✓ | RECKLESS AND BRAVE | Draco Malfoy

11 | KAPUT

KAPUT
(adj.) broken and useless; no longer working or effective

TESSA WAS HONESTLY SCARED OF WHAT COULD HAPPEN TO THE THREE OF THEM. She wouldn't stop clenching and unclenching her fists to calm herself all the while biting the inside of her cheek to keep from saying anything out loud. Filch took them down to Professor McGonagall's study on the first floor, where they sat and waited without saying a word to each other.

     Tessa glanced over at Harry first, seeing the drawn eyebrows and frown on his face. She reached over to give him a squeeze on his arm, forgetting about her own fears and now worrying over the boy's. He weakly smiled back at her before she withdrew her hand and turned to Hermione who was trembling.

     Letting out a sigh, Tessa closed her eyes for a second. How could they have been so stupid as to forget the cloak? No matter how many excuses Tessa could come up with, there was absolutely nothing that could make McGonagall let them slip by without detention or expulsion for being out of bed and creeping around the school in the dead of night, let alone being up the tallest astronomy tower, which was out-of-bounds except for classes. Add Norbert and the invisibility cloak, and they might as well be packing their bags already.

     Tessa let out another deep sigh. Looks like she'll be back home with Uncle Kasi sooner than she'd expected. How she's going to write her letter informing him she was expelled and on her way home, Tessa had no idea.

     Her thoughts were cut short by McGonagall entering the study with Neville.

     "Harry!" Neville burst out, the moment he saw the three of them. "I was trying to find you to warn you, I heard Malfoy saying he was going to catch you, he said you had a drag—"

     Tessa deliberately coughed out loud to mask what he'd just said as Harry shook his head violently to shut Neville up, but Professor McGonagall had seen. She was livid, looking as though smoke were about to steam out of her ears and nose with fire from her mouth. "I would never have believed it of any of you. Mr. Filch says you were up in the astronomy tower. It's one o'clock in the morning. Explain yourselves."

     For the first time, Tessa didn't raise her hand and didn't wish to be listened to. And it was also the first time Hermione had ever failed to answer a teacher's question.

"I think I've got a good idea of what's been going on," Professor McGonagall said in a knowing manner. "It doesn't take a genius to work it out. You fed Draco Malfoy some cock-and-bull story about a dragon, trying to get him out of bed and into trouble. I've already caught him. I suppose you think it's funny that Longbottom here heard the story and believed it, too?"

Tessa avoided looking at Neville's hurt eyes and wounded expression, whereas Harry was trying to tell him without using words on how what McGonagall was saying isn't true.

"I'm disgusted," McGonagall spat, causing Tessa to flinch. "Five students out of bed in one night! I've never heard of such a thing before! You, Miss Granger, I thought you had more sense. And you, Miss Valentine, I expected better of you. As for you, Mr. Potter, I thought Gryffindor meant more to you than this. All four of you will receive detentions — yes, you too, Mr. Longbottom, nothing gives you the right to walk around school at night, especially these days, it's very dangerous — and fifty points will be taken from Gryffindor."

"Fifty?" Harry gasped.

Tessa's heart plunged to the bottom of her stomach as she stared up at the older witch with an aghast look. "But, Professor —"

"Fifty points each," Professor McGonagall corrected herself, breathing heavily through her long, pointed nose.

Tessa was shaking her head to herself in complete disbelief. "Professor, you can't do that —"