The entire castle was shrouded in an unprecedented gloom.
It seemed as if Hogwarts herself had her soul shaken.
The children too were shaken from the events in the train. The first years especially had to be escorted, not from the traditional route of lake but from the carriages under the protection of teachers.
It was truly a pity that the first years did not get to see the brilliance of Hogwarts for the first time through the lake, after all that was a memory that was special to almost all that have studied in this prestigious school.
Before the traditional welcome feast, our dear headmaster had some warnings to issue and some hope to give. The usual dose of some bad some good.
The third year in itself was nothing important as a whole when compared to the other years when almost everyone was involved in some magical shit or other.
This left me and Hermione ample time to focus on taking our O.W.L's for the subject of healing.
The twins were busy with their own O.W.L's and rest of the class was busy fawning over the chance to visit Hogsmeade, go on dates and drink the legendary drink of butterbeer to their hearts content.
Madam Pomphrey was already very happy with our progress from last year therefore she gave us an almost free reign for the practical portion of our third year healing studies.
Me and Daphne would occasionally catch each others glimpses but in no way had we interacted with each other.
The commotion form the black heir taking an active part in the British wizarding world was most seen on the Slytherin table.
There was a different life in the topic regarding the black heir. It was as if a parallel fight was going on between him and the studies.
As I had no intention of changing the path of Voldi's resurrection, I was not going to participate in some foolishness like capturing Peter and handing him over to the ministry or directly kill him while he was still in his Animagus form.
As a matter of fact, I was not even going to do the foolishness of interfering with the confrontation between lifelong friends and now lifelong enemies. I was in fact looking forward to know what actually happens if me, Lupin and Snape never intervene in the confrontation.
Would Sirius kill the rat? Would Peter talk his way out of dying but instead end up joining the order under the pretence of being forced by the dark lord? Would Snape and Lupin still end up reaching the shack despite me not leading them? Would Peter finally be able to complete the task that was assigned to him?
All these questions had their own set of possibly insane answers and consequences. But, I had no intention of interfering.
The additional subjects that we had chosen were also fun to study. Both me and Hermione felt that the subjects were easy enough to understand and the classes fun enough to follow.
The only sequence of events that I decided to follow through from my first run was the freedom of Buckbeak.
The entire year passed with me becoming stronger and going about my day to day events as calmly as possible.
The O.W.L's for healing were easy enough and for the practical portion we were given two types of patients and our scoring criteria was the extent to which we are able to treat or cure them.
The first patient had the simple case of having a few bruises and broken bones. This was supposed to see our proficiency in treating the basics that a healer situated in Hogwarts would have to face on a daily basis.
The second patient was someone that had arrived at the clinic with a complain and it was our duty to manage it to the best of our abilities.
My patient turned out to have a ear infection as a result of potion that he had concocted in order to increase his hearing.
Hermione on the other hand had a patient whose spell had backfired on himself and now he had an extra finger on all of his appendages.
The treatment for my patient was easy enough for me. All I had to do was contain the infection with a spell and then create a antidote with the potion that had caused this in the first place.
Hermione had a more complicated task of reversing a spell, but she was the one that finished curing her patient first.
As we came out of our exams we were both happy with our efforts and confident in clearing the O.W.L with nothing short of an outstanding.
The school exams were even easier after going through the O.W.L exam.
It was finally the last day of our school year when the events finally started moving along their intended path.
Instead of using a time turner, I utilized my invisibility cloak to free Buckbeak once every personnel responsible for his execution had seen him and then went inside Hagrid's hut for a cup of tea.
I always knew that Buckbeak was not a mindless beast and therefore asked him to go to the location of one of my properties. I then informed Dobby of the same by making a trip to Hogsmeade.
I had been meeting Dobby regularly for the last year in the village and he was responsible for keeping me updated on the various ongoings in the wizarding world as well as tracking any activity of Sirius that would unnecessarily trouble the black heir i.e. ME.
However it turned out that I was worrying needlessly.
Sirius was but a simple fool. He never even considered that the heir was his own godson. He thought that the heir was someone that had been decided by the family magic once he was sent to Azkaban.
He just withdrew some money occasionally and was staying at the Grimmauld place once he came to know that it was still his and placed under a Felidius charm.
It was on the train back that we finally heard some tit bits regarding the confrontation.
Sirius had come out in the open with Dumble's now supporting him. The rat had escaped and no one knew how he did when he was under the custody of the ministry. Snape was the only one that reached the shack and witnessed everything and he was the one that helped in capturing the rat.
It seemed that there was some twist in the game finally.
The journey back was peaceful, at least for me.