Chapter 57: The Forbidden Forest

By the next day, the news that Gryffindor had been docked two hundred points was inevitably known to everyone.

At first, everyone's reaction was that it couldn't be true, but once they verified it at the giant hourglasses that tracked the House Cup scores, the castle immediately exploded.

Gryffindor, which had been in first place, dropped to last, and Slytherin, originally in second, naturally rose to the top.

Starting that morning, they celebrated jubilantly, applauding and whistling at Gryffindor, cheering and shouting as if they had already won the House Cup.

And Gryffindor, naturally, had no pleasant looks for the one who had caused all this; Harry Potter in particular was nearly ostracized by everyone.

That was normal — out of the six people, Fred and George lost points so often that everyone was used to it.

The same went for Silven, who was even more extreme: various tardinesses at the start of term had cost about twenty-odd points, the dormitory rampage at dawn had cost another twenty, and there were plenty of other scattered deductions on top of that.

But unlike the Weasley twins, Silven later made back all those points through various means, so once everything cancelled out, the little lions naturally had no complaints. Some even felt that Silven dared to take responsibility for his actions, a true Gryffindor.

So when they saw the list of point-deductors this time, he was the first one they overlooked.

Of the rest, Neville Longbottom had never had much of a presence, and the other two foolish first-years were always trailing after Harry Potter, inevitably seen by most as his sidekicks.

So their fury naturally fell on Harry's head.

Harry was out of sorts for quite a while, and out of guilt and shame he sought out Oliver Wood and said he wanted to quit the Quidditch team.

Then he got a thorough scolding from Wood.

"What good would that do! If we can't win the Quidditch match, how are we supposed to earn the points back?"

Harry's pressure only grew; every day he was either at practice or buried in revision in the library.

Sometimes when Silven ran into him in the common room, he could still catch a fleeting flash of envy in Harry's eyes.

He truly was envious.

Clearly they had all been caught together and all had points deducted, yet Silven alone could stand aside — not only did the students' attitude toward him barely change from usual, but even Professor McGonagall, who had flown into a terrible rage at the time, had not shown him any displeasure since.

Take the detention, for instance: the other five all received notes at breakfast, but Silven was told in person by Professor McGonagall.

"Your detention begins at eleven o'clock tonight. Go to the Entrance Hall and find Filch; he'll take you to the Forbidden Forest."

After one Transfiguration class ended, Professor McGonagall said to Silven: "I hope this detention will serve as a reminder to you…"

As for what it was reminding him of, she did not say.

"Understood, Professor McGonagall." He nodded, and only then left the classroom.

Going to the Forbidden Forest — and the kind specially permitted by the professor at that… Silven's eyes flickered; it was hard to say whether this was a detention or a reward.

Fred and George thought so too. Their detention was polishing the trophy room with their least favourite brother — not only did they have to clean every single trophy, they couldn't use magic.

"There are over three hundred trophies in there!" Fred lamented. "We want to go to the Forbidden Forest too!"

"Why couldn't it be that stupid Slytherin polishing the trophies!"

"Probably because… Professor McGonagall felt the three of you brothers had better teamwork?" Silven said drily, shooting them a disdainful glance.

Having the Marauder's Map and still walking right into the trap, delivering yourselves to Professor McGonagall?

This is the kind of competence you swore could get the job done?

Bah, false advertising!

Fred and George naturally could read exactly what Silven meant, and their faces instantly flushed red.

"That time, that time we were careless… who knew Professor McGonagall would be there…" Fred explained, though his confidence was somewhat lacking.

After all, their assigned job in the partnership was to keep watch on the professor, but once they got the Whomping Willow branch they were so busy celebrating that they forgot the real business at hand.

"Stupid Ron's fault!" George said.

They had inquired around… actually, they didn't need to. Malfoy, who had "done a great deed" for Slytherin's seventh consecutive championship, was so puffed up with pride that he openly spilled the whole story in front of everyone.

The gist was that while he was shoving with Ron, he "found" a letter, which detailed the specific time, method, and location they planned to send the dragon away, so he went to find Professor McGonagall in advance.

Almost no one believed the dragon part, but after Fred and George's analysis, the rest of the contents should be true.

In other words, if Ron had been just a little smarter and more careful, they wouldn't have run into the Professor McGonagall that Malfoy had called over.

Fred and George were furious — they never expected the cause of everything to be their own stupid brother.

Then came the frustration: that day they had clearly seen on the Marauder's Map that Ron and the others had left the castle, yet they hadn't paid it any mind.

Looking back now, Ron must have left through the front door… what's the difference between that and waiting to be caught by Filch!

Fine, it was their own oversight, they admitted it!

By eleven o'clock that night, Fred and George, one carrying a bucket and the other tools, headed off to the trophy room without a word of complaint.

Harry said goodbye to Ron and Hermione in the common room, then turned and went with Silven and Neville to the Entrance Hall.

Hagrid only needed four people; Hermione had a separate punishment.

When they came down to the Entrance Hall, Filch and Malfoy were already waiting there — Malfoy was the fourth person going to the Forbidden Forest.

"Follow me." Filch led them out of the castle, muttering darkly about how he missed the old days when rule-breakers could be chained up in the dungeons.

He also "casually" revealed that their punishment was to go into that dreadful forest and keep company with werewolves and Acromantulas.

Of the group, only Neville actually listened and believed, and was so frightened he trembled.

Malfoy didn't care at first, but once he heard they were going to the Forbidden Forest, his legs went weak.

Harry was all right; Silven didn't take it seriously at all.

Filch's words could only fool new students who didn't know the Wizarding World — that so-called dungeon had been completely sealed back when Armando Dippet was headmaster, and Dumbledore couldn't possibly have reopened it.

And going to the Forbidden Forest was even less worth mentioning — it was practically a reward; he couldn't be happier about it!

Silven's indifferent attitude left Filch a bit embarrassed, but by then they had already arrived near Hagrid's hut.

(End of chapter)