Serena Black || 𝑪𝒓𝒖𝒄𝒊𝒐

The Answer to the Riddle

• Serena Black •

"A secret's worth depends on the people from whom it must be kept."

A few weeks later, the tension in the air throughout the castle was almost palpable. The last day of exams, coupled with the final task of the Triwizard Tournament, seemed to put each of the students as well as the teachers in high spirits. The enchanted ceiling in the Great Hall showed that morning a bright blue sky with puffy white clouds and seemed to do the rest for the beaming faces at the breakfast table.

Perhaps the mood of her classmates was contagious, but Serena herself couldn't help but smile cheerfully as she entered the hall. The holidays were approaching and she felt well prepared for the last two exams. She also knew from Harry that he was sufficiently prepared for the final task. Even as Hall ran towards her, the Gryffindor couldn't help but greet him in a friendly manner.

"Morning, Black," the Slytherin replied with his usual grin, holding her back before she could continue on her way to her table. "Can we talk later?"

"Sure," Serena murmured, a little taken off guard, and gave him a curious look. But he seemed to want to leave it at the hint of a mysterious smile. "After the tournament?" he suggested.

She nodded, suppressing the urge to ask what he wanted to talk to her about. Sighing, however, she finally turned away, nearly bumping into Hermione who had run towards her excitedly. "Can't. Talk," she gasped hurriedly, without Serena having said a single word to her. "I think we've got her! Just need two minutes in the library.... Just to be sure."

"Who do we have?" asked Serena in astonishment, starting to follow her friend out of the hall with quick steps. Hermione turned to her fleetingly, her hair blowing. "Rita Skeeter. I just need to look something up real quick."

"But our History of Magic exam is in ten minutes!", Serena reminded her as she hurriedly tried to keep up. But once Hermione got something into her head, she was able to mobilise powers that no one had known about before. Serena only managed to catch up with her when she had already arrived at the library and was stopped by Madam Pince staring down at them menacingly. "Shouldn't you two have an exam right now, young ladies?"

"Yes but..." gasped Hermione, completely out of breath, but was silenced by a stern look from the librarian. "Go on then."

Serena, on the other hand, was still gasping for breath. She still didn't know what all the fuss was about. Since when did Hermione put up with being late for an exam? She herself knew that it would do no good to argue with the librarian. That was proven by the deep wrinkles of anger on the gaunt witch's face.

"You don't understand," Hermione meanwhile continued to try desperately. "It's important. I..."

"I'm sure it is," Madam Pince replied merely unimpressed, pushing the two girls out the door. "And you can come back as soon as you're done with your exam."

Hermione stared stunned against the dark wood of the massive double door, which was closed in her face. Inside, the normally even-tempered Gryffindor seemed to be fuming with rage and Serena could hardly believe that she was the one who had to remind Hermione of the upcoming exam. "Hermione, we really need to hurry now."

Taking two stairs at a time, the two girls finally sprinted to the History of Magic classroom, settling down to Ron's right and left respectively. Just in time as Professor Binns entered the classroom floating rather than walking. "What was so important?" the redhead whispered in wonder, giving them a curious look.

"Rita Skeeter," Hermione hissed, whereupon Serena pricked up her ears as well, for she herself still didn't have the faintest clue why they had almost missed the exam. "I don't know one hundred percent yet, but I think I know how she manages to overhear conversations. She's... I'll tell you later," she finished hastily and straightened up as Professor Binns handed out her exam papers, merely noticing the sheet that now lay in front of her. Hermione was back to her old self.

Dumbfounded, Serena stared at her. How on earth was she supposed to concentrate on the assignments now that she had learned that they might have finally found a way to stop Skeeter with her lies? It was probably an advantage now that she had gone over the material with Hermione for so long that she could recite it from cover to cover, feeling like she was on autopilot as she answered the questions about goblin rebellions.

The moment the bell finally rang for the end of the hour and thus the end of the exam, Hermione was the first to jump up from her seat as if she had just been stung by an Acromantula. Serena, too, hastily slapped her paper onto the ghost's desk, ignoring Ron's calls to wait for him.

It wasn't hard to miss Hermione in the nevertheless spacious library, her luscious shock of brown hair peeking out from behind one of the back shelves. As Serena began to storm across the room, Madam Pince looked for a moment as if she were about to disapprove of her behaviour, but merely shook her head. The dark-haired Gryffindor watched wide-eyed as Hermione leafed through a large, but rather thin, book entitled "Official Registers Against Misuse of Magic; Animagi".

"You don't think..." Serena slapped her hands together in front of her mouth in surprise. The longer she thought about it, the more sense it made. Tensely, the two girls bent over the twentieth century register and skimmed the few names registered, "Andress, ... Black, ... Foster, ... Kelly, ... McGonagall, ... Marten, ... Perks, ... Pettigrew, ... Santos, ... Smith."

"Now we have her," Hermione breathed in relief and began to smile triumphantly. But before she could elaborate on her theory, she paused haltingly and hastily put the book back on the shelf, dropping her bag. "Viktor!" she exclaimed in surprise.

The Bulgarian marched towards her and picked up the bag from which some books had slipped. "Sorry, Erminne."

The girl addressed turned bright red at the same moment and muttered something that sounded like a "thank you". While the two talked cautiously with bright eyes, Serena felt like a fifth wheel and looked indecisively back and forth between the two lovebirds. She quickly realised, however, that neither of them had even noticed that she was standing right next to them, so she decided to give them some privacy.

On the way to lunch, she thought about the latest news and tried to classify what she had just experienced in her mind. So according to Hermione, Rita Skeeter was an unregistered Animagus. That would at least explain how she had picked up snippets of conversation that she wasn't supposed to know and always seemed to be in the right place at the right time. It did, however, raise the question of in what guise she took the information. Presumably it was something small, inconspicuous....

Serena's gaze fell to the Gryffindors' table and immediately she noticed that more people than usual had taken seats at their regular places. So, in addition to Harry, Ron, Ginny, Fred and George, she spotted her godfather and her father. But while Remus gave her a smile, she only got a disappointed and even angrier look from her father.

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