“AVADA KEDAVRA!”

FLASH

*ROOAAAAAAAAAARRR*

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Almira opens her eye and lifts her back from the bed with a swoosh and quickly turns her head this way and that, ready to bounce on an invisible enemy. After a while she lets out a breath, before letting her head fall back onto her pillow.

Feeling uncomfortable cold sweat on her skin, that has also seeped into her sheets, she reaches for her wand on the nightstand and notices that she had changed to her natural form at some point of her nightmare. Quickly changing to her human form, she once again looks around to make sure that her friends hadn’t woken up and seen her.

Not seeing any movement and only hearing soft, steady breathing, she takes her wand and with a few quick but clean hand motions, and silently whispering “scourgify”, she cleans the sweat from her body and the sheets.

It has been four days since Almira’s talk with headmaster Dumbledore and during these couple of days she quite easily found out what happened to Quirrell as the whole school has been talking about it nonstop ever since the very next morning. The source of those happenings? Who else but Ron Weasley, the best friend of Harry Potter.

It seems that the name most people know him by, the-boy-who-lived, is quite an apt name, as, if you are to believe Ron’s tale about how the story went, they had spent almost the whole year searching for answers and solving questions before finally arriving just in time to stop Professor Quirrell, a dark wizard in disguise, from stealing the philosopher’s stone that had been entrusted to Headmaster Dumbledore for safekeeping.

Ron himself had been knocked unconscious by one of the defenses Hogwarts’ teachers had put up to protect the stone and Hermione Granger had solved the final puzzle to let Harry go fort and confront Quirrell, while she herself had returned together with Ron to alert Headmaster Dumbledore.

When Almira heard about this all, she could not help but think about how stupid this all sounds. If the stone was given to Dumbledore, then why didn’t he just keep it on himself at all times? Almira can’t believe that there would be anyone so stupid as to try and rob the strongest wizard known. Also, if it had to be kept in Hogwarts, then why were the protections devised so that even first-year students could solve them? A carnivorous plant that runs away from fire, a flying key you need to catch, a game of wizard’s chess and a puzzle in which you had to choose the right potions. It’s almost like they wanted Harry, Ron and Hermione to solve them.

Well, there was Fluffy as the first obstacle, but he’s just a big fluff.

Feeling that it shouldn’t be too long before it’s time to go for breakfast, Almira decides to get out of bed and move to the common room.

As she’s putting on her school uniform, she hears movement from behind her and turns around to find Megan sitting on the bed opposite to Almira’s with eyes wide open as if she’d seen the most shocking thing in her life.

“Mira early… End of the world?” Megan says quietly, before looking fearfully at the ceiling like it was about to come falling down.

“Morning Megan.” Almira says while stifling a giggle that she almost let out seeing her friend’s theatrics.

“Morning.” Megan replied, before getting out of her bead and also starting to change into her uniform.

After putting on her uniform, Almira waited for Megan to also get ready, before taking out her wand and casting the cleaning charm on her.

It had already become a part of everyday routine for Almira to cast the cleaning charm on all of her friends as a first thing in the morning and the last thing in the evening, as whoever designed the castle clearly hadn’t taken into account how the students would have to travel through half the school to get the restrooms. As for why her friends didn’t cast it themselves, was because while they could get rid of the sweat and visible dirt, cleaning charm cast by them felt like getting forcefully scrubbed of anything on their skin, but the ones cast by Almira felt like getting the most gentle massage washing over their bodies while also getting rid of the need to visit the ladies’ room.

Almira and Megan moved to the common room to wait for Hannah and Susan to wake up and join them, which didn’t take too long and after two more casts of cleaning charm, the group left towards the great hall to start their breakfast.

It was the last day of the schoolyear, so the first half of their day was dedicated to packing up all of their stuff ready for their trip to home.

When the evening came, the whole Hufflepuff gathered together in front of their common room after they had all packed their luggage for the summer vacation, before they made their way into the Great Hall with the strength of their whole house.

The Great Hall was decorated with colors of green and silver to celebrate Slytherin’s victory over the House Cup for the seventh time in a row. A huge banner carrying the Slytherin serpent covered the wall behind the High Table.

The feast had been going on for a while already, when suddenly the whole hall fell silent and Almira could hear people whispering about Harry Potter, before foregoing the whispering and speaking over one another.

Almira didn’t spend much thinking on these voices however as her focus was on the chicken leg in her hands, which a moment later disappeared from her hands and appeared back on her plate as the hall fell silent for the second time now.

"Another year gone!" Dumbledore said cheerfully. "And I must trouble you with an old man's wheezing waffle before we sink our teeth into our delicious feast. What a year it has been! Hopefully your heads are all a little fuller than they were... you have the whole summer ahead to get them nice and empty before next year starts....

Now, as I understand it, the house cup here needs awarding, and the points stand thus: In fourth place, Gryffindor, with three hundred and twelve points.

In third, Hufflepuff, with three hundred and fifty-two points.

Ravenclaw has four hundred and twenty-six points and Slytherin, four hundred and seventy- two points."

 A storm of cheering and stamping broke out from the Slytherin table.

"Yes, Yes, well done, Slytherin," said Dumbledore.

"However, recent events must be taken into account." The room went very still. The Slytherins' smiles faded a little.

"Ahem," said Dumbledore. "I have a few last-minute points to dish out.

Let me see. Yes...

First to Mr. Ronald Weasley for the best-played game of chess Hogwarts has seen in many years, I award Gryffindor house fifty points."

Gryffindor cheers nearly raised the bewitched ceiling; the stars overhead seemed to quiver. The Gryffindor’s prefect could be heard telling the other prefects, "My brother, you know! My youngest brother! Got past McGonagall's giant chess set!" At last there was silence again.

"Second to Miss Hermione Granger for the use of cool logic in the face of fire, I award Gryffindor house fifty points."

"Third to Mr. Harry Potter..." said Dumbledore. The room went deadly quiet “for pure nerve and outstanding courage, I award Gryffindor house sixty points."

The din was deafening. Those who could add up while yelling themselves hoarse knew that Gryffindor now had four hundred and seventy-two points exactly the same as Slytherin. They had tied for the house cup. If only Dumbledore had given Harry just one more point.

Dumbledore raised his hand. The room gradually fell silent.

"There are all kinds of courage," said Dumbledore, smiling. "It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, but just as much to stand up to our friends. I therefore award ten points to Mr. Neville Longbottom."

The Gryffindor’s table exploded in cheers, with people jumping around, over and on top of the table, all gathering around Harry, Ron and Hermione.

“Which means,” Headmaster Dumbledore’s voice could be heard loud and clear over the cheering. ”we need a little change of decoration.”

Almira stared in awe as Dumbledore used but a clap of his hands to change the colors of all the decorations from green and silver to scarlet and gold, with Slytherin serpent making way for Gryffindor’s lion.

Almira didn’t quite understand the logic of this competition if all the teachers could just give and take away the points as they please, but if others were happy with it, she will happily go along.

After the feast it was time to hear their results on the term-end exams.

The results could be said to be quite good for Almira. She got full points in Potions, Charms and Transmutation, but only got eighty points in Astronomy because she had made up new names for the stars and constellations. The History of Magic was the worst as she only got sixty-five points, which is just over the passing line. All the other subjects were only missing a point from here and there from full points so overall, Almira was happy with her results.

After getting their results it was time to leave Hogwarts. They were all handed a note that warned them not to use magic outside the schoolgrounds, before they all boarded the same boats they had come to the school the first time in.

The train ride with Hogwarts Express went by fast and soon they were on the King’s Cross Station.

They said their goodbyes and promised that they’d send letters to each other during the vacation, before each making their separate ways out of the station.

Almira makes her way out of the station and finds her mother waiting just outside.

“Mom!” Almira yells as she hurries towards her mother, who also makes her way towards her after seeing Almira.

Reaching her mother, Almira lets go of her luggage and buries her head in her mother’s chest and her mother is just about to hug her back when she feels her shirt getting wet. She close Almira in a tight hug, before gently soothing her.

“It’s alright sweetie, dear. Mom’s here.” She says gently.

They stay like that for a couple of minutes, not at all caring for how others around them are looking at them, after which Almira opens her mouth. “Mom, I was scared.” She said quietly.

“It’s alright, lets go home and you can tell me what happened. Mom’s going to make it right.” Her mother said softly as she started to lead Almira home, who still had her head leaning against her mother, and thus couldn’t see the cold glint flashing through her mother’s eyes.

 

 

 

 

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Author's jabadabaduu:

SOOO..... Well that's the end of year one of Catnip in Hogwarts. Why it took so long to write this chapter? Well I got a job and then stuff happened. Also ATM I have kinda love/hate relationship with this story, as I really like to write it but I have no idea on where I want to end it. Do I want Mira to take Harry's role in killinf Voldy? Do I want her to work as a background force? I don't know and because I don't know I get stuck on every major point of HP's plot.

On the other hand I've been thinking of writing another story, one which would not be a fanfiction but an original, which would mean I'd have total freedom on where I want the characters to go even with a direction that's just somewhere-in-that-general-direction-ish. Once I have the first few chapters done on that I'll post a not-a-chapter with a link to the new story. (It will probably take a while just like with this chapter, but it will come.)