The disappearance of a rat

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• Serena Black •

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• Serena Black •

"You can't change
what you refuse to confront."

Imperceptibly, without any change in the bitterly cold weather, January slipped into February and school had started again. Meanwhile, Serena still couldn't get the marauder's map out of her mind, even though she had much more important things to concentrate on. But why had it shown Peter Pettigrew's name? Was it a mistake? Was it some kind of joke by the manufacturers? Or was there much more to it?

Serena would have loved to get to the bottom of it, but unfortunately the map was no longer in her possession. Instead, she was determined to talk to Professor Lupin. After all, he himself had admitted that he knew the manufacturers, so he probably also knew about the nicknames. So surely he could answer at least a few questions that were so urgently on the tip of her tongue.

In fact, she was pretty sure that the new teacher knew more than he appeared to. Pondering how she could go about her task most skilfully without offending Lupin and getting thrown out immediately, she ran up the last of the many stairs that still separated her from the portrait hole. There, halfway up, she almost collided with Professor McGonagall, "Open your eyes, Miss Black!"

"Excuse me, Professor..." returned Serena meekly, biting her lower lip a little ashamedly as her teacher's eyes scrutinised her sternly. Suddenly, however, her expression changed. "I was just upstairs looking for you and Mr.Potter. We've done everything we can and the brooms seem perfectly fine," Professor McGonagall said thoughtfully, "You two must have a very good friend somewhere..."

The Gryffindor's mouth dropped open and she stared wide-eyed at the broom her teacher was holding out to her. In fact, it looked just as glorious as before, as if nothing had ever happened to it. "I can have it back?" Serena asked again in a matte voice, just in case. "Seriously?"

"Seriously," McGonagall replied, smiling even more. "I'd say you should get a feel for it before the match on Saturday. And, Miss Black, please take Potters with you right away."

Speechless, Serena was carrying two Firebolts up to Gryffindor Tower with her when suddenly Ron, grinning from ear to ear, turned the corner and ran towards her with Harry, "She gave it to you? Great! Listen, can I try it? Tomorrow?" the redhead exclaimed excitedly, staring at the brooms in awe as if he couldn't believe what he had in front of him.

"Yes, of course..." muttered his best friend, who looked at his Firebolt in amazement and finally suggested a little contritely, "You know what, we should make up with Hermione again. She was only trying to help..."

"Yeah, alright," Ron sighed after a moment's consideration, gesturing with a fleeting hand gesture towards the entrance to her Hogwarts house, "She's in the common room working for a change."

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