Chapter 12

I don't own any of the characters apart from Melanie Malfoy. All of the characters belong to J.K. Rowling.

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I leant back in the large armchair I had taken residence in for the past 3 hours and looked around the empty Room of Requirement. All the different stacks of items were in different parts of the room, so we had a clear working space. It no longer looked like the room we had first began using four months ago.

I had walked into the room 3 hours ago to try and figure out what I was going to do about my party invite. In the end, I had sat pouring over books containing very small text, trying to find a way to fix the cabinet. We had finally hit a dead end with the instructions Hermione had given us 2 months ago, and no matter what I tried, I couldn't get it to work. Draco had even tried using Dark magic on it, but nothing seemed to work.

So the scene Draco walked into was this: I was leaning over yet another huge leather-bound, probably looking like a hunchback because I'd been sat in the same position for so long, the Vanishing Cabinet had a couple of burn marks on it and a small box of white mice lay at my feet.

"Do I dare ask?" he joked as he walked towards me. When he saw the mice, he moved further away again. I laughed slightly as I remembered his fear and went to stand up so I could explain everything better. My back made a cracking sound, to which came a sudden relief from pain, and Draco scrunched his face up in disgust.

"I still haven't found anything about how to fix this stupid cabinet!" I shouted, hitting the wooden door with my fist. As I did so, a small piece parchment slowly drifted to the floor. Draco hadn't noticed and had walked over to the book I had been reading through since I entered the room 3 hours ago.

The small bit of parchment was floating towards the arm that I had outstretched. When it landed, two words in flaming red ink flashed onto the yellow background. 'Reparo maximus'. Then a small diagram showed in the corner with an arrow pointing towards the part of the cabinet it would need to be used on.

"Drake! Come and have a look at this!" I shouted to him, holding the paper firm in my hand. He walked over, clearly in a panic, and took the small, crumpled parchment into his own hand.

"It's blank Mel."

I snatched it back, ready to show him the spell that was written in bright red. "No, it's not. It's in bright red ink Drake, you can't exactly miss it!" I told him, my anger clearly evident in my voice.

"Look it over Mel, it's blank. There's nothing on it at all."

I glanced down at the small square in my hand to see the writing had disappeared. I turned it over in between my fingers to make sure I hadn't shown Draco the wrong side. When I finally looked up, I saw the smug look on the face of my twin brother. I gave him a small shove and started circling the cabinet looking for the small hole the diagram had pointed out.

"Told you," his smug voice carried to me from the armchair I had recently vacated. "Oh, and your hair turned red again."

I grabbed the curls at the end of my ponytail and dragged it round so it was in my line of sight. It was the same platinum blonde hair I had been used to seeing all my life. I looked up confused at Draco, wondering why he kept saying my hair was changing colours. Every time he had said it up to now, I would check and it was the same blonde colour as before.

"Well, it was when you were shouting. Your eyes turned bright green as well." he stated calmly. I, on the other hand, whipped my head around fast to face him, before running round the Room of Requirement in search of a mirror. Draco sat laughing at me from behind his desk the full time.

I finally found one and came to a sudden stop. In doing so, I managed to trip over a stray broom and go flying head first into a pile of boxes next to the mirror. By this time, Draco was clutching his ribs, crying and not making a single noise, he was laughing that hard.

I slowly treaded my way to the front of the mirror. I looked in it to see I still had blonde hair (although now it was messed up due to my recent fall) and grey eyes. Just like normal. I scanned the area around me to make sure nothing else was in my way and then stormed back over to my seat.

"So, I just did all that for nothing?" I asked Draco. He looked calmly up at me before bursting into another fit of laughter. I leaned further back in the chair waiting for him to regain control again. This took a long while, but eventually he was able to say a few words to me without laughing again.

"It was quite funny," he said, a smile creeping back onto his face. I glared at him and he quickly swallowed his laughter. "Still no luck with the cabinet then?"

"What do you think?" I spat, sarcasm dripping off every word. The bad mood had settled in now and I wasn't about to try and be nice about anything that obvious.

"Okay. I just thought with the mice being here, you might have got it to send something on a journey," he replied calmly. My bad mood evaporated and I looked down to the floor, suddenly hit with a wave of emotion.

"Open the cabinet," I whispered. He stared at me for while, daring me to tell him what happened. After a few minutes, he seemed to give up and walked over to the door and swung it open. On the floor laid a small white mouse, identical to the ones in the box. Identical, apart from the fact that one wasn't breathing.

"Oh," breathed Draco, turning back to face me. I looked at him with a small, sad smile before turning to pick up the invite Luna had brought me earlier. Draco walked over and took it out of my hand. He quickly scanned it over before handing it back to me.

"I don't know whether to go or not." I told him before he got the chance to ask me. He nodded slowly, deep in thought for a minute.

"You should go, but take Cho with you. It won't look suspicious that way; people are already asking questions on why we are together so much."

I nodded in reply to his answer. He had a point. Apparently, it was a known fact the Malfoys and Lestranges weren't as close as they were once thought to be. They were only partly correct, my mother and Aunt Bella were still quite close. However, me and Draco were getting strange looks, and considering we were in different Houses, we weren't allowed to be seen together as much anymore.

"Yeah, I'll ask Cho later," I said as I stood up and started circling the cabinet again. The diagram that had disappeared had shown the part I needed to use the spell on near the bottom. Draco was talking to me but I was paying no attention to anything he was blabbering on about. Suddenly, I spotted a small opening near the bottom of the door and bent down to have a look inside.

"Mel, what the hell are you doing?" he asked me, clearly having no idea what was going on. Inside was a couple of small cogs that looked to be jammed and what looked like a small white brain. The object had a large gash down the middle of it, which seemed to be the reason the cogs had jammed.

Instead of answering him, I picked my wand up off the floor from next to my feet and pointed it at the white object and focused my mind on the gash. 'Reparo Maximus' I whispered, hoping that none of the mechanics were going to fly out of the cabinet.

A bright yellow light shone out from every angle of the cabinet. The door flew open and I could hear the mechanism slowing working and moving against each other. Draco grabbed my hand and dragged me across the floor so I was next to him and as far away from the cabinet as possible.

The floor of the cabinet started to slowly make its way downwards, the same as it did the day me and Cho travelled into Diagon Alley. The mouse still lay on the floor and suddenly it was all over. I stood looking across the room in amazement at what just happened. The door slammed shut and the yellow light dimmed.

"What the...?" Draco said, he still hadn't moved out of shock and currently had a death grip on my wrist.

"I have no idea, but it has definitely been one strange night."

**

"Are you sure I look okay?" Cho asked me for the millionth time that day. The Christmas Party was due to start in 15 minutes and we were still in the process of getting ready. I had been trying to tell her for the past hour and a half that she looked amazing but she carried on questioning me anyway.

"Yeah you look great!" I told her without even looking across at her. I was too busy focusing on making sure I didn't turn my hair from blonde to black again from the curling spell I was using. Cho just sighed and plonked herself down in front of the mirror again and checked her hair.

I finished the last ringlet and stood up straightening my dress out. It was a short, simple black one, but it was one of my favourites and Cho had insisted I wear it. She looked me up and down before letting out a low whistle and standing up and walking over to the door.

"So unfair you look like that, and then there's me..." she muttered to herself as she walked out the door. I gave a soft laugh following her out. She had already stalked her way over to the door and was stood waiting for me with a slight pout on her face.

"Stop bringing yourself down! You look amazing! Anyway, I hear Harry's going to be there, your chance to make him jealous?" I teased her. She wrinkled her nose up in disgust at the last sentence, which I winked to in reply. She didn't even like him anymore and I knew he felt the same, but I liked teasing her about it.

I opened the door and bowed slightly, gesturing for her to walk out the door. She curtseyed in reply and we both burst into a fit of giggles. As we approached the corridor that led into Slughorn's office and I could tell Cho was getting nervous again, so I jumped onto her back.

I burst out laughing at the look of shock on her face when I first jumped, but after a few seconds she started laughing herself and started walking faster down the corridor. Just as we got to the door, she let me down so we could make ourselves presentable and not look like idiots before we'd even had the chance to grace the partiers with our presence.

I reached out my hand to knock, but the door was flung open before I'd even moved my hand. Slughorn was stood there with a warm smile on his face waiting for us to enter. After a couple of seconds, I returned the smile and reached for Cho's hand before pulling her through the door with me.

The party was already in full swing when we entered and it was hard to move past the entrance with the amount of people that were crowded in. Emerald, crimson and gold hangings lined all the walls with loud music bouncing off them all. House elves were trying to manoeuvre their way through the sea of legs to deliver the drinks and snacks to waiting guests. As I was making my way through the crowd, I nearly sent the closest house elf into the stage as I tripped over it.

We spent a lot of our time at the party dancing to the music and talking to the many guests who Slughorn had once taught. Easily, the best one was when we met two members of the Weird Sisters, my all time favourite wizarding band. Cho got just as excited as me and nearly fainted when they said their first words to us. All in all, it hadn't been a bad night, but just as I started to think that, it got interrupted by Filch barging through the crowd and knocking me over into the vampire that had been staring at me for the past hour.

I quickly shuffled back to Cho's side and saw the reason I had been moved in such a hurry. Being held by his ear by Filch, with a very disgusted look on his face, was my twin brother. I shook my head, just waiting to find out what had happened this time.

"Professor Slughorn," Filch wheezed, the look on Draco's face scrunching up even more, "I discovered this boy lurking in an upstairs corridor. He claims he was invited to your party. Did you issue him with an invite?"

This was obviously the last straw for Draco as he wrestled himself out of Filch's grasp and he looked absolutely furious.

"All right, I wasn't invited!" he shouted angrily at Filch, who flinched at his harsh tone. "I was trying to gatecrash, happy?"

I stopped listening at this point, lost in my own thoughts. If he had wanted to come so badly why didn't he just tell me, even after what he had said, Cho wouldn't have minded. When I finally looked back up, I saw Filch storming out the room and Draco thanking Slughorn. When they had finished their conversation, I started towards Draco, but was stopped in my tracks by Snape standing in front of me.

"Follow me Draco," Snape said curtly. Draco, somewhat reluctantly, followed him out of the office. I turned to Cho to tell her I needed to follow but she just nodded in understanding before I could even open my mouth.

I quickly scanned the room to see if anyone was watching before taking off at a run to find where Snape had taken Draco. I rounded the corner, but stopped dead in my tracks when I saw Harry Potter stood watching around the corner. Normally, I would have probably sent some sort of spell his way, but at least I now knew where Draco was. I took off at a run again, travelling to the opposite end of the corridor.

"I'm not trying to conceal anything from him; I just don't want you butting in!" Draco snapped at Snape as I walked up and peered around the corner.

Draco was clearly in a bad mood and I knew very well that the one person he didn't want knowing anything about our plan was Snape. As they carried on their conversation, I could see Draco's anger rising and I was getting more scared in case he would do something stupid.

Suddenly, "you are speaking like a child. I quite understand that your father's capture and imprisonment has upset you, but -". That had hit the last of Draco's nerves and he stormed off down the corridor in the opposite direction to where I was stood. Snape followed slower behind him and started walking towards me. I crouched down into the shadows and Snape walked straight past me.

As soon as this happened, a wave of hatred washed over me. He had tried to hurt Draco. Everything he had said in their conversation was to try and bring out a weakness in him, trying to bribe the plan out of him. I slowly stood up and made my way towards Snape's office.

I didn't even bother to think about knocking and just slammed the door open and stood in the doorway. Snape just looked up calmly, upon realising it was me, and lowered his head so he was looking at the papers on his desk again.

"Ah, Miss Malfoy, how nice of you to drop by on this lovely evening."

"So you can treat me in a nice enough way, but when it comes to Draco you just can't manage it. Is that right?" I sneered at him. I don't know where this confidence came from, but it kept me going as he looked up in shock.

"I was just trying to help your brother. I know you have both thought up a plan between you both but I thought you could use my help." He replied, just as calm as he was when he had addressed me earlier.

"Well we don't need your help." I spat at him.

"You might not, but it is clear Draco is struggling, he is weak -" his anger was rising, but it didn't bother me. I cut him off before he even had chance to finish his sentence.

"How dare you talk about Draco like that!" I snarled at him, advancing on him as I said each word. Suddenly, he fell back into his chair and was looking at me with a mixture of shock and sadness in his eyes. My anger dissolved in a matter of seconds at this and I tilted my head to the side in confusion. He just pointed shakily to the mirror at the side of the room and I cautiously made my way over to it, making sure to check over my shoulder every so often.

When I turned my full attention to the reflection in the mirror, I had to do a double take to make sure I'd seen it right. The girl stood looking at me had the same shocked expression on her face, but almost all the features were different. The reflection had bright red hair and green eyes blinking at me.

I turned back to Snape to ask him what had happened, but he was still looking at me in shock and sadness. After a few minutes of us just standing there looking at each other, he sat up a bit straighter and turned to look over in my direction. No matter how hard I tried, I could not get him to look me in the eye.

"I know you're angry at me because of what I said to Draco, but why would you do something like that?" he asked me, his voice monotone.

"Do what?" was all I could reply. I honestly had no clue what he was talking about.

"I don't know how you found out, but I would prefer it if the Dark Lord never found out, or anyone found out for that matter."

"What the hell are you going on about?" I asked even more confused than I had been when I was looking at my reflection in the mirror.

"Stop playing the innocent game. You've obviously transformed yourself to look like her because you know it's my biggest weakness." When I didn't respond to him, he looked over in my direction before carrying on.

He dropped all pretence and his face turned serious. He didn't avoid the subject anymore. "You mean you didn't know I was in love with Lily Potter?!"

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DUN DUN DUN! :O

Hey guys! So I'm back! :D It has taken me a lot longer to write this chapter and I wished I could get it up earlier but I'm quite happy with this one and it's my favourite one yet.

So what do you think is gonna happen in the conversation between Mel and Snape? A lot of answers will be given away in the next chapter, but it would be good to hear some guesses.

I will try and update again before I have to go back to school, but until then please comment and vote! It means a lot when I come on to find the little numbers going up. And if you feel like it, fan me as well? ;D

Until next time :) C x