Delicate | James Potter

1.24

~

Alice paused as soon as she entered the room. Despite the noises she'd thought she'd heard, there was no one there. The room was dark and empty; abandoned just like everyone said it was. She held her wand up and panned it around, trying to illuminate the corners just in case she'd missed something, but all she saw was broken furniture.

"Hello?" She called out again. At first no response came, but after a quiet half minute there was another loud whimper. It was rather animalistic, but either way it sounded to be in pain.

Alice turned her head to the direction of the noise until her eyes landed upon a singular set of stairs, ones that twisted up and around the corner. It was hard to see them, but after a few steps closer she could see the way they were cracked and broken, clearly fragile. Still, if someone was up there that meant she could get up there too.

There was an eerie silence lingering, the type in which you were acutely aware of every single breath you took. Alice found herself unconsciously holding her breath so as not to disrupt the quiet, which was probably a bad idea but it felt unnatural not to. Each step she took up the stairs elicited a loud creak and that wasn't helping either.

"Is someone up here?" She called for the third time. This time there was a loud thud, then scattered footsteps. "Do you need help?"

She took the frantic banging against the wall as a sign to continue. What if they were hurt so badly they couldn't properly communicate? Or they were in real trouble? What if she didn't know the right spells to help, and needed extra support? Her mind began to race with various scenarios and what she'd do in each one. She could run back down to the village quickly; Madam Rosmerta trusted her, she'd help if Alice asked.

The door at the top of the stairs was narrow and had strange scratchings down its front. Alice paused in front of it and took a deep breath, then pushed down on the handle. It didn't move, it was locked.

"I- uh, I'm coming in." She said, hands a little shaky. "Alohomora."

Once again the door clicked open easily, and this time she gave it a small kick so that it swung all the way open. Her eyes locked with yellow and Alice gasped, but she didn't have time to contemplate if what she was seeing was real because suddenly there was a large black dog wrestling with the being. Was that a werewolf?

Suddenly the eerie calm had broken, and everything was happening at once. There must have been some sort of noise charm on the room because now that the door was open all she could hear was rugged shrieks and growls of violent nature and mad, frantic barks. Then suddenly there was some sort of deer in the doorway and it was pushing her backwards with the antlers on its head.