The next morning, was the day that we knew that…Snape…ugh…was going to try and steal the Sorcerers Stone. Harry had convinced us last night that he wanted the stone for Voldemort. Ha! I said the name! We were in potions that day getting ready to take our final, and I was busy taking notes, and stealing glances at Draco. He, on the other hand, was just gazing at me instead of paying attention to what he was supposed to be doing.

"Miss Langston." Snape bellowed at the moment that I was stealing a quick glance at Draco.

I looked up at him and smiled, but it didn't even faze him.

"Show the class how to make the potion that I have just described." He said.

"Okey Dokie Smokie do the Hokey Pokey." I smiled.

I got up and put all of the ingredients needed into the cauldron, stirring it as needed, timing it just right, and then when it was done, I put it into a bottle and put a cork in it. I beamed and handed it to Professor Snape, who had realized that he hadn't caught me off guard. He was speechless, but that didn't last long…when does it ever?

"Sit down, Miss Langston." He finally said.

I took my seat, and Hermione, Ron, Harry, and Draco were beaming at me.

"10 points to Gryffindor for the best made potion I have seen in many years." Snape said suddenly. "Even Mr. Langston isn't as good as this."

I was shocked. Snape never gave out points to Gryffindors. I beamed again, remembering what he had just said about Scott, and thanked him.

"Just sit there and be quiet or I'll change my mind." Snape told me.

The rest of the class went smoothly for me, and Snape didn't call on me again.

****

While Ron, Harry, Hermione and I were walking around after one of our other finals, we heard Hagrid playing a flute, and something snapped in Harry's head.

"We have to go see Hagrid, NOW." Harry told us, and broke off into a run.

"Why?" Hermione and I asked.

"Don't you think it's odd that what Hagrid wants more than anything else is a dragon, and he just happens to get one from a stranger down at the pub?" Harry asked.

We all ran after Harry, and Hagrid stopped playing his flute and looked up at us.

"Why hullo. You got time for tea?" He asked us.

"Yes please." Ron said.

Harry shook his head. "Hagrid, we're in a hurry. What did the stranger you won Norbert off of look like?"

"I dunno. He had his hood up the whole time." Hagrid told him.

"Well, did you mention Hogwarts at all?" Harry asked.

"Not really. I did mention that after Fluffy a dragon's a piece o' cake." Hagrid said.

I knew where Harry was going. The hooded figure that had given Hagrid the dragon egg that hatched into Norbert had been Quirrell…I mean Snape…trying to figure out how to get past Fluffy, so he could get his hands on the Sorcerers Stone!

"Did he seem interested in Fluffy?" Harry asked.

Hagrid nodded. "Of course! How many three headed dogs have you seen even outside of Hogwarts? But I told him that you just play him a bit of music and he falls right to sleep…" Hagrid looked horrified. "…I shouldn't have told yeh that! Where are yeh goin'?"

"Thanks, Hagrid." I called back.

We ran into the castle, and then ran through the halls.

"We have to find Dumbledore." Harry said.

We ran into Professor McGonagall instead, though, right outside Dumbledore's office.

"We need to speak to Professor Dumbledore immediately." I told her, before Harry could.

"Well, I'm afraid that he's not here." McGonagall told us.

"Not here?" Harry asked.

"He got an urgent owl from the Ministry of Magic and left ten minutes ago." She said.

"Look, Professor, it's about the Sorcerers Stone." I told her.

She had not been expecting that. She dropped her books, and did not pick them up.

"How do you know?" She asked.

"We just do." I said.

"We know that someone is going to try and steal it." Harry added.

When we all nodded, she seemed to calm down slightly, and she picked the books up off of the floor.

"I don't know how you four came to this conclusion, but be rest assured that it is well guarded. Now go out and enjoy the sunshine." She told us, hurrying down the hall.

Needless to say that we did not go out into the sunshine.

"Snape is going to steal the Stone tonight. He knows all that he needs to know, and now Dumbledore is out of the way. We have to be ready tonight." Harry told us.

We all turned around. Snape was standing there.

"Good afternoon." He said.

We just stared at him. I tried to smile, but it failed.

"You shouldn't be inside on a day like this." He told us.

"We were just…" Harry began.

"People will think you're…up to something." He said.

"We'll go outside now, Professor." I said sweetly.

Snape seemed to soften, but then remembered that we were Gryffindors.

"Any more nighttime wanderings, and I'll personally make sure that you're all expelled." Snape told us as we headed out of the school.

"We need a plan." I said, once we were on the steps.

"Hermione, go watch Snape. Just hang out outside of the Teacher's Lounge." Harry told her.

"Why me?" She asked.

"Isn't it obvious? You can pretend you're waiting for Flitwick. You know, because you're afraid you got a question wrong." Ron said.

I nudged him lightly.

"Shut up." Hermione told him, but agreed to go.

"Ron and I will wait out on the third floor." Harry said.

I smiled. "Well, I'm going with Hermione."

Harry smiled, and the four of us went off to do our thing. Hermione and I were waiting outside of the Teacher's Lounge when Snape showed up.

"What are you two doing here?" Snape asked us.

"Well…" I began.

"We were looking for Professor Flitwick." Hermione told him.

Snape smiled. "I will get him for you."

Snape disappeared inside and brought Flitwick out for us. Hermione and I hadn't expected that.

"Um…" Hermione said.

"We were afraid that we may have done something wrong on the exam. It's driving us insane." I explained.

Flitwick told us that Hermione had gotten 112% on her exam and I had scored 115%.

"There is no reason why you two should worry. You're the brightest First Years that I've seen in many years." Flitwick told us.

We blushed, and went off to the Commons, where we found Ron and Harry. They told us about their encounter with McGonagall, and we told them about ours with Snape and Flitwick.

"She would take points from her own house?" I asked.

"You got 115%?" Ron asked me.

Hermione nodded. "And I got 112%."

"She was furious." Harry answered me.

"We're not on the same topic." I said.

"We have to go and stop Snape tonight." Harry managed to say.

We gasped.

"But after what McGonagall and Snape said? We'll get expelled for sure if we're caught!" Hermione exclaimed.

"Then we can't get caught." I told her.

"But can all four of us fit under Harry's invisibility cloak?" Ron asked.

"All four of us?" Harry asked.

"Well, we're certainly not letting you go alone!" I cried.

Harry smiled at us, and we decided to meet up later that night.

****

That night, Hermione and I grabbed dark sweaters and skirts. We sat out in the commons away from Harry and Ron, and started flipping through books that might have enchantments in it that we would possibly have to break. Harry had his flute that Hagrid had given him for Christmas, because he hadn't felt like singing.

After a little bit, Ron grabbed the cloak, and the four us were heading out, when Neville came out of the shadows and stood in front of us.

"What are you doing?" Neville asked us.

"Nothing. Nothing at all." Harry said, putting the cloak behind his back.

"You're going out again." Neville said.

I smiled. "No we're not. What makes you think that?"

"You're going to get Gryffindor in trouble again. I won't let you." Neville protested. "Besides, you're always telling me to stand up to people."

Ron blushed. "I didn't mean us."

"I'll…I'll fight you." Neville said. "Even you, Lana."

"Neville…when we fought when we were younger, who always won?" I asked him.

"You." Neville said slowly. "But I'll fight you."

I turned to Hermione. "Should you, or should I?"

Hermione took out her wand.

"Neville, I'm really sorry about this. Petrificus Totalus!" Hermione said.

Neville went stiff as a board and fell to the ground. I hurried over and turned him over. He was looking at us in horror.

"It's just a full body bind." I assured them.

"I'm sorry, Neville." Hermione said, the first to leave.

"Really sorry, Neville." Harry said.

"We'll explain everything when we get back." I told him.

"It's for your own good, you know." Ron said.

We all got underneath the invisibility cloak, and hurried to the third floor, where we opened the door that led to the room, which held Fluffy. Ron wanted to kick Mrs. Norris down the stairs, at which point I covered his mouth and stomped on his foot. He cringed in pain.

When we got in there, Harry put the flute to his lips, but really wasn't playing a tune, so I took it from him. Three years of flute lessons should pay off. I played a soft lullaby for Fluffy, and he fell off to sleep. Then we went through the trap door, landing on a strange plant of some kind.

"Lucky this plant was here." Ron said.

"Lucky?" Hermione asked.

The plant began to move, and bind us all. We all began to struggle, except Hermione, who sat still, and then fell beneath the plant.

"You have to relax!" She called. "If you don't, it'll only kill you faster!"

"Kill us faster?!? Oh! Now we can relax!" Ron cried.

I took Hermione's advice and then landed beside her, and Harry followed along again. Ron was not relaxing.

"Stop moving, Ron!" I called.

"It's Devil's Snare! Let me think." Hermione said. "Professor Sprout had said something about Devil's Snare liking the damp and dark."

"And not the light…" I said.

"That's it! Lumos!" She cried.

A bright light came from her wand, and then Ron came tumbling down. He brushed himself off and looked around.

"Lucky we didn't panic." He said.

"Lucky Hermione paid attention in Herbology." Harry told him.

We pushed on, and came to a large room that was filled with little flapping things, and a broom in a spotlight. There was a door on the other side of the room, and Ron and Hermione ran for it, but Harry and I gazed at the broom.

"Alohomora!" Ron yelled, trying the door. It wouldn't budge.

"You have to get the key…" I said slowly.

Harry looked up. "Those are the keys."

"We're looking for an old one." Ron told us.

****

"That one, there! The one with the broken wing!" Harry cried.

"Go get it Harry." I told him.

I joined Hermione and Ron at the door, and we watched as Harry went after the key. It was at a loss, though, and Hermione, Ron and I saw the other brooms. We mounted them, and all went after the key from different sides. Harry finally caught the key, and we all went through the door and shut it.

It was pitch black. We walked on a little more, and then light flooded the room and we couldn't believe our eyes. It was a giant chessboard.

"What are we going to do?" Hermione asked.

"We have to play our way across." Ron told us.

"Great." I muttered.

"Now no offense, but none of you are very good at chess…except Lana, who beat me when I challenged her. We're going to have to take the place of four black pieces, and I'll be in charge of moving things." Ron said.

"All right." Hermione, Harry and I agreed.

I became the Queen, Hermione was the Kingside Castle, Harry was the Kingside Bishop, and Ron was a Knight.

"Do you think that this will be like real wizard's chess?" Hermione asked before we began.

"Let's see." Ron said.

He ordered a pawn to move adjacent to an opposite pawn, and the pawn got up and destroyed ours. We all gulped.

"Yes, Hermione, this is exactly like wizard's chess." He said.

We played our way around until Ron and I saw the only way to win the game.

"I won't let you Ron." I told him.

"What?" Harry asked.

"I have to sacrifice myself." Ron said slowly.

"Ron, no! You can't!" Hermione cried.

"Look, you guys have to go and get Snape. Now let me do this." Ron told us.

Ron moved the Knight in front of the Queen, and she took her sword, and stabbed the horse, throwing Ron off. Hermione and I wanted to help him but Harry yelled at us.

"Don't move! We're still playing." Harry said.

He put the King in Checkmate, and then the three of us ran to Ron. He was unconscious.

"I'll stay with him." Hermione said. "You and Lana keep going."

I ran my fingers over Ron's forehead. "Be careful, Hermione."

She nodded.

"We have two trials left to go. We've done Sprout's, Flitwick's and McGonagall's, which leaves Snape's and Quirrell's." I told Harry. "Hermione and I have been figuring it all out along the way."

"Just hurry, you two." Hermione said.

Harry and I went on through the next door, and saw a dead Troll. It was obviously Quirrell's trial. The smell was too much to handle. We moved on, and came to Snape's trial, which was a room with weird bottles. Once we stepped into it, purple fire blocked the exit we had come through, and black fire blocked the exit that we wanted to go through.

"What do we have to do?" Harry asked.

"Here's a piece of parchment." I told him.

I picked up a piece of parchment off of a table and read it out loud:

Danger lies before you, while safety lies behind,

Two of us will help you, whichever you will find,

One among us seven will let you move ahead,

Another will transport the drinker back instead,

Two among our number hold only nettle wine,

Three of us are killers, waiting hidden in line.

Choose, unless you wish to stay here forevermore,

To help you in your choice, we give you these clues four:

First, however slyly the poison tries to hide

You will always find some on nettle wine's left side;

Second, different are those who stand at either end,

But if you would move onward, neither is your friend;

Third, as you see clearly, all are different size,

Neither Dwarf nor giant holds death in their insides;

Fourth, the second left and the second on the right

Are twins once you taste them, though different at first sight.

I sighed. "It's a logic puzzle. Okay, so this is going to take some thinking. Everything that we need is here on this paper. Seven bottles: three are poison, two are wine, one will get us safely through the black fire, and the other safely through the purple."

"But which is which?" Harry asked.

I looked at the paper. "The smallest one will get you through the black flames."

Harry picked it up and looked at it. "It's only enough for one of us to go through, it's not even a swallow."

I smiled. "Then you're going by yourself, I suppose. This one will get me back through to Hermione and Ron."

I picked up a rounded bottle from the table, and then, with tears in my eyes, I hugged Harry tightly.

"Be careful, Harry. I don't want anything to happen to you." I told him. "You're a great wizard."

"Not as great as you and Hermione." He said, blushing.

"We're just book smart. You're the brave one, and your friendly to everyone." I told him. "Just be careful, Harry."

I drank the contents in the rounded bottle, and shuddered.

"It's not poison?" Harry asked.

I shook my head. "But it feels like ice. I should leave before it wears off."

Harry nodded, and with on last glance, I turned and found Hermione and Ron.

"We have to get onto the brooms and go back the way that we came." I told her.

Hermione nodded. "Is Harry going to be all right?"

I nodded. "We didn't have to fight the Troll, and the potion was easy. Now, I'll carry Ron, and then we need to go to the Owlery and send Hedwig to Dumbledore."

I picked up Ron and mounted the broom. Hermione and I dropped Ron off with Madam Pomfrey, and then sent an urgent letter to Dumbledore before wringing our hands waiting to hear from Harry.