I Was Younger Then

You You're Running From

"Did you come from the orphanage too?" the little girl before Penny asked.

"Orphanage? I live at Hogwarts," said Penny.

"Oh, so you're not an orphan then. . ." the girl said, looking disappointed.

"Er, well I am an orphan, I just don't live at an orphanage."

The girl's blue eyes brightened as she looked back up at Penny.

"They let you into Hogwarts even though you're an orphan?"

"What? Of course they did, why should being an orphan stop that?" asked Penny, feeling thoroughly perplexed.

"The keepers ," she whispered looking around nervously, "they said Hogwarts doesn't like orphans because our magic isn't as strong, that's why they bring us here, to help us," she went on, her brows furrowed in suspicion.

"Who are the keepers?" Penny asked, a chill rolling up her spine as the words left her mouth.

The girl did not answer, instead she stiffened, her eyes fixed on something Penny could not see. "They're coming," she said, her eyes glazing over. "It'll be for you. When it hurts, I hold onto this," she handed Penny a small jade knight which must have been taken from a chess set. "Be brave" she whispered. Penny tried to reach out to the girl but screaming pierced her ears, shards of glass bursting around them, the girl before her vanishing.

"Miss Potter!"

Penny's eyes snapped open but her consciousness was lingering in the darkness of her dream. She looked up, unseeing, into the frown lines of Professor McGonagall, cold sweat clinging to every inch of her body.

"Sorry, Professor, I don't know what happened," Penny said, wiping the sweat from her face.

"Madam Pomfrey advised me you may be experiencing some lingering symptoms, perhaps it would be good if you were to visit her," Professor McGonagall said, scrutinizing Penny's face.

"No!" Penny said loudly, causing the other Gryffindor's to laugh. "I'm fine, I feel alright now," Penny went on. The last place she wanted to be was trapped in the clutches of Poppy Pomfrey again.

"Alright," Professor McGonagall said, pausing for a moment. "Then perhaps you can tell us what Emeric Switch says about transfiguring larger creatures, since so far it seems Ms. Granger was the only one to do the reading," she said, looking around severely at the class.

"It's harder to transfigure larger creatures because most people have a poor concept of mass which produces an unclear mental picture when transfiguring. Imagining it is a bit of a puzzle isn't it? How larger pieces can be fit together into something smaller, that's how I think of it, at least," Penny said, absentmindedly.

She wasn't yet full awake, her brain still trying to grasp onto the dream she'd been having before her Professor woke her up.

"Excellent, Miss Potter, you and Granger are exempt from tonight's homework. As for the rest of you, I expect one piece of parchment on this principle," she said as the bell rang.

The class groaned as they packed their things. Harry peered at Penny with his bright green eyes, worry lining the edge of his mouth.

"You never fall asleep in class," he pointed out as they and Ron and Hermione made their way back to the Gryffindor common room.

"I don't know. It was like, one moment I was awake and then I wasn't," Penny said, still feeling dazed.

"I feel that way during every Transfiguration lesson," Ron shrugged.

"Ron!" Hermione said, disapprovingly.

'What? We all aren't insane like you, Hermione."

"Do you think dying gives someone a connection to the. . .erm, other-side?" Penny asked, awkwardly.