Too Quiet
"Hey, I heard the Mandrakes threw a party in Greenhouse Three. I'm actually pretty interested in knowing what a party with those things would even look like," Percy said as he walked with his brother toward their next class. "That means it won't be long before they can make the potion for the petrified students. Even the other students seem to have stopped avoiding you like you're some kind of plague," he added.
"Mm," Harry replied.
"There haven't even been any attacks in the last few months. Lockhart says it's thanks to his presence that the culprit doesn't dare come out." Percy rolled his eyes. "Although most people think it's because of Sirius and Mark. They're still searching half the castle, but they haven't found anything yet."
"Mm," Harry said again with a nod.
That was all Percy was getting in response. Eventually, he turned to look at Harry and found him walking completely lost in thought again.
It was the same state he'd been in ever since that day they saw Riddle's version of the supposed heir.
"I think I'm going to switch Divination for Arithmancy. I've always been incredibly good at math. In fact, I could probably beat Hermione if I tried a little."
"Mm," Harry nodded again, which proved that he really wasn't paying any attention to his brother at all.
Seeing this, Percy smiled mischievously for a moment instead of getting worried. "You know, that Golden Snitch you bought for your collection? I took it out to play with Tyson for a while and we accidentally broke one of its wings. You won't be mad, right?" he asked.
"Mm," Harry nodded in response, still walking deep in thought.
Percy blinked.
Okay.
That was worrying.
He stared at Harry for several seconds as they continued walking down the corridor.
"I was also thinking about selling your Nimbus and using the money to buy Tyson a broom."
"Mm."
Percy narrowed his eyes.
He had definitely lost his brother.
"Harry!" Percy said as he grabbed his brother by the shoulders and started shaking him hard.
"What are you doing, idiot?!" Harry shouted, startled, as everything started spinning and his neck nearly snapped thanks to his brother's uncontrolled strength.
Harry broke free by smacking Percy's hands away and stepping back, but now his shoulders and neck hurt, and he glared at him.
"You're still like this? How much longer are you going to obsess over it? The attacks stopped, you haven't heard the killer's voice again, even the key went quiet, and now with the Marauder's Map we can easily keep track of Cedric, and so far he's just been wandering around the castle. Everything's going pretty well, so why are you still so lost in thought?" Percy said in a fairly relaxed tone. "Tyson, Hermione, and Ron have already gone back to normal. Pretty much everyone has."
"Something doesn't fit," Harry admitted after a few seconds.
"With what?" Percy asked, confused.
Then Harry turned and stared directly at him. "When have things ever gone well for us this long without a single problem?" Harry asked him in return.
That made Percy's eyes widen as if he'd only just realized it.
As if a bad feeling had suddenly settled in both their chests, they stared at each other for a few seconds before looking around.
"Harry! Percy!" someone suddenly called out, making both brothers spin around instantly, one pulling out his wand and the other a training sword, both pointing their weapons straight at whoever had called them.
Only to leave poor Neville completely terrified, frozen in fear as he saw the two of them pointing at him with completely serious expressions.
"Oh, Nev, it's you. Don't scare us like that," Percy said, letting out a sigh as he lowered his sword.
"S-sorry," Neville apologized as he touched his chest, his heart pounding violently from the scare those two had just given him. "But it's urgent," he managed to add.
"What happened?" Harry asked, frowning.
"The prefect sent me to find you. Someone went through all your things, and they want you to check if anything's missing," Neville explained as quickly as he could.
Hearing his words, both Percy and Harry frowned even more and prepared to run toward the Gryffindor common room.
"Yesss, it's here... I want to kill. I'm finally going to tear..."
Then, before Harry could even take his next step, he heard that voice that seemed to come from the walls themselves. As if that bad feeling had finally decided to make itself known at the exact same time.
"The voice!" Harry shouted instantly, making Percy stop and look at him. "It's back," Harry said in a truly serious tone.
"What?" Percy looked surprised for a moment, while Neville went pale at Harry's words, since he more or less knew what he was talking about.
"W-we have to tell Mr. Sirius and Mark," Neville said, trembling. After all, every student knew those two friends were at Hogwarts looking for the supposed creature.
…
"Why do we need to borrow so many books? We could just look for the information in the library," Ron complained as he walked beside Tyson, both of them carrying armfuls of books stacked so high they covered their faces. Right in front of them walked Hermione with a book almost as big as she was.
"No, we're looking for information about Parseltongue. And if anyone finds out we're looking into this because of Harry, they'll start suspecting him of being the heir again, and now that everything's calmer, it's better to leave things that way," she added in a serious tone.
"You make it sound like we're looking for something illegal. It's just an ancient magical language... used by ancient Dark wizards... and Dark Lords... and... yeah, you're right. People will think Harry's a Dark Lord or something," Ron said, realizing the problem with his own words.
"Harry isn't a Dark Lord," Tyson said immediately, frowning.
"Of course he isn't," Hermione said at once. "But we don't want everyone else thinking he is," she added. "They might even think he's the heir of You-Know-Who. After all, they said he could speak Parsel—"
Before Hermione could finish saying it, she frowned as if an idea had suddenly hit her.
"How could I be so stupid?" she said, smacking herself on the forehead in disappointment. "I think I just figured something out. We have to go back to the library," Hermione said, turning around to head back the way they'd come.
"You're going to borrow even more books?" Ron complained, feeling like his arms didn't have enough strength left to carry even one more book. Although Tyson was carrying more than him, he didn't seem to have any trouble. His only problem was that he couldn't see where he was going. "Come on, Tyson," Ron said, turning around to follow Hermione.
But he hadn't even taken a few steps when he realized Tyson hadn't moved from his spot and was standing there sniffing the air with a confused expression.
Hermione noticed it too and stopped to look at him.
"Tyson?" they both asked, staring at their friend's strange behavior.
"Smell... like... monster?" Tyson said in confusion, as if he wasn't completely sure.
Then he turned toward Hermione, or rather, toward the wall beside her.
"Watch out!" the Cyclops shouted, dropping the books from his arms and running toward Hermione.
She turned around as she heard the wall behind her cracking apart, and just as she finished turning, she saw an enormous mouth filled with razor-sharp teeth opening toward her.