| Chapter 21 Alcoves and Altercations |
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| The whole day Harry couldn�t think about anything except what had been happening in the school recently. He had never seen Sirius act so strangely, and he was becoming increasingly more worried every day. He strongly desired to discover the reasoning behind Sirius�s troubling behavior. However, the more he thought about it, the more confused he became. He thought it best to discuss it with Ron and Hermione, so he decided to meet them in the Common Room after dinner. When all three of them were in the room, Harry began to express his concern. �We need to get to the bottom of what�s happening around here lately,� he stated. �No kidding,� Ron said sarcastically. �There�s a problem though, we don�t know how to find out what�s wrong�� �I realize that, but it�s important that we figure out what�s going on soon, because I�m not sure how much time we have before something may� happen.� �Like you getting taken�� Hermione said with an uneasy tone to her voice. �Exactly,� Harry said. �Which is why I think I need to go back to Mrs. Figg�s office tonight. I have a feeling that she�s hiding something about what�s going on.� �You better get your cloak then,� Hermione told him, �It�s already 9:50 so you don�t have much time left before curfew.� �Good idea,� Harry agreed. He stood up and hurried up the stairs to his room. He unlocked his trunk, and pulled the shimmering, flowing cloak from its place. He sped back downstairs, nearly running into two second-year boys that were walking upstairs. He returned to Hermione and Ron, who were waiting patiently. �Is there anything I should look out for?� Harry asked them, while pulling on his cloak. �I�d like to know what�s going on between her and Sirius, so see if you can find out anything that they�ve been talking about,� Hermione said. �Alright,� Harry said, now completely invisible to Ron and Hermione. They opened the portrait hole and Harry stepped out of the room. �I�ll be back soon,� he whispered, and closed the door behind him. There were a few students walking back from a late dinner as Harry walked quietly but swiftly through the hallway. As he walked, he noticed less and less people in the halls, until soon he was alone. He checked his watch and saw that it was 10:05. I�d better hurry, he thought to himself. Suddenly, he thought he heard footsteps behind him. He stopped and listened, but no sound could be heard. He shrugged it off and kept walking. However, as soon as he started moving again, he heard more light footsteps. He spun around, but to his surprise, there was no one behind him. Beginning to get nervous, Harry started walking faster down the hall. He heard the footsteps again, but kept moving. He looked behind him, and finally saw what had been making the noise. Mrs. Norris was bounding down the corridor after him. Harry took off running as fast as he could, trying to get away from the cat, which stayed close on his heels. He struggled to keep his cloak on as he dashed down the hallway. In an effort to hide from Mrs. Norris, he darted into the nearest room, which happened to be the Trophy Room, and slammed the door. He leaned back against the door, panting. As he rested, he could hear scratching at the base of the door. Mrs. Norris was trying, with no avail, to get into the room. Harry slid himself off the door onto the brick wall. He looked around the room at the several hundred trophies that lined the walls. He saw the plaque that had his father�s name engraved on it, and the Quidditch cup that his house had won during his third year at Hogwarts. He also noticed a large trophy that brought back painful memories of the previous year. It was the trophy that he had been supposed to win for being the Triwizard Champion. However, the tournament had gone completely awry, and ended up with the death of a fellow student, Cedric Diggory. Harry had blamed himself for the boy�s death, and often woke up sweating from awful nightmares, in which he had been reliving the events of that horrendous day. Feeling a bit nauseous from the sight of the trophy, Harry put his arm up against the wall, leaning his head on his forearm. He felt his eyes burning with potential tears, but he rubbed them away with his other hand. Feeling horrible, he buried his face into his sleeve, trying to block out the agonizing memories. Suddenly, the brick Harry�s arm was resting on sunk into the wall. He jerked away, and watched with alarm as half the wall started sinking in. The bricks caved in to form a door-sized opening in the wall, which led to a dark stairway. Harry looked down into the opening and looked at the dark corridor. The flight of steps vanished into darkness. Overcome with curiosity, Harry pulled out his wand. |