Chapter 14: A Mystery Solved

In the wake of the disastrous potions class, my roommates had new material to torture me with. When I went up to bed that night, they'd painted a big red 'T' on my bedspread, representing 'Troll', the absolute worst grade a person could get.

It wasn't a huge deal. One quick spell and the paint was gone, and I was pulling the curtains shut so that they wouldn't see my tears. What upset me was the humiliation. Sure, it wasn't technically my fault that I'd failed the potions assignment. In fact, I'd brewed a perfect potion, and someone had simply tampered with it. But I was still ashamed of myself.

If I'd only realized that Lavender had added extra horklump juice, I could have thrown in some lionfish spines and at least stopping the bubbling. The potion would still have been orange – it would have taken another half hour of careful heating and stirring to bring back the green color – but we might have at least gotten part-marks.

Harry and Ron didn't understand. They understood that I was upset of course. And they comforted me as best they could. But they didn't truly get why this was so upsetting for me.

"One zero will hardly affect your average," Ron assured me. "I've gotten tons of zeros, and I'm still passing the year."

"You know you know how to brew the potion," Harry said. "You'll be fine on the exam in June.

But none of that was the point. I didn't care about exams; I knew I'd pass those with flying colors. And my goal wasn't just to pass the year, it was to be the best. How could I be the best with a zero?

While Harry and Ron weren't too great at the reassuring, they were very good at the distracting. Ron challenged me to more chess games, which I was still losing, but losing less badly, which I considered progress. Harry invited me to come watch his Quidditch practices, which I did, though I didn't find it nearly as entertaining as Ron apparently did. We visited with Hagrid a few times, and by the end of the following week, I was barely thinking about my zero at all, apart from when Lavender and the other girls would bring it up in the dorm, which they did less and less as I stopped giving them the reaction they wanted.

A few weeks later, I was playing a game of chess with Ron, when suddenly Harry had the breakthrough, we'd all been waiting for with Flamel. He remembered him from Dumbledore's chocolate frog card. After reading it, I knew exactly where to look for him, and realized excitedly that I had just the book up in my dorm.

Nicolas Flamel was an alchemist. He'd created the Philosopher's Stone. Which had to be the item that the giant three-headed dog was guarding. It was no wonder Professor Snape wanted it. Unlimited riches and immortality were a pretty attractive combination.

For a moment, I felt vindicated. Finally, we'd solved the puzzle. But then I started to wonder what we were supposed to do next. We put all this effort into figuring it out, and now we knew Snape was trying to steal this extremely valuable object. We had to do something about it, but we were first years. There wasn't much we could do. And we couldn't exactly tell an adult, like I normally would, because we weren't supposed to know about any of this.

Over the next few days, I found myself keeping an extra close eye on Professor Snape. I don't know what I was hoping to notice. It wasn't as though he was acting any different than usual.

I decided not to go so far as to stalk him, though I did find myself wandering up to the third floor more often than usual. That is, until Mr. Filch caught me hovering near the door that led to the right-hand side corridor and told me to scram.

"Look, last time he tried to get the stone, he had to let a troll in as a diversion," Harry pointed out to me one evening. "So as long as nothing crazy is happening, we don't have anything to worry about. When the next big catastrophe hits Hogwarts, that's when we go head him off."

"Or tip off an adult," I said. "We're just first years. Snape could take the three of us out in a second."

So, we waited. But as the days passed, and nothing exciting happened, thoughts of Snape and the Philosopher's Stone migrating to the backs of our minds and other things came to the forefront.

For one thing, Harry had his next Quidditch game coming up, and Snape was refereeing. It was strange that Madam Hooch wasn't doing it, and after what had happened at the last game, this was not a good development.

For another thing, Lavender and the other girls were still mocking and teasing me mercilessly, and I was starting to reach the end of my rope. I'd taken the laughter and ridicule all through primary school, and then again through most of this year. But first year was going to be over soon, and I wasn't about to let them continue on like this for another six years.

So the night before the big Quidditch match, I said my goodnights to Harry and Ron early and stalked up to the dorm, a plan in mind.

When I entered the dorm, Lavender and Parvati were seated on Parvati's bed while Sally-Anne and Lily stood on the floor behind them braiding their hair. Upon my arrival, all conversation and hair braiding came to a stop and the four girls turned to look at me.

"You're back early," Parvati said snidely. "Did Harry and Ron finally come to their senses and realize that you're way to lame to hang out with them?"

"Actually Parvati, I came to have a word with you," I said, my voice hard. I didn't let her comment get to me. I knew she was only jealous, and I was about to exploit that. "I came to have a word with you all, actually."

"Oh?" Lily said, dropping Lavender's hair and crossing her arms in front of her, like a challenge.

"That's right," I nodded, desperately trying not to lose my nerve. "All these comments and snide remarks that you make to me? I'm putting an end to that tonight."

"You and what army?" Lavender demanded, testing me.

I crossed my arms defiantly. "Look, you all know I'm friends with Harry Potter. And while he may not exert his influence all the time, if at all, he could if he wanted to. He could ruin each and every one of your reputations with just one word to the right person."

"Is that a threat?" Sally-Anne cried.

"You bet it is!" I said, my Gryffindor courage roaring. "Now I don't care if you don't like me. I don't care if you ignore me. I don't care if you never say a nice thing about me as long as I live. But I'm through with being teased and laughed at. I'm through with being sabotaged. I'm through with being treated like a piece of crap just because I'm a little different than you all."

"Who made you the queen of this dorm?" Lavender demanded.

"Nobody's queen of anything," I insisted. "I'm just asking for a little bit of respect."

"She's bluffing," Parvati said. "Harry's not going to do anything."

"Try me," I said calmly.

The girls exchanged nervous looks amongst themselves. I could tell that they wanted to believe I was bluffing but weren't confident enough to commit to it. And the truth was, while this was a partial bluff, since I hadn't mentioned anything to Harry, I felt pretty sure that he would do it if I asked him the right way.

"Fine," Lavender finally said, as the four girls all turned back towards me. "We accept your terms. But just know, that you've just blown your chances of ever being friends with any of us."

"Like that was ever going to happen," I rolled me eyes. "I'll be in the bathroom."

"Whatever," Lavender responded.

I grabbed my bathroom kit and crossed the landing to our shared bathroom, letting out a breath of relief once the door closed behind me. Of all the things I'd ever done, including facing a three-headed dog, and almost getting expelled for being caught outside the dorm after curfew, standing up to my dormmates had been the most stressful.

But I'd done it, and I'd succeeded. And hopefully things would be a bit more tolerable gong forward.

The next day was Harry's second Quidditch match. Ron and I brought our wands with us, prepared for anything that might happen. However, to our relief, Professor Dumbledore was in attendance, and nothing notable happened besides Ron getting into a fight with some of the Slytherins and getting a rather nasty cut on his cheek.

When Harry returned after the game, he had some chilling news about Professor Snape and the stone. Namely that Professor Quirrell seemed to be the only person currently standing in his way. It wasn't very reassuring, but there was no time to dwell on it. There was something else coming up that was going to require our full attention from here on out.

Exams were coming.