Upon hearing Nova speak the group of four jumped, with Neville nearly falling over and knocking over some of the trophies on the side."A little late for a stroll don"t you think." Nova said.
Looking a little irritated Ron said, "Us?! What about you? What are you doing hear this late?"
"Just talking to you. So what are you guys doing?" Nova replied.
When they heard this, Harry and Ron just stared dumbly at Nova. While Hermione just shook her head. Neville just kinda turned to air, but we won"t talk about that.
"Well Harry and Ron decided to have a duel at midnight with Malfoy, and thought it would be a good idea to get into trouble." Hermione explained.
"But Harry and Ron don"t know how to duel much less any effective spells. What were they planning on doing when nothing happened. Hitting Malfoy in the face?" Nova asked.
"I don"t know they are incredibly foolish, if I must say." Hermione replied.
"Um you do realized that we are still standing here right?" Harry said.
"And?" Nova said. "So explain the whole situation to me from how this started to now."
So then they started the short story, how Harry got on the team to Malfoy mentioning a duel to meeting Hermione and Neville.
"So in short. You two were led by the nose to a duel in the middle of the night and still expect Malfoy to show up. I wouldn"t be surprised if the Caretaker Filch didn"t show up in a few seconds instead."
Ron and Harry went red from embarra.s.sment when they heard Nova speak. Seeing their reaction Nova just shook his head, "Well at least you learned you lesson."
Hermione then spoke, "Can we please get back before we get caught?"
"Too late." Harry said.
They turned and heard, ""Sniff around, my sweet, they might be lurking in a corner."
It was Filch speaking to Mrs. Norris. Horror-struck, Harry waved madly at the other three to follow him as quickly as possible; they scurried silently toward the door, away from Filch"s voice. Neville"s robes had barely whipped round the corner when they heard Filch enter the trophy room.
"They"re in here somewhere," they heard him mutter, "probably hiding."
"This way!" Harry mouthed to the others and, petrified, they began to creep down a long gallery full of suits of armor. They could hear Filch getting nearer. Neville suddenly let out a frightened squeak and broke into a run -he tripped, grabbed Ron around the waist, and the pair of them toppled right into a suit of armor.
The clanging and crashing were enough to wake the whole castle. "RUN!" Harry yelled, and the four of them sprinted down the gallery, not looking back to see whether Filch was following -- they swung around the doorpost and galloped down one corridor then another, Harry in the lead, without any idea where they were or where they were going -- they ripped through a tapestry and found themselves in a hidden pa.s.sageway, hurtled along it and came out near their Charms cla.s.sroom, which they knew was miles from the trophy room.
"I think we"ve lost him," Harry panted, leaning against the cold wall and wiping his forehead. Neville was bent double, wheezing and spluttering.
" I -- told -you," Hermione gasped, clutching at the st.i.tch in her chest, "I -- told -- you." "We"ve got to get back to Gryffindor tower," said Ron, "quickly as possible."
"You have a bigger problem than Filch," Nova said.
"What do you mean?" Ron said. "And why aren"t you out of breath like the rest of us."
"I am not out of shape, and eating chocolate all day like you do Ron. But the problem is in front of you." Nova said which earned a teeth grinding sound out of Ron.
The group then turned and looked ahead of them. It was Peeves. He caught sight of them and gave a squeal of delight.
"Shut up, Peeves -- please -- you"ll get us thrown out."
Peeves cackled. "Wandering around at midnight, Ickle Firsties? Tut, tut, tut. Naughty, naughty, you"ll get caughty."
"Not if you don"t give us away, Peeves, please."
"Should tell Filch, I should," said Peeves in a saintly voice, but his eyes glittered wickedly.
"It"s for your own good, you know."
"Get out of the way," snapped Ron, taking a swipe at Peeves this was a big mistake.
"STUDENTS OUT OF BED!" Peeves bellowed, "STUDENTS OUT OF BED DOWN THE CHARMS CORRIDOR"
Nova just shook his head, how dumb can they be.
"Good job Peeves. Now make sure you give clear and accurate direction to Filch so he can catch us and ruin all the fun." Nova said and smiled at Peeves before grabbing the group and moving towards the door at the end of the hall.
It was locked.
"This is it!" Ron moaned, as they pushed helplessly at the door, "We"re done for! This is the end!" They could hear footsteps, Filch running as fast as he could toward Peeves"s shouts.
"Oh, move over," Hermione snarled. She grabbed Harry"s wand, tapped the lock, and whispered, "Aloh.o.m.ora!" The lock clicked and the door swung open -- they piled through it, shut it quickly, and pressed their ears against it, listening.
"Which way did they go, Peeves?" Filch was saying. "Quick, tell me."
"Say "please."
"Don"t mess with me, Peeves, now where did they go?"
"Shan"t say nothing if you don"t say please," said Peeves in his annoying singsong voice.
"All right -please."
"NOTHING! Ha haaa! Told you I wouldn"t say nothing if you didn"t say please! Ha ha! Haaaaaa!"
And they heard the sound of Peeves whooshing away and Filch cursing in rage. When Nova heard this he almost started laughing, he knew the poltergeist would pull a stunt like this even if he hadn"t said anything to it.
"He thinks this door is locked," Harry whispered. "I think we"ll be okay -- get off, Neville!" For Neville had been tugging on the sleeve of Harry"s bathrobe for the last minute. "What?"
But upon turning around and looking at what Neville was worked up about, the smile on Nova"s faded and sighed.
"Why is there a giant three headed puppy in the castle?" Nova said. When the other four heard Nova, they just turned and stared at him. After getting over what he said, they then realized where they were at.
They were in a corridor. The forbidden corridor on the third floor. And now they knew why it was forbidden. They were looking straight into the eyes of a monstrous dog, a dog that filled the whole s.p.a.ce between ceiling and floor. It had three heads. Three pairs of rolling, mad eyes; three noses, twitching and quivering in their direction; three drooling mouths, saliva hanging in slippery ropes from yellowish fangs. It was standing quite still, all six eyes staring at them, and the four knew that the only reason they weren"t already dead was that their sudden appearance had taken it by surprise, but it was quickly getting over that, there was no mistaking what those thunderous growls meant.
Nova then walked forwarded. As the four tried to grab him, Nova took a deep breath and said, "Sit!"
After a moment of silence as the group and the dog just stared in shock at what Nova had said, the dog then sat. Nova then said, "Paw." While extending his hand. The dog then put its paw in Nova hand. "Shake."
The four had their jaws on the ground, they couldn"t believe what they were seeing. In fact, Harry took off his gla.s.ses to give them a look see, to make sure they weren"t broken while Ron then proceeded to take the gla.s.ses from Harry and tried them on to make sure he didn"t need gla.s.ses.
"Lay down." Nova then said. As the dog laid down, Nova then proceeded to walk up and scratch it behind the one of his ears, "Good boy, who"s a good puppy?"
"Um Nova, what are you doing?" Hermione asked.
"Scratching his ear."
"I see."
"You want to join? He has a few more ears that you can scratch."
"No, no were good, you can continue. We will be going back to bed." Ron said grabbing Hermione by the elbow and helping her out the door.
Seeing them leave, Nova just shook his head, "Don"t know what"s wrong with them it"s just a big puppy. Ok roll over." And Nova then started to rub the puppies belly.
After a few minutes more, Nova stopped and pat the dog"s three heads and left the room. When he got back to the dorm, he was greeted by a angry Fat Lady, who was complaining about student"s ruining her beauty sleep.
"Your back in one piece. Thank G.o.d!" Hermione said. As she gave him a hug, "Why did you do that?"
"Do what it was just a big puppy?" Nova asked.
Hermione just shook her head, "Nova I think we are going to have to talk about your understanding of dogs."
*****************************************************
Before anyone says anything, I know, I owe you three more chapters.
And before anyone ask, you don"t want to know why I didn"t post yesterday or today, the single men won"t be able to handle that kind of information.
But I will tell you it involves, DxD cosplay, silver haired maid, and a whole lot of not sleeping.
Again please comment and give your opinion.