10

Turns out the twins were already waiting for me at the common room, seemingly eager to see how it went.

"What did you even use in that?" I asked, tired but wanting answers.

The twins glanced at each other, as if daring the other to tell me.

"Semi-permanent sticking charm," the braver one told me.

I gave them an expression that told of pain and suffering. "How am I supposed to clean that up?"

They gave sheepish expressions that could only mean one thing. They had no idea, which meant, for the next week, I'd be scrubbing away at charms that wouldn't get removed, no matter how much elbow grease I put into it.

I decided to put them on a pranking list, but I wouldn't dare involve their inventions next time. Not unless I was sure it couldn't backfire on me, that is. Sighing I started to walk to my dorm, dreading the next day of questions and classes. Flopping gracefully on my bed, I nearly forgot about Quinn's odd question from before. When he asked me if I knew who Quirrell was. I frowned.

Unless he was stupid, could Quinn know Voldemort was attached to Quirrell?

I dismissed that thought.

He couldn't know, how would he find out anyways?

I groaned before noticing my wolf necklace glowing a dim soft blue. I held it carefully, trying to find out why. A few minutes later I concluded that some sort of charm must've been set off. I'd have to ask Mother who gave it to me of course, as I had it for as long as I could remember. I reached into my trunk and started to write the letter.

Dearest Mother,

It has come to my attention that my prized Wolf necklace is not simply a necklace. May I inquire about the spells or charms cast on it? Or who gave it to me? With that out of the way, I can assure you I am in good health. I am good friends with Harry Potter and mere acquaintances with Potter's cousin. I am not having trouble with my classes.

With love,

Fenrir V. Malfoy

I set down my quill and cast a drying spell on the parchment. I then went over to my raven's perch and gently woke him up. "Brax, I need you to deliver this to Malfoy Manor ok?" I coaxed as I attached the letter.

He nodded and started the journey once the letter was secured.

Sighing I turned off the lights and fell asleep.

-In the morning, we all love and hate-

I woke minutes before the others, groaning and rubbing my eyes.

Today was not going to be a good day. Not only are people going to notice the loss of points, they'll know it was me due to Quinn.

Harry was the next to wake, though not as fast as me.

"Morning 'enrir," he mumbled.

I nodded in greeting, before getting out of bed to start the day. It didn't take me long of course, since I slept in my school robes. A quick run through of my hair and I was walking down to the great hall, ignoring any attempts at human contact. Finally, I reached the great hall, where Quinn was, surprisingly, sitting at the Gryffindor table, next to my usual seat. I sighed before going to sit next to him.

A few seconds of awkward silence went by before Quinn spoke up. "Why do you call me Quinn when I call you Fenrir? I prefer Milo," he stated, calmly of course.

I looked at him as if he was crazy.

"You never asked me to. I guess I could call you Milo." I shrugged, ignoring the way his face lit up at that.

Soon the hall began filling up with tired Gryffindors, energetic Hufflepuffs, studying Ravenclaws, and gossiping Slytherins. It wasn't long before owls came flying in. To my surprise, I had two letters, from Father and Mother. I skimmed through my Fathers letter, to no one's surprise it was full of carefully placed threats, before opening my Mothers. I read this one more carefully, before nearly choking on pumpkin juice. According to her, the one who gave me the necklace was none other than who I was named after - Fenrir Greyback. I read over the charms and was surprised to see only one, one that made it glow a soft blue when I had prolonged contact with a magical creature. I thought about last night, how it glowed.

Who was I with? Milo, Filch and Mrs. Norris of course. Filch was out instantly, he was a squib. Mrs. Norris, I believe, probably had some creature blood in her that gave her red eyes. I paused on Milo, could he be a creature?

I ran through what I knew of him, he was a Potter on his mothers side, but as far as I knew, they didn't carry creature blood. I pondered about his father, it was unclear if he was a Muggle or not.

Deciding that it was probably Mrs. Norris who set off the charm, I sat that thought aside, before thinking of something more important, like writing my Charms essay. I wasn't left alone in my thoughts for long, as Milo decided to speak up,

"Does your necklace have some sort of nightlight inside? It was glowing last night in detention," he pointed out.

I scoffed,

"The charm to detect Magical Creatures went off, probably by Mrs. Norris," I explained, noting the slight shift of panic in his expression.

"Neat charm, who gave it to you?" He asked, voice wavering.

I narrowed my eyes. "How do you know someone gave it to me?" I questioned.

He laughed awkwardly,

"Only a creature could cast a spell like that, I should know, got a cousin on my dad's side who's a creature." He tried to explain.

I didn't buy it.

He was way too nervous for that to be true.

I decided to change the subject, "Interesting, what creature?"

This question led to a long rant that did not answer my question. Tuning him out, I wondered why he was so nervous. Could there be more I'm not getting? Again, I ran through Milo's information in my mind, taking note of everytime he did something odd, more odd than usual.

It was quite a short list, ending with his nervousness when creatures are brought up.

It reminded me of the time Draco tried to hide his crush on Astoria Greengrass from me. He would get nervous whenever she was mentioned and try to change the subject when she was the point of a particularly nasty conversation.

I snapped back to attention when Harry started poking me.

"Hey Fenrir, have you heard the rumors yet?" He asked, seemingly concerned.

I shook my head and he continued, "People are saying you pranked Professor Quirrell with one of the twins' inventions."

I nearly slammed my head on the table.

"Harry, that's, unfortunately, correct," I admitted.

He just looked at me, as if not expecting that, which, in his defense, is not exactly what I'd normally do. Normally, I'd just throw a book, as that solves most problems.

I rolled my eyes and stood up, ready to head to Potions. However, I was mercilessly pulled back down by Harry.

"Explain," he demanded.

I slowly reached into my bag, pulled out 'Hogwarts: A History', and smacked him on the head. Hard. Now, let me tell you, I realized my error less than a second later when Harry promptly yelped loud enough to sound like Dobby when said house elf punished himself. After cringing a bit, I stated, "Harry, I'm sorry, but you are denser than a pile of bricks."

"You don't need to hit me with that thing!" Harry exclaimed as he motioned wildly to what I was holding.

"It's a book, Harry," I stated, "And yes, I did. You're trying to get me smited-"

"How?!" He demanded to know as he threw his arms into the air.

I looked at him incredulously. Just when I was about to explain the situation to Harry, someone cleared their throat next to me.

The boy there looked quite annoyed as he had his hands deep in his pockets. His uniform was unbelievably messy, like he just threw everything on haphazardly, but didn't quite care about his appearance, which was quite odd considering he was a Ravenclaw. His light brown eyes held nothing but boredom as he stared down at me. "I really hate to interrupt this… enlightening… conversation, but I was sent over here by Ophi-"

I groaned softly before sticking my hands in my bag. I fished around before handing over six Galleons to the boy.

"Oh, thank Merlin," the boy said as he turned heel, clearly ready to leave.

"Tell Ophi that I don't want any more of his sneaky secrets," I stated as I put my hands on my hips.

"Good luck with that," the Ravenclaw said as he went off to where the Slytherin was at his table.

I huffed in annoyance before turning back to Harry, who looked exceptionally confused. "That's probably my cousin's minion."

"Cousin?" Harry repeated questioningly, "And minion?"

"You've seen Ophi, right?" I asked as I pointed over to the boy in question.

"Uh… No," Harry said as if just realizing that there was someone here at Hogwarts named Ophi.

I gave Harry a long-suffering look because, well, he really was dense. "His mother, Bellatrix, is my mother's sister. Anyway, if he ever approaches you and asks if you want to know a secret, say no. Otherwise, you'll owe him a debt, and he takes debts very seriously."

"Okay… Why does he have minions?" Harry inquired.

"That's just his thing," I answered with a shrug.

Harry looked at me with concern all over his face.

"He's not bad," I said honestly, "Just… Well… eccentric."

"He's weird," Harry summarized bluntly.

"I mean…" I sighed heavily. "Yes, he's a bit weird…"

Harry hummed before finally turning to his breakfast.

I thanked everyone I could think of in my mind as I was ready to get to Potions class.