Reading Maddie Potter and Percy Jackson

Reading Chapter 16: Through The Trapdoor

In years to come, Maddie would never quite remember how she had managed to get through her exams when she half expected Voldemort to come bursting through the door at any moment.

"How did you manage?" Piper asked. Maddie shrugged.

Yet the days crept by, and there could be no doubt that Fluffy was still alive and well behind the locked door.

It was sweltering hot, especially in the large classroom where they did their written papers. They had been given special, new quills for the exams, which had been bewitched with an Anticheating spell.

"That's smart," Athena said.

They had practical exams as well. Professor Flitwick called them one by one into his class to see if they could make a pineapple tapdance across a desk.

Laughter was heard throughout the room.

Professor McGonagall watched them turn a mouse into a snuffbox -- points were given for how pretty the snuffbox was, but taken away if it had whiskers. Snape made them all nervous, breathing down their necks while they tried to remember how to make a Forgetfulness potion.

"That sounds awful," Thalia muttered, ignoring the glaring from the greasy haired professor. Clarisse nodded in agreement.

Maddie did the best she could, trying to ignore the stabbing pains in her forehead,

Maddie rubbed where her scar was, flinching as she remembered the pain she felt that week. Percy noticed and squeezed her hand. Maddie looked at him and smiled, squeezing his hand right back.

which had been bothering her ever since her trip into the forest. Lavender thought Maddie had a bad case of exam nerves because Maddie couldn't sleep, but the truth was that Maddie kept being woken by her old nightmare, except that it was now worse than ever because there was a hooded figure dripping blood in it, along with the same eagle and horse fighting with her reaching out to stop them.

"What is going on with you two?" Demeter asked. Poseidon and Zeus shrugged. The demigods all looked at each other, knowing what this was about.

Maybe it was because they hadn't seen what Maddie had seen in the forest, or because they didn't have scars burning on their foreheads, but Cedric, Ron, and Hermione didn't seem as worried about the Stone as Maddie. The idea of Voldemort certainly scared them, but he didn't keep visiting them in dreams, and they were so busy with their studying they didn't have much time to fret about what Snape or anyone else might be up to.

"That's what you should've been worried about too, Maddie," Artemis said, rubbing her daughter's back. Maddie smiled sheepishly.

Their very last exam was History of Magic. One hour of answering questions about batty old wizards who'd invented selfstirring cauldrons and they'd be free, free for a whole wonderful week until their exam results came out. When the ghost of Professor Binns told them to put down their quills and roll up their parchment, Maddie couldn't help cheering with the rest.

"That was far easier than I thought it would be," said Hermione as they joined the crowds flocking out onto the sunny grounds. "I needn't have learned about the 1637 Werewolf Code of Conduct or the uprising of Elfric the Eager."

Hermione always liked to go through their exam papers afterward, but Ron said this made him feel ill, so they wandered down to the lake and flopped under a tree. The Weasley twins and Lee Jordan were tickling the tentacles of a giant squid,

"I wish we had a friendly giant squid," Connor said sadly, looking down. Travis fake cried in agreement.

which was basking in the warm shallows. "No more studying," Ron sighed happily, stretching out on the grass. "You could look more cheerful, Maddie, we've got a week before we find out how badly we've done, there's no need to worry yet."