Mayhem in the night

I walked back to the common room with Gregory and Lucy.

"What happened?" Lucy asked.

"Lione decided not to wait," Gregory lied.

"Gregory said something to her and she left," I informed her. "What did you mean by her jumping off her broom, getting light headed and trying to kill herself?"

"Um..."

"At flying lesson," I pressed. "I thought she just fell off her broom. That's what she said happened. That's what you said happened."

"Leigh tried to kill herself," breathed Lucy. "Why? When?"

"She didn't, I was just saying that because she insulted my flying."

"What happened then?"

"At our first flying lesson last year she fell off her broom, right?"

"But you-"

"Right. But you see I was a lot nearer to her when it happened than anyone else. I saw what actually happened. She flung herself off the broom."

Lucy gasped.

"Why?" I asked.

"That's what I asked her afterwards. Remember, I hung back after everyone left the infirmary? I asked her and she said she didn't remember doing it."

"Maybe she bumped her head on the ground and got amnesia," Lucy suggested. "Really selective amnesia. I saw that in a film once called 'The Majestic' where this guy fell in to a river and bumped his head on the bridge. But he forgot his whole life so maybe it's not similar. Did Kettle forget anything else? Did she think her name was Luke?"

We stared at her. Then decided that the most practical course of action was to pretend she hadn't said anything.

"She said that when she got up in to the air she felt really free and strange. Next thing she knows she's in the infirmary surrounded by the class."

"Weirdness," I commented.

"No duh."

"Leigh is definitely the strangest person I have ever met."

"You know, that's exactly what I said."

It was Saturday. Lione was still being cold with Gregory but she seemed perfectly happy sitting, surrounded by people, holding her guitar. She had only got it out to tune it and do a little practice but was bombarded with requests, which she had to deny since most were too complicated for her and the rest required an entire orchestra.

"It's just not possible," Lione was saying. "The chords are simple enough but the tune just isn't recognisable without the violin. No one would be able to keep proper time and we'd all end up finishing at different points."

"Oh go on, anyway."

"No, I'm sorry! Besides, I need to tune this thing."

Lione was just plucking at random strings when Melanie came through the portrait hole in the middle of a conversation with her best friend Katrina Summers. When she saw Lione and her guitar she squealed with delight.

"Oh my gosh, Lione, I didn't know you played the guitar."

"Not very well," Lione told her, looking taken aback.

"Oh." Melanie looked disappointed. "Do you know anything?"

"Some things."

"I sing, personally," she put in, smugly. "People are always telling me how good it sounds."

I grudgingly had to giver her that, Melanie was an excellent singer. She might have been famous except unlike most pop stars she could actually sing. She was always showing off her skills by bursting in to whatever song was going through her head at the time.

"All the trees are brown," Melanie starting singing randomly.

From brown Lione suddenly joined in with the guitar. It sounded really good. Obediently Katrina, who by this time was – like most of Melanie's friends – under Melanie's thumb joined in for 'I went for a walk'.

"On a winters day!"

"On a winters day."

"I'd be safe and warm now."

"I'd be safe and warm now."

"If I was in LA."

"If I was in LA-ay!"

"California..."

"California dreams!"

"On such a winders da-ay."

The Gryffindors clapped.

"Wow Lione. You actually don't suck."

"Why thank you Melanie, you're not so bad yourself."

"What else can you play?"

It was a sickening sight watching my sister and one of my best friends bonding. I could barely dare to watch. And it seemed that if Lione and Melanie would become friends then we would never get round to pranking her like I had dreamed.

We sat in the Great Hall, waiting.

"We are going to get in trouble for this," I told them.

"Not if no one says anything," said Lione in a singsong voice.

"Shh," Lucy warned. "You'll put Gregory off."

"Ready?"

"Ready."

"Go stage one."

The water bomb dropped. A few students looked up as the red blur tumbled downwards. Snape didn't see it coming. He jumped up and screamed with fury. He was dripping wet.

"Stage two."

The second bomb, this time filled with custard, missed Snape by inches but got him with the splash. I was particularly glad to see that it also got Professor Browen.

"Dumbledore!" Lucy cried.

"Stage three is a no go, repeat, stage three is a no go."

"Lione," said Gregory flicking his wand so the third balloon flew out the window and hurriedly putting it away. "I'm sitting right next to you. You don't need to speak as if you've got a walkie-talkie. Hey! Maybe we should get walkie-talkies!"

"Shh!"

Snape flung his arm out to point at us. "You four!"

We looked around at the people around us, pretending to be very interested in whom he was talking about. Everybody in the hall was looking at us. There was a very audible snigger from the Slytherin table.

"Stop being so stupid and get up here!"

"Us?" Gregory inquired. "What did we do?"

"Yes," said Dumbledore, eyes twinkling. "What on earth did they do, Severus?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Snape cried.

"I have to admit I'm curious to know how and why you came to be covered in custard."

Lucy barely suppressed a giggle.

"Ask them!"

"Mr. Weasley? Have you anything to say?"

"No, sir."

"Have you any idea how this could have occurred?"

"No, sir. Sorry, sir."

"There," said Dumbledore as if that settled it. "I'm afraid that if they don't know what you're talking about and you don't have any evidence otherwise there is nothing I can do."

Snape looked livid as he marched out. "You're too lenient!" he shouted. "You're too flipping lenient."

The minute he disappeared from the doorway the hall burst into laughter.

"Told you we wouldn't get caught," said Lione with delight.

"Serves him right for setting us double homework," said Gregory.

I glanced up at the Staff table. Most of the teachers, including Dumbledore, were laughing. Browen wasn't. He was looking straight at us. Correction, he was looking straight at me. He did not look in the least bit happy.

That night we decided to make another trip to the Prankster room for, what Lucy described as, a 'Rummage'. We made our way along the corridors under Gregory's invisibility cloak. Suddenly Gregory stopped in his tracks.

"What is it?" I hissed.

"Something's wrong," he said. "Something's very wrong."

"Maybe there's a crime being committed," Lucy suggested in what she probably thought was a whisper. "I saw something like that in this film called 'Spider Man'. This man could sense when crimes were being committed. Advanced intuition they called it. No they didn't. That's what they called it in 'Unbreakable'. Anyway they called it Spidey sense. Well of course they only called it that-"

"Shh," said Lione, spinning around. "Did you hear that?"

"I couldn't hear anything," I said. "Lucy was too loud."

"I heard someone," breathed Lione.

Even I could hear the panic in her voice.

"It's probably nothing," I said slowly.

Even though we were under an invisibility cloak I could tell that Asher and Kettle didn't believe me.

We made our way further along the corridor we were in. Just as we were about to turn the corner in to the corridor containing the room leading to the Prankster room we came across an invisible barrier. Pandemonium ensued. Lucy and Lione screamed which set Gregory and I off in the shear panic and confusion of the situation. Everyone struck out violently and tried to run in all sorts of directions. Lucy tripped over my foot and fell out of the cloak. She grabbed at Lione and desperation but ended up pulling her out as well. The girls landed in a heap on the floor, clearly visible. Gregory threw the cloak off and went to help them. As I knelt down to pick up the cloak I heard something. Lione's head jolted up as well and I knew she had heard it as well. Sharp intakes of breath followed by a long drawn out breath outwards. Slowly we all got to our feet. Instinctively we moved closer together and looked around wildly. I saw it. The leaves of a plant in the corridor we had just left moved. They moved in exactly the way they normally move if someone moving away from us had brushed against them. But there was no one there.

"Um..." said Gregory. "Let's... er... keep moving."

We made our way along the corridor again and entered the room.

"It must have been a ghost," said Lucy shakily. "There are tons of ghosts around the castle; it could have been any one of them."

"I doubt it," said Gregory, unusually seriously. "Ghosts don't make much of an obstacle, do they?"

There was silence again.

"I'll open the door then shall I?" I suggested.

"Yeah. That might be a good idea."

I let us in to the room. As I did I leaned over to Lione.

"You heard it too, didn't you?"

"Heard what?"

"The breathing."

"You mean, a sharp intake then a long drawn-out breath outwards?"

"Definitely."

"Then yes, I heard it too."

"What was it?"

"Well it sounded to me like a person who was shocked to see us at first then, suddenly, it all made sense."

Not for the first, or last, time I wondered how she did it.

We walked in to the room and, just as Gregory and Lione had done before, I instantly knew that something was wrong. But unlike them I knew what it was.

"It's moved."

"What has?"

I looked up at my friends who were looking at me with concern. "Guys. Did any of you move the box of colour flashing contact lenses?"

"No. Why would we?"

"That's what I thought. Plus I don't remember it being moved. So how come it has."

Last time we had left the storeroom the box had been perched on top of a pile near to the entrance. Now it was sat on top of a shallower pile near the list of pranksters.

"It's scuffed!" Lucy cried

We turned to look at her. She was staring at the list of old Pranksters.

"There, see."

There was a strange mark all down the right side of the plaque. Gregory leaned forward and drew his finger along it. Everywhere his finger went the plaque became clean again. Gregory put his finger in his mouth and tasted it.

"Custard."

"Snape can't have come here!" Lucy cried suddenly. "This is only for pranksters and if he was one he'd have a better sense of humour than he does. Plus his name isn't on the list."

"Maybe it's someone else," I suggested, doubting my own words. "If we found it someone else could. Maybe there are some new pranksters around that haven't had a chance to pull a prank yet."

"That's impossible," said Lione. "We're the only ones who know how to get here."

"They could have found the paper," said Lucy. "We did."

"That," said Lione. "Is even more impossible."

"It's not that impossible, people have been finding that piece of paper for centuries. Someone else could easily find it. All they'd have to do is open the right book."

"Or rescue it from under the right staircase," said Gregory. "It dropped down the false step, remember?"

"It's not completely impossible that someone could have got at it though," I pointed out.

"But that would mean there were other pranksters around," said Lione. "And you would have thought we'd have noticed something by now."

"Especially since we're the main competition," Gregory agreed with a hint of pride. "But none of the first years looked up to any real mischief making."

"Did we?"

"I did."

"It doesn't have to be a first year," I pointed out. "It could be anyone."

"Then why didn't they put their names on the list?" said Lucy, looking offended. "That's the first thing we did when we found it."

"Maybe they're already on it," Gregory suggested. "Could one of the old pranksters be around? How do we know that when we came along there wasn't a prankster around already? You know, in seventh year or something."

"If they were in seventh year last year they would have left already," I pointed out.

"In sixth year then."

"No," said Lucy. "I know that list off by heart and none of the people before us are still around. And before you say anything, none of the teachers are on there either. And before you say anything else I didn't leave the door open. So no one could have just wandered in without knowing how to get in."

"And why did they leave the custard anyway?" I asked.

"Maybe they're taunting us," said Lione.

We looked around at each other and shuddered. None of us liked the idea of there being a rival group of pranksters around. Especially if they knew about us and we didn't know about them.