Chapter 32

Landen's POV

I run into the Heads common room and tip toe past a sleeping Eli and Brittney rush into Ariana's room, flinging the door open as I do. "Ariana!"

She stirs a bit, pulling a pillow over her head, but she doesn't wake up so I run over and jump onto her bed, grabbing her shoulders and giving her a shake. "ARIANA!"

She groans as she lifts her hand up and begins groping my face, stopping once she gets to my nose and poking it repeatedly. I pull the pillow off her head and chuckle. "What the hell are you doing?"

She pushes her messy, blonde hair out of her face and glances up at me as she drops her hand. "You mean that's not the snooze button? Then how in Merlin's name do I shut you up so I can go back to sleep?!"

I shake my head as I hop off the bed and pull the covers off of her. "No time to sleep; we're late for transfiguration!"

She abruptly sits upright and looks around anxiously before jumping off of the bed and sprinting into the bathroom. "SHIT! I look like SHIT!"

I roll my eyes and toss her uniform to her. "You don't look that bad. Honestly, you should really concentrate on getting rid of whatever died in your mouth."

She pokes her head out of the bathroom, a toothbrush sticking out of her mouth, and glares at me before pulling her head back into the bathroom and yelling out, "Hey git, how late are we?"

"Not too bad. Only five minutes, but Professor Patil is back today and you know how she hates tardiness…" I gather up her books for class and her temporary wand then take a seat on her bed to wait for her to finish getting ready.

After about ten minutes, she bursts out of the bathroom and grabs her books off the bed and hurriedly pulls me out of the room. We hurdle over Eli and Brittney and sprint into the Gryffindor common room, taking care not to run into anyone as we rush out into the corridor. It takes us only a few moments to get to class since we are sprinting through the corridor to the classroom.

We fly into the classroom, flinging the door open as we enter, and quietly take our seats as we earn an angry glare from Professor Patil. "Mister Raghnall, Miss Brighton, so nice of you two to join us today. Please take your seats and open your books to page 400."

Ariana blushes a bit as we sit down at our table and open our books but, rather than read, Ariana pulls out a piece of parchment and a quill and jots down a quick note before sneakily sliding it over to me.

Thanks for waking me up this morning.

I quickly scrawl my response on there and slide it back.

It was no problem. We can't have you missing two days in a row now, can we? Where were you yesterday?

I was in the RoR…

All day? Alone?

All day. Alone in the beginning and end, but James was with me for a couple of hours in between then.

When did you get back into Gryffindor tower?

A bit after midnight.

You came back alone after midnight? Did everything go okay?

I wasn't alone. I met up with James on my way back.

Oh, okay… So do you still want me to help you with occlumency lessons?

Yes, of course! Are you still alright with helping me?

Absolutely! Do you want to do it tonight?

That will work. I'll meet you in the RoR at eleven tonight?

That's fine. Is it just going to be us?

For now, yes. But eventually I think the others should be able to use the room to train in.

Train?

Well, yes. You don't just think we are going to be able to face my dad and his army of Inferi and Death Eaters without training first, do you?

No, I guess not…

Before I can slide the parchment over to her, it is snatched up off the desk by Professor Patil. She doesn't read it; she just glares down at Ariana and me while she burns up the parchment with her wand. "Since you seem to be done reading, please demonstrate the proper way to turn this book into a bird. Mister Raghnall, you first."

Ari's POV

Landen looks over at me with a smug grin as he waves his wand at the book in front of him. The book begins to sprout feathers and swell up, but before it completely transforms into a bird, it explodes loudly, feathers and book pages flying everywhere.

Landen has black scorch marks that char his face and he and Professor Patil both have feathers and page shards littered throughout their hair. Landen spits some feathers out of his mouth as he reaches up and groans when he feels that he's missing an eyebrow and, before I can stop it, the noise of my laughter fills the room as I clutch my sides and laugh uncontrollably.

Professor Patil's face reddens as she pulls feathers out of her hair and yells, "Miss Brighton, this isn't funny!"

A snort escapes as I try to stop laughing, but I can't stop. Between the sight of Professor Patil's head covered in feathers and Landen's charred, one eyebrowed face, I lack the ability to stop my laughter. Landen looks over at me and a laugh erupts from his lips, followed by more laughter. Pretty soon everyone in the class is laughing except for Professor Patil, whose face is getting redder and redder by the second.

Finally, she explodes. She points to the door aggressively, loose feathers falling from her head as she does, and yells, "THAT'S IT! TWENTY POINTS FROM GRYFFINDOR, AND I WILL SEE YOU TWO IN DETENTION TONIGHT! NOW GET OUT OF MY CLASSROOM!"

Landen and I suppress our laughter as we grab our things and hurry out of the classroom into the corridor. As soon as we get out of the classroom and the shut the door behind us, we bust out into a fit of laughter again, leaning against each other for support as we walk back to Gryffindor tower.

Once we have calmed down a bit and made it back to the Gryffindor Heads common room, we join Brittney and Eli, explaining why we aren't in class while we pick feathers and parchment scraps out of each other's hair.

"Okay, wait… You blew up a bird?"

Landen shakes his head, loose feathers and parchment falling as he does. "Well, technically I only partially blew it up… It was only half a bird. The other half was my book… Aw damn it! That was my book for class!"

I let out a laugh as I toss my book over to him. "We can share mine." I look over at Eli, who is smirking at me, and chuckle. "What?"

He shakes his head but continues to smirk. "I'm just realizing some things never change…"

"How's that?"

He shrugs his shoulders with a laugh. "Oh let's see… On your first day back you skipped all your classes and now you get kicked out of class! Are you sure that you and I aren't related by blood?"

I roll my eyes and let out a laugh as Brittney smacks him on the arm. I look at Brittney curiously, sure that there was something I was supposed to ask her, but I can't remember what it is. I can faintly hear Eli and Landen talking and laughing with each other but I've delved so far into my memory that it's more like muffled sounds. It takes me a moment, but it all comes back to me; I know what I'm supposed to ask Brittney and her name explodes from my mouth as soon as I remember. "Bri!"

She jumps at the volume I used then turns and looks at me warily. "What?!"

I clear my throat and lean toward her. "Tell me everything you know about Inferi…"

A bit of a short chapter for you. I would have made it longer, but I figured this was a good place to stop. As alwyas, I would love to hear your thoughts and opinions about this chapter! :)

Thanks!

-Tx