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Percy walked out of the hidden trap door of their secret room and began to silently walk around the castle's empty, echoing halls.
It was very, very quiet at this early hour, just before dawn, and Percy understood how much that peace and quiet truly meant, especially after the night he'd just had.
He found himself wandering up to the top of the Astrology Tower soon enough, just as the first rays of the sun began to peek over the distant horizon.
He watched as the sun fully rose up into the sky, painting it with beautiful shades of orange, pink, and gold. It was a peaceful moment.
Around six o'clock in the morning, feeling a bit hungry, he came down from the tower and headed towards the Great Hall for an early breakfast.
He was quite surprised to find a few of his Hufflepuff friends already there, looking tired and grumpy, along with quite a few Ravenclaw students who looked even worse for wear.
"Morning, guys," Percy said cheerfully as he sat down next to Cedric Diggory, who was moodily munching on a piece of dry toast. "Why are you all up so incredibly early?"
"We could not sleep, that is why," Juan, one of the French Hufflepuffs, grumbled, his head resting on the table. "Some absolute moron had somehow flooded our Hufflepuff dorms during the night. The whole place now smells like actual hippogriff shit."
Percy's eyes went wide with surprise. "What? Why would someone do that?! Who did it?!"
They all just shrugged, looking equally clueless and annoyed. "We do not know who it was," said Heather, another Hufflepuff, her voice laced with anger.
"But whoever they are, they are bloody mad, I tell you. They also tossed everyone's stuff around! They, like, completely destroyed all our good clothes, throwing everything into the disgusting, grey, smelly water!"
"How did they even do that without any of you noticing?!" Percy asked, shocked by the audacity of the prank.
"He was very quiet about it," Michael Corner, a Ravenclaw who sometimes sat with them, replied, looking exhausted.
"He must 'ave come in really late at night, when we were all completely out of it, fast asleep. One of our dorm mates, Korean, claimed he thought he saw something moving in the dark, but he must 'ave been stunned or something, because the next thing he knows, 'e is waking up on the common room couch, completely surrounded by dirty, smelly water."
"I am guessing they used an invisibility cloak," Gordan growled from across the table, his eyes narrowed. "And we all know who 'as one of those in this school." He shot a pointed look towards the Gryffindor table, even though it was mostly empty at this hour.
"Oh, shut up, Gordan," Juan said, rolling his eyes dismissively. "You know Potter does not 'ave the balls for something this extreme. Plus, 'e is not that cruel. Whoever did this? They were being deliberately cruel, not just mischievous."
"Damn," Percy grunted, shaking his head. "How bad was the damage to everyone's stuff?"
Cedric sighed heavily. "Most of the upper-year boys' clothes were completely trashed. Ruined beyond repair. A few of the girls got off relatively easy, just some of the seventh years had their things messed with, but yeah, most of the boys' clothes were totally ruined."
"Not mine, though," Michael replied with a lazy, tired smile. "I put all my clothes under a powerful protection ward I learned last year. Made sure no one could touch it."
"Your clothes are fine too, Percy," Juan informed him, then he hesitated. "But, ah, I do not think whoever did it liked the fact that you 'ad all your stuff under a ward as well. Last I saw, your mattress was completely trashed, ripped to shreds, and then thrown into the dirty water in the middle of the common room."
Percy sighed, rubbing his temples. "Shit, man. That is annoying. But, I am just glad no one actually got hurt in all this." He then looked over his shoulder and noticed the group of Ravenclaws at their own table.
They all looked incredibly sleep-deprived, with dark circles under their eyes and slumped shoulders.
Worried, Percy turned around in his seat and spoke to them, "What 'appened to you guys? Did not any of you get any sleep last night?"
"No! Not a wink!" one seventh-year Ravenclaw girl exclaimed dramatically, throwing her hands up in the air and then letting them fall with a loud cry of despair. "We could not get a damn single wink of sleep! Because of that fucking crazy couple!"
Percy blinked, confused. "What do you mean? What couple?"
"Well," said another seventh-year Ravenclaw boy, who was slowly sipping his black coffee and looked ready to fall asleep on the spot, right into his breakfast plate, "we 'ave a very important test in Potions today, so a bunch of us decided to do some extra late-night studying together. We 'ave a private study room just for the seventh years and fifth years in the Ravenclaw tower, it is usually very quiet, but..."
"But they would not stop FUCKING!" the first girl suddenly cried out, her voice echoing through the mostly empty hall. The rest of the seventh-year Ravenclaws around her all nodded in weary, annoyed agreement.
"Who?" Juan asked immediately, his earlier grumpiness vanishing, his interest now clearly peaked by the juicy gossip.
"We do not know who it was!" the same girl cried out again, looking utterly frustrated. "We tried, Percy! All night long, we tried searching for them, just to tell them to shut up! We searched the entire fifth-floor corridor at least ten times! Ten fucking times, I tell you! But we could not find them anywhere! It was like they were... like they were fucking inside the actual stone walls!"
Percy's eyes slowly widened comically as he began to connect the dots in his head. A feeling of dawning horror, mixed with a tiny bit of pride, started to creep up on him.
"But wait," Cedric asked, looking confused. "What does a couple... um... doing that... have to do with you all trying to study?"
"Well, you see, the problem was..." another Ravenclaw girl started to explain, then she stopped midway, her face blushing a furious shade of red. She cleared her throat awkwardly. "You see, the thing is-"
"-They would not stop SCREAMING!" the first, very eccentric Ravenclaw girl suddenly yelled out again, so loudly that she threw her empty teacup across the room in frustration. It hit the distant Slytherin table with a loud crash and shattered into a dozen pieces.
"All night long, that absolute bitch just kept screaming! It was like she was on a fucking broken record or something! One moment she would be all quiet and mumbling sweet nothings, and then the very next second she would be screaming at the absolute top of her lungs again! Over and over!"
"Ooh, that is so hot!" Juan said, leaning forward eagerly, his full interest now completely with the Ravenclaws and their story. "So, what 'appened? Did you guys 'ear anything good? Any juicy details?"
A Ravenclaw boy just shrugged, looking too tired to care much. "No, not really. The walls of the study room were thick enough that we could not really make out any names or specific words-"
"-Though the bitch sure did like saying, 'Oh my god! Oh my god!' a lot," the snarky, energetic Ravenclaw girl growled, mimicking a high-pitched voice.
"Why did not you just cast a simple muffling charm in your study room then?" Heather asked, looking at them with a practical frown.
"We can not," a different Ravenclaw boy replied, his voice dull with exhaustion. "The room is specially warded. It is spell-proof from the inside, so no one can cheat during study sessions by using magic."
"Then why did not you just go back to your own dorm rooms and study there?" Gordan asked, sounding genuinely perplexed.
"If you all wanted to study together, you could 'ave just used the seventh-years boys' dorm room, right? There are not any rules against the girls being in the boys' common room or dorms for studying."
The group of Ravenclaws all blinked at that simple suggestion. They looked at each other, their eyes blinking with utter confusion for a moment. Then, slowly, dawning realization spread across their tired faces.
"FUCKING HELL!" the energetic girl from Ravenclaw suddenly screamed, burying her face in her hands as her housemates all hung their heads in collective shame and embarrassment.
"Ha!" Cedric snorted, letting out a loud laugh. "These Claws are all the same, are not they? They can probably remember every single spell they have ever read in a textbook, but they completely lack basic common sense sometimes! Isn't that right, Percy? Percy?" Cedric turned to look at Percy, only to see his friend staring up at the enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall, doing his absolute best to hold back a massive blush that was rapidly creeping up his neck. "Percy, mate? You okay there?"
Percy quickly looked down, startled. "Oh? What? Y-yeah, I am fine. Totally fine."
"Are you sure about that? Because you look really red all of a sudden," Heather said, looking at him with concern.
"Oh, uh, yeah, it is just, well," Percy gulped, quickly making up a lie on the spot, "I was actually in my lab at the time, working late, so I also heard the... ah... the couple 'going at it', as you said."
"You did? How did you manage to get any sleep at all then?!" the energetic Ravenclaw girl yelled out again, looking at him with wide, incredulous eyes.
"That bitch must 'ave been screaming until well past midnight! I thought they 'ad finally stopped for a bit, but then they started up again, even louder, until like three in the bloody morning!"
Percy cleared his throat, trying to look nonchalant. "Oh, I just used ear plugs. Worked like a charm."
The Ravenclaws once again looked completely stumped, as if the idea of earplugs had never once occurred to them. Juan laughed loudly again.
"You were right, Cedric! They really are kind of idiots sometimes!"
The Ravenclaws, however, did not seem like they were in the mood for a fight or an argument. They just laid their heads down on the table, stuffing their faces with whatever food was closest, clearly praying that their Potions test later that day would be mercifully easy.
Just then, however, Percy noticed Fleur walk into the Great Hall. There was a slight, almost imperceptible, but definitely there, limp in her usually graceful walk.
She spotted him almost immediately and walked over to their table, a soft, radiant smile on her face. She leaned down and kissed his cheek tenderly.
"Good morning, my love," she murmured, her voice a little husky. "Did you manage to get any sleep at all?"
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If you want to read ahead by 20+ chapters you could take a visit on my patreon Or check it out.
http://patreon.com/SageOf016