The Christmas Holidays

It was finally the Christmas Holidays!!! Mostly everyone in the school had gone back home for the holidays, but about 14 people had remained in Hogwarts. Laurie and I had the whole of Ravenclaw tower to ourselves for a whole three weeks! Plus no homework!!! How could it get any better? Well, it did! Not only did we have the whole Ravenclaw tower to ourselves, it was always snowing outside and the castle was always cozy and warm.


We spent most of the first day having snowball fights outside.




After a while of pelting each other with snow, we retreated to the den. The inside had magically transformed into a "Winter Wonderland" in our absence.
The note on the wall carried the message:
Messrs Mooney, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs
wish you a merry Christmas and hope you have fun.
We hope you like the den.

It was covered in fake snow with lots of butter beer and chocolates and, what's more, a passage to Hogsmeade! We checked around and made sure that no-one was around, and went down our secret passage. It was a special treat for anyone left in the castle that christmas to go to Hogsmeade, but when we sent our owls, our permission slips were late, so we didn't get to go. So it was great.



We first went to Honeydukes sweet shop and bought some presents for the others. We didn't particularly trust Albus to be able to deliver our presents without harming someone when he arrived so we used a postal owl. For Tash, we bought her some Bertie Botts' Every flavour beans and chocolates frogs with a gift packet from Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes and for Sam, we bought her a set of jokes from Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes and a Gryffindor style scarf with lions on it that actually roared.

Now that we had finished with our christmas shopping, we went to the three broomsticks and bought some butterbeer to take back with us to Hogwarts. On our way back, we dropped into Honeydukes and bought a tonne of chocolate to celebrate christmas with.

When we got back, we noticed something was wrong imediately, the boxes had been over turned, glasses smashed and pictures ripped off the wall. We saw, written in Red acroos the wall:
I know your secret, Bolt, give over your den to me or I will reveal to everyone your secret. Yes, I know about your sister. You have until Christmas Day to hand yourself over. 3 days.

Laurie and I looked at each other, then said in perfect unison, "Luella!"

She had infiltrated our den. This meant war and I didn't care if I lost my sister as a friend.

The Secret's out!

Tash, Laurie and Sam all came bounding down the hill in their dog forms and transformed back into their usual forms. Unfortunately, Laurie, somehow still had a tail.
"Uuuh, Laurie, you may want to finish off with your tail." I pointed out to Laurie, trying not to laugh.
"Oh," she turned around and chased her tail, "thanks. You know, that's kinda fun!"
"Anyway, Annie, what's this you want to tell us?"
"Yeah! Tell us about your house-change!"
"What? House-Change?" Laurie looked very confused.
"Yeah, House-change because I saw her in Gryffindor common room and in Gryffindor uniform."
"You two, Shut up!!! You," she pointed at me, "Explain!"
"Ok then. I need you to it down. I have a lot to tell you. I'm not an only child as I have led you all to believe, I have a twin sister who is called Sophie."
"HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! Good one Annie! Twin sister! Ok, tell us what you're really on about."
"That's the thing. I'm nkot joking, I really do have a twin sister. When we came to Hogwarts, we separated into other factions. I went off on my own, and she went off with some girls whom she had met in Diagon Alley. It turns out that the girls who are her friends are Luella and the
Luella-ettes. None of you say anything. We haven't been in much contact except for some notes. She gets up early to go down to breakfast and leaves early and then she comes in last for lessons and leaves first. She spends her free time outside down in the boathouse with Luella and her clones. Apart from those three friends, she prefers her solitude. She begged me to tell everyone that I was an only child and to only say something if someone saw her. You got that?"
"I think so." They said in perfect unison, all looking at me with the uniform disbelieving expression.
"Ok then. The moment you have been waiting for. Sophie, could you please come out?"

My sister came out from behind the rock which had been keeping her from view.
"Hello. I'm Sophie. Nice to meet you." she turned to me, "Annie, I have to go now. I'm meeting up with my friends down at the boathouse."

The girls all gasped.
When she left, they bombarded me with questions.
"Why didn't you tell us? You promised us you wouldn't keep anything from us."
The girls all left in a huff, all except Laurie.
"You know, I think you were right. You honoured your promise to your sister. I'm guessing the others will be going home for christmas since they both got letters from their parents telling them to come back. I'm staying though. I think it will be fun. Tell you what, we'll map the school together. There won't be anyone to stop us. You think that will be ok? I've got to go, I need to go to the library and finish my H.O.M report on the Goblin revolts of 1287."
"Ok, thanks. See you. Good thing that it's Saturday, the Hols start tomorrow! We must finish our homework so we have holidays free, eh? See ya soon."

I went off towards the owlery to send my parents their Christmas present packages containing my favourite Wizard sweets and a cross-stitch golden-snitch iPod case for mum and a package of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes jokes.

But unknown to me, a sixth person had been listening in on our conversations. Luella came out from behind the little crop of trees and sniggered to herself.
"Hehe, Sophie's going to help me now with humiliaiting Annie. Whether she knows it or not! Muahahaha!!!!"

Meeting Sophie.

I sent a quick reply back to Sam saying:
Sam, meet us tomorrow in the hideout.
I have something to tell you.
Claws,
' ' '
O '

"Ok, guys. Meet me in the hideout tomorrow after breakfast and I'll fill you in.
Can't tell you here."

With that, I rushed up to bed and closed the curtains of my four poster and got out some more parchment.

Sophie,
Sam, one of my friends, has spotted you.
Must tell them.
Meet me at the Sandy cove down by the lake after breakfast.
DO NOT BE SEEN.
Annie
,,,
O

I made sure that no-one was watching and called my owl Albus to my side.

"Ok Albus. I need you to take this to Sophie in Gryffindor tower. Got that?
Make sure you're not clumsy. See you soon."

Next morning, we went down to breakfast as usual and wolfed down our toast and cereal.
"Ok Annie, what's the deal with this look-a-like in Gryffindor?"
"Yeah tell us pal," Laurie punched me in the arm," buddy, chum, AMigo!" she punctuated each and every word with a harder punch each time.
"You finished bruising my arm yet?"
"Nearly." Laurie gave me an almighty punch and I toppled to the floor. "Ok. Now I'm done."
"Ok. Annie, TELL US!"
"I CAN'T TELL YOU HERE!!!!" Everyone in the hall turned round to look at me, "Meet me at the hideout in 5 minutes."

I rushed off down to the sandy cove to meet my sister.
"Hello there Annie. Ok, what is it you wanted to tell me?"
"My friends. They've seen you. They're meeting me down here in five minutes."
"Ok. Well. I'll have to meet them then."

Christmas comes over the castle.

It was the end of November and we were ever nearing the start of our Christmas holidays. The castle had been transformed overnight into a Winter Wonderland, fake snow fell in every corridor and everywhere there were floating candles that gave off the smell of fir trees, those were so amazing. But overall, the Great Hall looked the best. Twelve humongous Christmas trees had been put up, all covered with house decorations, three trees per house, miniature Santas flew around on toy brooms over all the tables and a group of ghosts were always sat in the corner singing Christmas carols.

We only had three days left until the holidays.
"Can't you wait until the holidays?" I whispered to Sam during Potions.
"Like, le Duh!" Sam said all to loudly.
"You two, quiet!" barked Prof. Malfoy.
Laurie and Tash behind us started giggling uncontrollably.
"Oh, Shut up, Tash!" I hissed over my shoulder.

The bell rang and we all got up and left for our next lesson, Defence Against the Dark Arts.

"Ok then class. What do you think we're going to do today?"

"You're going to show us how you did in the Dark Lord?" Laurie piped up.

"Oh come on loser, you're so stupid. It's obvious that he's going to teach us how to duel." Luella sneered.
"Luella, five points from Slytherin. Ok class, today we will be doing a practical lesson on simple combative spells or otherwise known as disarming spells. Ok, if you can get out your notebooks and take down the notes and spells written on the board then we can get started."

We quickly finished taking our notes. He paired us up with random people, some of whom we had never met before.
Sam was paired up with her Slytherin crush, Delphinus Malfoy. She went bright red when she made his wand fly into her hand.
Unfortunately, Laurie was paired with Petunia Pygge, whom immediately got to work in attacking Laurie, it was all she could do to protect herself on the onslaught of hexes.
Tash was paired with Peter Broom, a tall Hufflepuff boy who was very clumsy.

I was then paired with a boy whom I had never met. His name was Scott McCraig. He was in Ravenclaw but I had not come across him. He was the most charming, handsome and witty boy I had ever met. I went so bright red when he flicked my wand out of my hand. It was so embarrassing.

The lesson soon ended, thankfully, and we went to go have our dinner. We all sat in our usual seats and we talked.
"OMG, I duelled with Delphinus! He was so cute when In took his wand! What about you Laurie, what was your experience in being *ahem* hexed?"
"Painful. Excruciatingly painful! So humiliating!!! What about you Tash?"
"Fun, Peter Broom was so clumsy that he tripped over his own feet every few minutes! Hilarious! What about you Annie?"
"Well, first off, pass me a sausage from the plate on your right, then I'll tell you. Thanks. Right. You see that guy down there on the other side of the table chatting with Brown? That is Scott McCraig. He is so charming, handsome and witty! He was so amazing! I actually blushed!"
"Wow, Annie! It seems that there may still be hope yet to turn you into a girl!"
"That's not the end of it. At then end, rather than hitting my wand out of my hand, he accidentally knocked me over with his spell and he blushed furiously when that happened. He stuttered an apology and helped me back to my feet."
"Brilliant! Well, it seems that all we need to do now is to make Annie into a proper girl!"
"Do you know what time it is? I'm expecting an owl from my mum saying if I can stay here for Christmas. I need to go at 6:30."
"Oh. it's 25 past right now. You should go. For that matter, I'm done. I'm going upstairs. Anyone joining me?"

Sam went to Gryffindor Tower and we went to Ravenclaw tower.
I knocked on the door-knocker and it said in a wheezy voice,
"You heard me before,
Yet you hear me again.
Then I die, 'Til you call me again
What am I?"

"That's simple. A phoenix."
"Nope!"
"Um, is it a... um... an echo?"
"You may enter."

We went into our common room and I promptly got a letter from Sam.

Dear Annie,
I've just seen the strangest thing.
I went into my common room and waited for my owl when someone came in. I didn't look round,
but obviously, they didn't see me and went and sat on one of the chairs by the fire with a book.
I swear she looked just like you. Except that she was wearing golden snitch earrings, but when I last saw YOU, you were wearing nimbus 2000 earrings. Strange.
EXPLAIN!
Bite.
xxx

Oh no! She'd seen Sophie!