To Alice's surprise Harry Potter was at supper that night, not looking the least upset by the days events, on the contrary he spent the entire meal talking excitedly to Ron and briefly the twins, who winked conspiratorially at Alice, before Malfoy turned up to gloat, his ever present bodyguards - or that was what they looked like - hovering behind him.
"What are you staring at?" Hermione looked at her impatiently.
With a stab of guilt Alice realised that she had been ignoring her friend for the past five minutes and Hermione had clearly been talking to her. "Sorry, I was miles away."
"You've been looking at Harry Potter all night, what's wrong? You don't -" Hermione looked scandalised, "you don't have a crush on him do you, after today?"
"No!" It was Alice's turn to look horrified. "No. I just know I've seen him somewhere before, it's been bugging me since we started school and I can't figure it out. He looks so familiar."
Hermione looked down the table at him and his red-haired companion and shrugged. "I don't know, maybe it's just because you've read about him. Are you finished?"
Alice nodded and followed her friend as she rose and began to make her way along the table walking round Malfoy who was still talking to Harry and Ron. Alice caught the last few words they were saying and so, clearly, did Hermione.
"Hang on a second." She pulled Alice to a stop and turned back to speak to the boys. "Excuse me."
Alice winced at her friend's brazenness.
"I couldn't help overhearing what you and Malfoy were saying -"
"Bet you could," Ron muttered ignoring the frown Alice threw in his direction for being rude.
"- and you mustn't go wandering around the school at night, think of the points you'll lose Gryffindor if you're caught, and you're bound to be. It's really very selfish of you."
"Hermione," Alice whispered as she tried to drag her friend away, "it's none of our business."
"You're right there." Harry quipped as he glanced at her, half in annoyance and half with a curiosity she couldn't fathom.
"Goodbye." Ron turned his back on them and resumed shovelling steak-and-kidney pie into his mouth.
"Well that was rude." Hermione stormed as they made their way up to the common room, "I try to give them some friendly advice and they throw it back in my face. I hate Ronald Weasley." She glowered darkly and stomped through the portrait hole. "I've a good mind to wait for them tonight and stop them leaving."
"Don't do that Hermione, it's really not worth it, if they're stupid enough to go and lose points then let them, we can always earn them back later. Professor Flitwick is giving a test next week we could get some for that."
"That's not the point, we shouldn't have to. Midnight duels! Of all the ridiculous, irresponsible things… Alright." She conceded as Alice continued to look at her expectantly, "I promise not to wait up for them, happy?"
"Ecstatic." Alice linked arms with her and walked her up to the dormitory.
The next morning as the girls came down the main staircase to the Entrance Hall Hermione peered over the banister at the hourglasses displaying the house points. Suddenly her legs seemed to fail her and her knuckles whitened as she gripped the banister for support. "Oh no," she moaned, "we'll never make that up. I told you we should have stopped them."
Looking to see what had caused her friend such concern Alice inhaled sharply. Where all the other Houses had a reasonable sprinkling of gems in the lower bulb of their hourglass, Gryffindor had - none.
"They lost them all," Hermione was moaning. "Now we'll never win the House Cup, they've lost all those points I won for knowing about Switching Spells too." She seemed on the verge of tears as she considered this.
Much as she cared about how her House faired, Alice was more concerned about her friend's extreme reaction to losing points. Leading Hermione gently into the Great Hall she sat her down well away from where Ron and Harry were sitting trying to avoid the glares of their fellow house mates with little success. Eventually she coaxed her friend into eating something, but Hermione just seemed to want to be left alone so grabbing a piece of toast Alice braced herself and went to sit next to Harry. Both boys looked at her in surprise, which was understandable as everyone else within spitting distance was treating them as a pariah and here she was actively seeking them out.
"So what happened then? I take it you got caught?"
"Yeah," Harry nodded glumly, "Filch."
"Ouch," she winced in sympathy, she hadn't met a single student yet who didn't hate the sour caretaker. "How did he find you?" she ventured tentatively.
"Malfoy set us up." Ron's reply was savage. "He tipped off Filch then didn't show up. Coward." He stabbed viciously at his bacon and chewed it morosely.
"We ran for it," Harry continued, "ended up getting lost down the third floor corridor, the door was locked and he cornered us after Peeves gave us away. It's just as well McGonagall believed we weren't down that way deliberately or I think she would have probably expelled us. She was so mad. As it was she docked us fifty points each and gave us a detention."
"It - wash - shcary." Ron added around his mouthful of bacon.
"I suppose Hermione did try to warn us."
"Boss us around you mean." Clearly Ron didn't appreciate the interference; ignoring the blistering look Alice threw at him and her snapped she was only trying to help he returned his concentration to his plate.
"Is she all right?" Harry nodded down the table to where a pale faced Hermione was picking at her porridge.
"I think she's in shock, she saw how many house points you lost."
Yeah," a pained expression crossed his face." I'm really sorry about that."
"She'll be fine eventually. Just needs time to recover is all."
Turning back to Harry she decided to ask him the question that had been bothering her for two weeks. There really must be something about Hogwarts that was making her braver. "Harry, sorry - do I know you from somewhere? Before Hogwarts I mean, you look really familiar."
"I know what you mean, I thought I recognised you on the train." He frowned for a second as he thought. "You're not from Little Whinging are you?"
"Little where? No I was brought up in an orphanage in Oxford."
"Oh I'm sorry, I didn't realise."
"It's alright," she shrugged, "I don't remember my parents and the Home isn't that bad."
"I don't remember mine either." He looked suddenly sad before he covered the moment by grinning at her, "but anyway I have no idea where I know you from, perhaps we met in a past life?"
"That must be it," she smiled as she got to her feet. "Well I'll see you in class."
She returned to Hermione who seemed to have decided both that her porridge wasn't worth eating and that she, for some reason unknown to Alice, needed to go to the library before class. As the two girls walked out of the Great Hall they heard a commotion behind them.
"I wonder what that is." Alice stood on her tiptoes to get a better look at the long package six owls had just delivered to Harry.
"Who cares?" Hermione sounded bitter as she stalked towards the staircase. With a sigh Alice steeled herself for an uncomfortable day and followed her to the library.
Hermione's birthday arrived six days later and to celebrate the Alice bought her the biggest box of chocolate frogs that she could find and the girls spent the evening sharing them by the fire in the common room whilst they did their Transfiguration homework.
A week later the Gryffindors had their second flying lesson, with the exception of Neville who Madam Hooch felt would gain more benefit by simply observing his classmates. Hermione managed to hover several feet off the ground, but remained clutching the broom looking completely terrified as Alice soared above her feeling elated. Being on a broom felt right, it was as though something had fallen into place and filled a hole that she never even knew was there. She felt the wind rushing past her face as she pushed her broom higher only to be brought back down to earth with a jolt by the sound of Madam Hooch shouting at the students to come back. Much to her delight however the professor merely split the class into to groups, those who could clearly handle a broom, of which Harry, Alice and Ron were part, and those who needed extra help, much to Hermione's humiliation. She spent the rest of the hour flying loops around the grounds and playing tag with Parvati and Sally-Anne Perks, the fifth Gryffindor girl, before all too soon the lesson was over. Alice remained on a high though, chattering incessantly to Hermione about brooms for the rest of the day, which was an odd experience in itself as, like giggling, chattering was something she had never really done before.
Much to Alice's amusement her friend had decided that the best way to punish Harry and Ron for losing all Gryffindor's house points, and more, was by ignoring them completely and by doing fantastically well in all her classes just to rub their noses in the fact that she could get house points by doing so. Her logic may have been slightly flawed, and neither of the boys seemed much affected by it, but Alice couldn't help but admire her staying power, she managed to keep it up for nearly two months without exception. The only down side was that her increased persistence in answering every question in class, which, Alice reasoned, she would probably have done anyway, started to annoy all of the other students.
On the morning of Halloween they were paired up in Charms to practice making objects levitate. Much to both parties clear distaste, Ron and Hermione were paired together whilst Alice ended up with Neville. Alice already knew she could do the spell, she had practiced it secretly in bed with the curtains pulled shut the night before, she hadn't even told Hermione as rule breaking was a bit of a sore point with her at the moment. As a result she spent most of the lesson unsuccessfully trying to teach Neville how to do it, gently correcting his pronunciation and adjusting his wand movements to no avail. Part of magic was the belief you could perform the spell and Neville had no self confidence whatsoever.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw Hermione make her feather soar several feet into the air much to her partner's chagrin, and suppressed a grin.
By the end of the lesson Neville's feather was no nearer to flying than he himself was and after declining her invitation to walk to the next class with them he walked out of the classroom on his own.
"Did you see that Alice?" Hermione was positively brimming with excitement as they left Charms, "I managed to levitate it five or six feet at least! That's quite good for a first try."
Alice was about to open her mouth to reply as they heard a voice from just ahead of them exclaim, "it's no wonder no one can stand her. She's a nightmare, honestly." It was Ron speaking and it was all too clear who he was talking about. Torn between wanting to punch Ron and making sure that her friend was alright she turned to find Hermione frozen to the spot with tears spilling down her cheeks.
"Hermione," she began, reaching out a hand to comfort her, but her friend brushed it off and ran off into the crowd that filled the corridor before she could say another word.
Unable to follow her through the throng of people Alice rounded on Ron. "What did you say that for? She's really upset now and it's all your fault. Can't you see she only wants to do well? You're horrid Ron Weasley. You should go and apologise right now."
Startled by her outburst Ron looked dumbfounded before spluttering out, "well, I only meant that… the thing was that… she wasn't meant to hear," he finished plaintively.
"So? Find her and apologise," she threatened before whirling away to her next class hoping to find Hermione there and comfort her.
But Hermione wasn't in the next class, or any of the others after that. Alice spent the whole of lunchtime looking for her and all the time between classes and supper. Eventually however her stomach called her to the Great Hall. It wouldn't do Hermione any good if she passed out from hunger whilst looking for her, and there was a chance she might be there anyway. She wasn't and Alice was just about to wrap a chicken wing in a napkin to eat on her search when Professor Quirrell, the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher bolted into the Hall and ran the length of the room before collapsing in front of Dumbledore and gasping out, "Troll - in the dungeons - thought you ought to know."
Suddenly the room was in uproar as hundreds of students clamoured for an explanation. Dumbledore eventually managed to gain silence by firing off several purple firecrackers from his wand and ordered every pupil back to their dormitories. As people began to push past her, Alice caught sight of the Weasley twins and fleetingly wondered whether they had let the troll in, but she quickly dismissed the thought, they were reckless not stupid.
Dashing into the Great Hall she spotted Harry and Ron on the stairs and pushed her way through the confused crowd towards them. "Have you two seen Hermione?"
"This maybe isn't the time to ask me to apologise." Ron replied scathingly.
"I don't care about that just now," she stumbled sideways as several students stampeded past them, but Harry caught her before she fell. "Hermione's missing, I haven't seen her all afternoon and she doesn't know about the troll!" She tried not to let the panic she was starting to feel show in her voice.
"We'll help you find her." Harry looked expectantly at his friend.
"Oh, all right." Ron snapped. "But Percy'd better not see us." Quickly so as to avoid Ron's brother they ducked down and scurried up several flights of stairs before finding themselves in a completely deserted corridor, they had just turned a corner and were beginning to check the classrooms when they heard footsteps hurrying along behind them.
"Percy." Ron hissed pulling the other two behind a large stone griffin.
It wasn't Percy however, it was Professor Snape, looking haughty as ever and stalking down the corridor with his usual bat-like presence.
"What's he doing here?" Harry whispered in her ear. "Why isn't he down in the dungeons with the rest of the teachers?"
"Search me." Ron muttered helpfully.
Alice just shrugged; she had more pressing things to worry about at the moment. Like whether or not a huge, violent, blundering troll had crossed paths with her friend. Hermione might be brilliant, but she was still only twelve.
"He's heading for the third floor." Harry seemed ready to follow him before Ron stopped him.
"Can you smell something?" The others gagged as the smell hit them.
"The troll!" Alice hissed she pointed down to the end of the corridor where it had emerged into a patch of moonlight. It was without doubt the ugliest thing she had ever seen.
"Quick," Harry said as it disappeared through a doorway, "we should lock it in." The two boys led the way towards the door and Alice hung back as they turned the key triumphantly. The boys ran back to where she was standing and she had taken two steps back up the passage when she heard a blood curdling screech coming from the room they had just locked.
"Oh no," Ron had gone deathly pale.
"Hermione!" Spinning she dashed back to the door and fumbled with the lock, the boys just a few paces behind her. As the three ran inside they saw Hermione cowering in a corner trying to keep as far away from the troll's flailing club as she could. It seemed to have managed to do significant damage to the bathroom already as debris littered the room. As the club connected with one of the cubicles splinters of wood exploded through the air with deadly force to join the jagged shards of ceramic already cast across the tiles and it was only luck that prevented any of them from being injured
"Confuse it," Harry yelled lobbing a tap at the monster, it missed but his shout was enough to attract the troll's attention which gave Ron an opportunity to get round the other side of it and throw a pipe at it. Together the two boys began to draw the troll away from Hermione. Alice raced over to Hermione trying not to slip in the puddles of water which had sprayed from the broken sinks.
"Hermione come on," but she was too scared to move and Alice didn't have the strength to drag her back to the door. As she turned to see what had happened to the boys she saw the troll back Ron up into a corner and then from nowhere Harry threw himself onto the trolls back and - whether deliberately or not she wasn't sure - stick his wand up its nose.
In desperation Alice cast around for something to use as a weapon, seeing the troll almost knock Harry out with the huge club it carried gave her an idea. Raising her wand she tried to remember how to do the spell and prayed to anything that was listening for this to work.
"Wingardium Leviosa!" The club flew out of the trolls hand and hung suspended above its head for several seconds before she let it fall with a loud crack. The floor trembled as the troll keeled over sideways, sending Harry flying across the room, and landed with a thud. For a moment no one said a word.
"Are you alright?" She called across the room to Harry as he extricated himself from the shattered remains of a cubicle.
He raised his hand to signal the affirmative.
"Is it - dead?" Hermione's soft voice asked.
"I don't think so, just knocked out."
"How about you Hermione?" To Alice's surprise it was Ron who asked. "Look," he ploughed on, not waiting for an answer, "I'm really sorry about what I said before. Just so you know. Sorry."
Before Hermione could respond several doors slammed and Professors McGonagall, Quirrell and Snape burst into the room.
As it turned out things went better than Alice could have expected, instead of detentions as she would have envisaged after such serious rule breaking, especially considering the boys' previous record, they were each awarded five points for tackling the troll. All except Hermione who, much to Alice's surprise claimed responsibility for the whole incident and lost five points. After a stern telling off, the Professor sent the students back to their dormitory with a warning not to try sneaking off anywhere else.
The next day the four first years all sat together at breakfast; at first very little was said as they got over their initial, and in Alice's case chronic, shyness. By the time they all left the table they were much more comfortable with each other and Harry, Ron and Hermione were chatting as though they had known each other for years with Alice throwing in the occasional comment when she thought it would be least noticed. As the day continued she re-evaluated her first impression of the boys, before she had disliked them for being mean to Hermione but now that her friend seemed to have forgiven them for it she could see that they weren't that bad. Harry was really nice despite what he'd been through and the fact he was famous and once you got past Ron's repulsive way of eating and ignored some of the stupider things that came out of his mouth he was alright too. After all they had helped rescue Hermione.
Over the next few days they became fast friends and when Harry told them in confidence that he was playing seeker on the Gryffindor Quidditch team, a feat of which Alice was desperately envious, she traded secrets by telling the boys about the three-headed dog she had seen with the twins.
"Why didn't they tell me about it?" Ron complained on learning of his brothers' involvement.
"They probably just didn't want someone to overhear them telling you," Hermione placated as she conjured a bright blue flame inside a jam jar to keep them warm in the courtyard.
"I still think they could have told me," he grumbled.
The others laughed, but Harry quickly grew serious again. "You think it was guarding something?" He shot a significant look at Ron.
"What?" Hermione couldn't stand mysteries. "What do you know?"
"Well when Hagrid, the Gamekeeper, took me to Diagon Alley to get my school supplies in the summer we went to Gringotts."
"This wasn't the day of the break in?" Alice asked, a suspicion beginning to form as to where this story was going.
"Yes," Harry looked at her excitedly. "The article about the break in said that the vault had been emptied earlier that day and while we were there Hagrid took a package from one of the vaults, leaving it empty. He said it was Hogwarts business. Very secret. We thought it had been moved to the school. We must have been right," he finished triumphantly.
"Do you think You-Know-Who's behind it?"
"Voldemort!" Harry and Alice corrected in unison before looking at each other in surprise. Alice had discovered that people in the wizarding world hated saying Voldemort's name which in her opinion was a ridiculous superstition, even Hermione didn't say it. Last week she would have thought Harry would be the last person who insisted on saying it, but now that she knew him slightly better she realised that he saw it as normal too.
Both Ron and Hermione had gone pale at the mention of his name but Hermione was the first to recover as her quick brain began to turn over the possibilities. "He could be, if he was strong enough I suppose, everyone says he isn't but I think it's foolish to assume that don't you?" She continued, without waiting for an answer, in what Alice recognised was her thinking out loud mode. "It depends what the package was, did Hagrid give you any clues Harry? What did it look like?"
Harry measured a two inch space between his hands. "It was about that big and wrapped in brown paper. All Hagrid said was that it was more than his job was worth to tell me what it was."
"It must be quite valuable then," Hermione mused, "or very powerful."
Their conversation was cut short at this point by Snape appearing in the courtyard and docking five points from Harry for taking a book outside. Nevertheless they continued discussing the package the dog was guarding on and off for the rest of the day, but as supper drew closer Harry grew quiet. His first Quidditch match was tomorrow and the nerves were starting to get to him. Ron tried to cheer him up in the common room that night by assuring him that the Slytherin team were rubbish and that his brothers, who it turned out were on the team too, would pound them to dust. It didn't seem to help.
Finally giving up on trying to settle Harry disappeared to ask Snape for his book back and the others carried on with their Charms homework. He wasn't gone long however as ten minutes later he came flying through the portrait hole, bursting with the news that Snape had injured his leg.
That night when the others had gone to bed Alice and Hermione sat up in the dormitory discussing the revelation.
"I know the boys think he was trying to get by the dog, but I don't think he could have been, do you?" Hermione was sitting at the bottom of her bed, talking in a whisper so as not to wake the other girls. "I mean I know he's not very nice, but he's not stupid. You'd have to be mad to try and tangle with that dog."
"Are you saying I'm mad?" Alice joked, her eyebrow quirked upwards in amusement.
"No, no, of course not. Besides you didn't know it was there."
"Maybe Snape didn't either."
"But he's a teacher. Surely Dumbledore would have told them -"
"It depends how big a secret it is."
"I suppose," Hermione seemed thoughtful, "but if he did know about it I can't imagine he was trying to get past it can you?"
Alice shrugged, if she was honest she wasn't sure. The evidence certainly seemed to be against him, but she didn't really want to judge her teacher without proof, even if he was particularly horrid.
"I hope Harry does well tomorrow," Hermione moved back to her own bed and pulled the blankets up to her chin, "he's so nervous about it."
"What are you reading?" Alice asked as Hermione struggled to lift an enormous old book onto her knees.
"It's a compendium of major magical occurrences for the last eight hundred years. It's very interesting, I'll give it to you when I'm finished if you like."
"Alright," Alice smiled at her friend in the gloom as she snuffed out her candle leaving only Hermione's wand light for illumination. "Goodnight."
"Goodnight."
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