𝐁𝐋𝐀𝐂𝐊 | f. weasley

twenty-one

CASSANDRA SHOT UP STRAIGHT at the sound of a cry. Her hands rested on Fred's chest as she whirled around, searching for its source. Fred, meanwhile, groggily rubbed his eyes, taking his own sweet time to wake up. Cassie, on noticing Fred's movements, suddenly realised she was practically on top of him. With flustered motion, she clambered off the sofa, her cheeks heating up. The sudden sound of footsteps alerted Fred of his surroundings and he finally woke up, standing up straight beside Cassie, who watched as the Gryffindors assemble themselves in the common room yet again to find out the source and reason of such a scream.

"Are you sure you weren't dreaming, Ron?"

"I'm telling you I saw him!"

"What's all this noise?"

"Professor McGonagall told us to go to bed,"

By now everyone had assembled, crowding near Harry and Ron, the latter claiming to have seen Sirius black with a knife. Fred, however, hadn't heard of this and on seeing the crowd became excited at the prospect of continuing their celebrations.

"Excellent! Are we carrying on?" he said brightly.

"Shut up!" Cassie scolded, elbowing him in his stomach making him wince, not expecting that much force from the little girl.

Cassandra made her way through the crowd towards her friends.

"What happened?" Cassie asked, grabbing onto Harry.

"SIRIUS BLACK, I SAW HIM!" Ron exclaimed loudly hoping someone would believe him.

"If he did come in, Cassie would have seen him! She sleeps in the common room anyways!" Harry tried reasoning, asking Ron to calm down.

"No, actually. I was sleeping a bit too soundly this time," Cassie admitted sheepishly, "So if anyone came, I didn't realise,"

Soon enough, Percy came back, ushering everyone back into their rooms. Ron once again tried telling him what he saw but no one seemed to believe him. Then followed Professor McGonagall, who strolled into the common room on hearing the commotion, chastising Percy for letting the celebration 'get out of hand'.

"IT WASN'T A NIGHTMARE!" Ron yelled in frustration, having enough of being belittled, "PROFESSOR I WOKE UP AND SIRIUS BLACK WAS STANDING OVER ME, HOLDING A KNIFE!"

Professor McGonagall stared at him.

"Don't be ridiculous Weasley! How could he have gotten through the portrait hole?"

Cassie could think of a million ways her father would have achieved that stunt, but she knew for a fact he didn't have that childhood youthfulness anymore so those methods would no longer be useful (or practical), leaving the only option of entering the common room being through the portrait hole.

Ron had asked Professor McGonagall to go ahead and verify with Sir Cadogan's portrait if he let anyone in. Much to their horror, he indeed had let in a man who had read out all the passwords off a little sheet – which turns out had been written by Neville.

Professor McGonagall was furious over this matter, scolding Neville to such lengths the boy was battling the tears in his eyes. When she had calmed down a little bit, she called upon Cassie to her office, while the other teachers were notified of Black's break-in.

"Yes Professor?" she asked as she entered through the door. The school was being searched again, in hopes of catching Black before he managed to escape again.

"I have come to know you have been sleeping in the common room for the past few weeks?" she began.

Cassie nodded.