CHAPTER EIGHT - Troll Time, Show Time

"It's troll time, show time,

Troll time, show time,

Quirrell seems like a sus guy at night time.

Those white lies, blind eyes

White lies, blind eyes

Can't seem to hide from a first-year, he do try."

***

The next morning, Harry and Ron told Attuoria all about their late night adventure. Their explanation was very much different from Hermione's.

"You remember that small package Hagrid took from the vault, right?" Harry asked.

Attuoria nodded.

"We're positive that the three-headed dog is guarding the package," said Harry.

"And it's either really valuable or really dangerous," added Ron.

"Or both." Attuoria pointed out. The boys nodded. They sat in silence for a while before Attuoria decided she might as well reveal this information to them.

"When we went to Hagrid's on Friday afternoon," said Attuoria, catching the boys' attention. "I heard Hagrid refer to the package as 'the stone'. He said it would be dangerous to go looking for it. The three-headed dog might be why."

"When did he say that?" Ron said with a frown. Attuoria realised Ron had no idea she could read minds. She glanced at Harry, who just looked back at her.

"She can read minds." Harry blurted out. Ron's eyes grew wide.

"You're a Legilimens?"

"What's a Legilimens?" Attuoria played dumb, remembering how Dumbledore told her not to reveal the contents of their conversation to anyone else.

"It's a person who can read other people's minds. It's very difficult to learn, unless you're born with it." Ron explained.

"Oh. Yes, I can do that. Please don't tell anyone." Attuoria said. "I don't think people would want to talk to me if they knew I could do that."

Ron shook his head a few times, as if to clear up his mind or shake away the surprise. "Sure. I won't. Just please don't read my mind all the time?"

"The only time I read your mind was last night after you guys ran away from the dog, as well as the first time I met you on the train." Attuoria smiled. "Don't worry about it."

Ron laughed, "Yeah, well even if you do, just don't go around telling other people what I think about all day."

"Tell me all his secrets," Harry whispered loudly, pointing and Ron and nudging Attuoria. Attuoria laughed and shoved him away. "I'll tell Ron all your secrets." She jokingly threatened, and Ron started laughing too.

Just then, the owls flooded into the Great Hall, signalling the delivery of the post. Everyone watched in awe as six large screech owls heaved a long, thin package through the air and dropped it right in front of Harry, hitting multiple plates and knocking a great deal of food off the table.

"Looks like your broom is here." Attuoria said as Harry read the letter on top of the package.

The three of them hurried out of the Hall with the package, excited to open it. But on their way upstairs, the snobbish Slytherin trio stopped them.

"That's a broomstick," Malfoy spat after grabbing the package. "You'll be for it this time, Potter, first-years aren't allowed them."

Ron immediately responded and the two of them got into a heated argument. But before anything else could happen, Professor Flitwick appeared and broke them up. Attuoria watched Malfoy's face carefully the whole time, trying to figure out his intentions and why he constantly bothered Harry and Ron. But Malfoy wouldn't look at her, which meant she couldn't read his thoughts.

And this interaction, as per all previous interactions with Malfoy, ended with Harry and Ron triumphantly walking away, leaving Malfoy standing there with anger and confusion on his face.

"What are you staring at? You filthy mudblood." Malfoy snapped when he realised Attuoria was still standing there staring at him. Ron and Harry were already giddily climbing up the marble staircase.

The original question in Attuoria's mind was replaced by another once she heard his sentence. "Mudblood? What's a mudblood?"

Malfoy let out a laugh, shoving Crabbe and Goyle behind him, who immediately laughed as if on queue. "She doesn't even know what it means. Clueless muggle-born."

"I have no idea what you are saying." Attuoria made a mental note to try and find out the meaning of the word later. "But I do want to ask, what's your business with Harry and Ron?"

"None of your business." He sneered.

"Well, it kind of is. They are my friends." Attuoria said, surprising herself at her selection of words. "Friends" is a word used to describe people who share mutual affection, meaning they care about one another. Did she care about Harry and Ron?

"So?" Malfoy scoffed.

"So I want to know why you're being so..." Attuoria hesitated, searching her mind for an adjective that rightly describes Malfoy's behaviours. She wasn't too familiar with human traits and emotions, so she could only pick from the ones she knew about already.

"Annoying." She said.

Malfoy raised his eyebrows. "You just called me annoying?"

"Yes. You're quite annoying."

"Don't worry, Knight, I could say the same about you." He said with a smirk.

Attuoria smiled back at him. "Well then, that makes two of us!" She gave him a quick wave before turning around and running up the stairs to catch up with Harry and Ron, who were already nowhere to be seen.

***

With Harry now at Quidditch training three evenings a week, Attuoria found herself spending more and more time at the library with Hermione.

The two of them didn't speak to each other much. Hermione just sat at the table, her nose deep inside a very thick book. Attuoria wandered around the shelves, searching for anything that was relevant to her thoughts.

It has been almost three months since she first arrived at the mortal realm, and it's nearing her second month of school at Hogwarts. Now that she was settled and adjusted in this human world, she decided it was time to search for the true identity of "T.M.R.".

To say the search was difficult would be an understatement. It was near impossible. Attuoria had no idea where to start. When a few weeks passed with no avail, Attuoria asked Hermione for advice.

"Say I wanted to find a person only using their initials, where would I start?"

Hermione shut her book. "Only initials?"

Attuoria nodded.

"Do you know the person's age? Gender? Where are they from?"

"Well I know that this person was in London from June sixteenth to the twenty-third, year nineteen-eighty. He or she is most likely an adult, at least twenty, probably quite old," Attuoria listed, going through everything she knew about the mysterious messenger. "But the age is just a guess."

"What are the initials?"

"T-M-R."

Hermione frowned, staring at the table, deep in thought. "It doesn't ring a bell for me. Are you sure this person is even a witch or a wizard?"

"I'm not certain, but it's very likely."

"You do realise that hundreds of people could share the same initials as this person, right?"

"Yes, I do realise." Attuoria sighed. "This person could totally be just another commonplace citizen. I don't know."

"Why do you even need to know who this person is?" Hermione asked curiously.

"Um," Attuoria suddenly felt nervous again and clamped her hands together. "I, uh, I can't tell you. Sorry."

Hermione huffed but didn't push any further. "Well if it's really important to you, you might as well ask a teacher. Maybe Professor Dumbledore, he'll probably know."

"Yeah. Probably." Attuoria mumbled, resting her head in her arms as Hermione returned to reading. Attuoria didn't really want to bring the matter to Dumbledore. He might just get more suspicious. He would definitely make her tell him about the message, but Attuoria had a feeling the message was meant for her and only her.

Her conversation with Hermione was actually quite helpful. She could start by finding more about the events that happened around the year 1980. It might not lead her anywhere, but at least she would be gathering more information.

"Hey Hermione? Do you know any books about events that happened around nineteen-eighty in the wizarding world?"

Hermione's eyes lit up. "Oh, yes! I read so many of them before coming to Hogwarts. Modern Magical History, The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts and Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century. Did you know Harry Potter is mentioned in all of them?"

"Really?"

"You didn't know? He's famous! Let's go, the books are all in the dorm."

For the rest of the month of October, Attuoria spent all her free time reading Hermione's books. The two of them formed quite a strong friendship. Attuoria noticed that her friendship with Hermione was completely different from her friendship with Ron and Harry. Even though Hermione was a chatty, bossy know-it-all, and Attuoria was quiet and observant, the two of them shared a common interest in learning. Their personalities seemed different on the outside, but were actually quite similar on a deeper level.

Soon, it was October thirty-first: Halloween. In Attuoria's opinion, Halloween was ridiculous.

Halloween started as a celebration for the ghosts of the dead returning to earth. People thought the barrier between the mortal world and the world of ghosts and spirits would get thin on Halloween, so they dedicated this festival to scaring away these paranormal beings.

However, being a "paranormal being" herself, Attuoria knew very well that there was no physical barrier between the mortal and spiritual realm. What kept the two worlds separated was more complicated than just a barrier, but it's not like humans would understand.

What confused Attuoria even more were the number of pumpkin-flavoured treats that morning in the Great Hall. What part of pumpkin relates to scaring away spirits? Apparently "jack-o-lanterns" were supposed to scare away spirits and ghosts, but as a demon herself, Attuoria didn't find the glowing pumpkins very scary.

In Charms class that morning, everyone was excited to finally learn how to levitate objects. Professor Flitwick put everyone in pairs to practise the charm on a feather. Attuoria felt bad for both Ron and Hermione when they got picked as partners, as both clearly disliked each other. Attuoria was paired up with Dean Thomas, who was a nice enough kid.

"Thank god I'm not with Neville," Dean whispered, eying Neville, who was partnered with another girl and clearly giving her a heart attack. "I swear he'd stab my eye out by accident."

"Thank god I'm not with Seamus, either. Man, would you just look at him." Dean beckoned towards Seamus across the room, who's feather was already starting to smoke up.

"Good for us, I guess." Attuoria said with a shrug. She then swished and flicked her wand at the feather. "Wingardium Leviosa!"

The feather lifted itself off the table by a few centimeters before Dean slammed his hand on it and pressed it back down onto the table.

"Hey what was that for?" Attuoria asked, frowning.

Dean plucked Attuoria's wand out of her hand. "I want to do it first, and you're going to teach me."

"Why should I teach you?"

"Because that's what a nice person does."

"And I'm a nice person?"

"Yes, now tell me how you did it."

"Just swish and flick and say the spell."

"That's not helpful."

"Just do it."

Dean gave her a look before moving his focus onto the feather. He cleared his throat. "Winga-"

"Oh, well done!" cried Professor Flitwick before Dean could finish. "Everyone see here, Miss Granger's done it!"

"Oops, sorry." Dean apologised.

"Why are you sorry?"

"If I hadn't slammed your feather back onto the table, you'd be the one Flitwick is praising." Dean said apologetically.

Attuoria shrugged, "It doesn't really matter."

The class ended and Dean wouldn't stop bugging Attuoria to help him with the spell. Attuoria didn't know what to say. She told him multiple times, "just swish and flick and say the spell", but Dean still couldn't do it. Attuoria noticed Ron, Harry and Hermione all leaving the classroom already, so she dragged Seamus Finnigan over and told him to help Dean. She excused herself and left just as Seamus set their feather on fire.

She hurried down the crowded corridor and caught up to Harry and Ron.

"- must've noticed she's got no friends."

"Who?" Attuoria asked, slightly panting as she jogged up next to Ron.

"Hermione. She ran past us crying." Harry explained.

"I mean she's got no friends so I'm not surprised." said Ron, shrugging casually but clearly looking uncomfortable.

"She's my friend." said Attuoria.

"Well that's because you're also a nightmare. A different kind of nightmare. You're weird and quiet, always staring at people and stuff."

"Ron!" Harry punched Ron in the arm, "that's mean!"

"No," said Attuoria. "He's not wrong. I should really stop staring at people."

Harry and Ron laughed, thinking it was a joke, but Attuoria was being serious. She realised that staring at people for too long often gave off the wrong signal, sometimes even raising suspicion. She needed to look more discreet when reading people's minds.

Attuoria noticed something was wrong when Hermione didn't show up to class for the rest of the day. She broke into Ron's thoughts and heard him think to himself that he might have overdone it this time and truly hurt Hermione's feelings, but he didn't say anything about it.

On her way down to the Great Hall for the Halloween dinner feast with the two boys, she overheard Parvati telling Lavender that Hermione had been crying in the girls' toilets the entire afternoon.

"I'm going to go find Hermione." said Attuoria just as they were approaching the Great Hall.

"What? And miss out on the feast?" Ron exclaimed.

"I don't really like Halloween anyways." Attuoria said quickly before turning away from them.

"She doesn't like Halloween! See, I told you she's weird." Ron said to Harry jokingly as the two of the strolled into the Great Hall.

Attuoria took a turn down one of the corridors and made her way to the girls' bathroom. She spotted Professor Quirrell in the distance, his purple turban an easy identification as he strolled down the hallway. Attuoria watched him curiously, and as he got closer, he looked up from the ground and made a split-second eye contact with her before quickly averting his eyes from her gaze. Attuoria said nothing as he walked by, but she could now hear his thoughts:

"It's the Romanian girl. Why is she not at the feast? Well, no matter, hopefully the troll finds her."

The troll? Attuoria was confused by what she heard as the Professor disappeared from sight. She remembered the thoughts she overheard from Quirrell during their lesson, and immediately grew suspicious. There was definitely something odd about the man. He acted so nervous and jittery on the outside, but his thoughts revealed that it was all a facade. But what was it for?

Attuoria shook the thought from her head. It wasn't important, and it was none of her business. Her business right now was to find Hermione. She took a second turn to another passage and finally arrived at the girls' toilet.

The moment she entered, she heard Hermione's quiet sobs. Had she been non stop crying the entire day? The human body must be very efficient at producing tears. Just like how it won't stop producing saliva.

"Hermione?" Attuoria asked, walking over to the closed stall.

"Go away!" Her shrill voice rang out. She coughed and sniffed a few times.

"Hermione please come out, I've been trying to find you all day. Even Ron's sorry."

"He is?"

"Actually, he didn't say that but I can tell he feels bad -"

"Well if he didn't say it, then he's not sorry! I don't want his pity!" Hermione's voice angrily echoed around the bathroom.

"Please, Hermione? We're all worried about you." Attuoria said. It's as if a light bulb suddenly lit up inside her mind. This was friendship. When Hermione was gone, Attuoria noticed something wrong and couldn't stop thinking where she was. She was worried about her friend. That's what it meant to be worried, and to care about someone.

When Hermione didn't reply, Attuoria decided to say something a little more heartfelt (at least as heartfelt as she could muster out of her demon mind).

"Hermione, you're my friend. And because you're my friend, I care about you. So please, come out."

Attuoria heard Hermione sniff a few more times before her stall door slowly eased open. Hermione came out, her eyes puffy and red from crying all day.

"I'm sorry I yelled at you." She apologised shyly, wiping her face.

"It's okay. Now let's go before the Halloween troll comes and gets us." Attuoria joked, remembering what she heard from Quirrell's thoughts.

"Troll? What -"

Before Hermione could finish her sentence, the door to the girls' toilet flew open and in came a twelve-feet-tall, huge grey monster with a lumpy body, thick short legs and flat, horny feet. It had an ugly bald head perched on top of it's tree-trunk-sized neck. The monster's presence immediately stunk up the entire bathroom with the smell of excrement and sweaty old socks. And to make it worse, the monster was holding a huge wooden club.

Hermione let out a piercing shriek of fear and dash straight back into the stalls. Attuoria frowned at the sound. She was a complete stranger to fear, and the sight of the troll did absolutely nothing to her. It even made her feel slightly more confident that Hermione was scared. She silently stood in place, staring up at the gigantic thing.

"Oh, so this is a troll," Attuoria said to no one in particular, scrunching up her nose at the smell. What was a troll doing, wandering around the castles freely?

And then it hit her.

"Quirrell," she hissed under her breath. Quirrell must've unleashed the troll on purpose to cause fear amongst students. But why?

Before she could contemplate the answer to that question, the troll advanced towards her with slow clumsy steps, it's large wooden club smashing the sink closest to the door. She backed up and hit the wall. Only then did Attuoria realise she was trapped in the girls' bathroom with Hermione. And the troll, despite not scaring her, was undeniably huge.

Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted the door open behind the troll. It was Harry and Ron.

"There's Attuoria! Where's Hermione?" Harry yelled the moment he entered the bathroom.

"In the stall!" Attuoria called back, not taking her eyes off the troll's ugly face. If she knew anything about fear, is that if you act like you're not intimidated, the intimidator tends to lose their confidence. She was determined to stare it down.

"Ron! Confuse it!" Harry shouted as he seized a fallen tap from the ground and threw it against the wall, creating a loud clanging sound.

The troll stopped at the noise and lumbered around, blinking extremely slowly as it finally spotted Harry. It lifted up its club, about to strike. The troll's back was now facing Attuoria.

"Attuoria RUN! Go get a teacher!" Harry yelled, covering his head with his arms. Attuoria shot out of the bathroom through the door and out onto the hallway. She looked left and right. The corridor was empty, and eerily quiet. The castle was huge. How was she supposed to find a teacher?

Shouts, crashes and odd roaring sounds were echoing everywhere from the door behind her. Attuoria was so tempted just to head back in and teach the troll a lesson, but at the same time, going back in might just cause more trouble for them.

So she did the next best thing and ran out the corridor, making turns back to the Great Hall. She was bound to bump into someone along the way. And sure enough, she crashed straight into Professor McGonagall as she made a sharp turn. Attuoria toppled backwards but the Professor caught her before she could fall.

"Professor -"

"The troll. Where is it?" Professor McGonagall asked before Attuoria could even finish. Attuoria took a quick note of the two teachers behind her: Snape and Quirrell. The two professors with the most questionable and suspicious thoughts, Attuoria thought to herself. She did all she could not to confront Quirrell about the troll right there and then. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed that Snape was walking slightly weird, but she didn't think too much about it.

"Follow me." Attuoria said, fast-walking back towards the girls' bathroom. The three professors followed along behind her as best as they could until they finally arrived at their destination.

Professor McGonagall aggressively slammed the door open and burst into the bathroom, with Attuoria and the two other professors trailing in behind her.

The troll was lying on the ground motionless. Harry, Ron and Hermione stood next to it's fat, heavy body, completely unharmed.

Snape immediately rushed forward to examine the troll, trying his best to hide his limp. Quirrell, on the other hand, took one look at the beast, whimpered, and sat down on a toilet seat, clutching his heart.

"What on earth were you thinking of? You're lucky you weren't killed. Why aren't you in your dormitory?" While Professor McGonagall chastised the three students (thankfully forgetting about Attuoria), Attuoria kept her eyes on Quirrell. On the outside, he looked absolutely terrified of the troll, but Attuoria knew better. She kept staring at him until she could tell he was getting uncomfortable. She needed to make him look at her.

But when he finally did, it wasn't the frail, frightened gaze she had expected. Quirrell gave her a sharp, hard look with his slanted eyes, a nefarious smile curling onto his lips which disappeared so quickly it's as if it was never there. She knew it was supposed to intimidate her, but she wasn't scared. She knew all the games that involved fear, and his level of intimidation was quite amateur.

Unfortunately for Quirrell, however, he made the mistake of eye contact. Attuoria now had access to his thoughts. But for some reason, she heard a different voice. It wasn't Quirrell's thinking voice.

"I told you not to make eye contact!" said the foreign voice in Quirrell's mind.

"She's just a harmless first-year." Quirrell's voice was back.

But then, the foreign voice returned. "A first-year who is clearly suspicious of your actions. Your acting is not adequate. She is not fooled. The way she looked at you in the hallway earlier, she knows it's you. She is reading you like a book."

Attuoria was shocked at what she was hearing. Who is this mysterious voice in Quirrell's head? How did this person know that she was suspicious of Quirrell? She hadn't told anyone! Attuoria suddenly became wary of her own vulnerability. Could her mind be read by others? Dumbledore couldn't read hers, and he was supposedly the greatest wizard of all time. Unless there was someone better...

"And you!" Professor McGonagall's voice snapped Attuoria out of her thoughts. "Miss Knight!"

"Yes, Professor?"

"Thank goodness you were in the right place at the right time and showed us to the troll. Five points to Gryffindor for your resourcefulness. You were clever to head straight to the Great Hall when you noticed trouble."

Attuoria stood there awkwardly. She was expecting to be scolded. "Oh. Thank you, Professor."

Professor McGonagall dismissed them and they hurried out of the bathroom.

"Where's Hermione gone?" Attuoria asked as they climbed up the stairs back to their dorms.

"Did you not notice? She took the blame and left before us." Harry said.

"She didn't notice because she was busy staring at Quirrell." said Ron, giving Attuoria a pointed look.

"Quirrell?" Harry said in disbelief.

Attuoria shrugged, "He's weird. I don't trust him."

"Well neither do we. But mind you, we definitely should have gotten more than fifteen points for that." Ron grumbled.

"Ten, actually, once she's taken off Hermione's." Harry pointed out.

"Good of her to get us out of trouble like that. Mind you, we did save her."

"She might not have needed saving if we hadn't locked the thing in with her." Harry reminded him.

"What? You locked the troll in there?" said Attuoria.

Harry and Ron exchanged looks, chuckled nervously and nodded.

"Are you kidding-"

"Want to know how we defeated it?" Ron quickly suggested before Attuoria could go into any more detail.

Attuoria paused. "Sure. It seemed like an epic battle."

They returned to the common room where the Gryffindors were all eating food that had been sent up from the feast due to the loose troll. Hermione stood alone near the door, waiting for them. The four of them all briefly thanked each other before hurrying off to eat.

Ron and Harry sat down with Attuoria, excitedly explaining the entire fight all over again and reliving the thrilling moments. Hermione returned to her dorm quite early, probably to read again. But from that day on, Harry and Ron finally accepted Hermione as a friend, and Hermione accepted the two boys as her friends.

Attuoria couldn't be happier seeing the three people she grew to care about finally making up and forming a friendship.