Chapter 20 – Exams, Finally

The next few days went by mostly without incidents. The exams were less than a week away so homework had stopped being handed out, only to be replaced with more revision. Not needing to revise as much as anyone else, given that she could remember most of her notes by heart, Emma went back to exploring every night. She had also been taking extra special care since Hermione's torture.

It was a Wednesday night, a few hours after their Astronomy lesson had finished and Emma was sitting up on the seventh floor of the castle, under a tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy. He had apparently earned the moniker for trying to teach trolls ballet, but that wasn't why she was here. It was because this part of the castle was hiding something.

All along this corridor there were portraits and tapestries lining the walls, except where Emma sat. In this segment of the corridor, separated by pilasters, was Barnabas' lone tapestry and the opposite wall segment was blank. It was so obviously a place for a hidden door, but it had resisted all her attempts to divine it. She had asked some of the nearby portraits, tapped the wall in various places and she had even tried saying different phrases to the tapestry, all to no avail.

She sat there, under the tapestry, facing the blank wall, occasionally glaring and hissing at it, getting more and more frustrated. She'd tried all of her recent ideas and none of them had worked. She was about to give up and try her luck elsewhere when she heard footsteps approach her. It was roughly four o'clock in the morning in a very secluded part of the castle, so nobody should be around.

Emma had just made herself not noticeable when Quirrell rounded the corner. She had no idea why he was still in the castle. It made her wonder what Dumbledore was doing. Had she not proven his guilt with her memory.

'You can't hide from me, little one.' he smirked.

'What do you want?' asked Emma, exasperated, before pulling her t-shirt over her nose.

'To offer you a deal.' he said silkily, moving forward.

Emma's eyebrows raised at him in curiosity before she held up her hand, palm toward him.

'If you want me to be able to listen, keep your distance.' she said angrily. 'Don't know why I should listen anyway, after all you've put me through. You know, you nearly got me killed last time.'

Quirrell stopped and then looked at her expectantly. Emma wasn't sure what to do. She was scared and she was afraid to show it. He seemed to want something from her, most likely because she was a vampire. That could be the only reason to approach her. Maybe she'd been persuasive enough with her lies last time to make Quirrell think she could be trusted, so she decided, again, to play the role of wronged, independent vampire, to get more answers, and more evidence to give to Dumbledore.

'Fine.' she said, feigning boredom. 'What do you want?'

'I want you to kill Harry Potter.'

As much as Emma knew it was a stupid thing to do, she laughed at him. Both aspects of herself found it incredibly funny. The persona that she'd fallen into mocked him for thinking she would do it, especially after she'd already told him that Dumbledore was considering giving her to the ministry. Emma also thought he must be getting very desperate indeed if he was trying to get a child to do his dirty work, albeit a vampire child.

'Some deal.' mocked Emma, sarcastically. 'I kill Potter and the ministry executes me. You must think so little of me.'

'Once Potter is out of the way, and I have gotten what I came for, you may come with us. We will protect you. You will be free to feed wherever you wish.' he said, smoothly. 'You won't be here for long, either way. The school will be throwing you out for being a squib, or maybe Dumbledore will give you to the ministry anyway.'

Emma had to admit, the persona she was playing would probably consider the deal, if it wasn't to kill Harry, but she knew better. Quirrell was dying, and once Voldemort got hold of the stone, his death was certain. He was nothing more than a tool to Voldemort, a means to an end. It would be the same for Emma.

'So, I kill Potter, you get the Philosopher's Stone, and we all live happily ever after?'

Quirrell's eyes bulged and his calm exterior faded, suddenly worried.

'What?' smiled Emma, happy at his confusion. 'You thought you were alone when Snape confronted you in the forest? And you said I couldn't hide from you.'

His expression returned to normal with some difficulty, but Emma spoke again before he could reply.

'I'll think about it. It would be nice to try human blood for once.' she mused, calmly. 'What is my deadline?'

'The evening on the last day of the exams.' replied Quirrell, finally smirking again before returning the way he had come. 'I look forward to your answer.'

'He's so gullible.' thought Emma. 'No wonder Voldemort managed to possess him.'

Emma felt better after that discussion than the previous one. At least she was still alive. She stayed where she was, letting her adrenaline run its course and processed what happened.

She needed to get the memory to Dumbledore as soon as possible, so Emma made her way to the gargoyle on the second floor, but the password had been changed. The next choice was Professor McGonagall, but that would have to wait until morning.

Emma made her way to McGonagall's office and sat outside. She waited until about ten minutes passed six, listening intently to the clock in the office before she knocked on the door. McGonagall was already moving about her room so the door opened almost immediately, and she looked as stern as ever. She made a point of checking the clock on the wall after seeing that it was Emma at the door.

'What seems to be the trouble, Miss Pearson?' she asked, letting Emma in and indicating for her to sit.

'I need to get a message to Professor Dumbledore, Professor. It's urgent. I tried to deliver it last night, but I wasn't able to get into his office because he changed the password.'

'Yes, he changes it frequently.' said McGonagall, looking suspicious. 'Why don't you owl it to him?'

'It's not that kind of message, Professor.' said Emma.

She summoned an empty flask from across the room before extracting the memory and dropping it into the glass.

'Professor Dumbledore needs to see this as soon as possible.' pleaded Emma. 'Please, it's urgent.'

'This is most peculiar.' scowled McGonagall, still suspicious. 'What exactly is so important about that memory?'

Emma wasn't sure what to say. She would have lied, but felt that the truth would probably be more persuasive.

'It's a memory of Professor Quirrell asking me to kill Harry.'

McGonagall's shocked expression lasted longer than Emma thought it would. It seemed as if Dumbledore hadn't told her about Quirrell and Voldemort. She eventually pursed her lips as she held out her hand to take the memory from Emma.

'I will see that Professor Dumbledore gets this immediately.' she said, sternly. 'Would you like to accompany me?'

'No, thank you, Professor.' replied Emma, emphatically. 'I'm going back to the common room and I'm not going to let Harry out of my sight!'

At that, Professor McGonagall finally smiled. She gave Emma ten house points before leaving for Dumbledore's office.

When Emma got back to the common room, she told Hermione everything. They had decided that they wouldn't tell Harry or Ron what happened, given that it wouldn't make sense without also telling them about Emma. She just wasn't ready for them to know yet. Instead, Emma said that she had overheard Quirrell saying he would try to take the stone on the night after the last exam. It seemed a good enough compromise given that they had already told Harry that Quirrell was being possessed by Voldemort. They felt that he deserved to know, given that Voldemort tried to kill him as a child, however, it seemed to make him really nervous and agitated, and he complained about his scar hurting more often. Emma and Hermione began to wonder if they'd done the right thing in telling him.

For the rest of the week, Emma kept a close eye on Harry. It was fairly easy as they had all the same lessons, and spent most of their time in the library or common room. The only difficult part was when he went down to breakfast or dinner. She ended up just watching him and Quirrell from the entrance hall.

As for Quirrell, he was still around. Dumbledore hadn't gotten back to her about the memory either and she was really beginning to question his competence. Hermione and Emma went back and forth, wondering how they should respond to Quirrell's deal. They both agreed that no matter the answer, he'd kill Emma eventually, however, saying no would make it happen sooner, rather than later. In the end, Emma sent Quirrell an owl saying that she would go through with it after the final exam. She made a point of stressing that it was purely in the interest of self preservation, insisting that she felt it was the only way he would keep up his end of the bargain.

Of course, Emma had no intention of killing Harry, or anyone for that matter, but it gave them a week to make up a plan. They knew, after all, that he was going to steal the stone on the night of the last exam.

As for the exams themselves, Emma thought that they went very well. Every subject had a theory test, and some, including Potions, Charms, Transfiguration and Defence Against the Dark Arts, had practical components.

After taking on board what McGonagall had said about the results being private, she decided to do her best, instead of aiming for Acceptable in everything. She thought she did reasonably well in Herbology and History of Magic, especially considering her notes for those subjects were lacklustre, and she even surprised herself at how well she thought she did in Astronomy and Defence Against the Dark Arts. As she expected, she felt that she had done very well in Charms and even Potions, despite Snape breathing down their necks the whole time they were making a Forgetfulness potion. Transfiguration, however, was the only exam that disappointed her. She felt that she did very well on the theory, but obviously failed abysmally when she was asked to turn a mouse into a snuff-box. She knew the wand movement and the incantation and performed them both perfectly, but absolutely nothing happened.

'That was far easier than I thought it would be,' said Hermione after their last exam, History of Magic, and Emma nodded in agreement. 'I needn't have learned about the 1637 Werewolf Code of Conduct or the uprising of Elfric the Eager.'

Emma and Hermione kept chatting about the exams, how well they thought they did and went over individual questions all the while trying to ignore Ron's grumblings that it made him feel ill.

They were heading toward the grounds outside, given that it was, apparently, a very warm day when Emma suddenly stopped. They had just gotten to the front door of the castle when the glaring light from the high midday sun filled Emma's vision. It was blinding, painfully so, and her skin felt like it had been covered in a rather aggressive variant of itching powder. She realised that this was the first time she'd actually been outside in direct sunlight in months. She had spent most of her recent daylight hours indoors, and the few times she did go outside, usually to Herbology, it was overcast. It was quite a shock to her system, though it was nothing compared with garlic, and it certainly wasn't enough to stop her from joining the others, but it was still incredibly unpleasant. It was with this reminder that she was a vampire that she thought about her deal with Quirrell and realised they were all out of time.