she had just awoken from a terrifying nightmare drenched in sweat and shaking all over. she peered at her roommate, aspen lovelace, who was soundly asleep. aspen slept like a rock and therefore had no issues with elara's night terrors.

february 18, 1994

i feel like i'm going crazy. my nightmares are getting more and more realistic everytime i fall asleep. tonight's dream was of either murder or attempted murder, for when the man with the knife brought it down, i woke. 

the man looked like he hadn't had a good meal in years. his hair was scraggly and slightly greasy. he was paler than draco, which is no easy feat. his face was so hollow that his cheekbones casted shadows on his face. the man's clothes hung off of him like they were two sizes too big.

he was standing near a bed when he lunged for the curtains and slashed them up. i can't think of any reason why he would. maybe he has a flair for dramatics. the man turned to the bed he was nearest to and leered over it maliciously. lightning flashes and he brings the knife down.

i have no idea what the hell this is about.

elara sighed. she pulled her wild black hair into a knot on the back of her head and rubbed her eyes. an overwhelming craving for banana bread pulled her to her feet. she plucked a soft blanket off the edge of her four-poster bed and laid it over her shoulders, pulling it tight.

"aaarrgghh! nooo!" she heard a faint yell and then a door slamming.

worried someone was hurt, elara yanked open her own dormitory door and ran towards the sound. she reached the bottom on the girls dormitories stairs and saw a figure run out the portrait hole.

fear fueled elara.

she sprinted up the steps towards the boy's dormitories, towards the sound of unmistakable panic. elara yanked open the door and was met with the sight of four boys right in front of her.

"what's happened?" she demanded, eyes wide with panic.

"sirius black with a knife! he slashed the curtains!" ron answered while shaking tremendously.

elara caught sight of the curtains and blanched. this was uncannily familiar to her dream. her mind went to the person running out the common room. sirius black. she had just seen sirius black. she said nothing as she turned and fled down the stairs with harry, ron, seamus, and dean tailing behind her. doors opened as they ran past, sleepy voices calling out to them.

"who shouted?"

"what're you doing?"

the common room was lit with the glow of the dying fire, still littered with the debris from the party. it was deserted.

"are you sure you weren't dreaming, ron?"

"i'm telling you, i saw him!"

"i saw him too!" elara yelled right along with ron. "he was running out the portrait hole!"

"what's all the noise?"

"professor mcgonagall told us to go to bed!"

a few of the girls had come down their staircase, pulling on dressing gowns and yawning. boys,too, were reappearing.

"excellent, are we carrying on?" said fred weasley brightly.

"everyone back upstairs!" said percy, hurrying into the common room and pinning his head boy badge to his pajamas as he spoke.

"perce — sirius black!" said ron faintly. "in our dormitory! with a knife! woke me up!"

the common room went very still.

"nonsense!" said percy, looking startled. "you had too much to eat, ron — had a nightmare —"

"no! he wasn't dreaming! i saw him go out the portrait hole!" elara spoke up trying to defend ron.

"you sleepwalk all the time!" tori davis protested from amongst the crowd that had gathered in the common room.

"yes, well -- "

"now, really, enough's enough!"

professor mcgonagall was back. she slammed the portrait behind her as she entered the common room and stared furiously around.

"i am delighted that gryffindor won the match, but this is getting ridiculous! percy, i expected better of you!"

"i certainly didn't authorize this, professor!" said percy, puffing himself up indignantly. "i was just telling them all to get back to bed! ron and elara here both had a nightmares —"

"IT WASN'T A NIGHTMARE!" elara commanded the common room's attention. never once in here years at hogwarts had she raised her voice. the authority in which she spoke made it difficult to not hand onto every word she was saying. "I SAW HIM LEAVE THE COMMON ROOM!"

"PROFESSOR, I WOKE UP, AND SIRIUS BLACK WAS STANDING OVER ME, HOLDING A KNIFE!" ron yelled, expasterated he only had one person on his side.

professor mcgonagall only stared at him.

"don't be ridiculous, you two, how could he possibly have gotten through the portrait hole?"

"ask him!" said ron and elara simultaneously, pointing at the back of sir cadogan's picture.

glaring suspiciously at ron and elara, professor mcgonagall pushed the portrait back open and went outside. the whole common room listened with bated breath. "sir cadogan, did you just let aman enter gryffindor tower?"

"certainly, good lady!" cried sir cadogan.

there was a stunned silence, both inside and outside the common room.

"you — you did?" said professor mcgonagall. "but — but the password!"

"he had 'em!" said sir cadogan proudly. "had the whole week's, my lady! read 'em off a little piece of paper!"

professor mcgonagall pulled herself back through the portrait hole to face the stunned crowd. she was white as chalk.

"which person," she said, her voice shaking, "which abysmally foolish person wrote down this week's passwords and left them lying around?"

there was utter silence, broken by the smallest of terrified squeaks. neville longbottom,trembling from head to fluffy slippered toes, raised his hand slowly into the air.

no one in gryffindor tower slept that night. they knew that the castle was being searched again,and the whole house stayed awake in the common room, waiting to hear whether black had been caught. professor mcgonagall came back at dawn, to tell them that he had again escaped.

of course, the only person who had slept was aspen lovelace. even after elara went through a ridiculous amount of trouble to get her awake, aspen was asleep again minutes after she had settled on a couch in the common room next to seamus. the undeniable grin on his face told that he couldn't be happier that aspen was asleep on his shoulder.

the only person who didn't know seamus finnegan had a massive crush on aspen lovelace was aspen lovelace.

throughout the day, everywhere they went they saw signs of tighter security; professor flitwick could be seen teaching the front doors to recognize a large picture of sirius black; filch was suddenly bustling up and down the corridors, boarding up everything from tiny cracks in the walls to mouse holes. sir cadogan had been fired. his portrait had been taken back to its lonely landing on the seventh floor, and the fat lady was back. she had been expertly restored, but was still extremely nervous, and had agreed to return to her job only on condition that she was given extra protection. a bunch of surly security trolls had been hired to guard her. they paced the corridor in a menacing group, talking in grunts and comparing the size of their clubs.

ron and elara had became instant celebrities. for the first time in her life, students were paying more attention to elara positive attention. it was nice, but she wasn't a fan of being in the spotlight. ron however, though still severely shaken by the night's events, he was happy to tell anyone who asked what had happened, with a wealth of detail.

neville was in total disgrace. professor mcgonagall was so furious with him she had banned him from all future hogsmeade visits, given him a detention, and forbidden anyone to give him the password into the tower. poor neville was forced to wait outside the common room every night for somebody to let him in, while the security trolls leered unpleasantly at him. none of these punishments, however, came close to matching the one his grandmother had in store for him. two days after black's break-in, she sent neville the very worst thing a hogwarts student could receive over breakfast — a howler.

the school owls swooped into the great hall carrying the mail as usual, and neville choked as a huge barn owl landed in front of him, a scarlet envelope clutched in its beak. elara, harry and ron,who were sitting opposite him, recognized the letter as a howler at once — ron had got one from his mother the year before.

"run for it, neville," ron advised.

neville didn't need telling twice. he seized the envelope, and holding it before him like a bomb,sprinted out of the hall, while the slytherin table exploded with laughter at the sight of him. they heard the howler go off in the entrance hall — neville's grandmother's voice, magically magnified to a hundred times its usual volume, shrieking about how he had brought shame on the whole family.

harry got a letter too and tore open the envelope while hedwig helped herself to some of neville's cornflakes. the note was from hagrid, asking harry and ron for tea. the two boys invited elara along as well, but she declined. she had plans to study with hermoine at six, and since she'd been in a right state ever since christmas, elara thought it cruel to change plans.

at six, they went their separate ways. elara was subconsciously pissed at ron for being a prat to hermoine. she was pissed at harry too, but they were her friends. finding hermoine's table in the common room wasn't difficult; it was the one piled with the most books.

"whatcha working on?"

"ancient runes." hermoine grumbled, rubbing her temple with a hand.

hermoine looked as tired as ever. her bushy hair was messy and the bags under her eyes were magnificent. elara didn't press. everyone had their limits, and hermoine was nearing hers. they continued on studying for three hours with the occasional question and answer. 

it became increasingly difficult to study when a large group of people began to bunch around the bulletin board.

"hogsmeade, next weekend!" said the voice of ron. "whatd' you reckon?" he added quietly to harry as they went to sit down.

hermoine and elara exchanged looks. elara had no idea what she'd do with herself if sirius black ended up killing harry.

"well, filch hasn't done anything about the passage into honeydukes..." harry said, even more quietly, though not quietly enough.

"harry!" hermoine hissed, clearing a space in the wall of books that had been hiding her from view. "harry, if you go into hogsmeade again... i'll tell professor mcgonagall about that map!"

"can you hear someone talking, harry?" growled ron, not looking at hermione.

elara wondered how someone could be so childish. anger bubbled. the glare she was sending ron was incinerating. 

"ron, how can you let him go with you? after what sirius black nearly did to you! i mean it, i'll tell —"

"so now you're trying to get harry expelled!" said ron furiously. "haven't you done enough damage this year?"

elara's mouth dropped open at ron's tact, or lack thereof. hermione opened her mouth to respond, but with a soft hiss, crookshanks leapt onto her lap. hermione took one frightened look at the expression on ron's face, gathered up crookshanks,and hurried away toward the girls' dormitories.

ron and harry expected elara to yell at them from the look on her face. they hadn't expected her to only clench her jaw and follow after hermoine, but not after shooting them a withering glare.

"bloody hell, she's terrifying when she's mad." said ron meekly.

elara didn't bother knocking before she barged into hermoine's dorm. hermoine was sat on her bed with her face buried in her hands. a part of elara wanted nothing more to turn right back on her heel and deck ron weasley, but her feet urged her towards hermoine.

she gently took a seat next to her crying friend and sat awkwardly for a moment, wrestling with herself on what to say.

"hermoine -- "

"i really have damaged so much this year, lara!" hermoine launched into her rant, teary-eyed and sniffling. "i mean i reported the firebolt for nothing, and then crookshanks kills scabbers! ron's right -- "

"no." elara cut her off, awkwardly putting an arm around hermoine's shoulder. "ron's an ass."

hermoine made a weird sort of snort-sniffle sound. she didn't even protest elara's use of language. "but -- "

"no, hermoine. there's nothing wrong with wanting your friend to stay alive. they're teenage boys. they're reckless, they're dumb, they're idiotic, and they've got the emotional range of a bloody teaspoon." 

"oh, lara." hermoine sniffled. 

the two girls sat like that for a long time. they talked about mishaps they had accidentally caused when they were younger because of their magic. hermoine had once turned a kid's hair green, and elara had once set a squirrel on a girl who was being mean to her.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

-- hermoine and elara = the ultimate power couple

-- yeah elara's the type to get really quiet when she's mad

cause those people scare me and elara's pretty scary

-- also she's thirteen she can't exactly make threats

because she'd just look like that image of a stuffed

duck holding a knife

-- wOah!! major plot point revealed!!!!! wow so mysterious

wonder why she dreamt that... ahaha.... ha....