Bonded

Twenty-Five

"She must've done this to other people," Calliope said to Natalie as the two walked down to breakfast the next morning, "I think it was supposed to leave a scar, but the cuts kept healing really quickly."

"That old hag!" Natalie raged, "she literally tried to use a torture device on you, Callie! You've got to tell Dumbledore! I think-"

"it's not that big of a deal, it didn't work anyway-"

"George I don't know where it came from!" Fred was saying as the twins approached the two Hufflepuff girls, "it just appeared on my hand last night!"

"Well, it must've come from somewhere!" Protested George, "we need to get revenge on whoever is pranking us!"

"No one is- Callie what the hell!" Fred yelled when Calliope grabbed his left hand, which he was holding in a funny way as if it were injured. A scabbed over wound on the back of his hand read; I will not disrespect the ministry, in Calliope's neat handwriting.

"No one is pranking you," Calliope said as she stared at Fred's hand.

"What do you mean? Where's it from then?" George demanded.

"It's from Umbridge."

"But I've not seen the old hag since our lesson yesterday," frowned Fred.

"That was Callie's detention last night," said Natalie, "Umbridge had this funny quill that carved the lines that Callie wrote into her hand."

"But it healed quickly," said Calliope, still staring at Fred's hand.

"Wait, she tried to use a quill that literally cut into your hand?" Fred demanded.

"It's not like it worked," Calliope let go of Fred's hand.

"Still, that's way out of order! We've got to do something about this Freddie," said George with an evil grin.

"Hows about we test some of those blood blister pods?" suggested Fred.

"Don't," Calliope told them, "I've got this one handled, you guys go have breakfast, I'll catch up with you later."

"Where are you going?" Natalie asked as Calliope began to walk off towards the marble staircase, "what're you doing?"

"You'll see!" was Calliope's only response.

********

Calliope walked quietly through the corridors, silently concocting her revenge plan as she walked. She wouldn't have cared if Umbridge's punishment had simply hurt her, but the fact that it had hurt Fred made her angry, as again, it was all her fault that the Weasley boy was suffering.

She approached Umbridge's office door and listened to ensure that the woman was in the room before she drew her wand and waved it in an intricate pattern with her wand, in infinitum obfirmo, she thought. A silver light shot from the end of her wand and hit the door, casting a brief silver glow over the entire door before it quickly dissipated and returned to normal.

The door handle rattled, but the door did not budge. It rattled again but still refused to move. Calliope heard Umbridge curse loudly and a crash, signifying that the woman had shot several unsuccessful spells at the door. The banshee smiled and headed back towards the Great Hall, looking forward to her breakfast. 

"What did you do?" George demanded eagerly when Calliope sat down at the Hufflepuff table beside Natalie, who was being joined by both the twins and Lee.

"You'll see," Calliope replied with a faint smile.

"Why am I scared she's killed, someone?" Lee asked.

"She doesn't kill people," Fred grinned at Calliope, "she only maims or seriously injuries."

"In this case, I saved a lot of people from boredom," Calliope said.

"I want to know what she did!" George complained. "Fred make her tell us what she did!"

"We'll find out soon," Fred met Calliope's eyes, "and whatever it is I'm sure it will be amazing."

********

"I wonder where Umbridge was," Hermione Granger could be overheard at lunch as she spoke across the Gryffindor table to Harry and Ron, "they didn't even bother to send a substitute."

Fred, George, Natalie and Lee also overheard this, and all turned to stare at Calliope who continued to eat her sandwich.

"Screamer, what in Merlin's name did you do?" Fred asked.

"Oh it was just a simple spell," Calliope smiled, "but we should be free of Umbridge until Professor Flitwick gets around to looking up the counter-charm."

"Countercharm for what?" George asked eagerly.

"I charmed her office door, she's trapped in there until someone casts the spell to let her out," said Calliope, "with any luck Flitwick will take ages to look up the counter-charm."