November Snow

f i v e

Severus Snape walked into the hospital wing at midnight, his eyes gazed across the room to spot a pale young girl laying on one of the beds, unconscious. Next to her bed laid other students, just as same as her, only petrified. Her breath was even, but still too weak.

He remembered earlier that day, Dumbledore summoned him to the hospital wing. He didn't know what happened, but he still came, only to see his Goddaughter laying on the hospital bed, being tended by Madam Pomfrey. Potter, Granger, Weasleys, Lovegood and Tughorn were there, surrounding her bed until they were dismissed by the Headmaster and the school nurse.

How November wasn't petrified or dead was a mystery to her friends, but not to him.

"After this, she will suspect herself, Severus." Dumbledore told him.

"We can't tell her yet, Professor, not now."

Snape approached her bed, observing her and gripped her hand tightly in his cold ones.

"Be strong, November. You will wake up." He whispered before leaving.

•••••

My eyes refused to open, even though I tried my best to. I was afraid, thinking I was dead already, knowing that I had looked into the monster's eyes. Or should I say, the Basilisk.

How did I know anyway? It just popped into my head when I remembered those eyes: giant, yellow, unmistakable features of a Basilisk's eyes. That made sense. I heard the voices when others didn't because I knew parseltongue. But did that mean Harry was a parselmouth too, like me?

"When is she gonna wake up?" I thought I heard Ron's voice.

"We don't know." And that was Harry, I think "No one knows why she wasn't petrified, or why she didn't die there. Madam Pomfrey isn't sure when she would wake up either."

"I don't know what we would do without Hermione, let alone her." Ron sighed.

Now that I knew I wasn't dead, my brain screamed for my eyes to open, and my body had the tendency of not listening to what my brain said. But eventually, my eyes opened slowly, feeling the stickiness between my eyelids as if I had been asleep for too long. My body was stiff, unable to move, but I could already feel my fingers twitching. The bright daylight poured in and flooded my vision, I blinked a few time to shoo the blur away and shifted, let them know that I was awake.

"Nov?" Harry asked.

"Yeah?" My voice sounded horrible.

"Thank God you're awake." They both smiled brightly "You've been unconscious for nearly two months!"

"That long?" I sat up and looked over to where they were standing, and behind them, on the bed, was another girl "Hermione?"

"She was petrified." Ron said.

"Did you figure out who the Heir of Slytherin is?" I asked.

"No, but it's not Draco." Harry said.

"I told you." I sighed.

"We think it's someone in Gryffindor." Ron said "They have the password and broke into our common room."

"And took Tom Riddle's diary." Harry continued.

"Tom Riddle's diary? Where did you get that?" I asked.

"Found it in Myrtle's bathroom." Ron said "Hermione found you in there too."

"What did you see?" Harry asked.

"A Basilisk." I said.

"Hermione found something too, before she was petrified. It also wrote about the Basilisk." Harry said "That's why the spiders were running away."

"And also, we found out that they were all petrified because they looked at its reflection, not its true eyes." Ron said.

"But I wasn't petrified, or dead." I stated.

"That, we don't know." Harry said.

"But how's the Basilisk been getting around?" Ron asked "A dirty great snake. Someone would have seen..."

"Hermione answered that too."

Harry opened a piece of paper crumbled in his hand, inside was a ripped-off page of a book and on it, scribbled in Hermione's handwriting, was Pipes. I looked at him, to Hermione, then back to the piece of paper, confused.

"Pipes?" Ron voiced my thought "It's using the plumbing."

"Remember what Aragog said? About that girl fifty years ago?" Harry said "She died in a bathroom. What if she never left?"

"Moaning Myrtle!" Ron exclaimed.

"About that..." I started.

Just then, the magnified voice of Professor McGonagall boomed across the castle and echoed in every corridor, nearly startled us to death. She told all of us to go back to our dormitories, and all the teachers to go to the second floor corridor immediately.

"We should go." I mumbled.

"Come on Harry." Ron said "Let's head to the second floor corridor."

Harry nodded, and before I could stop them, they ran away. I sighed in defeat and turned back to look at Hermione. She was petrified while holding a mirror. Smart girl. She probably did that to avoid looking into the Basilisk's eyes. She did her part, it was time for us to do ours.

I picked myself up, my knees nearly gave in to my weight and I grabbed the bed rail, steadied myself. Then, I slowly walked back to the Slytherin common room, the walls being a great support. I took careful steps down the Slytherin dungeon and told the password.

"Pure-blood."

The door didn't open, then I realized I had been in a coma for nearly two months, and the Slytherin's password changed every night. I stood there, dumbstruck, not knowing what to do when I heard someone walking up behind me. I whipped around to see Malfoy and his cronies. He flashed his infamous smirk at me.

"You're not dead yet?" Parkinson smirked.

"And you?" I raised my eyebrow "I'm surprised that monster left you out of its hit list."

Malfoy didn't say anything. He just walked past me to the entrance and spoke the password. It was "Salazar" this time, and he went in, followed by his cronies and a glaring Parkinson. They all scattered, Malfoy stayed back in the empty common room as I walked in and the door closed behind me. I ignored him and walked to my room, only to stop in trance as he spoke up.

"You better watch your back, Avery." It was the first time he ever called me something not offensive "You're the first Slytherin attacked by that monster, and it may try again."

"Care for your own being, Malfoy. You're just like many people here, wanting me dead." I said before leaving.

I didn't know why I defended him when Harry and Ron accused him, something about him made me want to do that. Strange.