An American at Hogwarts

Chapter Fifteen

I woke up fairly early the next morning, feeling rested for the first time all week. I'd spent a little time studying the map last night, and it was insanely cool. It showed the location of every single person in the school; it even showed the staircases moving!

Obviously Hogwarts was a lot bigger and weirder than a corn maze, so I couldn't memorize anywhere near all of it in one night. I did make a pretty good dent though, and when I met Fred and George in the Common Room I thought I had a solid idea of some of the more complicated corridors.

"Alright Alexa, let's go!" said Fred, practically jumping up and down in excitement.

"We're going to go from the Common Room to the Great Hall now, and then we'll test how much you've learned," George explained.

"Sounds like a plan to me!" I followed the twins out the portrait hole, and I tried extra hard to look around and make note of the route we were taking to expand the map in my head. I was a pretty visual person, so when I studied the map last night I started building a picture in my mind. Little by little I'd complete it, until I didn't need the map anymore.

"So how'd the memorizing go last night?" asked Fred.

"Pretty good I think! Where did you guys get that thing anyway? It's really amazing!"

"We stole it from Filch's cabinet of contraband," answered George with grin.

"He'd labeled it 'Confiscated and Highly Dangerous'," added Fred. "What did he expect?"

"I threw a Dungbomb—"

"—and I reached into the cabinet and grabbed the first thing I could."

"Dang, that worked pretty well for such a ridiculous plan! How did you figure out how to make the writing show up? When you first handed it to me I could've sworn it was just a blank piece of paper," I said. We were into the secret passage now, but both boys still glanced around to make sure we were alone before answering.

"When you get the words wrong, the map talks," said George.

"Whoever those people were—"

"—Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs—"

"—they set up some kind of system to help future troublemakers like us," explained Fred. "Whenever we said something or tried the wrong spell, they would give us hints."

"It took us a while, but eventually we got to the right words."

"Wow. Who are these guys? They're amazing!"

"We don't know!" said Fred.

"But we'd give just about anything to find out. We need to thank them!" added George.

That was all it took for the gears to start turning in my head. I was a puzzle solver, and now I was curious. When I had the map again later tonight, I would do my best to backtrack the creators and memorize all the corridors.

We popped out of the secret passage just a little ways from the Great Hall, right in front of a group of Ravenclaws. They all jumped, which made me grin. I was gonna have fun messing with people once I knew the corridors better.

"Alexa? Where did you come from?" I looked closer to see who'd spoken and I found David standing among the group.

"Oh, hey David! Don't worry about it." I grinned, and I could tell Fred and George were having just as much fun as I was. "Oh! Hey, so does it still work for you to meet in the library today?"

"Uh... yes. Yes, that should still work."

"Great! I'll see you around... one?"

"That sounds perfect."