CH10 - The Golden Trio

The sun's rays filled the small dorm, lighting up the space brightly, and piercing through the bed curtains. Edmund's eyes squinted as he put up his right hand in front of his eyes to block the light unsuccessfully as he tugged on his shoes. Pulling on his robes to complete his ensemble of clothing, he hurriedly ran into the common area, noticing he was the last of the boys to arrive.

Looking around, he saw many students chattering excitedly, discussing their summers and upcoming lectures. Turning his eyes to the fifth-year prefects, he saw that they too were in a good mood, putting on an instant dampener on his own.

'Ughh,' he groaned in his mind, 'of course Hufflepuff is the house of morning people. Just my luck,' he thought grumpily as he pulled at his face and drooping eyes in an effort to appear less like an inferius.

Ben and Jeremy greeted him confusedly, probably wondering why he looked like a walking corpse when they had all gone to sleep at the same time.

'I should probably set some sort of nightly reading limit on myself,' Edmund grimaced, 'But then again, I'm going to have to get used to less sleep if I want to explore the Forbidden Forest at night. Maybe there's some magical solution I don't know about?' he thought to himself.

It was only a few minutes later that he saw Cecilia's distinct wild blonde hair turning the corner down the girl's dorm stairs, followed by two others.

Cecilia immediately came to stand next to him without a moment of hesitation, looking even grumpier than him, making Edmund feel a little less awful.

"Trouble in paradise?" he asked, eyeing Cecilia's two roommates who were conversing in hushed tones, giggling a few times in between.

"Jennifer Stevenson and Chelsea Patton," she pointed out each of them discreetly, huffing all the while. "They've known each other since birth. Thick as thieves, and that basically means I might as well not even exist in our dorm."

"They look nice enough," Edmund countered, amused.

"Too nice!" Cecilia insisted.

Her icy blue eyes lost a bit of their anger then, turning contemplative.

"Could be worse though," she admitted. "And you? Are your roommates the same as mine, or is there some other reason why you're looking a kid who got his candy bar snatched from him?"

Edmund glared at her, while Cecilia laughed.

Before Edmund could get in another word, the prefects called for their attention, and Cecilia scampered off to join the other girls mischievously.

"Everyone here?" Cedric asked, while Patricia looked over to check that all six of them were there.

"Great!" Cedric said, whirling around towards the common room entrance. "Everyone follow us then please."

The way back to the Great Hall was more familiar this time around, and Patricia decided to share a few tricks to remember the correct path that might help them in the future.

"Always remember," Cedric added as he stepped backwards up the Grand Staircase, "Hogwarts is always changing in small ways, so try to say on your fee—!"

His arms flailed wildly as Cedric's textbooks flew through the air and his hands tried to reach out to grab onto the bannisters to prevent him from faceplanting.

Once he had steadied himself, Cedric first looked down to pull his foot out from the trick step he had fallen into, before looking up.

Patricia stood with her wand out lazily, Cedric's books levitating in a circle in front of her, as she smirked at him.

Already flushed, Cedric looked towards the six younger students, seeing them giving him a deadpan look.

Quickly snatching his books from the air, Cedric turned around before clearing his throat quickly.

*Cough*

"As I was saying, try to stay on your feet," he continued as if he had never been interrupted at all.

Everyone began laughing raucously, and after a few seconds, Cedric gave in and joined them as well.

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- (Scene Break) -

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The day after that went by in a flash for Edmund.

History of Magic began without any fanfare when Professor Bins phased through the blackboard and began reading straight from the book right on the dot when class began...

While Binns lulled everyone to sleep with his powerful sleep magic, Edmund chose to plug his ears and read ahead in his other subjects.

Charms and Transfiguration were primarily introductory, with the focus of the lesson being to discuss the curriculum rather than progress. Still, both classes ended with a small bit of magic, which everyone was excited to perform.

In Charms, Flitwick was thrilled to see Edmund's enthusiasm, applauding for him when he achieved the Lumos charm on his first attempt, and squealing in excitement when he demonstrated the colour-changing charm on his quill.

However, it was in Transfiguration that Edmund truly shone, especially since Professor McGonagall knew that Edmund had only received his wand a week prior. After a short lecture, the Professor had turned back into a cat while midair, landing gracefully on her desk. Her eyes, which usually darted this way and that to check on her students, were locked completely on Edmund in awe. Watching Edmund easily transform the matchstick into a needle, and even going on to experiment with different colours and designs of the needle, McGonagall was left speechless.

After class, she had kept Edmund back, commending him on his talent and initiative, and encouraging him to keep up the good work.

Breakfast, classes, lunch, and then more classes. Just when Edmund thought he'd be allowed to run free until dinnertime, the teachers had announced an orientation for various club activities that students could sign up for, which had eaten up the few precious hours he had.

However, dinner itself had proved interesting, for it was the first time Edmund caught sight of three unmistakable people, the Golden Trio.

The ever-charismatic and lanky Ron Weasley sat at the Gryffindor table gorging himself on the feast, sipping liberally on pumpkin juice. His bright orange hair stood out like the sun, further noticeable due to his tall figure.

A tiny bushy-haired witch in a bright pink jacket sat next to him. Hermione Granger, the brains of the Golden Trio, lived up to her reputation as she balanced a book against a pitcher of water precariously. Even as she ate and talked to her friends, her eyes never left the pages.

Harry Potter sat opposite both of them, his flaming red scar unmissable on his forehead, despite the boy's best attempts at covering it with his overgrown hair. Bright green eyes stood out on his thin face, etched with a deep scowl full of hatred. Glancing at the paper Harry was reading, Edmund realized it was due to the headlines plastered with news about Sirius Black's escape. The man thrashed like a feral creature in the picture, his teeth bared, ready to bite at those who drew too close to him.

'Thankfully Black's not my problem,' Edmund thought, eating his last bite of treacle tart.

A squeaking noise drew his attention back to the Gryffindor table, where he saw Ron feeding a large round rat a small cube of cheese. The rat grabbed the cheese from Ron's fingers with his claws, before diving back into the safety of the inner pockets of Ron's robes.

'Pettigrew though...' Edmund pondered gravely.

'If I let him get away back to Voldemort, then I won't be needed anymore. I'll become the backup plan. If I'm not irreplaceable, then I'm just another one of Voldemort's minions,' he thought as his knuckles turned white from gripping his fork too tightly. 'No, Pettigrew's gonna have to go. The only question is how.'

Pushing his plate back and standing up, Edmund's mood lightened.

'For now, it's time to explore,' he thought excitedly.

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- (Scene Break) -

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Picking a random corridor to wander down probably wasn't the brightest of ideas.

'But then again, how do you find somewhere new if you know where you are?' Edmund tried to justify to himself while smiling.

In other words, Edmund was lost, and he was loving it.

The stony expanses of the walls of Hogwarts looked identical to one another and would have baffled Edmund were it not for the subtle differences he slowly began to pick up on.

Bright torches lined the walls, their holders ornately carved with slight alterations in each hallway. The high arched dome ceilings were designed to form varying geometric patterns, mirrored by the placement of the window panes. The halls with windows next to the quidditch pitch were distinctly thicker, likely to provide protection against stray bludgers, while those that led to the outside were much narrower to prevent the cold drafts of air from getting inside.

No door that he found was left unopened, no matter how plain. Most times all he discovered was an old classroom so full of dust that it must not have been touched in the past hundred years. One time, however, he did find a rather out-of-the-way broom cupboard, surprisingly occupied. The two older students who had their hands up each other's shirts definitely did not appreciate his presence.

'It is a pretty good spot for some Coitus Uninterruptus,' Edmund laughed happily as he ran away from the boy chasing him while spewing curses.

Edmund knew that many new students were planning to explore the castle in their free time, but he had come across none of them, speaking to the vastness of the space. The only conversations he'd had were with portraits, nearly all of whom were happy to have some company.

Through them, Edmund discovered some of the most popular secret passageways of the castle, marvelling at the way they bent space to transport him large distances with ease.

The most helpful secret he had found was courtesy of an elderly lady in a portrait at the very top of the Grand Staircase. It turns out the poor woman hadn't had anyone to talk to in a long time because she was too frail to visit other portraits and too high up on the wall for most students to notice.

"Did you know," she had rasped, "that there are a series of paintings at the same location on each floor of the castle that depict how Hogwarts was built in cooperation by the four founders?"

Seeing Edmund's nod, she continued with a smile.

"What you probably don't know," she whispered, "is that knocking on any of the sceneries a specific number of times will create a passageway leading to that floor of the castle, from portrait to portrait."

Deciding to test the theory while running from his pursuer, Edmund turned the corner and furiously knocked on the golden frame of the picture seven times. Swinging open the painting/door, Edmund barged through the short tunnel before pushing out the other end, collapsing to the floor breathlessly.

Looking out the window, Edmund saw how high up he suddenly was, letting out a delirious laugh of delight.

After catching his breath, Edmund was filled with an urge to go up even more. He followed a small winding staircase upwards before opening a small door, breathing in the cold Scottish air with a deep breath.

Leaning on the parapets, he looked out over the Hogwarts grounds towards the Forbidden Forest. The full moon had just passed the night before, so there was still plenty of light illuminating the treetops. Various sounds of hooting and howling could be heard from deep within the forest, interspersed with loud rustling noises followed by an eerie silence. Looking up above that, Edmund watched as the motionless dementors encircling the Hogwarts grounds stood on duty, waiting for their prey to show.

"This.... is gonna take a lot of planning," Edmund murmured thoughtfully.

'I'll need a way to get in and out of the grounds undetected, a cover for the time that I'll be missing, a way to navigate the forest without getting lost and keeping track of where I've already explored, self-defence skills good enough to at least escape the horrors of the forest, and who knows what else...' he listed off, getting more and more depressed as he thought about it.

'Slow and steady,' Edmund chanted to himself as he let out a deep sigh. 'It's only a matter of time.'

'Let's hope I either find my way back before curfew, or get lost enough that even the teachers out patrolling can't find me,' he thought as he walked down the stairs slowly.

'Either sounds fine,' Edmund thought, whistling Hedwig's theme to himself merrily.