Colin raced into the Hufflepuff common room. "I've got it, I've got it!" He waved Harold Hightower's History of Magical Artifacts at Maisie. "I was just about to give up for the night when I found it, right at the back!"

She gave him a meaningful look, and then glanced pointedly around the room, which was full of students, many of whom were now watching Colin curiously. Oh.

"Um. Professor Binns will have to give me an 'O' for my essay if I include a reference to the Midnight Manacles!"

Curiosity and interest vanished as quickly at the mention of Professor Binns as they did in his classroom.

"Great, Colin," Maisie said a little too loudly. She pushed the cards in front of her across the table to the other students. "One of you, play my cards. I'm not having any luck tonight, and I'm sick of getting my fingertips singed."

Colin waited until she'd casually wandered out of the room in the direction of her dormitory, counted to five, and followed her.

She was waiting in the corridor. "What is it?"

"Look." He opened the book and leafed through it to chapter thirty-seven. "It's here." He held the page so she could see the note inked in the margin in sharp and spiky handwriting. "All Seekers seek the Quidditch Key, for its enchantment attracts the Snitch to the key-bearer."

"Oh," Maisie said. She wrinkled her nose. "Seekers."

"But Maisie, don't you see? With the Key, you could be on the team as a Seeker, not a Beater."

"But I don't want to —"

"Mike, then, for Ravenclaw, if he can keep his broom under control. Didn't you say that what matters is that one of us, a first year, shows that we're as good as the older students? What does it matter if you do it as a Seeker or a Beater? You'd be on the team!"

"I suppose," Maisie said. "It does feel a bit like cheating, though. I'd only be pretending to be good enough." She set her jaw. "And I really am good enough, as a Beater."

"I know you are," Colin said. "We all know you are. But this is more important than that, isn't it? It's about our whole year, not just Hufflepuff. All the first year students, having to listen to the sixth and seventh years go on about the Battle of Hogwarts as if they won it single-handed and I bet not a one of them actually fought or anything or were even in Dumbledore's Army!"

Maisie still looked doubtful. "You do it, then. We'll find the Key, and you be the Seeker, and I can still be a Beater when the handle grease infusion is finished."

Colin snorted. "You've seen me on a broom. Even Gran couldn't teach me to stay on, and she sits a broom like she was glued to it. No-one would believe for a second that I wasn't cheating. But you're a good flier, everyone already knows you are." He changed tack. "Look. Let's just see if we can find it. Then we can hand it in, if you want. That would be almost as good as getting on the team, wouldn't it? Everyone knowing that three first-year students found something the Hogwarts Professors couldn't?"

"That would be good," Maisie admitted. "Alright. Professor Granger said it was on the fifth floor, didn't she?"

"Yes, but they might have found it already and moved it, to the dungeons."

"Then there's no point looking, is there?" Maisie pointed out. "If the idea is to show we can find it when they couldn't. So we should assume they haven't found it. Besides, if it's a real key, then it wasn't what Professor Potter was carrying, was it? He'd just put in a pocket or something. Does the book say anything else?"

Colin shook his head. "No. The whole chapter is on enchanted keys, but old Hightower didn't write anything about our key."

Maisie gave a decisive nod. "Right. Then tomorrow, we tell Mike what we know, and tomorrow night we all meet up on the fifth floor and start looking."

"What if there's something dangerous up there?" Colin asked.

"This is a school, Colin," Maisie said patiently. "They'd never let anything really dangerous run around loose. There'll be ghosts, and possibly a Boggart — which Mike can deal with — and probably Filch and Mrs Norris if we're not careful enough. That's it."

It sounded entirely manageable in Maisie's matter-of-fact voice, but as Colin crept up the staircase to the fifth floor the next night, it felt a great deal less so. In fact it felt like another one of Maisie's totally mad ideas, but for once, Colin couldn't blame anyone but himself for the lunacy he was about to embark on.

This was your mad idea.

That being the case, he absolutely could not flee back down the stairs to the safety of the brightly lit main corridors far, far below. No matter how much I want to.

"Colin, come on!" Maisie hissed at him. "It's a bloody staircase, not Everest!"

He scrambled up the last steps. "A staircase with trick steps," he pointed out. "That moves about intermittently. And —"

"Yes, alright, it's a staircase though, isn't it? Have you seen Mike?"

Colin stared at her. "He left dinner before I did. He isn't here?" Maisie shook her head. "Do you think something's happened to him? Should we tell a teacher he's missing?"

"We're missing," Maisie said patiently. "He probably went to get his homework done first. You know Mike." She leaned over the balustrade a little further than Colin considered safe. "Look, he's down there. On his way up."

Colin tugged her back by her robe. "I'll take your word for it. Any sign of Filch?"

"I passed Mrs Norris on the third floor, so he's probably down there."

Colin frowned. "Don't they usually split up, to cover more ground?" He looked around apprehensively. "Did you hear that?"

"What?" Maisie asked. She leaned forward again and waved at Mike.

"A footstep, or something. I'm sure I heard it."

"You're imagining it."

"But what if it's Filch?"

"If it was Filch, I would have heard it. He stamps around. Mrs Norris is the quiet one."

Mike came panting up the last flight of stairs. "Sorry I'm late. I had to listen to three of Professor Flitwick's stories before I could get away." He produced a slightly squashed cupcake from beneath his robes. "I did manage to pocket this, though, if you're hungry."

Maisie took it, divided it neatly in two, and handed half to Colin. "Did he catch you on your way out?"

Mike shook his head. "No, I went to see him. I thought there were probably useful charms for looking for hidden things, and there were." He took out his wand. "Look. Lumos." The tip of his wand began to glow, casting a soft blue light over the landing.

"What happens if Filch spots it?" Colin asked.

"Nox," Mike said, and the light vanished. "And there's one more, too — it's called Revelio, you know, like Madam Weasley cast on the two Maisies?"

"Pretended to cast," Colin corrected. "She knew it wouldn't work."

"Yes, but the point is, it reveals spells. Professor Flitwick showed it to me, and I think I've got the hang of it. So if there's a hidden door or something, I can probably find it."

"Brilliant, Mike," Maisie said. "I was going to suggest we split up —" Colin opened his mouth to object, then shut it again as she went on, "but you're the most useful one of us. I think we should stick together. Start on one side, and just work our way around."

In the end, to everyone's surprise including his, it was Colin who found the relevant doorway. They were working their way down the west corridor, opening all the doors and peering inside, while Mike cast Revelio on every blank wall, when Colin found a door that wouldn't open.

He gave the handle a rattle. "Locked."

"Let me," Mike said. "Alohomora!"

Something clicked inside the door, and when Colin tried the handle again, it turned. Gulping a little, he eased the door open, Maisie and Mike peering over his shoulder.

It was another corridor, long and narrow, with only one other doorway at the very opposite end. Apart from that doorway, and a statue of some sort near it, the corridor was empty.

"Come on," Maisie said, pushing past Colin.

"Lumos!" Mike's wand began to glow, and he followed Maisie, holding it high. Colin brought up the rear, pulling the door almost closed behind them, in case of Filch or Mrs Norris. In the wandlight, he could see the statue more clearly: a woman in some sort of armour, holding a sword with its tip between her feet and her hands folded on the hilt. There was something written on the wall above her, and he squinted, trying to make it out. Woe … betide …who …

Maisie pointed at the other door. "It —"

Colin read disturbs, and clapped his hand over Maisie's mouth. With his mouth right by her ear, he murmured as quietly as he could, "Woe betide who disturbs my sleep." He released her, and pointed to the engraved warning.

She nodded her understanding, and began to tiptoe towards the door at the far end of the corridor.

And hiccoughed.

She put both hands over her mouth, eyes wide, as all three of them froze. Nothing happened, and after a long moment they all began to creep forward again. They made it three more steps before Mike hiccoughed. A second later, so did Colin, and then Maisie again, the loud HIC making it past her muffling hands.

And the statue came to life.

"WHO DARES DISTURB MY REST?" she roared in a surprisingly deep baritone voice.

"Um, we — hic — are sorry," Mike said. "Rea-hic-lly sorry."

The statute raised her sword, which was now on fire. "WHO DARES DISTURB MY REST?"

"Maisie," Colin said, through the hiccoughs that were coming thick and fast now. "I think we should go."

She set her jaw, the effect of her determined expression a little ruined by the hiccough that forced its way past her firmly compressed lips. "We're three — hic — students who wa-hic-nt —"

Suddenly, the statute was swooping towards them, blazing sword held high above her head. "WHO DARES DISTURB MY REST!"

Mike and Colin ran. Maisie held her ground slightly longer, but when Colin yanked open the door and he and Mike piled through it, she was just behind them. Together they slammed the door and put their backs to it.

"Why did you have to get the hiccoughs?" Mike panted.

"You got them too!" she snapped.

"We all got them," Colin said. "Was it Professor Flitwick's cupcakes?"

Mike shook his head. "All they do is do a little dance for the students." He paused. "But you're right, Colin. We all got them, and they've stopped. Something in there gave them to us."

Colin nodded. "A two stage trap. Sound wakes up the statute, and something in the corridor forces you to make a sound."

"Probably Hungarian Hiccoughing Gas," Maisie said. "You can get it from Weaselys' Wheezes, my brother thinks it's the height of humour."

Mike's forehead wrinkled. "Why would you use something from a joke shop making protections for a powerful magical object?"

"Maybe they didn't," Colin suggested. "I mean, there might be something else in there too, fire or something, that's the real trap. The Hiccoughing Gas might have been accidental."

"How do you accidentally release a gag gas in a locked secret corridor?" Maisie asked.

Colin shrugged. "Maybe they set it off somewhere else and there's an air-vent or something and it just drifted in there."

"Either way, it's there now. There's no way to get to that other door without waking the statute," Maisie said.

"There is, though," Mike said slowly. "Colin … remember the Boggart day?"

Colin shuddered. "I certainly do." He'd been so terrified sneaking into the storeroom as soon as Professor Granger had left the room he'd almost rather have faced another Boggart. Thank Merlin Mike's charm against her theft-detection spells worked.

"The lesson, that day, remember? Learning the theory behind the Solution to Hiccoughs."

"I wasn't really paying attention," Colin said. "Having, you know, other things on my mind."

"Well, I was." Mike grinned. "And I reckon I could brew it, too. It's not that complicated."

"We'd still need to get the ingredients," Maisie said.

"I am not getting another Boggart," Colin said flatly.

"That's the brilliant thing," Mike said. "The ingredients are almost the same as Cinderjuice, it's just the order and Flobberworm mucus that's different. All we have to do is find Professor Granger's teaching assistant and tell him we really want to learn to brew Cinderjuice, like he was going to teach us to, and just 'waste' some of the ingredients."

"This is the same teaching assistant we accused of attacking Professor Granger and being about to kill us?" Colin said. "That one? The scary one with all the House point deductions and the glare?"

"Professor Granger said he had an odd sense of humour. That was probably all jokes."

Maisie snorted — at least, it had to be Maisie, even though it didn't sound much like her, because when Colin looked around quickly there was no-one else there.

"Even if they were jokes, we have no idea where he is," Colin pointed out. "Professor Granger said he was recluse, or whatever. Scarred. Never saw anyone."

"I think we might know where he is, actually," Maisie said slowly. "Remember that night we saw the three of them going into one of the doors in the dungeon corridor? I asked one of the prefects what was down in that part of the dungeons, and she said, it's where the Potions Professor used to live, but the door is locked now with wards no-one can break."

"So?"

"So I know he must live around there somewhere, because when the Boggart came —"

"When you brought it into the school and let it out," Mike corrected.

Maisie dismissed that with a wave of her hand. "He turned up, like, right away. Right after Professor Granger did. Before Professor Potter. So I bet he's in the old Potions Professor's rooms, and that's who they were visiting that night."

"So all we have to do is find a way past unbreakable wards that have defeated everyone else in Hogwarts and probably Ministry Aurors as well, and persuade someone completely scary and absolutely terrifying that we want to brew a really difficult potion and then pocket some of the ingredients under his nose," Colin said. "Are you listening to yourself?"

Maisie shrugged. "We can always just knock on his door."

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Author's note: And how badly can this go wrong?