Death Eaters... Forever?

OWLs were approaching rapidly, but I wasn’t too worried about them – not like Hermione. I told her time and again that she’d do perfectly fine, as always. I knew she’d get Outstanding, but she couldn’t – or wouldn’t – believe me.

Looking at the timetable for my exams, I groaned. The first OWL I had was Transfiguration, followed by Potions, Defence against the Dark Arts, Charms, Care of Magical Creatures, Astronomy and finally History of Magic. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to take any NEWTs because I hadn’t signed up for them.

Transfiguration was on Thursday, and as we waited to be let into the examination, Hermione fretted.

“What’s the charm for turning an inanimate object into an animal? And how long does it last?”

“Movestia. And it lasts for about a week and two days.” I sighed. We’d already been through this. Ron groaned.

“I didn’t even know we were able to do that! I’m gonna fail!” I just looked at him. I’d tried to tell him to study, but he’d been too easily distracted – first by an ‘accidentally’ knocked-over pot of ink, then by his worry that his owl wasn’t fed.

Professor McGonagall began to talk, and we quieted down enough to hear.

“You will go in single file. No talking, and no notes or cheating or I will personally administer the truth serum to you. Now, your examiners will be personally testing you, so I suggest you treat them well.” I zoned out; I knew the drill.

We filed in as we were told, although a few whispers were heard.

“My name is Heron Davis, and I will be your examiner.” I smiled at him encouragingly; he looked nervous. He was only young, and I felt sympathetic towards him.

“Ok, I would like you to turn this lamp into a wine glass.” He pointed to the lamp.

“Hungdriora.” I smiled as the lamp turned graciously into a beautiful fluted wine glass with golden ivy curling round it imaginatively. Heron looked impressed, but composed himself.

“Ok, now I want you to Transfigurate this mouse into a shoe.” He took a cute little mouse from a box at his feet and set it on the table. It trembled with fear, but I knew this wouldn’t hurt the poor creature in the least.

“Stindornate.” I was proud to see the mouse turn into a black knee-length boot.

“Finally, I want you to turn this basket into any animal of your choice.” I thought about it. It would have to be impressive. I decided not to turn it into a dangerous wild animal, so instead decided on a snake. The snake in question was a huge python, which lazily raised its head to look at me, amber eyes burning into mine.

I looked away, scared that it would begin to talk to me – I had found that I was a parsel-tongue in first year, but there had been no incidents since.
“Well done, Miss Wilson!” Heron gave me a grin, and I knew I’d received an Outstanding.

XXX
Potions was interesting; we were told to make a simple Confunding Potion first, and then a series of simple potions. However, we also had to make a truth serum and a potion of your choice.

My examiner was an elderly woman with white-blond hair called Amelia Flettin. She was all smiles, and congratulated me as I handed in a flawless truth serum. Now for my favourite part.

I took the ingredients – simple ones such as Hippogriff feathers and green Nani seeds – and began to create my potion. I smiled as I saw Amelia’s confused look. Of course she hadn’t come across this potion before; it was my own creation, which caused the drinker to cough butterflies. Useless, but fun.

As I bottled the transparent blue liquid, she asked me what it was. As I told her, her eyes widened slightly, and she gave me an appraising look when I told her it was of my own creation.

Hermione was waiting for me when I left, and immediately began to rant about her horrid attempt at the truth serum. Neville also caused a small explosion, but it was to be expected from him – not that I was blaming poor Neville.

We had Defence against the Dark Arts on the same day, so I grabbed a quick bite of lunch and practised my spells.

After the theory part of the exam, we were escorted to private rooms, in which we were to take the practical part.

The examiner I was assigned was a small mousy man called Wesburn Stumblefoot. He asked me to disarm him, which I did easily, bind him, curse him (I only used a simple curse of my own which caused the victim’s fingers to disappear – he was mortified, but I used the counter-spell and he recovered himself) and finally show him an advanced spell. I chose the Patronus, which successfully shocked him.

XXX
The next few OWLs were rather boring, although the report on Mars and Venus for Astronomy took me three days. Fred and George had finally started up their shop in Diagon Alley, and Fred gave me a free Fizzer firework, which I accidentally left in my pocket during my last exam. As I finished the seventh paragraph of my huge essay on the Giant War, I heard a small noise from outside the Great Hall.

Toady, who was overseeing the exam, hurried out to look. A single small firework met her, fizzing out to nothing inches from her face. Unfortunately for her, it was disruption enough, and now everyone was looking around. I heard another noise, louder this time and wondered what Fred and George had been up to.

The sudden arrival of hundreds of fireworks, large and small, sent many students scurrying from their seats, and Umbridge looked furious. I looked around for Fred and George, and sure enough, there they were near the ceiling on their broomsticks, dropping fireworks down on the sudden chaos. Fred looked at me and grinned before throwing a small firework that erupted into a huge dragon. It chased Umbridge from the Hall while the rest of the fireworks sped outside, hot on Fred and George’s heels. The screaming mass of students dragged me along, but I was able to meet up with Harry, Hermione and Ron.

Hermione looked rather frazzled, and I knew how she felt; it had been so much effort to write that essay, and now it would go to waste.

The Weasley twins flew higher and threw one last firework – which exploded into a massive ‘W’ – before flying away from Hogwarts while the students cheered loudly.

Suddenly, Harry collapsed, his eyes focused on something only he could see. I was the first to notice, but Hermione noticed too, and gasped in horror before trying to help him up.

However, after a few seconds, Harry could stand by himself, looking pale but normal once again.

“What happened?” I asked, and then almost cried out as my Dark Mark began to throb painfully. However, I followed him as he disappeared through the crowd, returning to the castle.

“We need to get to the Department of Mysteries,” Harry said urgently as he began climbing the staircase.

“But why?” Hermione asked, confused.

“Because Sirius is in danger. Voldemort will kill him if we don’t get there soon!”

“What if it’s a trap?” Hermione was worried, and so was I.

“It’s not – it was like when I saw Mr Weasley get hurt!”

“Harry, we need to make sure he’s not at Headquarters first!” A small argument ensued, but Harry regretfully conceded.

“The Floo Network. Umbridge’s fireplace is the only one that isn’t monitored at Hogwarts, so we’ll need to go there,” Harry told us, outlining his plan.

“I can create a distraction,” I offered, holding up the Fizzer Fred had given me.

Setting it off just down the corridor from Toady’s office, I waited until she’d come to check it out before signalling to Harry and the others and going into Umbridge’s office. Ron looked pale, but relaxed slightly when I locked the door.

Harry went to the fireplace, but just as he made contact with Kreacher, Umbridge stalked in, wand raised.

XXX
“Can we at least eat the lollies I have?” Ron held up a handful of the ‘lollies’ that I recognised – Puking Pastilles, Noseblood Nougat and other such horrid snacks – Fred and George’s inventions of course. Crabbe and some of the other members of the Inquisitorial Squad snatched them off Ron predictably and gobbled them in one go. Good ole’ Ron.

Severus had angered Umbridge when he told her she’d used up the last of his truth serum on Cho Chang – who we thought had been the one who betrayed the rest of the DA members.

“Padfoot’s in danger!” Harry told him as he went, and Severus sneered contemptuously. I was surprised by his enmity toward Harry, but thought that Sev would still take him seriously.
After Umbridge had tried to force Harry into telling her who he’d been contacting, Hermione and Harry had led Toady off to the Forbidden Forest, where they said Dumbledore’s ‘weapon’ had been hidden.

Disarming our now-incapacitated captors, we took our wands and met Harry and Hermione on their way back from the Forest. After another small argument, Harry grudgingly allowed us to come with him to Department of Mysteries.

We took Thestrels – they led our carriages from the train to Hogwarts every year. I’d known the Thestrels all my wizarding life, so I was surprised to find out that only people who’d seen death could see the skeletal horses. It must’ve therefore been rather scary to fly on an invisible horse high above the ground, and I felt sorry for the others. Neville, Hermione, Ron, Luna Lovegood, Ginny, and of course Harry and I all arrived at the Ministry, which was deserted.

“This way,” Harry said confidently as we entered the lower floor and set off down the corridor. In no time, we were at a huge obsidian-black door.

“Are you sure you want-” Harry began, but I cut him off.

“Yes, we are coming.” I was snappy because of the pain in my arm, although as we neared our goal, it was becoming easier to bear. The others nodded.

Strangely, the door was unlocked, and I had a sneaking feeling that we were indeed walking into a trap.

Harry uttered a small spell that lit the end of his wand, and we could suddenly see.
We looked around us, and row upon row of shelves piled to a ceiling that was too high to see. Upon the shelves were countless glowing misty balls such as those we used in Divination. Harry walked straight to a certain place, and then stopped.

“He was here, I saw him,” Harry said, confused. Uh oh.

“Let’s go,” Ron said, trembling with fear.

“Wait.” Harry looked at one of the misty globes, and picked it up. “It says it’s mine,” he explained.

“Seriously, Harry, let’s go. I have a bad feeling about this. We’ll leave and never come back,” Ron was looking around, pale face glistening damply in the half-light.

“Too late,” a new, familiar voice came out of the darkness. Lucius walked into view, and it was then that I realised we were surrounded.