Fear And Loathing At Hogwarts

Chapter One

 

    Bill Weasley was having a very hard time sleeping.

After spending half the night tossing and turning, unable to fight his nightmares about horrible creatures that were so frightening he couldn’t even think about them without cringing, Hogwarts’ Head Boy sat with his knees drawn up to his chest on the window seat, staring out at the night’s full moon.

Werewolves come out at the full moon… Bill’s eyes flicked to the shadowy Forbidden Forest at the sound of a dark howl. Stop being so jumpy – it was only a nightmare, Bill scolded himself. He raked a pale, freckled hand through his chin-length fiery red hair.

The recent happenings at Hogwarts weren’t a dream, though Bill wished they had been. He had been the one to discover the most recent victim, with his younger brother Charlie. He still saw the poor girl’s face behind his eyelids whenever they drooped shut, frozen in a scream when he found her. Covered in blood. A seventh-year, Ravenclaw’s Seeker. A girl by the name of Yumi Okama. He saw her body, clothes town up as if slashed by long, unforgiving claws, right arm swollen and a horrible shade of purple, blood staining the bight green dewy grass.

The girl had probably been out for an early morning Quidditch practice, the same reason Bill and Charlie were strolling along the grounds towards the field at 6:00 in the morning. Bill often helped his younger brother train, racing around the field on broomsticks and throwing bronze Knuts through the air for Charlie to catch. In the past two years that Charlie had been Gryffindor’s seeker, Bill had trained with him three days a week and had only lost two Knuts.

Training the rest of that year was pointless, though, considering that Dumbledore cancelled the last Quidditch game of the season (Ravenclaw vs. Gryffindor, for the cup), making Gryffindor the winner by default – since they had the most points even though Slytherin played one more game than they had. The celebration was somber, despite Gryffindor’s second consecutive win – Yumi’s attack had been the third that year.

Bill rested his chin on his knees and gazed out at the dusky sky, loosing a yawn. He wanted to sleep – McGonagall’s Transfiguration final in the morning was sure to be a doozy – but as soon as his eyes would close, he heard the screams of his nightmares… Bill wondered if Yumi in her comatose state suffered the same horrible dreams he did. Bill had never really known her – she was a year older, and a Ravenclaw – but he had visited her twice in the hospital wing, staring into her lifeless eyes and wondering what had happened to her.

Bill saw the sky turning pink with the first bit of sunlight and decided to take a sip of the sleeping potion he had brewed a week before, even though it locked him in with his dreams, he needed to rest up for more finals. It was only Wednesday, and he still had Transfiguration, advanced Arithmancy, advanced Charms, Goblin Logic Studies, and intermediate Charm-breaking finals that week, not to mention Snape’s dreadful Potions final on Friday morning.

Bill screwed his green eyes shut and took a swig from the vial hidden under his bed table before stumbling back to bed. His breathing steadied and his mind sank back into visions of creatures that he couldn’t escape from just as the sun peeked over the horizon.

 

* * * * *

 

“Bill, wake up! Bill!” Marcus Cross shook his roommate hard, trying to rouse him from his seemingly deep slumber.

Bill groaned and sat up, eyes adjusting until the two Marcuses he saw melted into one. “Come on, we have potions in fifteen minutes! You don’t want to go home for the holiday with failing grades, do you? Your father will kill you! Come on!”

Bill reluctantly rolled out of bed, throwing on his jumper and robes and raking his fingers through his hair. His eyes were bloodshot and dark circles hung under them, his hair was greasy from accidentally sleeping in and skipping two days of showering, and his robes were wrinkled from sneaking sips of sleeping potion between classes and napping in the bathroom. He trudged after Marcus down to the dungeons, where they were the last to arrive for Snape’s final.

Bill spent the two hours they were allotted to plan and create a very tough potion used to cure nearly every type of poison, but his mind was definitely not on powdered newt droppings and boggart juice (and whatever boggart juice was made of, Bill didn’t even want to know). He was groggy and dizzy from lack of sleep and could only think of the dreams he had been having. He thought maybe they were trying to tell him something… but what? All he could remember from them was plenty of screaming and vague remembrances of monsters and creatures that he had never actually seen before. Probably just the fruits of an overactive imagination, but still… Bill had never really had any fear of, well, anything, and—

“Mr. Weasley, I suggest you quicken the work on your antidote, or I shall be forced to base your entire grade on whether or not it can cure a bite from the poisonous fang of a Norwegian Ridgeback,” Snape said, sneering. “And in order to do that, you’d have to be bitten by one first. Would you like me to arrange that?”

Bill lifted his head up with much effort and continued stirring his cauldron, which was emitting a smell that was much more rank than the potions around him. He ignored a group of snickering Slytherins in the corner and tried his damnedest to keep his eyes open while he quickly checked his watch. Still 45 minutes left of this hellish class… good thing he could drop it next year to take double Goblin Logic classes. Logic is just something that most people don’t possess, and Bill planned on being able to trick his way out of any situation. If only he could utilize his knowledge of logic to figure out these demented dreams.

Just as Bill was bottling his potion (which by now was a putrid shade of yellow while everyone else’s was red), the bell rang to release Hogwarts students from exams and the school year. A whole week of glorious vacation until the exam scores were released, a whole week to catch up on sleep and try to stop being so freaked out about some little nightmares.

Bill practically threw his putrid smelling antidote at Professor Snape and ran out of the dungeon, his day brightened a bit by a new outlook on life now that exams were finally over.

Charlie caught up with him in the Gryffindor common room while Bill was going upstairs to change his clothes and take a much-needed shower. “All right, Bill?”

“All right,” Bill grunted.

“You don’t look alright,” Charlie called. “What’s the matter with you? You’re not still on about that girl, are you? She’ll be okay, Madam Pomfrey can take care of anything!”

Bill didn’t answer, he merely slammed the door of the sixth year dorms in his younger brother’s face. “Leave me alone,” came a muffled reply.

Charlie threw the door to the dorms open and chased Bill into the bathroom. “What is the matter with you? You look like hell, you smell like a sewer, and you haven’t been sleeping at all. Now I’m your bleeding brother, are you gonna tell me what’s wrong or what?”

“Fine, if you’re going to bug the hell out of me,” Bill yelled back. “I’ve been having these horrible nightmares, I don’t know why, but they’re all I’ve been able to think about since we found that Yumi girl. The other two that were attacked, months ago, they’re still in the hospital. Why? No one, if they even know, will tell us, and it’s driving me completely mad.”

“I didn’t now it was affecting you so much,” Charlie said sympathetically. “I’m sorry… Look, I have a Defense Against the Dark Arts final after lunch, but I should be free about 2:30. You wanna talk when I get done? Might make you feel better.”

“Yeah, okay, see you,” Bill said dismissively, taking his robes off. “I need a shower.”

Charlie left his brother and shut the door, hearing the water faucet start. He sighed and gathered his books to head to his last exam, a bit frightened to see his brother in this state. Who was Charlie going to lean on if his only crutch was this torn up and rickety? I’ll be there for him for once.

 

* * * * *

 

Charlie and Bill sat on a path through the Hogwarts grounds, munching on a small picnic that they had pilfered from the kitchen. (Of course, it doesn’t take too much work to do so, with the house elves practically throwing food at you…) “Now,” Charlie began as he buttered a piece of bread. “You’re going to talk to me. I know that it’s no ordinary nightmares that could be turning you into such a wreck.”

Bill sighed and took a bite of an apple. “You’re right, as always. You’ll laugh if I tell you, though.”

“I wouldn’t,” Charlie insisted.

Bill took another bite of apple and stared into his brother’s green eyes. “You promise you won’t?”

“I promise. You’re the most fearless person I know. Whatever is making you lose sleep and act like a zombie can’t be a laughing matter,” Charlie assured his brother. “Especially during exam week!”

Bill managed a small smile. “Okay… fine. I think that whatever is attacking students is…” Bill took a deep breath. “Is… targeting me next.”

Charlie hadn’t been expecting this. He was actually more expecting Bill to admit a secret crush on the girl they had stumbled across, but this… he didn’t really know what to say. “W-why?”

“I don’t know, Charlie!” Bill cried. The fear that had been haunting him at night was beginning to creep slowly upon him. “I feel like I am being watched at night, I’ve had to put a silence charm around my bed because every little sound makes me jump out of my skin. I – I hear what sounds like whispers, hissing my name…”

“Bill-“ Charlie started, but was cut off abruptly by approaching footsteps. “Hide the food, it’s Horner!”

The two fiery-haired boys scrambled to shove their entire picnic spread into their book bags before Horner could catch a glimpse. Charlie knew that Professor Horner, the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, would try to find any excuse to punish two unsuspecting Gryffindors – and a good one was staring him in the face as he approached.

“My, look what we have here. Apples, bread and butter, fruit salad… if I didn’t know any better, I’d think that our Head Boy and his troublesome little brother were once again stealing food from the kitchens. Is that so, boys?” The daunting figure of Professor Horner had appeared before the two Weasleys could manage to hide their feast. Horner lifted his dark, round sunglasses a bit so he could look down at Bill and Charlie with his ice blue eyes.

“Were just having a snack,” Charlie piped up quickly, mentally kicking himself for having said anything at all.

Horner’s cold eyes flicked to Charlie’s and gave a menacing stare. “I believe the last time I caught you eating food from the kitchens without permission, I let you free of any punishment, but this time… both of you will serve detentions tomorrow night at 11 O’clock sharp – with me. And ten points from Gryffindor.”

Charlie’s freckled cheeks blazed red with anger. His eyes shot daggers at the hated professor as the tall, thin, gangly man stalked away. “I hate him so much, everyone knows that he favours Ravenclaws. Just because they’re so bloody smart and he has such high expectations…” Charlie sneered. “Damn him. He should have stayed at Durmstrang if he wanted to teach Dark Arts experts.”

Charlie ended his rant when he noticed his brother’s face. All the blood had drained from it, leaving him looking like a ghost with pale pink freckles. His usually sparkling eyes had gone dull, and his lip was quivering.

“B-Bill?” Charlie shook his brother’s shoulder. “Bill!”

“I-I can’t serve detention with him!” Bill said shakily. “There’s no way…”

“I know, he’s a git and all, but Bill…” Charlie gripped his brother’s shoulder. “It’s nothing to get this worked up about.”

“He gives me the creeps, Charlie! It just makes everything worse!” Bill drew his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. “And at night, too! God, what am I going to do?”

“I have an idea, but you’ll have to go to the hospital wing and be very uncomfortable in order to do it.” Charlie produced a vial filled with a greenish liquid. “I accidentally made a vomit-inducing potion when I was trying to make an ointment to heal burns.” Charlie showed Bill a large burn mark on his leg. “Came across something funny in the Forest. Anyway, one swig of this, and you’ll be vomiting your guts out all night.”

Bill cringed and pocketed the vial. It was really his only way out – if he didn’t want to piss his pants in front of Charlie and Horner at the sound of an eency little howl from the Forest… “Okay. When should I take it?”

“Right after dinner. Plenty of food to puke up and just late enough that you’ll have to spend the night in the hospital wing.” Charlie gave Bill a winning smile. “Cheer up, buddy. Everything will be okay. With Dumbledore around, they’ll get the psycho that’s doing this in no time.”

“I hope you’re right,” Bill said unconvincingly. “Because I am going out of my wits.”