As long as you're all here, go ahead and read this next chapter. It's for Hogwarts, Assignment 5, Muggle History subject. The task I have chosen is to write about someone using the phrase "Off with his/her head!" in a non-humorous way. I think I can use this very well, so let's see what happens.

Word count: 615

I awoke on a cold stone floor, groaning from pain I barely remembered receiving the blows to. I knew there had been blows, that was for certain, but I did not fully remember why.

Sitting up, I examined the stone room I was in. It was effectively a prison, with a small window that was much higher than I could have reached.

In an instant, I remembered why I was in this prison: I was a witch. British nobles were a notoriously superstitious lot, and they had taken to rooting out and beheading, hanging, or drowning suspected practitioners. I knew there was a chance I could be caught and killed for what was commonly believed as heresy, but which was simply a matter of my birth.

I knew I had been convicted, and I could not very well deny the truth. They had found my wand, my house had been searched, revealing my owl, potions ingredients, and other marks of my witchcraft.

My sentence was to be beheading, I remembered. I feared this, but more than that, I feared imprisonment. I knew about people imprisoned for many years before their death sentences were carried out. I was young, only twenty-nine years old, so that could be a while yet.

I jumped a bit as the wooden door was pushed open, and a middle-aged man entered. His expression was grave, and he wore the clothes I'd learned Muggle priests wore.

"Good day, sir," I said pleasantly.

The priest bypassed all niceties, intoning solemnly, "Grace Weasley, you are hereby convicted of witchcraft. Your sentence will be death, carried out by beheading this 15th day of October, the year of our Lord 1671. Do you wish to confess, and mayhap save your immortal soul from the fires of Hell?"

I was completely confused by some of his words, but I got the main idea.

"Begging your pardon, sir, but even a witch as myself cannot argue with the evidence brought against me. When am I to die?"

He gaped at my bluntness, but spoke. "Now. Come, miss, we must go."

I wasn't very well going to walk willingly to my death. Foolishly, I briefly hoped that if I would not go willingly to the axe, they would leave me be. This was over hopeful of me, for the priest, quite a bit larger than I was, simply gripped my shoulder and pushed me out of the cell.

A few moments of walking led me outside into sunshine and warm air. I didn't pay attention to the lovely feeling of warmth and sun, for my eyes were fixed on the contraption before me. It was a wooden platform, with a lever which was attached to a long rope. At the end of the rope, a metal… something was attached. It seemed to be a blade, but no blade was as big as this one, at least as far as I knew.

I heard none of the proceedings, the words drowned out by my rising fear and panic. I tried to resist approaching the contraption, but it was no use. I was forced forward, into a kneeling position below the great blade. A basket lay below my head. I realized what was going on instantly. The lever would allow the blade to fall and cut off my head, and then it would be caught in the basket.

A man on a balcony above the courtyard said the words I would have no time to forget.

"She is a witch. Off with her head." The words were harsh and cold. I heard a click of the lever, a whoosh of the great blade, felt a flash of pain, and then nothing.