LOST ↝ G. WEASLEY [1]

14 | G.N.O.

"This is madness," Arden said, setting down her essay with a sigh and quickly apologizing when Madame Pince shot her a glare for talking in the library. "I mean, two rolls of parchment on why muggles are dangerous?" she asked, quickly dropping her voice into a whisper.

"I mean, she's right," Rowan whispered. "my nan and granddad are muggles. The only danger they pose is her overfeeding me when I come to visit. Says she wants to make sure we're eating well and not going hungry."

"I bet it's so that they can eat you, like in that old muggle fairytale." Arden teased. "You know, the one about the kids who find that house made of candy, and the old lady tries to fatten them up to bake into pies."

"But those are the witches doing the fattening and baking, not the muggles." Joey reminded her with a sly grin.

"Yes, but that's what they want you to think," Arden said, sending the three teenagers into a fit of giggles, only stopping when Madame Pince sent a loud shush in their direction.

"Don't you three know better than to be disruptive in the library?" a voice asked, and they looked up to see Nicolette and Monty walk over next to them, a smirk crossing the girl's features as she awaited their answer. "Come on, library's almost closing. Time to get back."

Joey quickly rolled up the letter she had been writing to George, shoving it into her bag along with her quill and ink. Pulling her bag over her shoulder, Joey stood up, following the group out of the library and up the stairs towards the seventh floor. As they neared the Room of Requirement, the familiar ornate doorframe came into view, Rowan stepping forward and pulling it open to reveal the rest of the group.

"Where've you been?" Ginny asked. "We thought you'd miss curfew."

"Library," Arden informed the younger girl.

"Gin, do yourself a favor and don't go through seventh year. The workload's absolute hell." Rowan told her.

"I'll keep that in mind if we live that long," she countered with a shrug. "Doesn't seem too likely, these days."

"Hey, we're all getting out of this," Monty assured her. "you'll live to see your seventh year, whether you want to attend it or not."

"But have you seen that Muggle Studies essay?" Seamus asked. "Two rolls of parchment on why my dad's dangerous? He's only dangerous if you go and try to change the channel on him when he's watching his programs."

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"This is a load of rubbish," Nicolette whispered later on as everyone tried to get to sleep. The guys had managed to fall asleep, while Nicolette, Ginny, Luna, Arden and Joey still lay awake, staring up at the ceiling. "this castle's no better than Azkaban."

"At least they don't have to do homework," Ginny added.

"I miss the comfy beds of the dorms, but not enough to risk my neck going back." Nic said.

"I miss watching Quidditch matches," Joey added in.

"I miss Hogsmeade." Arden said. "And candy from Honeydukes. And butterbeer."

Joey sat up then, looking around at the other girls. "Let's go."

"Let's go?" Nic asked, sitting up next to her. 

"Hogsmeade," she said, gesturing over to where the painting of Ariana Dumbledore hung on the far wall before standing up and pulling on her maroon knitted jumper that Molly had adorned with a giant golden J. "We've got ourselves a way to get there. I mean, I don't think anything's still open at this hour, but even just to walk around for a bit and get out of the castle."

"I'm in," Ginny said, standing up as Joey quickly swapped her pajama pants for a pair of jeans and pulled on her sneakers. "come on, you cowards."

"What if we get caught?" Arden whispered nervously.

"The only person who's going to catch us is Aberforth." Joey assured her. "We have nothing to worry about. Come on, it's girls' night."

As soon as everyone was up and dressed, Joey illuminated the tip of her wand and led the other girls over towards the painting, as she was still the only one to have crossed through it. As they neared, Ariana gave her a friendly smile before swinging the painting open to reveal the dark passage ahead.

"If we die tonight, Joey, I'll kill you." Arden said as everyone lit the tips of their wands one by one. 

"What's life without taking some risks?" Nic asked excitedly as they climbed up into the passageway. "I mean, if we're all about to die soon anyways, where's the harm in this?"

The door swung shut behind the girls, causing the others to jump a bit in surprise. 

"Alright, careful, there's steps down this way." Joey warned them. "It goes underground."

After what seemed like forever, the group finally reached the end of the tunnel leading to Aberforth's house. Ariana slowly swung open, revealing Aberforth watching them intently with his arms crossed over his chest.

"Do you lot have any idea what time it is?" he asked.

"Didn't mean to wake you," Joey apologized, quickly waving a hand between the girls and Aberforth. "girls, this is Mr. Dumbledore. Mr. Dumbledore, these are a few of the other members of Dumbledore's Army. We just needed out of the castle for a bit. We're going mad in there," 

"Well, come on in, all of you," he said as they hopped down into the sitting area one by one. "just... be quiet when you return."

"Thank you, sir," Luna said as he retreated back out of the room.

"He seems pleasant," Nic muttered sarcastically as they left the small house, reaching the crisp night air of Hogsmeade.

"So where do we go from here?" Arden asked.

"I've got an idea," Joey told the others. "follow me."

She led the group down the path that made up most of the Hogsmeade shops, reaching the clearing where many came to view the Shrieking Shack. Though most Hogwarts students still believed it to be the most haunted building in Britain, the group knew it was just Remus when he was back at school, and that it remained empty until that night in Joey's third year when Peter Pettigrew made his big escape.

As soon as they were all in the clearing Joey sat down on the ground, leaning back until she was laying down in the grass and staring up at the stars. One by one the girls all joined her until they were just laying back, watching the sky above and breathing in the night air.

"Why didn't we think of this sooner?" Luna asked.

"The boys are going to be pissed when they find out." Ginny added.

"This was nice," Arden said. "I'm glad we did this."

"By the way," Ginny said, sitting up and looking at the others. "having Seamus and Tommy in the Room of Requirement with us has me thinking that we should start recruiting more of the old members. You know, build up the numbers and what not."

"I agree," Nicolette said. "I think it's time we start teaching others, now that we've all learned loads ourselves. Let's be the teachers that the Carrows aren't."