He left without another word, leaving everyone in their awkward silence and confusion. It was only broken by Ron who spoke in an effort to lighten the mood.
"Well, I guess that means no Quidditch match."
Harry didn't hear anything else he said. He was already out of the common room and dashing toward Dumbledore. "Professor, what--?"
"Please, Harry," Dumbledore said, "do not ask me further."
"But the Order of the--"
"Elyse! Heather!" Dumbledore called.
"… What?" Harry asked, totally bewildered.
"Yes?"
Two girls had suddenly appeared in front of them, Harry almost running into one, the one who had spoken. She had shoulder-length, wavy blonde hair with gorgeous blue eyes that reminded Harry of Kelly. In fact… everything except the hair length reminded Harry disturbingly of Kelly, as if this girl was her sister or a relative of some kind. She was a bit stockier than the girl next to her and gorgeous all around.
The other girl had slightly longer, light red hair with just the slightest wave to it, like a light wind was permanently hitting her. Tall and lanky, she ineffably reminded Harry of Ron. Her hazel eyes surveyed Harry and Dumbledore as she listened.
"When do you want to go?" Dumbledore asked.
"As soon as we can," the blonde said.
"You will be taking Harry with you, you understand?" Dumbledore asked.
"What?" Harry asked, now taking his eyes off the newcomers to stare at Dumbledore. "Where am I going?"
"Harry, this is Elyse--" Dumbledore pointed to the blonde "--and Heather--" Dumbledore pointed to the auburn. "They will escort you and most likely Mr. Weasley, as leaving him behind is a hard thing to do, to find Kelly."
"Yes, it is!" someone said as they raced out of the portrait hole.
"As I suspected," Dumbledore said, nodding at Ron for a hello. "Elyse, Heather, you will not be able to go as soon as I would like for you to. True, the sooner we get Katie back the better, but the Bryth meeting still stands true."
"Katie?" Harry asked.
"Ladies, please explain the situation to these two in private. Mad-Eye will be in my office by now, and I must attend to him," Dumbledore said, and leaving so quickly he could have Disapparated.
"Okay, you two, there's a lot of explaining to do and only a short period of time to do it," Elyse said, stepping up to the forefront. "First off, and most importantly, you must know that you have not--"
Heather cursed. "We'll have to explain later. C'mon, the blood sample."
"It's ready? So soon?" Elyse asked.
"You forget who you're talking to," Heather reprimanded.
"You're a miracle worker, Heath," Elyse said, and with a swift apology, the two were off.
Neither Harry nor Ron spoke for a moment, but then Ron quietly swore. "We were that close--" He held his finger a millimeter apart "--to finding out what Kelly hasn't been telling us, and then some blood sample comes up."
"But Ron… we already know what Kelly's secret is," Harry said, stopping as he suddenly realized this and that he had been pacing.
"What?" Ron asked, surprised.
"Kelly is the greatest weapon of the Order of the Phoenix. Ron, she's a member! But then she was…" Harry trailed off as the truth dawned upon him.
Ron quietly finished his sentence. "Then she was here to look after you, and make sure you didn't get in too much trouble."
"But I have gotten into loads of trouble. She's helped me with it! I mean, we escaped the castle to go to the place Voldemort was hiding. If she was trying to keep me out of trouble, she did a very poor job, indeed. And I mean, she was my girlfriend! She wouldn't go that far, would she?" Harry asked, starting to pace again.
"I dunno, Harry," Ron said quietly. "Neither of us do. Because honestly, we don't really know her."
Neither of them spoke. Harry was still trying to fit together the few missing pieces of the puzzle together when Ron spoke again.
"A blood sample. That sounds like they analyzed the blood in the dorm."
"I bet that's exactly what they did," Harry agreed.
"But they're in already? I mean, they'd have just been taken…." Ron stopped.
"Remember what Heather said? 'You forget who you're talking to'. We don't really know them, remember?" Harry said. "They're probably like the Secret Students or something…."
McGonagall slowly turned a corner and walked toward them, staring at a piece of paper in her hand. She was shaking, and almost ran into Harry and Ron on her way to the common room.
"Potter," McGonagall said shakily, holding a piece of paper in her hand, "the… the test results came in on the blood and…"
Harry snatched the paper out of her hand. She tried to take it back, but too late. "Katie Andrews?" Harry asked.
McGonagall sighed. "Yes."
Harry thought hard. "Andrews…. That name sounds familiar…." Then it hit him. "Riley Andrews!"
McGonagall just stared.
"Professor, Elyse and Heather were about to tell us about Kelly, but they left before they could because of this. Can't you please tell us?" Harry asked.
McGonagall looked at him intently. "I… I could… but I won't." McGonagall snatched back the results and walked into the common room.
Harry stood there for a minute, contemplating his options, then raced toward the Grand Staircase, Ron's confused yells behind him. Harry raced down the stairs, skipping almost half of them in his haste. When he reached the Entrance Hall, he deliberately raced into Malfoy, but kept going even after the empty threats were shouted back at him.
Harry raced toward Hagrid's cabin. Aiming for just left of it, he continued running, Ron's panting somewhere behind as he breathlessly followed.
It was only here that Harry realized flying over the Forbidden Forest would be faster than going through it.
Harry stopped, allowing Ron to catch his breath. "Accio Firebolt! Accio Cleansweep Eleven!"
After a moment, the brooms came zooming into sight and stopped just in front of Harry. The two brooms gleamed pink in the dazzling sunset that Harry paid no attention to. He hopped onto his broomstick, gave Ron a look that told him to do the same, and headed off, waiting only a moment for Ron to get on his Cleansweep.
"Harry, what are we doing?" Ron asked as they flew over the beginnings of the Forbidden Forest.
"We're going to see Riles," Harry called back, silently urging his Firebolt to go faster.
Harry zoomed over the forest, hardly looking down at all. The trees grew thick quickly at the speed he was going, but he was waiting for them to thin before looking up into the face of the horizon. He only hoped that Riles would be at her home. Ron was close behind him the entire trip, though Harry made sure not to go too fast in case he lost Ron behind him.
Harry only once met any creature in the air on his trip. He almost ran into one of Hagrid's thestrals, who needless to say didn't take too kindly to it. Chasing them away, and actually getting part of Ron's robe, it only stopped when it reached the end of its territory, wherever that line was, Harry thought at the time.
Harry looked down--the trees were definitely thinning now. He could see patches of grass below him. The patches grew steadily bigger as he neared the other end of the forest. Harry looked up into the bright, though almost gone, sunset and saw the Secret Student's house for the third time in his life.
It was, by far, one of the more interesting houses Harry had seen. The first two stories were cerulean blue, sticking out oddly against the next two bright yellow stories. After that was a kind of forest green that reminded Harry horribly of Slytherin. The top two stories were undoubtedly Gryffindor red, a beacon of hope that Harry might get some answers here.
Harry landed quickly and quietly in front of the house. He waited impatiently for Ron, his thirst for answers close to outweighing his want to wait for Ron. Harry swiftly hiked up the few stairs in front of the mansion and knocked boldly on the door. Ron, who had only been here in his mind, gazed about the place.
"It's just like I remember it…" he said in awe.
There was no answer to Harry's knock. He knocked again and waited a whole minute without anyone answering. Harry took out his wand and whispered, "Alohomora!"