Lumos: Year Two

It was nearly eight o’clock at night when Helena was heading to Professor Lockhart’s classroom. She was worried that she’d get caught for being out too late, but to her surprise, the entire area near his room was barely surveyed at all. When she arrived to the door, she knocked on it quickly, watching as it opened by itself.

“Ah, Helena! What are you doing here so late?” Professor Lockhart saw her step inside in silence. He looked down and noticed that in her hand was Voyage with Vampires, “Do you have a question about my book? Or even some compliments?”

“Well,” Helena prepared herself for the worst, “I wanted to let you know how much I admire you! You are one of the most brilliant wizards I have ever—met—“ she had to stop herself from vomiting, “I can’t believe how brave you are for doing these things!”

Gilderoy seemed to be pleased with himself when she spoke. His eyes were twinkling as he walked toward her. His periwinkle robes swayed back and forth with every step.

Dear god, just stay away from me… Helena pursed her lips.

“I’m touched that you feel this way. I’m so content to know that you enjoy my knowledge from my journeys!”

“They’re all magnificent, really! I never knew that just one man could do all of these things,” Helena smiled falsely, Really, I mean it. How does one man do all this? “You’re truly one of the best and one of my role models.”

“Wonderful!” he pulled something out of his drawer, “An autograph for your troubles?”

“Oh, no, I couldn’t possibly—“

“Take it, I insist!” he winked.

Helena took it slowly as she tried not to make a disturbed expression. Lockhart looked to the clock and saw that it was a quarter past eight.

“Dearest me—look at the time! You should probably head back to the common room. These days, it’s always dark by the time its six!” he started to head for his office, “I will see you in class, Monday!”

Helena nodded as Professor Lockhart closed the door behind himself. Helena kneeled down quickly next to his desk, trying to think of the spell she was going to cast.

“Ah yes—Flagrante Incantatem,” she whispered as a jet of orange light quickly made his desk flash. With that, she disappeared out of the room.

Running down the hallways, she saw that lights were becoming very dim. She had a hard time seeing down the stairwell, but crossed her fingers to make sure she wouldn’t fall off. She didn’t want to use any lighting spells until she was away from any prefects who may pass by. When she had made it to the first floor, she headed to the main hallway to go toward the dungeons. There was a sudden gasp, followed by a slam against the stone floors.

Helena was startled by the loudness as it echoed through the long corridor. She tried to look through the darkness, only able to see vague figures of statues, doorways and something that had a reflection nearby. Curious, she walked a bit closer with narrowed eyes. She felt a crunch beneath her feet as she took a few steps forward, stopping immediately to see what it was. It was broken camera lenses.

“Wait… that can’t be…” she held her tongue, hoping she was wrong. She approached what now appeared to be a fallen figure, “Lumos.”

Colin Creevey was wide eyed with the breath of a ghost. He was laying down stiff on his back, holding his camera toward his face with a still expression. Helena nearly fell over from her weakened legs as she backed away. Her heavy breaths were slowly getting louder as she began to scream desperately. She didn’t want to find what hurt him; she ran for the dungeon doors that were down the hall, still wailing loudly.

“Pureblood! PUREBLOOD!” she sputtered at the portrait as it opened quickly and she jumped inside, running into the common room. She was panting heavily and all the students were looking at her in confusion. Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle were in one corner, staring at her oddly as her siblings were in another with wide, puzzled eyes.

“What’s wrong with you?” Draco asked rudely.

“Another—Attack—“ she fell to her knees, finally losing her energy.

The room went silent as Jude stood up to go and help her. He pulled her forward and walked her to an armchair before kneeling in front of her, speaking lowly.

“Who was it, Helena?” he whispered.

“Colin Creevey,” Helena was still breathing heavily.

“Did you see who attacked him?”

“No—I heard Creevey fall, saw him lying there and ran!” she shook her head.

“She’s probably lying,” Draco smirked, “You see the mud-blood fall, but you don’t see his attacker?”

“Shut up, Malfoy,” Jude glared.

Draco’s cheeks went pink as he turned around to his friends with crossed arms.

“Victoria… you should probably have her go up to bed. Take her to her dorm…” Jude turned to the rest of his siblings.

Victoria nodded as she took Helena to her bed, waiting for her to dress and lay down. Pansy was in the bed across the room, moaning loudly from the pain she felt from when Lanee had given her a beating. Helena ignored it and quickly found herself falling asleep. When she did so, Victoria left the room.

It wasn’t until Monday when Helena finally decided to get out of bed. For all of Sunday, she claimed that she was feeling ill and decided to stay in her bed. During potions class, Helena stayed incredibly quiet and did hardly anything with her group. She had a glazed look in her eyes and felt the fear take over her, making her flinch every so often. She knew that since she was a pureblood, she was probably safe. Still, she wasn’t sure what to expect. In her eyes, a monster was a monster and it kills anything in its path.

She would hear several others talking lowly about what had happened to Colin Creevey in the hallways between classes. She tried not to let it bother her, but if she said it didn’t, she was lying to herself. She knew that today was going to be a tough day to get through.

When Defense Against the Dark Arts came along, Helena remembered the curse that she had put on his desk. She felt a bit more relieved that this would be a tension-free class since she would get a good laugh out of it.

“Today we will be learning about flesh-eating billobeeds!” Professor Lockhart stood triumphantly before taking several books off of his shelves.

“What did you do to him?” Lanee whispered to Helena.

“You’ll see,” Helena sniggered, “My brother taught me this trick.”

“Wouldn’t he have noticed by now?” Lanee asked.

“It activates when I wave my wand.”

“Ah…” Lanee tried to keep a straight face during most of the lesson. Lockhart set some papers down on one of his tables before pulling out a quill to jot some things that he was talking about down. He then went to sit on his desk, asking for everyone to pull out some parchment.

Helena sneered at Lanee before pulling her book out from under the table, waving her wand at the same time to hide the motion. At first, nothing seemed to happen, but before Lockhart could finish his sentence, he stopped with eclectic eyes and a red face as he yelled at the top of his lungs, jumping off of his desk as he hopped around with his rear end being scorched. The pain was lingering with charred bits of his britches that were burning at his skin as he continued to screech like a banshee while most of the entire class had begun laughing uncontrollably.

The only person who seemed to not find it funny was Hermione Granger, who stood up with a firm expression, pulling her wand out as she pointed it at him. “Aguamenti!”

A jet of water burst from the end of her wand, hitting Professor Lockhart and soaking him and the area around him. The room went silent as he stared at them with wide eyes.

“Well… that was an unexpected prank… Mr. Finnigan, I will arrange a punishment for you with Professor McGonagall,” he gave an unpleasant smile, “Anyways… class dismissed!”

“Wait, that’s rubbish!” Seamus yelled out, “I didn’t do it!”

“Only someone like you could have possibly done something so… blazing,” he turned to hide in his office.

Seamus was left, jaw dropped as he turned to both Lanee and Helena who started to laugh intensely. They both got up and started to make fun of Lockhart’s expression as Seamus suddenly stood up and looked at them.

“You did it, didn’t you?!” he watched them.

“Oh, Shay, why would we do that?” Lanee purred as she and Helena walked out of the classroom.

---

December was at its midst, just when fresh fallen snow had arrived to cover the roof of the large castle. Helena had just passed her 12th birthday, from which her parents had sent her a new broomstick. Apparently Jude had told them that she may try out for Quidditch in the next year and he and Artemis wanted to help her toughen up and practice. It was a beautiful model with a slick, wax coat over the darkened wood with neatly toiled bristles.

Helena went to potions class with Lanee and saw that they were in one of the larger chambers today. There were 20 cauldrons set up in rows, so Helena immediately put her station next to Lanee’s. They were making a Swelling Solution today and despite the fact that most of the Gryffindors were doing a decent job, Professor Snape had many remarks to make. Draco Malfoy took pride in his potion that was in front of Helena’s, but she could see that there was something boiling in his brew that wasn’t supposed to.

Helena’s potion as close to perfect. If Helena didn’t know any better, she’d say that Hermione, Lanee, and she were the best students in the class.

“I think that he’ll be pleased with ours,” Helena smiled to Lanee.

BOOM!

Goyle’s potion exploded, splashing everyone in its path. People began screaming and flailing around. Helena was splashed on her arms as they became blistered and enflamed. She was lucky enough not to get the full hit like Draco did, whose forehead was blowing up toward the ceiling.

“Ew... ew…” she was becoming nauseous of the smell.

Lanee’s entire face was splashed, swelling it to a monstrous size. Fortunately for her, she was able to control how her face worked and tried to lessen the distension. She was the only one who seemed to find this amusing as she played with her swelled up face.

"Look guys! I'M BUBBLING!" she laughed as she looked to Seamus and Dean, whose faces were puffing up like blow fish.

“Silence! SILENCE!” Snape screeched to get everyone’s attention, “Anyone who has been splashed, come here for a Deflating Draught—when I find out who did this—“

Helena immediately ran for the line, being one of the first to drink the antidote, her arms returning to normal. After the class had gotten rid of their swellings, class had ended and everyone was heading out of the room.