Title: Jade Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Author: Queen Serenity

Fandom: Harry Potter

Chapter: Nine – Tricks and Trolls

Time went by fast.

Really, really fast.

Lisa had started to come to the library study sessions with Hermione and Jade.

Not long after that day with the flying lessons, the Ravenclaws had started charms with Gryffindors, so Jade, Hermione, and Lisa all got to see Ron a bit more.

Jade had taken to using her free time to study things that weren't part of class… to read the books in her new bookshelf, which Hermione had practically drooled over when she'd seen it, and to read many different books in the library. Jade couldn't help but look towards the Restricted Section in curiosity, but she knew that the books there weren't allowed…

Other than that, she also spent her time sometimes, when she was alone in the dorm, releasing her Snitch choker and going after it, even though she didn't have a broom. It was fun, watching Solluna chasing it around sometimes like an overgrown kitten.

As for Solluna… well, she was keeping her time occupied by practicing her shadow-diving. She seemed to be determined not to leave Jade like that again.

When the days were still nice out, Jade, Lisa, Hermione, and Ron would all go outside to study, or sometimes just hang out. Once in a while Ron's brothers, Fred and George, would be out there. Those two were a barrel of laughs, always making jokes and such. One day, when Hermione wasn't around, Jade took the two aside and asked them if they had any hexes or spells of a certain… type, which they could teach her. She could find out in books if she wanted, but she figured those two might know a few especially useful ones.

After that, it seemed that Pansy Parkinson had gotten a lot clutzier, tripping when there was nothing there and such.

Oh, yes, Jade had decided to go out of her way sometimes and make Pansy Parkinson's life hell. The wench deserved it, and besides… it would be fun. But only because it was being done to someone like her.

At one point, during Potions, Jade had inconspicuously used a Levitation charm (which she'd taught herself from the textbook ahead of time… they hadn't learned it in class yet) to switch one Parkinson and Bulstrode's ingredients with something else that looked much alike… so that when Snape came over to check on their potion, which had congealed and started to balloon into one gleaming sickly-looking yellow-green bubble, Snape was eyeing the bubble. Grimacing, Parkinson poked her wand cautiously at the bubble, which promptly exploded, sending a foul-smelling slime all over Snape and the two horrified girls.

The look on Snape's face as grass and thin vines started growing from the exposed skin of all three like just so much fur was priceless. As the professor wordlessly escorted the two girls from the room, obviously headed to see Madam Pomfrey, his expression thunderous, Jade felt a little bad for Snape. She'd meant for the potion to just hit the two girls, not Snape, too. The potion they had been working on had been a simple one meant to induce hair-growth, but the ingredient switch she'd done had made it into an unstable quick-fertilizer potion. A few minutes later, a Slytherin prefect had come in to tell them that they were to study for the rest of the period, and then just go to lunch.

Sometimes, Jade would not go to hang out with her friends, but would rather seek out Draco and get him to come to the library to hang out and read with her. It took some work to get him to ditch the lackeys, but, when she did, it was rather enjoyable for the two of them. They just sat there towards the back of the library, where it was more private, and read assorted books, chatting occasionally.

Yep, time passed very quickly with how very busy Jade kept herself. Before she knew it, it was Halloween morning.

That morning, they woke to the delicious smell of cinnamon and baking pumpkin.

In Charms, Professor Flitwick told them that they were going to be learning a simple levitation charm today, something that pretty much everyone was excited about… although both Jade and Hermione had taught themselves the charm ahead of time, they played along. Jade was paired with Lisa, who she knew would be a good partner; although Lisa wasn't usually teaching herself ahead of time, she was smart enough that a lot of this stuff came natural to her.

Ron and Hermione were paired together… it was obvious that this pleased neither of them. The two never seemed to get on too well in the study sessions, as Hermione was always correcting the tiniest mistakes that Ron made, and seemed to think he wasn't trying hard enough, and Ron was always snapping at Hermione, thinking she was acting like Miss Perfect.

The charm wasn't all that hard, at least for the Ravenclaws. One Gryffindor, Seamus Finnigan, accidentally set his feather on fire. Jade and Lisa giggled slightly, causing him to redden.

Jade could see Ron wasn't having much luck… the boy was getting frustrated, completely fouling up the motions and rushing the pronunciation.

"You're saying it wrong," Jade heard Hermione snap. "It's Wing-gar-dium Levi-o- sa, make the 'gar' nice and long."

"You do it, then, if you're so clever."

Hermione proceeded to do so and her feather floated up gracefully to hover about four feet in the air. The look on her face was smug as Professor Flitwick pointed out how well she'd done.

Jade and Lisa went ahead and took turns lazily floating their feather in front of Solluna, who batted at it… it really was quite simple, why couldn't the Gryffindors get it?

At the end of class, as everyone left, Jade was walking with Hermione and Lisa on either side of her. A few feet ahead, Ron could be heard griping to Neville.

"It's no wonder no one can stand her," he said. "She's a nightmare, honestly."

As Hermione left Jade's side, breaking into a run and rushing past Ron, Jade could see that her face was in tears. Ron stopped, looking after her.

Mumbling to Lisa that she'd see her later, Jade made her way to Ron's side and tapped on his shoulder so that he turned to face her.

"She heard you."

"So?" Ron said, but he looked a little uncomfortable. "She must've noticed that people usually avoid her."

"I don't, Lisa doesn't, and you usually don't, either."

"Yeah, but you guys are just good to study with."

Jade was pissed. "You can be such an ass sometimes." She shoved her way past him.

Hermione wasn't seen for the rest of the afternoon, not even in class. In the middle of class, though, when Jade had to go use the restroom, she found her.

Hermione was in the bathroom, in one of the stalls, crying in great, gulping sobs.

Jade tapped on the door. "Hermione, come on out. Please?"

Hermione's voice sounded a bit croaky when she replied. "No, just leave me alone. You heard what he said…"

"Yeah, but he's an ass. Besides, you know that he was wrong… Lisa and I hang with you a lot…"

"I know, but everyone else always seems to a-, avoid me. I must be positively horrid!"

Jade was, temporarily, at least, defeated… so she headed back to class.

When it was time for the banquet, Jade sat, staring at the food, and was considering getting up to try and get Hermione again when something happened…

Professor Quirrell came rushing into the hall, his turban a little messed up, terror on his face. As everyone stared, he gasped out, "Troll – in the dungeons – thought you ought to know."

He then fainted like a pansy.

That's strange, Jade thought to herself. I remember hearing somewhere that about the only thing Quirrell actually is good against is trolls… oh, well.

When the prefects were leading the students from the Great Hall, Jade ducked down and allowed herself to fall back among the Gryffindors, where she yanked on Ron's arm to get his attention. Solluna was at her feet.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Just follow me," she snapped. This was all his fault, he would help. She pulled him into a group of Hufflepuffs going the other way, and then into a deserted side corridor.

"Now what's going on?" he asked. "Hurry up, Percy's gonna notice I'm gone probably and come after me."

Jade glared at him. "Hermione's been in the bathroom since earlier, crying because of you. Now she's in danger, because she doesn't know about the troll and it's loose… though it's in the dungeons for now. It's your fault that she's there, instead of having been safely in the Great Hall when we were escorted out."

Ron held up a hand to stop her. "Fine, fine, I'll go get her with you. Just one question." They started walking at a fast pace, Jade in the lead.

"What?"

"Where the heck is 'there'?"

"The girl's bathroom."

"What!" Ron came to a stop, causing Jade, too, to stop and look back at him. "I can't go in there!"

"What?" Jade gave him a weird look. "Why?"

"It's a girl's bathroom. I don't know if you've noticed, Jade, but I am NOT a girl!"

Jade rolled her eyes. "There's no one there but Hermione, so it doesn't count.

Suddenly, they heard very quick footsteps coming towards them.

"Percy!" Ron hissed, pulling Jade to hide behind a statue.

Watching, though, they saw that it was not Percy, but rather Snape. He crossed the corridor and disappeared from view.

"I wonder what he's doing…" Jade whispered, curious. "All the professors were downstairs taking care of the troll, I thought."

She looked down at Solluna, who was peering up at her. "Follow him, please? At least to see where he's going. You can meet me in the dorm later."

Alright. Be careful, Jade. The werecat slinked off in the direction Snape had gone, blending in so well with the shadows that she was hard to see.

They went a corridor over, heading still for the bathroom. Jade paused, her nostrils flaring sharply.

"Can you smell something?"

She sniffed lightly, and felt her stomach turn over as the scent completely assaulted her senses. It smelled like old socks and a public toilet sent from hell… it was disgusting.

And that's when they heard it… a low grunting, and the shuffling footfalls of gigantic feet. Ron pointed – at the end of a passage to the left, something enormous was moving towards them. They shrunk back as much into the shadows as was possible and watched as the… thing… emerged into a patch of moonlight.

It was a horrid sight. Absolutely horrid. About twelve feet tall, its skin was a dull, granite gray, its lumpy body like a boulder with its small bald head perched on top like a coconut. The smell coming from it was incredible, and not in a good way. It was holding a long wooden club, which dragged along the floor because its arms were so long.

The troll stopped next to a doorway and peered inside. It waggled its long ears, making up its tiny mind, then slouched slowly into the room.

Jade and Ron just sat there, staring in shock, for about a minute. It looked like the troll… wasn't in the dungeons anymore.

They snapped out of it when they heard something that made their hearts stop – a high, petrified scream.

Jade stared at the doorway in horror. "Oh, no!" She exclaimed. "Ron, that's the girls' bathroom."

"Oh, no," Ron echoed, as pale as the Bloody Baron.

Both crying out Hermione's name, they barreled through the open doorway.

Hermione was backed against the wall opposite, looking about to faint. The troll was advancing on her, knocking the sinks off the wall as it went.

"We've gotta distract it!" Jade yelled out to Ron. Her eyes focusing on a large piece of rubble from the sinks the troll had knocked down, Jade did a very precise swish and flick. "Wingardium Leviosa!" Directed by her wand, the piece of rubble rose up and started whizzing around the troll, beating it randomly upside the head. This just seemed to make it angry, and it bellowed its rage as it lumbered towards the next movements it saw, which was Jade's wand moving, lifting its club as it came towards her. She stepped back slightly, her green eyes widening in fear.

"Oy, pea-brain!" yelled Ron from the other side of the chamber, and he threw a metal pipe at it. The pipe did nothing to the troll, but it turned at the yell and started towards Ron, giving Jade time to run over to Hermione.

"Please, Hermione, come on!" She said, desperately tugging at a terrified Hermione's arm. Hermione's mouth hung open in terror and she didn't budge as Jade pleaded. "I don't think I'm good enough yet that I'd be able to levitate you out of here!"

All the sounds of the yells and echoes and stuff seemed to be driving the troll nuts. It bellowed again and started toward the nearest person, Ron, who had no way to escape.

In the next few seconds Jade looked, considered, looked, considered, and then she did something which was very brave and, she knew, very stupid. She backed up against the wall and took a great running leap and, scrabbling her legs, managed to get up the trolls back. Wrapping her legs securely around its neck, keeping herself hunched down so that her head was at least a little protected, she promptly balled up her fists and began punching at the troll's beady little eyes with the bottom of her fists, thinking that this at least had to be a vulnerable part.

What happened next was something she didn't even really mean to do. Because of her position, she wasn't able to very well hit the troll's eyes, so it didn't much notice that. However, her wand was clutched awkwardly in her balled-up fist, so that she inadvertently jabbed the troll in the eyes.

Turns out this affected it.

A lot.

Even a troll doesn't like having a piece of wood jabbed into its eye.

Bellowing in pain, the troll twisted and flailed around, while Jade tried her best to clench her legs tighter. She grabbed the troll's waggly ears to hold on for dear life, and it turned out that these were a tender spot; it howled louder and thrashed more.

Hermione had sunk to the floor, hugging her knees, seemingly paralyzed with her terror. Ron was watching the whole scene in horror and pulled out his own wand. He cried out the first spell that came into his head, one he had just heard cast a few minutes ago: "Wingardium Leviosa!"

The club flew up out of its owner's hand, rose high, then dropped with a sickening crack on the troll's head. The troll swayed slightly and Jade, realizing what exactly was about to happen, dropped quickly off of it scrambled away just as it fell face-first to the floor, sending a tremor throughout the whole room.

Jade dusted herself off and wiped off the bottom end of her wand, a disgusted look on her face.

"Ew – troll germs."

Their attention was suddenly caught by the sound of slamming and quick, loud footsteps. Just a moment later, Professor McGonagall had come bursting into the room, closely followed by Snape, with Quirrell bringing up the rear. Quirrell glanced at the troll, let out a pitiful, faint whimper, and sat quickly on a toilet, clutching his heart. Jade shot him a disgusted look.

Snape looked Jade over once, obviously looking for injuries, before bending over the troll. Professor McGonagall was looking at Ron and Jade. Her lips were pursed so tightly that they were white… Jade had never seen the woman so angry.

As she berated both Jade and Ron, she was interrupted by Hermione, who explained that they had been looking for her. This, of course, surprised McGonagall.

"Miss Granger!"

Hermione was at last on her feet.

"I went looking for the troll because I – I thought I could deal with it on my own – you know, because I've read all about them." She paused, and gave both Jade and Ron a slight smile. "If they hadn't come after me, I'd be dead now. Jade jumped on it and poked it in the eye with her wand, and Ron knocked it out with its own club. They had no time to get help… it was just about to finish me off right when they arrived."

Jade was stunned that Hermione was covering for them. But she tried not to show it…

"Well – in that case…" Professor McGonagall was staring at the three of them. "Miss Granger, you foolish girl, how could you even think of tackling a mountain troll on your own?"

She proceeded to take five points from Ravenclaw and sent Hermione to Ravenclaw house, providing she wasn't hurt.

After Hermione was gone, McGonagall awarded Ron and Jade five points apiece for their respective houses for having taken down the troll, which she obviously thought had been naught but luck.

After that, the two students headed for their respective houses. By the Entrance Hall, which was on the way, they found Hermione waiting. There was an embarrassed silence, then they all said 'thanks' without looking at each other. They then set off to their houses.

After this event, they were not just study buddies, but they were all good friends. I tell you, nothing brings you together better than taking down a twelve-foot troll together.

In the Ravenclaw common room, where the feast was being finished, Jade loaded up a plate for herself and put assorted meats on another plate. She took both up to the dorm, where she found Solluna waiting for her on her bed.

She gave the plate of meat to the werecat, who started eating gratefully.

"So where was Snape headed?" Jade asked, curious.

Solluna didn't even pause in her eating. I followed him as far as that door in the forbidden corridor. He went through that, but I was not going in there again.

Jade couldn't help but wonder why Snape had been there. She didn't think he was doing anything bad, but… why? He had to have had a reason…

QS: I know some parts of this might seem to follow too close to the book, and I'm sorry… I really am. But it's gonna get better, k? OH! And one more thing… You've probably noticed how Jade treats Pansy. Like I said, Jade isn't exactly what you'd call a goody-goody… She just hates outright rudeness, especially when its unprovoked, and she's fiercely defensive of friends. She doesn't like bullying, but tolerates it when it's not her friends.