The Keeper's Curse

Chapter Six

Hwapoww!

It was 4:30 sharp. Percy waited nervously at the entrance to the abandoned storeroom in the dungeon. His fingers were sweaty and sticky with anxiety. A sweatdrop rolled from his temple down to his chin. In reality, there wasn’t much to be afraid of, but Percy felt as if he was delivering ransom to devious kidnapper, Draco’s words echoed ominously through his mind, “bring no one, tell no one.”

If possible, Percy became even uneasier when the door at the far end of the corridor squeaked slowly open. His eyes shot wide open, his whole body stiffened. He heard footsteps, walking in rhythm, 2 feet to be exact. From this he instinctively knew it couldn’t have been Draco Malfoy and his two henchmen. It was probably Filch! He quickly ran into the storeroom, its door had already been partially open.

The faintly lit corridor, with torches along the wall revealed a shadow on the wall increased in size with every one of Percy’s deep breaths. The figure turned around the corner toward Percy’s side of the hall. The figure revealed a trail of mud as it approached the abandoned storeroom.This reassured Percy that it hadn’t been Filch walking through the hallway. Until…

The mysterious figure swung the heavy door open and walked straight into the room. “Oh, hmmm… she’s not here yet,” Oliver said to himself as he looked around the empty room.

Until, he heard a soft thump coming from a pile of moldy wooden crates. “Whoa, what was that? He approached the largest crate slowly, ugh smells like someone stepped on a dead skunk in here.” Then Oliver heard a strange mumble of words coming from the direction of the crates, almost as if someone was cursing under his breath at him. He pinched his nose and kneeled down to get a closer look. He cautiously placed his hand over the edge of the crate’s lid, and slipped his thumb underneath, to lift it up.

“Pssssst! Oliver!” Penelope whispered hoarsely.

His hand quickly let go of the box, and he sprung straight up on his feet.

Penelope walked into the room, and chuckled at Oliver’s erratic behavior.

“Oh you scared me. Wow, you’re even more beautiful even in the depths of the dungeon. Like an angel with a glowing halo,” Oliver whispered as he walked away from the crates. “Ha!” a loud snort was let out from behind him.

They both took their gazes away from one other and into the boxes piled in the corner. “Well anyway, I just wanted to talk to you somewhere private. I wanted to tell you that, well this is hard for me to say,” explained Penelope shyly, “Well, you know, you and I, we’re… wait no. I’m not very good with this. How can I put this is better words…” She touched Oliver’s cheek. She closed her eyes and pressed her face gently against Oliver’s, and embraced him in a deep kiss.

“Arrrghhh!” an agonizing scream surfaced from the corner.

They’re lips abruptly parted from each other. As theyboth jumped up in shock.

“Was that Peeves?” Penelope asked, still in shock. Peeves the Poltergeist was probably blamed for every single mishap that occurred on school grounds. But most times, he’s blamed justly; this time was one of those unusual times in which it wasn’t him.

“Penelope… There’s something I have to tell you.” Oliver’s solemn tone, broke the silence. His voice was always very soothing to Penelope, but something about the way he spoke this time, caused a chill to run down her spine.

“Someone is threatening to—no umm… I can’t go—wait. It’s about—I just can’t tell you that—”

“Can’t tell me what?” she listened intently.

“Just forget it.”

“No, what is it that you can’t tell me?”

“Just forget I said anything.”

“What are you trying to say?!” she shouted. Beneath her enraged appearance, her eyes began to water. “Why can’t you just tell me.”

He pressed his fingers tenderly onto her face. She shuddered at his warm touch. And he smiled.

“Don’t worry about it, it’s nothing that I can’t handle by myself. I’ll take care of it. I don’t want to get you involved in my little problems. You know, Quidditch-related stuff, I wouldn’t want to bore you to death.” He laughed uneasily.

She knew his smile wasn’t genuine, but she let it go. As much as she wanted save him from himself, it seemed to make him happy to fight his own fights.

He laughed again, this time with more energy. “If I can deal with Fred and George all the time, this should be nothing.”

They both smiled at each other and let out reassuring, yet superficial, laughs. They both walked out of the room and back upstairs.

Percy clumsily climbed out of the crate and stood up. He started twiddling his fingers, and laughing evilly.

“What idiots… He thinks he can get rid of me that easily. Well let’s see about that. Mua ha ha ha ha haha!”

“Weasley, I’m glad you’re practicing your new found personality, but don’t you think this is a bit extreme? I didn’t require you to act the parts of villains in muggle cartoons,” Draco Malfoy remarked as he walked into the room. The large silhouettes of Crabbe and Goyle stood rigidly behind.

“You’re 34 minutes late Malfoy. I should deduct points— Nevermind, uhhh where were we?”

“I saw the two lovebirds walking to the Great Hall, holding hands, blecchhh. But you can sense the tension between the two. This mission will be a lot easier than I thought; I did the research. So here goes.” He pulled out a large piece of parchment from under his robe and a dictator-like pointer stick, that makes a cool whip-like “whoosh!” sound when it’s waved.

“But, there’s nothing on the parchment,” Percy remarked with an eyebrow raised.

“Ah-hah! Exactly! The plan is so simple; I don’t need to draw a diagram! I just like pulling out this stick. Hwapow! Mua ha ha ha ha ha ha!” Malfoy lifted his head back and laughed.

Now Percy, Crabbe, and Goyle all had their eyebrows raised.

“What? I got caught up in the moment. Yeah like that never happens to YOU, Weasley.” Percy’s eyebrows shot back down, and he blushed. “Anyways, like I was beginning to say, until someone INTERRUPTED me!”

“Hey I didn’t! You were the one laughing maniacally that time!” Percy defended himself.

“See you just did!”

“Did WHAT?”

“YOU INTERRUPTED ME AGAIN!” Draco’s eyes glowed red.

The whole room became quiet.

“Ha ha ha! You have a lot to learn about discipline, Weasley. It’ll take some time for me to mold you into well-respected members of my gang. Take a look at Crabbe and Goyle, now those are some fine examples of who you should be like.”

Suddenly Percy’s eyes and nostrils enlarged, as he stepped back from Crabbe and Goyle’s stupid-looking grins.

“The plan is simple, we plant a nasty rumor about Wood. Before long it will be all over the school. And Clearwater will instantly dump him. And as an added bonus, the professors will disqualify Wood from the Quidditch tryouts as a punishment for his misdemeanors.”

“So what’s the rumor?”

“I have no clue. I’m making this up as I go along. Give me some credit here.”

“But I thought you said you did research and—”

“Eh! What did I say about questioning my authority here!”

“But you didn’t say anything about—”

“Eh! There you go interrupting me again!”

Percy let out a hopeless and annoyed look.

“Hwapow!” He swooshed the stick at Percy’s nose, just barely touching it.

To a cross-eyed Percy, Malfoy was becoming incredibly annoying.

“The time has come Weasley, to the Great Hall at once,” Malfoy ordered.

Percy walked out of the room. “Aren’t you three coming?”

Malfoy looked at his pocket watch, “Five minutes Weasley, you start off ahead of us, you know this is to remain strictly confidential, you can’t be seen with us,” Malfoy explained.

“Right.”

“Oh before you go Weasley, there’s one more thing.”

Percy turned back sneakily, “What?”

“You smell absolutely horrible! Like you stepped on a skunk or something! Ugh!”

:p>

At dinner in the Great Hall. Percy was so anxious to get his revenge that he barely touched his plate. He slid down into his seat. And with eyes like a hawk he surveyed the tables at the Great Hall. And to his dismay, Oliver and Penny were sitting next to each other at the Ravenclaw table, laughing, not a good sign at all. Percy was surprised his own attempt to break the two up proved futile. “Errr… That Oliver Wood… Such an ignorant fool. Why if I could get my hands on him!” he mumbled under his breath.

“Ummm… Are you okay Perce?” George asked from across the table.

“I’m fine, why would you ask,” Percy replied casually.

“Oy, must be the breakup, still hard on your Perce?” Fred explained.

Percy snarled at his brothers, but he looked away from them and back at his prime target.

“Whoa, but it was a good thing too. If I were Penelope Clearwater I would’ve dumped that poor pathetic loser lo-o-ong ago,” George added.

“Don’t say that Fred! You’ll probably hurt poor Percy’s feelings. And plus he’ll probably go all bonkers on you, and next thing you know, a Howler will be in from mum,” Fred remarked sarcastically.

Percy still ignored them.

“Yep, by the way, I never knew Oliver was going out with Penelope,” George remarked.

“Oh haven’t you heard, it’s been all over the school by now,” Lee Jordan interrupted.

“Oliver Wood and a girl? Ha! This should be funny, I haven’t seen him that close with anything other than his broom. This is great, less practice for us!” said George.

“Yeah and what’s with the names like ‘Gummy Bear’ and ‘Honeymuffin’?” said Fred as the three of them started laughing and pointing across the room.

Now Percy was boiling up inside, the nerve on his forehead began bulging and throbbing. Then he spotted Draco Malfoy seated with the Slytherins, wand in hand, held tightly under the table. A tiny spark of light appeared from his Draco’s wand, the thin stream of light traveled across the Great Hall toward the Gryffindor table, slowly twisting and turning its way toward a third-year Gryffindor. Percy Weasley’s eyes intently traced the stream of golden light on its journey. It stopped and hovered in place. Until it reappeared in the form of, “A wizard’s photo?” Percy whispered in bewilderment, expecting something more potent from Malfoy.

The floating wizard’s photo landed gently on a young Gryffindor’s shoe. “He sent the photo to Lavender Brown?” thought Percy.

Malfoy shifted his gaze away from her and bit his lip. Then he raised an eyebrow and turned back around. With his wand hidden under his robe, he muttered a simple spell. It flipped Lavender’s fork off her plate, it landed with a clunk on the floor.

“Ughhhh! Eww…” Lavender wiped the mashed potatoes off her face with a napkin, and then she reached down to the floor.

She felt her away across the floor, to find her bewitched fork. But she picked up two objects. Fork in one hand, Draco’s photo in the other, her eyes enlarged and she gasped, as her fork fell back onto the ground.

Percy was watching the photo the entire time. Lavender rubbed the dirt off, squinted, and looked more closely at it. But once again, her head sprung back, and her eyes widened. She whispered something to Parvati Patil, who was sitting next to her, and much giggling ensued.

“What exactly did Draco Malfoy want with the two gossipiest girls at Hogwarts?” Percy almost jumped out of his seat when the thought struck him; he walked up to Lavender and Parvati.

“Ahem. May I ask what is all the commotion here?” Percy asked authoritatively.

The 3^rd years shuffled about. “We’re just fine how about you?” Parvati commented nervously.

“What is that?” Percy asked Lavender.

“Nothing.” She crinkled up the photo.

But before she could tuck it into her robe or pass it to Parvati, Percy snatched it out of her hand. “I had no idea what is was, I just found it all of a sudden, I had nothing to do with it. I—” Lavender stopped her rambling as Percy’s face changed to a pleased look.

Percy looked carefully at the picture, it was dark, and the lighting was dim.But what he could see was the Quidditch equipment shed, with Oliver Wood clad in his Quidditch uniform, and another figure with him. He seemed to have his face smushed into a girl’s—he was making out with Alicia Spinnet? There was no mistaking it, the figures in the wizard’s photo moved and one can tell that it wasn’t a coincidence that they were so close to each other. Percy was content with Malfoy’s operation; he was pleased with his careful craftsmanship. He tossed the photo back into the gaggle of giggly Gryffindors, and walked back to his seat, at the far end of the table. When his back was faced to them, he smirked, trying to control his laughing. He sat down and watched intently for what was to come.