A voice.
It screeched.
"Long live the cat!
Long live the Cat-King!"
There was a room. There were three children in it, and a smaller creature, not a child,
not quite a man; his voice -the same voice- continued to screech:
"Long live the Cat-King!
The Cat-King knows it all!"
Amongst the children, the girl was sighing, as pleading for more patience. She hated the smaller creature, now
more than ever before. The creature, though not the type to know everything, knew things few others knew.
And he had that type of body that knew things few ohers knew, and that type of voice that said
things few others knew, and hid others he didn't know.
The voice, this time, rhymed the whole rhyme:
"Long live the cat
and long live the Cat-King.
King of all cats,
and king of all things."
-We could do well without the silly rhymes, Peeves- said the girl, looking up at the floating smaller creature, darts of impatience out her eyes.
"Silly? Silly?" mocked the creature named Peeves.
"Aye, not silly rhyming, but of the most helpful nature, hey Neenee-boo?"
-You heard her, now shut up, mate!-said the second child, a red-haired boy; he was
trying (and trying so hard) to sound imponent, even if his skinny scrawny body revealed
otherwise. -Now scram! --at this, the creature Peeves only laughed, but it had had enough fun for the night,
and it left for this reason, no other.
-I scared him off, luckyly.
-...It's not as if it's even good poetry- muttered the girl, named Hermione, who above all hated
mockery of her own name.
-Leave him be, I don't mind- said another voice.
A voice which came from the third child, muffled through the arms that hugged himself; a soft voice that came from the
body of the child sitting on the floor, and though he was close, its sound was of a faraway nature; it was the single
most empty voice in the world, hollowed by a dream of loneliness, that would not
fill up with a book of memories.
Was, was, were, those words haunted and strayed his own voice, after having done so to his body.
Ill, but of no mortal maladies.
The boy was sad.
The girl, Hermione, saw it; the tall boy, named Ron saw it. The third boy was sad beyond sadness, and help was needed.
-Oh, Harry- cried Hermione -for how long have you bottled this up inside of you?
Ron stopped her mid-action, for she was reaching for Harry's body in an attempt to
embrace his sad figure.
-Ron, why?
-Just let him be, he needs to mope a bit; it'll pass- he whispered, motioning towards the door.
Hermione sighed again, and she and Ron left Harry alone in the room. Perhaps Ron was right, she thought; maybe Harry's in a faraway place that we can't reach, because neither of us have walked his path...
She sighed once more.
And so the King heard this sigh, and sent for a messenger into the night.
And they all went to sleep, and then dream.