Cast yourself (you are the spell)

Chapter 15

Hope barely manages to squeeze herself through the common room door from the amount of bodies packed tightly into the room. She shoves her way through all of them, and loses Josette somewhere between the entrance and her friends. She's pretty sure the girl went straight to her dorm room.

Looking once more for her friends, she finds them standing by the couches, their positions mirrored in that they're all crossing their arms and staring up at Professor Snape, who is standing near the staircase to the dorms. It would be funny if Hope had any idea at all as to what happened.

"What did you do?" she hisses to Penelope, only half-serious, and the girl glares at her.

"How was your detention?" Penelope throws back, and Hope's lip pulls up in a sneer. She definitely did not need a reminder. She still can't believe she had apologized to a muggleborn, and if Josette told anyone at all, her family would kill her. Yet, a part of her was relieved. Lying that she had read that letter really taken a toll on her.

Hope's thoughts stray momentarily before she forces herself to snap back to the situation at hand, and she notices a second later that Penelope and Rose are completely wet and dripping a weird green substance. They're both wearing their night robes, and when Hope leans forward...

"You two smell like wet Hippogriff." The words escape her before she can think twice and both girls narrow their eyes. Maya laughs behind her hand, her giggles cut off sharply when Penelope looks viciously in her direction.

"Attention. Attention!" Hope glances back to Snape, who's still standing impatiently in the last place she saw him. "It has come to my concern that a few of your...peers...have decided to play-their idea of-a practical joke. The school's house-elves are currently working to eradicate all traces of the foul odor left by these-"

"Foul odor?" Hope asks.

"Some piece of shit put exploding dungbombs under our beds," Rose tells her, and Hope raises her eyebrows. She's barely ever heard the girl curse before, and she's slightly surprised that students have started a prank war in the middle of October. They usually wait until after winter break to begin.

"You should all be able to go back to your rooms shortly," Snape continues. "First, second, and third year dorms have all been cleared. I will convene with the rest of our staff in the morning, and we will attempt to survey the possible culprits and apprehend them accordingly. However, mark my words, there will be no petty revenge, and these juvenile pranks end here. If I catch anyone from my house petulantly retaliating, they will automatically lose fifty house points. Do I make myself clear?"

Not a single person nods or speaks, and if Snape's eyes twinkle in the light, Hope does not think twice about it.

"Good."

The students divide and make space as Snape leaves the room, and the room grows silent. Hope sits down on an empty armchair, her hands folded neatly in her lap as she watches the first, second, and third years all trot up to their rooms, leaving the rest of the students waiting patiently in the common room.

This is a matter for the bigger kids.

"Alright, well, this was obviously the work of Gryffindors," she speaks up once she sees the younger kids have left, finding that many of the Slytherins are already looking to her for guidance. This isn't the first time this has happened, after all, and every time it happens she's always in charge of the next move. "Ravenclaws are too clever for something as dull as dungbombs, and Hufflepuffs can't see passed the rainbows and unicorns up their asses to even think about doing any harm."

"That leaves those reckless idiots," Hope adds, merely thinking out loud. "Did anyone see anything?"

Her eyes flit across the room, but no one says a word and, strangely, when she briefly looks at Sebastian, he can't quite meet her gaze.