The Chamber of Snogs

Who: Ora Yang, Alison Mallory, Lysienne Aldrern, Kahvi Sidhe
Where: Hogsmeade Village
When: A Saturday in late November
What: The last Hogsmeade trip of the school year--Dean Thomas makes a run for it and Khavi joins the rest of the girls of the Chamber of Snogs

( Hogsmeade )

[OOC: Please remember to watch this thread and reply to all comments!]

I knew it, I knew it.

It's no use saying 'I told you so' because I think Neville, Luna, and Ginny just got caught stealing the Sword of Gryffindor from Snape's office. Professor Slughorn just informed us a few moments ago and now everybody in Slytherin is talking about it, and so must the rest of the school.

The plan started off so well. Alison and Ginny managed to stow three brooms in a closet on the fifth floor, and Snape was out of his office for the duration of the operation. Alison and I graffiti'd a wall on the second floor next to some classrooms, but something went wrong. I'm not sure what it is, but there was a lot of ruckus kicked up when some of the students found the graffiti, and even though we had all the Carrows, Filch, and Professor Snape in one place, somehow I think they got caught. Snape must have called a meeting in his office or something and caught them along the way.

I hope the Carrows aren't going to kill them. They're all purebloods so they might be tortured, but nothing worse is going to happen...right?

And this sounds terribly selfish right now, but they might let our names slip during the torture process if they haven't already. So everybody be careful. I don't even think my status as an Ambassador's daughter is going to protect me this time, if our names are dropped.

I wonder if there's a polite way to inform Neville that while we all appreciate him growing a backbone, Muggle Studies is not the place to run out and give it a spin. Muggle Carrow almost turned purple today, I swear, and I don't want to see Neville on the wrong end of any of the Unforgivables.

Well, that was a nice trip to Hogsmeade. It's refreshing to be able to get out of school for once and see what it's like out there, but sadly it's not going too well in Hogsmeade either. It was very quiet and subdued when we went after class to pick up Professor Slughorn's parcels, doesn't seem like the people in Hogsmeade are gathering much anymore. Fred and George even treated Alison and me to some butterbeers at The Three Broomsticks, but it was a lot emptier there than I remember. Maybe that's just to be expected, because we usually only go there on school trips when it's crowded to capacity, but it really was different, and I don't think it was the lack of Hogwarts students that accounted for it.

Hopefully by now the Order will know that the Minister of Magic is under the Imperius Curse by some Death Eater named Yaxley. From the list that got passed onto me, it seems that several of the higher ups in the Ministry are either Death Eater sympathizers themselves or under the curse as well, which really worries me about how deep You-Know-Who's corruption runs.

At any rate, I hope we use up those potions ingredients fast, because there's always information the Order could use, and well...you can tell that Alison really misses Fred and George, and they miss her a lot too.

After sifting through all of almost two weeks of Snape's conversations in his office, I am convinced that he must be the most boring person in the universe.

All he talks about are the board meetings he has, the daily reports of the state of Hogwarts and its students, and making sure the accounts are in order. He's said nothing about the Carrows, nothing about the Dark Lord or serving him, and nothing even about which students or professors he might even slightly dislike. In short, there is no gossip happening at all in his office.

I wonder if 'budgets' is code for 'You-Know-Who.'

Who: Ora Yang and Draco Malfoy
When: Sunday, September 21, 1997
Where: Room of Requirement
What: Draco has a plan

( Ora blinked sleepily when she woke, rubbing her eyes... )

It works! We're all brilliant!

The Extendable Ear we planted in Snape's office is picking up all conversation in his office. The drawbacks so far is that we can't tell except from context who Snape is speaking to, and we also don't have a way to record the times corresponding to Snape's converations, but we can always try to improve on those later.

In the end, it works! I hope all the charms we've put on it will stay for the next little while. In the meantime, the conversation so far in Snape's office has been very minimal and boring. All he's done for the past couple of days is fill out school paperwork for the Ministry and approve the exam schedules for NEWTs and OWLs. I was hoping he would say exactly what was on those exams, but...nothing.

Well, if Snape starts plotting things with the Carrows in his office, now we'll know about it, and hopefully not too late.

Who: Ora Yang, Alison Mallory, Lysienne Aldrern, and Leah Chase
When: the second week of classes
Where: The Chamber of Snogs
What: The girls plot to spy on their new Headmaster

Carefully, Ora padded down an abandoned corridor on the sixth floor of Hogwarts, looking around to make sure there were no other students in the vicinity. The sixth floor of the castle was usually strangely empty, most of the classes being on the lower floors and the greater parts of the rooms in this wing being abandoned, or having been, like most rooms at Hogwarts, shifted by the castle to some other part. The Chamber had been on the fourth floor their second year, before suddenly being moved to the sixth their fourth year, and it had taken almost of a week of prowling around Hogwarts after and between classes for them to find Gilbert and Serge again, who had giggled and snickered about how long it had taken.

Ora strode up to a wall lined with paintings that did not seem particular, and waved a hello to the boys. The darker-haired Serge was the first to notice that Ora was standing there, and he spared a glance for her before seeming to whisper something to Gilbert that made them stop mid-Snog.

"Everybody's here already," Gilbert said lazily, waving a lazy greeting at Ora before wrapping his arms around Serge's neck again. He raised an eyebrow. "You four seem to be spending more time here than usual."

Ora shrugged. "Well, with things going on the way they are this year..." she trailed off, figuring it best to leave it at that.

"Ah," Serge nodded knowingly, "I've heard rumors, bits and pieces, about the new Headmaster and the new teachers." He kissed Gilbert loving on the nose before diving back in. "Small wonder," he said, as the door swung open.

Ora entered and the door swung closed behind her, once more melting seamlessly into the walls. The other girls had various textbooks and parchments open and spread out on the floor, looking up as Ora entered.

"Sorry I'm late," Ora grinned, finding her favorite couch and plopping herself on it, dumping her schoolbag at her feet. "I think I've figured out how we're going to get those Extendable Ears in Snape's office," she said as the girls look at her and carefully set down their homework. They all seemed to be listening, so Ora launched into her idea.

"We're going to need the following things," Ora started, counting on her fingers. "A tightly controlled Reductor or Deprimo, a good enough Reparo to fix it, a good silencing charm, a quill charmed to write down everything it hears, an infinite journal (like ours), a few brooms, a good Disillusionment Charm, a perfect Sticking Charm, a good Disillusionment Charm, and probably a few brooms." Ora paused to take a breath. "In short, we are going to make a whole in the roof of Snape's office, lower down an Extendable Ear, fix the hole, leave the other end on the roof where a quill and a journal will be recording everything that's happening in there. We'll need to affix the other end of the Extendable Ear and the journal to the roof, make sure no one can see them, and make sure they won't get rained on or blown off the top of the castle.

"There," Ora said proudly, taking a big breath. It had taken her nearly all week to try and tackle the particular problem of spying on her new Headmaster. "It's that simple."

At this moment, I think I can only breathe a sigh of relief that our new head of house is Professor Slughorn. I think if we ended up with one (or both!) of the Carrows I would have woken up this morning and just walked out the door. I'm not exactly sure of the details, but I'm almost certain that as the daughter of a Chinese ambassador I'm probably the only person attending the school solely by choice. But don't worry, I'll be sticking this year through, not only finish my N.E.W.T.s, but also probably to harrow those Carrows and so we can raise hell to the extent that even Potter will be envious of us.

Speaking of Potter, there's a giant hole in Gryffindor House this year, and it has three names. The entire school is talking about his absence, in the corridors, during lunchtime, in the library--just everywhere--which I suppose serves as a good diversion because nobody really wants to talk about how dismal this year is looking to be, especially since Quidditch and Hogsmeade trips are still up in the air.


I don't think anybody in the Great Hall last night missed the part where Snape announced the new "Dark Arts Professor, Amycus Carrow." I don't think a single student was left out of the ensuing silence and trading of looks, though the smirks that grew on my own house table made me feel rather ill. Not to mention that Snape announced Blaise Zabini and Pansy Parkinson has Head Boy and Head Girl. Ugh, I thought I was going to retch on the spot! Blaise is actually an all right sort of fellow if you ignore his arrogance. Pansy though, don't get me started. How much trouble do you think me and Alison will get in if we shrink Pansy's underpants again?

I still haven't found a moment alone with Draco yet. He looks terrible with dark circles under his eyes and his skin so pale I'd probably describe it "pallid." At least he's alive, even if he looks rather miserable. There are a lot of things I have to ask him, I'll let you guys know whether he spills or whether I really end up strangling him.

Anyways, let's meet up after classes at the Chamber of Snogs today! We haven't talked with Gilbert and Serge for a while, and we should also start making plans about what to do with that box of Extendable Ears and other fun Fred and George inventions that Alison brought with her!

Have you seen The Daily Prophet today?

They're putting together a survey of Muggle-born wizards and witches and calling the people in charge of interrogating them the Muggle-born Registration Commission! And claiming that Muggles must have stolen magic? This is completely ridiculous! Magic cannot be stolen or obtained by force, everybody knows that!

Dad is furious at what the Ministry is doing (even though it is really none of his business, at least officially), but he's just an ambassador, he's completely powerless. Not to mention the fact that apparently Minister Thicknesse has canceled all of his meetings with my father, and all the rest of the international ambassadors for the rest of the week on pretense of being very busy overseeing domestic affairs. I hope this angers the International Confederation of Wizards enough for them to do something about it, but somehow I doubt they're going to do anything. They aren't supposed to meddle...

I'm just glad that none of us are Muggle-borns. Alison, you're the closest of all of us to a Muggle, I hope they haven't got you, you've got blood from your mum's side, right?

Also, I hope I see Draco at King's Cross station, getting on the Hogwarts Express. I think I might slap him, and then try to strangle him later.