Flora And Fawna [HARRY POTTER]

33

Rosie considered the first weeks of her fourth year at Hogwarts to be pretty uneventful. Certainly it was more uneventful than it was at home, Harry had begun to talk finally and his favorite word seemed to be Rosie's name, screamed at all hours of the day. Petunia thought it was cute that Lily's son was so attached to his aunt, but Petunia didn't have Harry waking her up several times a night for a cuddle. Near the end of the break Rosie had finally given up keeping Harry in his own bed, and had just let him curl up beside her.

It at least got him to sleep through the night.

Since fifth year would be full of revising and studying for their OWLS, Rosie and Penny had been spending almost every night in the Library, reviewing what they had learned the last few years and guessing at what they would need to know. Mostly it was Penny asking Rosie to review with her, because she was afraid she would be the first Ravenclaw to ever get a Troll, but Rosie studied as well.

Rosie was coming back from the library one night, she had left Penny behind because the girl insisted she was going to stay until Madame Prince kicked her out, when her year finally became interesting. It was almost curfew so Rosie didn't expect anyone to be in the hallways, by that time the first years had mostly found their way around the castle and no longer just appeared randomly, lost and afraid. She was surprised, however, when she went to turn a corner leading past the trophy room and ran smack into a red haired gryffindor, one she had seen pulling pranks around the school.

Neither student was expecting the blow so of course they both fell to the floor in a tangle of limbs, books, and robes. Rosie was just able to keep her inkwell from falling onto the stone and shattering into a million of unusable pieces. She was not, however, able to save herself and her back fell rather heavily, knocking the breath out of her.

Rosie was stunned for a moment, but the boy on top of her was not. He had landed on top of her anyway so she was pretty sure she had kept him from taking much of the fall.

"Oh bloody hell," the boy cursed, moving to get to his feet as running footsteps began to become audible. "I had almost outrun him when-"

Filch, the school caretaker, came around the corner and he was fuming. The elderly man came to a screeching halt and he set his eyes on the two of them, the gryffindor with the red hair looked rather sour that he was caught fleeing whatever he had gotten in trouble for. Filchś lips parted to show his crooked, yellowing teeth in a disturbing grin.

"Run into a bit of trouble did you, Mr. Weasley? And who is this? Your partner on crime?" Neither one of the student's had a chance to correct him, Rosie wasn't even sure the boy would have corrected him- that Rosie had no part in whatever it was the boy had done- before Filch was doling out their punishment.

"The two of you will be cleaning the trophy room until your fingers bleed," he snarled, before grabbed ahold of both students, and hauling them away to headmaster Dumbledore's office.

*******

"You what?" Penny demanded as Rosie returned to the dorms that night, long after Penny had thrown in the rag on studying and decided to try for sleep. Rosie had stepped through the door of the common room and had been bombarded, because Penny had expected Rosie to be back by the time she returned and Rosie hadn been. Apparently Penny had imagined all sorts of horrible scenarios, more than a few of them being focused on a slytherin trying to jump out and attack Rosie and Rosie being sent to Azkaban for murdering another student in self defense. 

But no, the reality had apparently been worse.

"I have detention," Rosie said again simply, having already made her peace with the fact that she had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Rosie had tried to explain to the headmaster, the boy had too, that Rosie had just been an innocent bystander but Mister Filch had been adamant that he had seen Rosie around Mrs. Norris at the time of the unfortunate incident.