"Ah-ah-ah, ooooh~"
At the entrance to the Gryffindor common room, the Fat Lady was holding a mirror and belting out vocal exercises, completely absorbed in her self-indulgence.
"Um, can you open the door, please?" Harry interrupted her for the seventh time, worried that her singing would attract the entire school.
The Fat Lady finished her last note before pausing.
"Where have you all been?" she squinted suspiciously. "Little wizards sneaking around late at night—you're quite bold, aren't you?"
"Don't ask. 'Pig snout, pig snout,'" Harry said impatiently.
"Hmph, I'll be reporting this to Professor McGonagall sooner or later," she muttered as the portrait swung forward, allowing them in.
The group tumbled into the common room, collapsing into the armchairs, trembling. For a long while, no one said a word.
"What are they thinking, keeping something like that in the school?" Ron finally blurted angrily.
"We almost got eaten! Did you see that dog? It was hideous—the ugliest thing I've seen, except for spiders."
Hermione, on the other hand, wasn't angry. She had been examining the map, amazed at how advanced it was.
Ron's complaining started to grate on her nerves. Her bad mood flared back, and she snapped the map shut. "What do you even have eyes for? Didn't you see what it was standing on?"
"The floor?" Harry guessed. "I wasn't looking at its feet—I was too busy staring at its heads."
Hermione sighed, clearly exasperated. "No, not the floor. It was standing on a trapdoor. There's something underneath it."
"You act like you've been down there," Ron muttered irritably.
"What does it matter to you if I have?" Hermione shot back, glaring. "You got tricked by Malfoy and didn't even realize it.
"A midnight duel? If it weren't for me, Filch would've caught you tonight already!"
Hermione stood up and glared at both Ron and Harry.
"I hope you'll think of Gryffindor next time before breaking school rules without any skills to back it up. It's better for everyone that way!
"Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to bed."
She spun on her heel with a dramatic flick of her hair, but after a few steps, she turned back and added:
"And by the way, Fluffy isn't ugly at all. He's just…" Hermione paused, searching for the right words.
"…just a bit more unique than regular dogs. For a three-headed dog, he's actually quite cute!"
Ron stared at her retreating figure, mouth agape. "What's that about? It's like we dragged her along!"
Harry, however, was lost in thought. Hermione clearly knew the three-headed dog—why else would she call it Fluffy?
He remembered what she'd said earlier in the restricted area, mentioning William. Could it be that they had already been past the trapdoor?
What on earth was down there?
What had Hagrid said? 'If you want to keep something safe, there's no safer place than Gringotts—except maybe Hogwarts.'
Harry believed he had just figured out where the grubby little package from vault 713 had ended up.
…
Hermione climbed the spiral staircase toward the girls' dormitory. As she reached the door, she hesitated and whispered, "William, come out. I know you're here."
She waited for thirty seconds, but the only sounds were the whispering wind. There was no other movement.
Wearing an expression of "I see through everything," she declared seriously, "If you're planning to use a Disillusionment Charm to sneak into the girls' dormitory, forget it.
"There's magic around here that prevents boys from entering!"
Hermione scanned the area one last time, but no one answered her.
Satisfied that she was alone, she slowly moved to the door, pausing to call out, "I'm really going in now."
Still no response.
Hermione entered the dormitory. A moment later, the door creaked open again, and her head peeked out, her eyes darting suspiciously around.
Finally convinced she had only been outsmarting herself, she sighed and shut the door.
…
Back in her dorm, Hermione crept to her bed, drew the curtains, and plopped onto the mattress, annoyed.
"Ugh! One day, a professor will catch him and take a million points from Ravenclaw!" she fumed.
Meanwhile, William was oblivious to the drama.
He lay on his bed, thoroughly engrossed in the brewing instructions Snape had given him.
The next day, Hermione didn't mention returning the map.
William didn't ask for it either—it wouldn't take much effort from his part to make another one.
However, Hermione insisted that the map was now her birthday present and declared she didn't need any other gifts from him.
Ha—only a fool would believe that! William thought.
Hermione's birthday was September 19th—ten whole days away.
For girls, any gift given within three days of their birthday might still count as a birthday gift. But anything earlier? That's just a regular gift.
And ten days? That might as well be from another lifetime.
Anyone foolish enough to take her words seriously and skip a birthday gift would undoubtedly hear about it for the rest of their life.
Arguments years later would drag out this "stinginess," citing it as proof of unforgivable negligence.
The reverse, of course, was entirely different.
If you gave her a gift now, and she asked for another on her birthday, she'd say, Didn't I already get you something a month ago? Why are you so greedy, expecting two gifts and all?
The mysteries of a girl's logic were endless—strange and charming (and terrifying) creatures indeed.
…
William wasn't about to make such a rookie mistake.
On Hermione's birthday, he gifted her an owl.
It was a magnificent long-eared owl, its head tufted with striking black-and-white feathers, its upper body a deep brown mottled with pale yellow streaks, truly, a beautiful bird.
Hermione had wanted a pet during the summer, but the Gringotts incident had disrupted her plans. William considered the owl a form of compensation.
He suggested naming it "Rhaegal," to complement Anne's owl, "Drogon."
"When I get another owl, I'll name it 'Viserion,'" he added.
Anne also gave Hermione a gift—a collector's edition set of magical creature stamps.
She had spent all her saved pocket money and even gone into debt with William for it.
Hermione sat alone in her dorm, crouched by her bed, organizing her birthday gifts.
Although there weren't many—shockingly few, actually—she was delighted. She inspected them repeatedly, never tiring of the process.
She sat on the floor with Anne's stamp collection on her lap, flipping through the pages with increasing joy.
The owl at her feet hooted softly, begging for treats.
Hermione smiled, her dimples deepening as she hummed a tuneless little melody, her happiness clear for all to see.
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