Cassia's POV

"I'm telling you, it's spooky. She knows more about you than you do," Ron commented as we walked up the stairs after dinner, heading back to Gryffindor Tower.

I heard a noise and looked behind me to see one of the railings start to disappear. Oh, no! I'd heard Hermione talk about the staircases frequently changing!

"Well, who doesn't?" Harry replied. The staircase began to move, startling us, and we clung to the railings.

"What's happening?" Ron asked, bewildered.

"The staircases change, remember?" Hermione reminded him. The staircase stopped once it reconnected in another spot.

"Let's go this way," Harry said.

"Before the staircase moves again," Ron added, scared for his life.

We came into a spooky looking room I'd never seen before. Somehow I got a bad feeling about this.

"Does anybody feel like we shouldn't be here?" Ron asked.

"We're not supposed to be here," Hermione said, matter-of-factly. "This is the third floor. It's forbidden!"

"Let's go," Harry said.

The torch next to us was suddenly lit, and we heard a meow. It was Mrs. Norris, Filch's dirty old cat.

"It's Filch's cat!" Hermione exclaimed.

"Run!" Harry said.

We bolted down the corridor. The torches on the wall lit up every time we passed one.

I looked ahead of us and saw that we were coming closer and closer to another door. "Let's hide in there!" I suggested.

Once we reached the door, Harry pulled on the knob as hard as he could. "It's locked!" he complained.

"That's it. We're done for," Ron moaned.

"Oh, move over!" Hermione snapped. She pushed him out of the way. "Alohomora!" waving her wand. The door instantly unlocked, and we rushed inside, slamming it shut behind us. We heard Filch enter the corridor and Peeves whooshing in. Great. Just great.

"There are students out of bed. Which way did they go, Peeves?" Filch said, "Quick, tell me!"

"Say 'please'," Peeves replied coyly.

"Don't mess with me, Peeves," Filch snapped, "Now where did they go?"

"Shan't say nothing if you don't say please," Peeves said in his annoying sing-song voice.

Filch sighed. "Fine. Please."

"NOTHING! Ha haaa! Told you I wouldn't say nothing if you didn't say please! Ha ha! Haaaaaa!" And we heard the sound of Peeves whooshing away, followed by Filch cursing in rage.

"Filch's gone," Hermione reported after an agonizing 30 seconds of waiting for the caretaker to leave.

"Maybe he thinks this door's locked," Ron suggested.

"It was locked," Hermione corrected him.

"And for good reason," Harry added. He was staring ahead of us, frozen in his tracks.
I followed his gaze and froze where I stood. Standing before us was a massive 3-headed dog. And it was growling at us. We all screamed at the top of our lungs and ran out of the room as fast as our legs would carry us. We pushed the door closed with all our might, locked it, and then high-tailed it out of the 3rd-floor corridor.

<><><><><>

"What do they think they're doing? Keeping a thing like that locked up in a school?" Ron asked, out of breath, once we were inside the Gryffindor common room.

"You don't use your eyes, do you?" Hermione argued as we headed up the stairs to the dormitory. "Didn't you see what it was standing on?" she asked.

"I wasn't looking at its feet! I was a bit preoccupied with its heads, or maybe you didn't notice- there were 3!" Ron retorted.

"It was standing on a trapdoor, which means it wasn't there by accident. It's guarding something," Hermione explained. We all stopped outside one of the girls' dorms.

"Guarding something?" Harry and I repeated.

"That's right. Now, if you two don't mind, I'm going to bed. And so is Cassia, before either of you come up with another clever idea to get us killed. Or worse, expelled," Hermione snapped. She pulled me into her dorm and shut the door behind us.

<><><><><>

The next day, before dinner, Oliver was giving Harry and I a lesson in Quidditch. "Quidditch is easy enough to understand," he explained as we helped him carry a big trunk out onto the field. "Each team has 7 players; 3 Chasers, 2 Beaters, 1 Keeper, and a Seeker. That's you, Harry." We set the trunk down, and Oliver opened it. "There are 3 kinds of balls. This one's called the Quaffle," he continued, handing Harry and I the biggest ball. "Now, the Chasers -- one of which is you, Cassia -- handle the Quaffle and try to put it through one of those 3 hoops." he pointed to a set of 3 hoops on both ends of the field. "The Keeper -- that's me -- defends the hoops. With me so far?"

"I think so," Harry replied, handing Oliver the Quaffle.

"What are those?" I asked, pointing to 2 black balls that seemed to be squirming under their restraints.

Oliver handed us each a small club, a bit like a short baseball bat. "You'd better take these," he suggested. He then released one of the squirming black balls. It shot straight up in the air, and then plummeted back down.

"Careful, now, it's coming back," Oliver warned us.

Harry and I held our bats at the ready, waiting with baited breath to see which direction the ball would go so we both wouldn't swing at the same time and risk injury. The ball went directly to Harry, and Harry immediately whacked it with the bat, sending it far away from us.

"Huh. Not bad, Harry. You'd make a fair Beater," Oliver complimented. His smile vanished once he saw the ball was hurtling back towards us. "Uh oh..." Luckily, he caught the ball before it could do any damage, but the force of it speeding at him knocked him to the ground, and he had to wrestle the ball back into the trunk so he could restrain it again.

"What was that?" Harry and I asked in unison.

Oliver chuckled, looking at us. "Bludger," he replied, "Nasty little buggers. But you-" he pointed to Harry "-are a Seeker. The only thing I want you to worry about-" He opened a little compartment in the lid of the trunk, and pulled out a little gold ball. "-is this. The Golden Snitch."

Harry had a huge smile on his face as he held the Snitch. "I like this ball," he said.

Oliver smirked. "Ah, you like it now? Just wait- it's wicked fast and damn near impossible to see," he said.

"What do I do with it?" Harry asked.

"You catch it," Oliver replied, "Before the other team's Seeker. You catch this, the game is over. You catch this, Harry, and we win." He then looked at me. "Now, Cassia, for the time being, you are going to be our reserve Chaser. What that means is, in case one of our Chasers is sick or injured, you'll take their place for the match. However, you will be practicing with the Chasers when we run drills at practices. Got that?"

I nodded. "Yep!"

The Snitch sprouted clear, birdlike wings, and started to fly around us.

"Wow..." Harry and I said in sync again. All three of us looked at each other and laughed again as the Snitch continued to fly around on the field, before eventually landing back in Harry's palm.