Late-night browsing ((Charisma then anyone))*

[Arywiel Coone G3]

Arywiel snuck out of the portrait hole. She paused, one foot outside the entrance, pricking her ears. The fat lady gave a little grumble. Cautiously, Ary swung the whole way out and edged along the corridor. It was dark and rain was drumming the windows. She tip-toed to the end of the corridor and pulled back a tapestry. It was conceiling a hidden staircase. She took the trusty stairs one at a time, before she reached the foot of the steps. The doorway before her was narrow and blocked by a stone gargoyle. Arywiel had been this way many times before, although few people knew it. She tapped the gargoyle with her wand and the ugly beast sprang into life and leapt to the side. she slipped out, the statue sprang back and turned into solid stone once more.

As Arywiel made her way down the corridor, she twiddled her wand between her fingers. If she was caught now, the teachers would most certainly dock points, she thought. She felt a pang of guilt as she imagined the Gryffindor points going down by 20, perhaps even 50 if the wrong person caught her. Ary told herself that she wasnt being selfish. There was no other time to explore the castle during the day. Besides, if the school really wanted to keep her in her dorm, they would charm the fat lady to not let her out. Perhaps Dumbledore almost wanted his pupils to investigate and see the castle for themselves. What would Hogwarts be without the occasional spot of trouble? Reassuring herself, Ary quickened her pace.

Footsteps. Ary paused for a second before she tried a door to her left. It was locked "Alohomora!" she whispered, and the lock sprang. She hurried into the classroom and snapped the door behind her. All was silent, no footsteps. Perhaps the teacher had turned back around? She looked around the empty classroom. Ary scowled to herself. Perhaps she imagining it, after all, she was in an excited state. Cursing her thumping heart, Arywiel wrenched the door open and crept on down the hall.

She passed a second gargoyle. She prodded it with her wand, but it just growled at her. "Er- sorry!" She heard herself say before she hurried on. Further on down the passage, the torches in brackets had wider intervals, so it was gradually geting darker. She scampered down a spiralling staircase to her right. Ary was then standing in a second, large corridor. She was rounding the corner, when she heard footsteps coming her way. Was it a teacher or prefect patrolling the hallway? She didn't stop to find out. Gripping her wand tightly, Ary rushed in the opposite direction. There was a large niche in the wall were a bust of a previous Headmaster perched on a high column. Arywiel slipped into the niche behind the column. It was a very arrow space, so she didn't have enough space to do antything but stand. There was a torch the bust, so Ary struggled to stay in the shadows. The footsteps passed her hiding place slowly and deliberately. She waited, her heart thumping loudly. As soon as they rounded the next corner, she caught her breath. Peeking out from behind the column cautiously, Ary looked over her shoulder as she ran on.

She very nearly screamed when she hit a person. She hadn't looked were she was going when she barrelled into the figure. "I- I'm sorry!" She gasped. "I wasn't thinking, I- I didn't mean-" She peered at the person's face through the dark. Wasn't it? "Charisma!" She sighed a sigh of relief. "I thought you were a teacher! Or- or Filch!" she said in a loud whisper. Arywiel paused. Weren't those the footsteps coming back in their direction? Perhaps the patroller had heard the collision and voices. She looked at Charisma with wide eyes...

[Charisma Turner G3]

Charisma breathed in the fresh air around the grounds and smiled as she grasped her small sketchbook and walked toward a hill overlooking most of the grounds. She laid a blanket out and spotted a tree in the distance. The Whomping Willow. Charisma laughed as she poised her muggle style pencil over the sketchbook and began to draw. It was as if the willow knew it was being drawn, as it kept so still. Charisma let her pencil glide across the paper, drawing curves and shading in shadows. After what seemed like hours of drawing, Charisma was finished. She signed it and held it up in the air to admire her work.

Suddenly, Charisma realized how late it was. It was very dark, and the moon was high in the sky. She groaned. She did not feel up to getting detention for being caught staying up late. She made her way back to the giant Oak front doors, but realized they were locked. She sighed and took a seat near the doors. Then something caught her eye. There was a small window near the front doors that had been left wide open. Charisma grinned. She cast a Wingaridum Leviosa spell on herself to lift her up to the window. Filch was patrolling the corridors of course. She sighed. But then he heard a noise and he ran toward the noise with delight. Charisma shook her head as she climbed through the window. She noticed a knight standing in a corner and smiled. That was no ordinary knight. That knight concealed a hidden passageway. Charisma hid her sketchbook and pencil in her robes and snuck past the knight, which hid a small and cramped spiral staircase. She climbed down it with difficulty and reached a very dimly lit corridor. She heard footsteps. Charisma immediately headed for the wall and blew out some of the torches, hoping the mysterious person would not be able to see Charisma clinging to the wall through the thick blanket of darkness.

She walked along, staying as close to the walls as possible, making sure to blow out each torch as she went along. Charisma paused. More footsteps. She paused and detached herself from the wall to see if anyone was coming. The footsteps ceased. Charisma was about to continue walking when she crashed right into someone. Charisma was about to scream, but she covered her mouth with her hands to silence herself. Through the dim lamplight, she noticed the face of Arywiel Coone. She rolled her eyes. She should have known. “Wow Ary. How come I’m not surprised to see you here?” Charisma whispered with an amused smile. Ary was in her year and house, so they knew each other well, seeing as they shared a dorm and all. Suddenly, Charisma heard footsteps again. She ducked into a small niche, pulling Arywiel along with her. She covered both their mouths as Filch walked past the corridor, obviously still in hot pursuit of the sound. Once he had passed, Charisma let out a small sigh. “Thank god.” She whispered in a relieved tone.

[Arywiel Coone G3]

Next thing she knew, Charisma had clamped her hand over Ary's mouth and shoved her into a niche. They sat there for a minute, Charisma's hands over both of their mouths, the two looking very stupid, according to Ary. The flat-footed "thunk thunk" of footsteps hurried towards their hiding place and halted right in front of them. There was a pause and Ary was almost sure that their persuer was sniffing the air. She ducked her head around the top of the niche and peeked out, careful to stay conceiled by the shadows. The figure was turning its head, this way and that. There was a scuffling sound around the corner, and the figure scurried off in the direction of that noise. "Thank God!" came Charisma's sigh. Ary clambered out of the niche and stretched her back. "Sorry Ka, but next time find us a comfy place to hide." She grinned, stretching her arms.

Ary took a look at her watch. "It's pretty late. We can either get back into the Gryffindor tower or have a look around." She studied Charisma's face hopefully. "We may as well now we're out." Ary wouldn't feel so selfish if she wandered the Halls accompanied. At least all her finds would benefit somebody else too. She knew Charisma (or Ka, as she liked to call her) as the arty type and perhaps, if she wasn't mistaken the kind less likely to take walks after dark. Ary stuffed her hands into her pockets and looked at Charisma coolly.

[Celia Richmond]

((Sorry to cut this short girls, but you're breaking the rules and hence it['s my duty as a prefect to turn up and stop it all))

Celia yawned. It was late. She was up late for 2 reasons. Firstly, she was doing her prefect duties, and patrolling the corridors. Secondly, she had an Astronomy class at midnight to get to, so she wasn't in the best of moods. Right now, it was 11.30, and she was partolling the Gryffindor tower. Nobody else had volunteered so it was up to her to do the job. Someone else had the Ravenclaw one, which she would've preferred to do, but it could've been worse. She was up on the seventh floor, where the Gryffindor common room and dormitories, so she would catch any students out after curfew, and send them to bed with a warning that if she caught them again, McGonagall would be informed and points taken off.

As she turned a corner, she heard whispering. It sounded like 2 younger students, most likely girls from the sounds of it. She held up her lantern, wondering where the voices were coming from. "Next time find us a comfy place to hide" was what she heard, and she assumed the 2 girls were hiding behind something. Probably a statue. or some tapestry. She went along as quietly as possibly so they wouldn't hear her foosteps, and held up her lantern to each statue she passed. The whispering was getting louder, she was getting closer. She hated telling people off for breaking the rules, but it had to be done-it was her duty as a prefect, and she wouldn't want to be seen slacking on the job-she'd do it properly.

Eventually she found the culprits, 2 3rd year girls that Celia recognised but didn't know the names of. "Now, girls, you should know better than to be sneaking around at night like this. It's not going to do you any good now, is it? Now what are your names?" She asked them, and they introduced themselves as Arywiel Coone and Charisma Turner. "Right, Arywiel, Charisma, get to bed immediately. I don't want to see you out after dark again, do you hear? If I do, or see you breaking any other rules, I'll tell McGonagall-be thankful I'm not telling her tonight, and taking points from you. Now, go back to your dorms and get some sleep. Professors don't appreciate tired students in their lessons. Now go. Immediately.

[Arywiel Coone G3]

Ary glared at the floor as Celia told her off. Ary's face was burning with shame and she felt like crying. She cast a look at Charisma and felt a pang of guilt. Was it her fault that they had been discovered? Crest-fallen, she sauntered back along the corridor, aware of the prefect's eyes on the back of her neck until she had rounded the corner. She hung her head and gloomily made her way back to the Gryffindor tower. Thankfully they hadn't docked off points. If Her fellow house-mates had seen 20 points less in the Gryffindor hourglass, she would have felt terrible. Ary felt her cheeks still burning with shame. What had she been thinking? She kept her eyes on the floor, following the patterns of the tiles carefully. Anything to distract her thoughts.

Plenty of boys in her year roamed the school after dark and they never got caught. Or perhaps it wasn't such a big deal to them if they got scolded at. It could have been worse. Snape could have rounded on the two mid-night walkers. Ary pictured his black eyes narrowing and his lip curling in cruel satisfaction. There would have been a pregnant pause in which Ary's heart would have stopped and her eyes bulge. Snape would have smirked wickedly and whisked them off to his office. 20 points off each and a detention every week for two months. Ary tried to cheer herself up by the fact she got let off so lightly.

((cont'd in common room- check for post ))