• Serena Black •

"They're called Thestrals,
but people avoid them
because they're a bit different."

The snowfall over Hogwarts had only increased during the night, much to the delight of the students and much to the displeasure of Filch, who had spent the whole time trying to keep the Entrance Hall dry and grumbling at anyone who had brought a load of snow with them.

While most of her classmates were already enjoying breakfast and mentally preparing themselves for the lessons ahead, Serena waited impatiently for her friends at the Gryffindor table. She still had no idea what had happened to Harry the previous night. Neither Ron nor he had turned up that morning and Serena couldn't see any of the other Weasleys either. She was beginning to worry a little that something bad might have happened

Hermione's first question was also about the whereabouts of her two best friends as she sat down opposite Serena, who could only shrug her shoulders. "I wonder that too... But last night I saw Harry with McGonagall, they were on their way to Dumbledore's."

"What do you think happened?" Hermione asked worriedly, poking at her cereal without taking a bite.

Serena nibbled on her roll just as listlessly, not taking her eyes off the door. "I hope nothing's wrong," she mumbled.

"Hey, have you seen Ginny?" Neville yawned and sat down next to Serena, apparently still half in the realm of dreams. "No, but Fred, George, Ron and Harry are kind of gone too," she replied.

"Harry and Ron both went out yesterday, at least, after Harry had a nightmare or something. They didn't come back after that," Neville reported, whereupon Serena and Hermione exchanged worried glances.

The students came and went, but there was never one of the redheads or Harry among them. With each new wave of students, the tension in the two girls grew.

Before they could concoct any more conspiracy theories, Professor McGonagall had stepped up behind Hermione and asked the two girls to stand aside for a moment. "Follow me, please."

Hermione and Serena didn't hesitate and followed their teacher out of the hall and into an empty corridor. McGonagall looked at them with her usual stern gaze. "As you may have noticed, there was a little incident tonight."

"What happened?" Hermione whispered worriedly.

"Your friends are fine," McGonagall assured them and the two of them breathed a sigh of relief, as if a weight weighing a tonne had been lifted from their shoulders. "It's more about Arthur Weasley..." she continued.

"Is he all right?" Serena blurted out and her heart began to race. Surely nothing bad would have happened to him...

"He was attacked," her teacher explained. "He's fine... according to the circumstances. He's in St Mungo's now. Professor Dumbledore has decided it would be better to send your friends home straight away and release them from lessons until the holidays."

Hermione nodded mutely and McGonagall continued in a lowered voice, "Please try not to let anything show and remember that the correspondence is no longer secure. Do you have any questions?"

Serena had to swallow and Hermione croaked, "No, Professor."

"Good, then make sure you get something to eat, you two look quite pale." With these words, the transfiguration teacher finally rushed off.

"What do you think happened?" Hermione whispered in an oppressive voice as they made their way to Umbridge's classroom - neither of the girls managed to down a single bite in light of their recent findings.

Serena looked equally perplexed. "I guess we'll find out more on Friday," she sighed, already looking wistfully towards the holidays. She would finally see Remus and her father again. She had to admit to herself that she was a little jealous of her friends in this respect, even though she didn't want to swap places with any of them and was very worried about the head of the Weasleys.

Hermione suddenly smacked her forehead with one hand. "Bugger! I promised my parents I'd go skiing with them."

Amused, Serena raised an eyebrow. "Skiing?"

"Actually, skiing isn't really my thing." she grinned meaningfully.

"So you'd rather spend Christmas in stuffy Grimmauld Place, would you?" giggled Serena, secretly wishing for nothing more than to be able to celebrate Christmas at Crystal Cottage. She hated the Blacks' old house and thanks to the Ministry's incompetence, they probably had no other choice. Now that her father had been locked up there for almost half a year, literally sealed off from the outside world, she wondered if he had already lost his mind.

"But don't tell Ron," Hermione begged her, looking at her pleadingly as the door to her classroom came into her field of vision. "I told him skiing would be great because he kept laughing."

"Don't worry," Serena laughed, dropping into her seat as they reached the classroom.

A few minutes later, Hailey burst into the room, sticking her head out at her friend. "Where's Ron?"

"He's gone to see his family," Serena explained, lowering her voice so that no one could overhear their conversation. "His father is injured in hospital."

Her best friend's eyes widened in shock as Umbridge had just entered and scanned the rows with her small eyes. They finally stopped at the two empty seats and then instantly darted to Hermione and Serena in turn. "Miss Granger, Miss Black, can you tell me where your friends are?"

"They're with the Weasleys," Serena replied with a sweet undertone in her voice, just as her teacher always did - though it already sounded rather passive aggressive to her ears.

The corners of the pink plague's mouth twitched. "In the middle of term?"

Serena exchanged a quick glance with Hermione and then replied with a fake smile, "I guess it was urgent."

"What could be more important at this time than preparing for the exams?" whispered Umbridge.

"Oh I don't know, maybe family?" Hailey sourly answered her teacher's rhetorical question, her eyes instantly shooting over to her. "Miss Price, please raise your hand if you're not addressed."

Hailey visibly rolled her eyes and muttered something to herself that Serena was sure was more than an insult. In fact, it was the first time her best friend had ever been not polite to a teacher, as she normally took great care with her tone when dealing with authoritative people.

"So no one can tell me why Mr Potter and Mr Weasley left in such a hurry?" Umbridge now turned to the entire class and Hermione hesitantly raised her hand. "I think you should speak to Professor Dumbledore about this, as we don't feel authorised to discuss a private matter in front of an entire class."

Umbridge looked as if Hermione had punched her in the face with her answer. "Very well. I'll sort this matter out later. Now, please open all your books and read chapter seven."

At the end of the lesson, Hagrid led them into the forbidden forest in care of magical creatures. That alone did not bode well for the students. All the fifth and sixth year students who had taken this subject still had lessons together and were now marching suspiciously through the thicket in a large group.

When Hagrid finally stopped, they were in a clearing so deep in the forest that there was hardly any snow. Serena stood by Maxon, whom she greeted with a kiss, and then watched in disgust as Hagrid dropped half a cow on the ground. That definitely didn't bode well for her either.

"Come closer," the gamekeeper tried to encourage his students, but it was hard to miss the fact that most of them felt quite uncomfortable and kept looking around uneasily. Serena had been in the Forbidden Forest often enough by now to know that the really dangerous creatures were still hiding a little deeper in the forest.

Hagrid let out a shrill cry that echoed through the dark trees. No one said a word, the others seemed far too frightened at the thought of what their teacher might attract.

A few minutes passed and nothing happened in the clearing until Maxon suddenly drew in a sharp breath. Serena tried to follow his gaze, but couldn't see anything in that direction. "What's there?"

"Here comes another one!" Hagrid announced proudly and Serena couldn't help but declare him mad after all. On the other hand, he had already dragged in crazier creatures, so why not something invisible? But then why could Maxon recognise something in the clearing?

"Can't you see it?" the Ravenclaw whispered, scrutinising her with narrowed eyebrows. "They're right there in the middle of the meadow."

"What is it?" she asked, squinting her eyes in the hope that she might be able to see something.

"They look like bony winged horses," he explained, his brow still furrowed.

Fortunately, Serena didn't seem to be the only one who didn't have a clue what Hagrid had summoned. Confused, most of the students looked around and finally Malfoy asked in a mocking voice what they were all wondering. "Excuse me, but what exactly are we supposed to be looking at?"

"Thestrals," Hagrid announced. "There's a whole herd living here... Which of you can see them?"

Only a fraction of the students raised their hands hesitantly, including Maxon, Neville, Hall and another Slytherin boy. Hagrid explained to them that only those who had seen death could see the creatures. Serena scrutinised her friend from the side, not knowing that he had seen anyone die. Unsure whether she should ask him about it, she finally decided against it. If he had wanted to talk about it, he would probably have told her himself.

Her gaze continued to wander to Hall, who was standing a few metres away from her by the Slytherins. Had it been his mother that he had seen die?

An all too familiar Chrm Chrm finally brought her back from her thoughts. Armed with the familiar clipboard, Umbridge stood between the students. "Are you aware that the Ministry has categorised Thestrale as dangerous?"

Serena rolled her eyes and couldn't suppress a soft groan, if Hagrid hadn't said anything, the old drooling witch wouldn't even know that Thestrals were standing in front of her. So how could they be dangerous?

For the rest of the lesson, Umbridge tried to portray Hagrid as a stupid half-blood and incompetent teacher. The Slytherins were only too happy to help her, of course, and in the end they all knew that Hagrid probably wouldn't do well.

Together with Hailey and Astoria, Serena trudged slowly through the snow back to the castle. In the Entrance Hall, the they said goodbye to Tori and went through the large double doors into the Great Hall to help decorate the castle for Christmas. In the end, this proved to be more difficult than expected, because it seemed that Peeves didn't like Christmas at all.

Whenever the ghost got the chance, he would try to sabotage the efforts of the students or simply annoy them.

"Hey! I-I need help!" croaked Ernie, who was playing tug-of-war with Peeves for tinsel.

"Can ghosts retire?" Serena asked wistfully and sighed hopefully. Her best friend grunted and hung a bauble on the giant Christmas tree. "It had better be."

"I heard that!" Peeves screeched and came flying towards Serena, shooting right under her outstretched arm, which she was about to use to decorate the tree. The big red Christmas bauble clattered out of her hand and landed on the hard floor. Cursing, she bent down and muttered: "Reparo."

"Black, Price!" 

Serena groaned, just when she thought it couldn't get any worse, fate put another one on top. "Where's your friend Weasel?" Malfoy snarled, tossing a small Christmas bauble from one hand to the other.

"What do you care?" Serena asked, annoyed, and went back to decorating the Christmas tree.

"We were just wondering," Malfoy said meaningfully in a spiteful voice, "If Weasel sees someone die, will he be able to recognise the Quaffle better?"

Pansy Parkinson began to giggle like a lunatic, whereupon Serena slowly turned to the two of them. "You don't joke about that," she hissed, especially as Ron's father was actually injured in hospital.

Some of the surrounding Slytherins roared with laughter as well, while Hall gave his cousin the kind of murderous look he had only used on Serena a few other times. So she knew how scary that could be.

Malfoy looked to him, still grinning broadly, probably thinking that he would celebrate his joke just as much. The grin froze on his pointed face in an instant, however, and to Serena's surprise, she could actually see a bit of guilt in his eyes.

Without a word, Hall left the Great Hall. Professor Flitwick, who was overseeing the whole thing, called after him in a high-pitched voice: "Mr Hall, you're not finished yet!"

But even this didn't seem to dissuade the Slytherin from his plan. Serena looked at Malfoy, who was now looking rather dazed, with raised eyebrows. "You really put your foot in your mouth there."

"Shut up, Black," he hissed, his features returning to their usual haughty expression. "You better make sure you stay away from him. I bet his father and brother won't be too pleased if they find out about your meetings."

With those words, he departed with his gang, leaving Serena standing there. "What a moron," Hailey muttered beside her.

Defiantly, Serena silently began to embellish the tree. Of course, she realised that Elijah and Damien Hall didn't think much of her and probably regarded her as a mere blood traitor as well. Nevertheless, Malfoy's words bothered her, so why didn't Hall have the same opinion? Why was he seeing her when he knew it didn't reflect his family's beliefs? Maybe it was all just a game or part of some plan? "Why won't he leave me alone," she muttered with a sigh.

Her best friend looked at her with concern and whispered: "Maybe he can't."

"What do you mean?"

"He doesn't want me to tell you but..." Hailey grimaced and took a deep breath. "Remember at the party when he kissed Daphne?"

"Yes..." Serena replied slowly, not having the slightest clue where this was going.

"Maybe you noticed that he looked quite strange afterwards, but..."

"Maybe he was trying not to puke," Serena interjected.

"Now let me finish," Hailey demanded briskly and continued smugly, "I asked Tori what it was like when she refused the task and she said it felt like numerous deep needles were stabbing into her body."

"So?"

"I had a hunch that the same thing had happened to Hall and I was right," she continued. "When I asked him about it when you were with Umbridge, he asked me not to tell you. I kind of blackmailed him into it but..."

"Oh, you blackmailed him with this!" Serena replied, having forgotten to ask her about it. "Even if I don't quite understand why he doesn't want me to know."

"Because he did the task wrong!" Hailey explained impatiently. "He thinks you're much prettier than Greengrass, but since he'd already messed it up a bit at the lake, he didn't want to kiss you again."

Serena formed a silent 'oh' with her lips, she really hadn't expected that. But what difference did it make? Just because he thought she was pretty didn't mean anything, did it? Lost in thought, she fiddled with one of the prickly branches of the Christmas tree, causing some of the needles to fall to the ground. Fortunately, she would be in Grimmauld Place in a few days and hopefully be able to clear her head a little. A little break from all the Hogwarts drama would certainly do her more than good.

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Christmas is almost here!

I'll post the next chapters on Christmas Eve and the first and second day of Christmas ❤️