As Pansy began to come to, after having been hit by a stunner for what seemed like the millionth time by Su, she was reminded again of her lack of dueling prowess, and just how reckless she had been in accepting the duel with Ron in the first place. Harry and Su were the duelists, while she... well let's just say that fighting had never been her thing.
"You did better that time." Su supported, reaching down to help her up.
"No I didn't, that was even worse." Pansy said, recognizing that Su was only just trying to give her at least some confidence in her progress.
"I told you I'd turn you into a duelist before the night was over and by Merlin I'm going to." Su claimed.
She certainly was trying her best to fulfill that, they had gotten permission from Flitwick to practice dueling in his dueling arena after hours, and now it was nearly 1:00 in the morning, Harry and Susan had told her they would stay late as well and help her, but she had insisted on them going to bed, leaving only Su, who steadfastly insisted on helping her.
While Pansy admired Su's faith in her, she knew herself that it was a lost cause, one simply did not become a duelist overnight, and even Su knew that as much as she might try to deny it. Harry had only won his duel with Malfoy because of his own natural talent, and an incredible amount of luck, two things that she had never seemed to have, the only luck she could ever remember having received was when Harry had won her in that duel.
"Let's face it, I'm just not cut out for this." Pansy declared.
Su looked at her before replying slowly, "I suppose you're not the best duelist in the world, but then again I'll bet Weasley isn't either. The boy spends most of his time still trying to perform a spell that makes alcohol!"
Pansy giggled at that, memories of watching Ron in his many failed attempts with Seamus to make rum, whiskey, or various other alcoholic beverages, none of which having succeeded. It was also true Ron wasn't the best student either, he was constantly getting in trouble for failing to do his homework, or when he did, doing an abysmal job. Many times he was caught trying to cheat off of other students, particularly Hermione, who had taken to obscuring her homework whenever Ron was near.
"Trust me," Su told her, "against that lout you've got nothing to worry about."
While she had to admit Su might have a point, she still worried. "What if I lose though?"
Su answered, "What would Harry think?"
"Harry would go beat Weasley up." Su answered her own question, "He'd have him begging for forgiveness, and reduced to the blubbering pile of rubbish that he is."
"See now that's exactly what I don't want to have happen." Pansy replied, "I don't want him or anyone else fighting for me."
"I guarantee you Harry wouldn't mind." Su soothed, "He would be happy to..."
"Its not that, its the principle." Pansy admitted, "I don't want to be the damsel in distress all the time, having to rely on Harry and you for protection. What does that say about me as a person? A weak little rich girl who can't fend for herself?"
Su's eyes widened as she realized what she meant, and then she looked completely out of sorts, wondering how to respond to that. Su was a person who handled her problems with action, dealing with emotions on the other hand, particularly other people's were, not her strong suit. Nevertheless, she tried to come up with a response to that.
"You know people tend to think I'm weak and unable to do anything before they get to know me." Su began, "All they ever seem to see is this short little chinese girl. That's one reason why I like fighting so much, so that I can prove them wrong."
"I'm not a fighter like you though, I don't really bring any value to Harry or anyone else for that matter." Pansy responded.
"Do you think Harry is really that superficial that he would like a person only for their fighting prowess?"
Pansy still felt horrible, she wasn't a fighter like Su, nor did she have such long gorgeous shiny black hair like her. The other girls she would be sharing Harry with was already becoming extraordinarily pretty as she began to go through puberty, and had fantastic minds. Susan in particular stood out for having an amazing and caring personality. Nobody could help but like Susan.
Herself on the other hand... While she had tried to shake it, she couldn't help but worry that having to share with two such desirable girls would one day cause Harry to forget about her entirely, that she would simply become someone that he had to be with. More than anything she hoped to learn to truly love him, and for him to love her. She already knew that he was by far the most amazing boy that she had ever known, already she couldn't help but like him.
Finally she broke down and confessed these thoughts to Su, who stood silently listening, making not a single comment until after she had finished.
She then had to wait a good long minute while Su thought up a reply.
"It's not like I haven't wondered just how our relationship with Harry will go," Su admitted, "I like him a lot too, and one day I also hope it will develop into something more, yet as for what may end up happening in the end, who knows, I'm only 12, a lot could happen before we're married. Yet in any case I don't think Harry would ever be the type of person to simply forget about any one of us, it isn't in his nature, nor would I or Susan try to steal him for ourselves. Its a difficult relationship in many ways but we all just have to learn to how to deal with it. The best thing we can do is have all of us be friends with one another so that we can always work things out."
"I'm glad you're my friend." Pansy confessed, grateful to her.
"I am too," Su said moving in to give the other girl a hug.
Yet after hugging each other for a moment, as Su began to draw away, Pansy noticed a cut on Su's arm.
"How did you get that?" Pansy asked, pointing at it.
Su glanced at it, then said, "Oh that, that's nothing, I have small stuff like that happen all the time while practicing dueling, its no big deal."
"Hold on," Pansy said, pulling out her wand and pointing it at the cut, "Mende."
The wound began to close up and heal itself, until finally there was nothing there at all.
"Good as new." Pansy proclaimed.
"So it is," Su agreed, looking it over once again, "I didn't know you were good at healing."
"I have an aunt who's a healer and taught me quite a few healing spells whenever I went to go stay with her each summer when my parents went on their annual business trip to Dubai." Pansy answered, "My father never cared much for my aunt, as he felt that she was beneath him because she was willing to do such "menial labor", but they didn't want to bring me with them, and my aunt was the only one I could stay with. I always loved going over there, much better than it ever was at home, and she decided to teach me how to use healing spells after I promised not to tell either of my parents."
"Well I'll know who to go to when I get more injuries," Su replied, "it could come in handy."
Pansy grinned, "Secretly I had been wanting to become a healer, but I always knew Draco would never have allowed it, most wealthy Purebloods discourage their wives from working."
"So I've heard, but that was before you ended up with Harry, and I have full confidence he wouldn't mind. In fact I'm sure he would be grateful to you; he gets scraped up nearly as much as me." Su answered.
"I thought about healing him before when I saw him scraped up, but I wanted to make sure I could do it correctly. Healing can have disastrous results if not done correctly, that's why I've been practicing so much, figured it was at least something that I was good at and liked doing." Pansy answered.
"I wish you'd told us sooner." Su told her before suddenly stopping for a second as if thinking about something, "Those disastrous results, you don't think any of them might be any good in a duel would you?"
"You mean deliberately mess up the spell?" Pansy asked.
"Like instead of seal up a cut, seal up Weasley's big fat mouth, yes." Su suggested.
Pansy couldn't resist grinning, she knew that while it may or may not be unethical to actually cause harm with healing spells, it certainly would have its merits, and with the right spells, shouldn't cause any real lasting harm. Besides, it would be fun to watch Weasley squirm, and have an edge over him.
"You know I think I know just what spells to use." Pansy couldn't resist saying with obvious malicious glee.
When she got back to practicing, trying out healing spells for combat purposes, she felt much more comfortable and capable of using the spells than the ones Su had been trying to teach her. That familiarity with spells that she actually knew how to do quite well enabled her to focus more on the spells that came her way from Su. She knew that Su was going easy on her, and probably allowed herself to be hit, but she couldn't help but grin when she saw her spell had hit its mark, a spell that immediately caused Su to lose her voice as she struggled to talk, a spell meant to heal a sore throat - if it was used correctly, that is. Used incorrectly as she had purposefully done it had the side effect of the person temporarily losing the ability to speak. This spell however used in such a way would essentially prevent any witch or wizard not knowing non-verbal magic from being able to duel, and leave them at her mercy.
After restoring her ability to talk, Su spoke up, sounding impressed, "That's such a useful spell, I'm definitely going to have to learn that."
"I'll teach you." Pansy replied, happy that she now had something that she could teach the incredibly talented Ravenclaw girl.
"I noticed you used a couple others." Su admitted.
"Yeah," Pansy answered, "that spell that made that soothing music, I was hoping it might serve as a distraction, and then one that's supposed to make your feet feel warm, but if poorly done will make them feel too hot. If you got hit with that one it would feel like running on hot coals. I thought of one other spell I can use, but I decided to spare you on that one and use it on Weasley. It's a muscle relaxant spell that has the unfortunate side effect of the person losing control of their bowels unless another spell is placed on the patient first."
Su laughed, "You mean that Weasley would..."
"Yep, he'd have a little accident." Pansy joined in on the laughter.
"You know I think I'm going to like watching this duel." Su confided.
An hour later, when they finally returned to their dormitories, Pansy went to bed confident and eager for the duel that would take place the next night.
DUELDUELDUEL
During breakfast, the 4 of them were sitting at the Ravenclaw table with Su's friend Padma when Ron and his two cronies, Seamus and Dean stopped by their table.
"You ready for our duel Slytherin?" Ron sneered.
"Are you?" She countered.
The weasel seemed pretty offset by this cheeky and confident reply, and he actually backed up a step, it was amazing just how pathetic he could be.
Yet as that step also knocked him into both his two cronies standing behind him, he suddenly realized he was making himself look like a fool in front of them as well and squared his shoulders, grinning back at her. "I couldn't be more ready, see you at midnight."
He turned on his heels and left, leaving them once again with the good fortune to no longer be in his presence."
"What a jerk?" Susan declared, "I hope you mop the floor with him."
"Don't worry, she will." Su answered boldly, putting an arm onto her in the process to show support.
"Do you feel the practice you put in helped?" Harry asked, "You know I would have stayed to help you longer if you had let me."
"It's all right, I'll be fine." Pansy reassured him, "Su helped me find my niche when it comes to dueling."
Harry made an interested sound as he was currently chewing his food.
"You'll see." Pansy replied mischievously, enjoying being the one to have a few tricks up their sleeves for a change.
"Then I look forward to seeing what you can do." Harry told her, displaying a sense of pride in her in his voice, causing her heart to flutter a bit. It meant a lot to her that Harry would feel any measure of pride in her.
When they finally got some free time after dinner Pansy was quick to show Harry exactly what she meant, and after being the recipient of her mute spell and then having his ability to speak restored, he had to agree that he was impressed, causing her to swell with pride again.
With a few spells that she could now use at her arsenal, Su and Harry had her focus more on dodging and avoiding spells, being careful however not too tire her out too much for the actual duel. While she knew that she wouldn't even have a real chance against either Su or Harry in this regard, they at least reassured her that she was quite good at it, and she hoped that it would be good enough to beat Weasley.
However, they were kicked out 10 minutes before they were supposed to be in bed by Flitwick, who was quite irate at finding out just how late they had stayed the previous night, but fortunately let them off with a stiff warning not to do so again. They of course didn't mention that they would be out after hours yet again that night.
Yet they did not return to their dormitories, instead opting to find an abandoned classroom to sleep in, as having the 4 of them leaving from 4 different Common Rooms would quadruple their chances of getting caught. Instead they tried the best they could to get some sleep before the duel without any real bedding. As tired as they all were however, it proved not to be an issue, as they fell right asleep, other than Su, who volunteered to keep look out.
Pansy herself was fairly tired, as she was practicing dueling and staying up late the previous night fell right asleep, but felt like she had scarcely closed her eyes when she was shaken awoken by Su.
"It's time." Su told her, as she groggily woke up and began to get up, while Su also woke up both Harry and Susan.
After they all got up, they headed over to the trophy room that was just down the hall.
Looking around however, they failed to spot Ron, or Seamus or Dean, evidently they were a bit late.
They had barely had any time to wait for them however before they heard the voice of Filch utter to his pet cat Mrs. Norris, "Let's see if that boy was telling the truth, my sweet."
As the light from his lamp grew closer, they each ran for it, with Su in the lead, followed by the rest of them, doing their best to try and catch up.
Yet suddenly they saw another lantern coming up in front of them from the other side of the corridor, they were trapped.
With nowhere else to go, Su tried to turn around, but Pansy knew that they would be caught from the other side as well. Hoping that she could simply run right past the other person, she kept running, only to collide into the side of the person anyway, as they turned out to be far bigger and take more of the hallway than she had thought.
"What the?" The person asked.
She immediately recognized the voice to be the gruff, deep voice of Hagrid, the Hogwarts groundskeeper.
"Hagrid!" Su enthusiastically said, sounding genuinely pleased to see him.
"Hello Su." Hagrid replied fondly as she came up in front of him, "What brings ya out this late at night? Not an extra long detention I hope?"
"Look, there's no time to explain." Su said breathlessly.
Yet before she could get out another word, Filch finally caught up with them. "Ah hah!" He crowed in triumph, "Students out of bed!"
He grinned nastily at the 4 of them with his rotten teeth, probably imagining just what kinds of punishments he could give them.
Hagrid looked over at them again, and slowly put two and two together, realizing they did not in fact have permission to be out this late.
Yet Pansy couldn't see any reason for that to do much good, as none of them really knew Hagrid, unless you counted the time when Harry had met him and been told he was a wizard, an experience that he had already related to all of them.
Much to her surprise, however, Hagrid chose to back them up.
"Now wait just a minute," Hagrid told Filch, "These 4 are serving detention with me."
"Doing what exactly?" Filch asked disbelievingly.
"Helping me feed the animals." Hagrid answered, as he once again picked up a large tub of raw meat, something in all the excitement Pansy had failed to notice.
"Is that so?" Filch questioned.
"Hagrid was just explaining to us what the Hippogriffs should be fed, raw fish, salmon being their favorite, but they also like cod." Su told Filch.
"What about unicorns?" Hagrid asked Su, surprisingly able to pull off the charade quite easily, as if he had asked such questions before many times.
"Carrots and apples, although any fresh veggies will do, and during mating season you want to feed them gem fruits which cause their horns to glow a beautiful rainbow hue which is attractive to prospective mates." Su quickly answered.
Filch didn't seem like he was willing to give up so easily, but Su took advantage of his hesitancy and asked Hagrid, "Weren't we going to go feed Fluffy?"
Hagrid nodded and said, "Right ya are, well I guess we'd better get on over there."
They left a very disappointed Filch behind, they set off to wherever this creature called Fluffy was located. When they got out of earshot of Filch, Su thanked Hagrid, "Thanks Hagrid, that was a close one."
"Yer want to tell me just why yer out so late and why I had to lie ter Filch?" Hagrid asked back, "I should have turned ya all in, the lotta yeh."
"You wouldn't have done that Hagrid." Su answered confidently, "I knew I could count on you, you're the best." She planted a kiss on Hagrid's knee as she couldn't reach his face, but it still caused Hagrid to blush at the praise.
"How do you know Hagrid?" Susan asked of Su.
"I wanted to know more about that 3 headed dog so I went to go ask Hagrid about him." Su explained, "Apparently Hagrid knows a lot about dangerous creatures like that. That's why I knew all that stuff about feeding various animals, Hagrid has been explaining to me."
"The only other student I've had so interested in creatures was Charlie Weasley." Hagrid admitted with pride, "Its nice ter find another student who seems to enjoy studying creatures so much."
"Did you say Weasley?" Harry asked.
"Yep, I believe he has 5 other brothers as far's I know, the youngest just entered Hogwarts this year." Hagrid replied.
"That's why we were out so late." Harry explained, "I'm guessing Ron is Charlie's younger brother, who's in our year and challenged Pansy to a duel, but evidently was too much of a coward to actually show up and try to get us caught by Filch instead."
Hagrid seemed to absorb this for a second, before replying, "Well I'm not gonna to turn yeh in, but I'm also going to make yer finish the detention that yer supposedly doin', yer going to go help me finish feeding the animals, starting with Fluffy."
"Ooh, Hagrid can you please let me fight him now?" Su asked with delight.
"I already told yer its not safe to do tha', can't imagine why yeh have the need to fight everything, Fluffy really is a great dog once you get to know 'im" Hagrid claimed.
"I thought your dog's name was Fang?" Harry asked.
Su grinned, "Oh not that dog Harry, I think you know the one."
Harry blanched as the rest of them realized just what dog Su was referring to.
Pansy was seriously considering simply taking whatever punishment Filch had planned for them rather than face the Cerberus again, but she eventually followed the others and went down to the back of the 3rdfloor corridor where "Fluffy" was located.
Hagrid was about to unlock the door with a key that he produced from one of his huge pockets, yet found that the door was already open.
"What the?" Hagrid asked, "This shouldn't be unlocked."
His surprise turned to outright alarm however when he opened the door to find a sleeping Fluffy, who was laying down next to a self playing harp.
"This is not good!" Hagrid said aloud.
"What's wrong?" Susan asked.
"Somebody figured out how ter make Fluffy fall asleep." Hagrid admitted, "They're probably already down the trap door."
"Then let's follow them and stop them." Su suggested.
Hagrid glanced at the trap door and said, "I don't think I would fit through tha'."
"Then we'll go down there ourselves." Su answered.
"No way I'm going to let you do that, and get yourselves into trouble." Hagrid refused, "You don't know what's down there, you'll get yourselves killed."
"Of course I do." Su said, surprising all of them, "There's a devils' snare at the bottom, then there's a room full of keys, a room with a chessboard, a troll to fight, and then a room behind a wall of fire."
"How on earth do you know all of that?" Susan asked.
"Obviously I went down there before." Su told her without a hint of remorse, "You don't really think I could pass up a challenge, or a sense of danger?"
Susan shook her head incredulously, and Su said, "Don't worry Hagrid, we'll do it."
Before Hagrid could stop her, Su opened up the trap door and jumped down it.
"Blast that girl!" Hagrid roared, realizing his size prevented him from following after her, even while attempting rip open a wider gap to no avail.
"We'll get her back then, and bring her back up while you go get us up a rope or something to pull us out again, or perhaps let Dumbledore know about this." Harry suggested.
"I can't just let you all go." Hagrid argued.
"We'll be out in no time." Harry said.
Hagrid seemed to linger a bit before realizing that either of those things would be the most he could do under the circumstances.
At the same time, Harry leaped down the trap door after Su, followed closely by Susan.
After a second's worth of hesitation, Pansy jumped after them, and in the split second before she landed she suddenly had one of those moment's that a person had in hindsight of a bad idea, as it would not have been necessary for all of them to have leaped down the hole in order to go and get Su, yet now it was too late to change her mind.
Yet as she landed upon the devil's snare that Su had already warned them about, she found that instead of being choked and squeezed to death by vines, there was a huge bright white light shining in her face, emanating from a wand, yet when she saw who was on the other end of the wand, her eyes rose in alarm.
"Nobody move or I'll be forced to kill you." Quirrell told them, directing his wand from one of them to the other.
None of them moved, not daring to try anything while Quirrell still had his wand leveled at them.
"Now step away from the plant slowly." Quirrell told them.
Each of them did so, slowly moving forward.
"How did you find me?" Quirrell asked of them.
"We saw the harp playing by itself and put two and two together." Su finally answered.
"Do Dumbledore or any teachers know that you're here?" Quirrell asked.
"No." Su answered truthfully, even if it wasn't really what Quirrell wanted to know, as Hagrid technically was not a teacher.
Quirrell breathed a sigh of relief, "Well nothing personal but I can't have you following me or warning anyone else, and my master wants me to kill you."
Both Harry and Su raised their wands as he said this, and Quirrell suddenly realized that they were at a standoff, should he try to kill one of them, he would get hit by the other one.
He chose then to point his wand at Susan.
"Stay back or the girl gets it," Quirrell told them.
Still with two wands now pointed at him, and now joined by a third with Pansy also joining in, Quirrell slowly backed up.
They chose to allow Quirrell to retreat down the passageway as there was no telling what he might do otherwise, still worried about Susan getting hit.
Unfortunately it was at that time Quirrell leaped behind a stone outcropping, temporarily obscuring their ability to hit him and that was when Quirrell took advantage, trying to neutralize them all at once.
Quirrell fired a spell directly at the ceiling above them, causing an avalanche of falling debris. Quirrell ran for it then down the tunnel, yelling something at them in the process but whatever he said was obscured by the sound of the collapsing tunnel, while they still focused on not letting the debris crush them, both Harry and Su too focused on maintaining a shield to protect them with.
The Devil's snare was immediately covered by stone, along with the side where Quirrell was, while the shield that Harry and Su were trying desperately to hold up was getting hit as well.
"Help us!" Harry screamed, forcing both Pansy and Susan to snap out of their fear and lend whatever they could to the shield, using the spell that they were told to use.
Fortunately with the 4 of them using it, the shield held firm as the debris lodged itself all around them, forming a little bubble.
Pansy felt exhausted, the energy needed to use the spell was significant and she felt herself buckling under the strain.
Finally, her strength gave out and she ended the spell, followed closely by Susan, and then Harry and Su who finally had to end it themselves.
Yet luckily the stone all around them held firm at least for now, although any effort to move them could be catastrophic, and have it collapse anyway.
"We're trapped." Harry concluded.
"Are we going to die?" Susan asked in fear, still not yet over the ordeal with Quirrell.
"We're not going to die." Harry answered, trying to sound brave, but also seeming to understand the seriousness of the situation.
Pansy had to agree with him, essentially they were inside a small area that could collapse any second especially if any help that arrived tried to move it, probably had a limited air supply, and Quirrell would be getting away with the stone.
Harry tried to touch the stone to see if maybe he could move it without the whole thing collapsing but a sudden rumbling again nixed that idea.
"Okay, well, that's not going to work." Harry announced, "Any other ideas?"
Everyone looked at Su, hoping that she might have an idea, but she shook her head.
"I'm sorry, its hopeless," She answered, "and its all my fault, if I hadn't tried to be the hero we wouldn't be in this mess."
Su, for once, looked genuinely sorry for her rash actions, and Pansy somehow knew that if they ever got out of this alive, Su would be much more careful about her decisions in the future.
"I never thought it would end like this." Susan said forlornly, sitting down onto the ground.
Pansy sat down next to her in order to comfort her, and in that moment, she realized that somehow, someway they were going to get out of there, alive, she just knew it.