright, only thinking of him briefly. For only five minutes, until exhaustion drove her to a blissfully dreamless sleep.
To be continued…
A/N: I know that this chapter is a bit slow but I promise you that the pace will only increase from now on…please bear with me!!