What He Knew

Chapter 6

My first lesson was a double potions with Draco and Ryan. Draco was silent for the whole thing, staring moodily into the distance as Slughorn described the different parts of the syllabus for the year ahead. Ryan tried multiple times to talk to him but he completely blanked her the whole lesson. She gave up, rolling her eyes at him and muttering "prick" under her breath.

At the end of potions Slughorn asked me to stay back for a second.

"Is there anything I can do for you, sir?" I asked, curious as to why I was being held back.

Slughorn smiled cheerily, "I just wanted to let you know that I knew your mother, she was a fine student while she was here! Very ambitious too. Tell me, did she ever become a Herbologist?"

I stared at Slughorn blankly, sure he had the wrong person, my mother had attended Beauxbatons and as far as I knew, she had never left France. 

"I'm sorry sir you must have me confused with someone else. My mother is French, she went to Beauxbatons."

"Yes, for her first 5 years but she transferred here in 6th year, the same as you. Oh dear, did she not tell you this?" Slughorn looked worried, as if he had told me something I shouldn't have heard. 

I inhaled sharply, overwhelmed by this new information.

"You know what sir, it's actually all coming back to me now, she did mention it. Just in passing is all... It must have slipped my mind, I'm forgetful like that!" I was hardly going to spill my guts to my new potions professor about how my mother had never told me anything about her life.

I laughed it off with Slughorn and he scribbled me a note for my next professor to apologise for my lateness. The moment I left his classroom though I had to pause and restore my breathing. My Mother was here. And I had no clue. If I didn't even know what school she went to what else was I missing?

The rest of the lessons passed relatively smoothly, the only strange thing was that Draco decided to ditch the rest of classes after potions. Ryan hadn't been worried at first but after the 3rd missed class she started frowning and looking out for him in the hallways.

After lessons Ryan and I hurried back to the common rooms to dump our bags and change to head down to the lake. Ryan was as pale as I was but insisted she needed to take advantage of the last of the summer sun to "work on her tan".

Just as we were climbing up the stairs out of the dungeons we saw a familiar streak of blond hair ahead. Ryan called out to him but he was too far ahead.

"Come on, let's follow him" Ryan said, speeding up.

"What about your tan?" I joked, keeping up with her.

"I know you don't notice how strange he's being but trust me, it's weird. He never would've ditched so many classes last year, his Mum really values high grades." 

I didn't argue with her, honestly, I was just happy to have someone who wanted me to come on these little missions.

It was easy enough to follow Draco, his blond head bobbing high above most of the students. However, when we came to the 7th floor it became increasingly more difficult to keep out of his sight. There weren't many classrooms this high in the castle, the rooms were mainly storage and a few were recreational so there weren't many students around. We had just ducked into a hallway to allow Malfoy to get further ahead when we collided with Ginny and Valentine. 

"Val!" I cried smiling broadly at her. She returned the smile weakly, looking obviously at the colour of my tie and jumper.

"I see you got put into Slytherin then?" She said, pulling at her sleeves.

"Yeah, I tried to find you last night but this place is a maze!" I laughed trying to get a proper smile out of her. 

"Yeah, sorry, when I found out you weren't put in Gryffindor or Hufflepuff after you didn't come find me at dinner I assumed you were in Ravenclaw..." Why was she being so damn awkward? Sure they didn't like Slytherins but surely that couldn't change their view of me so much?

"Well, Ginny and I have to go uh..."

"Meet the boys, we'll see you around, yeah?" Ginny finished for Val, grabbing her arm and dragging her away before I could reply. 

I watched Val walk away and then looked at Ryan. The moment she met my eyes she burst out laughing.

"What the hell is their problem?" She asked, raising her voice and saying in a mocking tone, "I assumed you were in Ravenclaw"

I sighed, "They think all Slytherins are bad and I guess that means me too now."

Ryan rolled her eyes, "You know what? They're right, we are all bad but that's better than being all stuck up their own holes!"

I couldn't help but laugh, weren't Ginny and Val just as bad for painting a whole house based off a few bad people? Sure, Val's parents were all buddy buddy with Death Eaters, what right did she have to act all holier than thou? 

Ryan grabbed my arm, "Come on, let's see if we can catch up with Malfoy."

We didn't catch up with Malfoy though, he wasn't anywhere on the 7th floor or the 6th or the 5th or any of the floors to be exact. 

"He can't just have vanished!" exclaimed Ryan giving up and walking out the front doors and down to the lake.

We laid out until the sun began to set around 7 and we headed back inside to grab some dinner. 

Malfoy wasn't at dinner and he didn't enter the common room that evening at all as we did our homework by the windows that allowed us to watch the giant squid swim lazily by.

It was 11pm by the time we had finished all our potions and transfiguration homework. Ryan glanced at the portrait as if willing Draco to come through it. But he didn't.