Deception

Amara had never ran so quickly in her life, nor had she tripped over her own feet so many times in her life either. She passed first years, which were walking down the corridors blindly, comatose from that evening’s supper.

She reached the stairs that led down to the dungeons, and despite her better judgment, she took them two at a time. Despite there being a few missteps and perhaps twisting her right ankle, Amara made it to the bottom without tumbling down the steps.

She muttered the password before dashing in, nearly running over Blaise Zabini in the process.

“Sorry,” she said as she caught her balance. If she had to name the one person that frightened her most among the Slytherins, it was Zabini. His good looks did little to take away the certain coldness about him. His calculating eyes and his rather reserved demeanor, made him almost terrifying.

His dark eyes studied her closely, as if he wasn’t quite what to make of her. “Where are you going Hart?”

Amara squirmed underneath his scrutinizing look. “The dorms; I need to write a letter.”

“And the running was for…?” He asked, his cold tone told her that he found her very strange. Perhaps that was a good thing though; it would mean he’d stay away from her. But this thought did very little to stop her burning cheeks.

“I wanted to get it off before dark,” was her simple reply. They stood there in silence for a moment. Amara stood there shifting from one foot to the other from nerves and eagerness to get out of there.

“Really,” he said before making an ‘hmming’ noise. He didn’t believe her, and that would be fine if she didn’t need to escape his company.”

“Yes,” Amara replied, giving him a strained smile. “But as you can see, since I am in such a hurry, I need to be going. Nice chatting with you, Zabini.”

And hopefully she wouldn’t have to do it again anytime soon.

Amara rushed away before Blaise could reply. She needed to hurry or else everything would fail and the information she learned would become useless.

She grabbed a quill and a piece of parchment and began to quickly write, not caring that her writing was a bit sloppy.




J,

I have stumbled across valued information, and yet there’s really no time to explain. Potter and his friends are heading to the Ministry. They’re searching for someone named Sirius.
You’ll need to trust me on this one,

Amara frowned at the letter. It was short, but straight to the point and it would have to do. She knew Jonathan would have many questions and would be extremely unhappy with the lack of actual information to support her claims. But it would have to do.

Amara slid the letter into the enveloped and said a little prayer that everything would work out so she didn’t end up looking like an idiot.

With a blink of an eye Amara raced out of the room once more. It was times like these that she wished she wasn’t a Slytherin and had a common room much closer to the Owlery

There were more students in the corridor now signaling the end of dinner. Most were wandering off to their own common rooms to finish any unfinished school work. While others weren’t quite sure what they wanted to do and stood around with their friends chatting away and blocking people trying to get by.

This frustrated Amara to no end as she practically plowed these lingerers over. They screamed at her, and few choice words were thrown her way, but Amara ignored them.

It seemed as she was running that her worries were finally catching up with her. What if Potter never left Hogwarts and was happily tucked away in his dorm? No, it’s Potter, he’d find a way out of Hogwarts. But what if her letter reaches Jonathan far too late? What if he shows up at the Ministry and no one is there. He’d look a fool, and so would she.

Even if nothing really happened tonight, Amara was hoping that at the very least they’d catch Potter outside of school. Then her rushing wouldn’t have been completely useless.

She reached the Owlery, short on breath. Her eyes watered as looked around for her silly owl. How she hated that thing, and often referred to him as It.

“Here,” Amara snapped, holding out her arm for him to jump on. “Be nice, Eurus.” Amara scolded as her brown owl snapped at her fingers.

She quickly brought him to the edge before setting him down. She tied the letter around his foot tightly; the last thing she needed was for it to be lost somewhere between Hogwarts and London.

“Hurry, Eurus. Take this to Jonathan and you will have a nice treat when you return.” Amara said, even though she felt silly for talking to an owl.

Eurus’s feathers ruffled and he nipped at Amara’s fingers once more. But Eurus seemed to understand what Amara had said. He expanded his wings before taking off into the evening.

Now all she could do was hope.