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going to come amongst you now and put you all into pairs. Professor Snape, if you'd like to help me--"

The teachers went through the crowd pairing people up. It took a few minutes due to the sheer size of the onlookers, but to Saffron's surprise, the crowd had diminished significantly as it seemed that many of the older students were solely there to watch Lockhart struggle and had left once that had ended.

"I'd rather just watch Snape crush Lockhart all night," said Olly disappointedly. A moment his eyes bulged in horror as Lockhart was approaching them, though, he appeared to have not heard him and proceeded to pair up Olly with Luna and Saffron with a tanned first-year girl, who had been in a group of five and had been the odd one out of the pairs made by Lockhart.

"I'm Emilia," the girl offered her hand to Saffron, who returned it with a smile. "First year Ravenclaw,"

"Saffron," Saffron nodded at her. "I'm a second year Gryffindor,"

Emilia raised her eyebrows in realisation. "Rowan and Rachels sister, I recognise you,"

"Face your partners!" called Lockhart loudly from the platform.

"Go easy on me," Emilia said with a shaky laugh. "I'm still very new to this,"

"And bow!"

"Don't worry, I am too, it'll be fine," Saffron assured her, bowing across at the girl respectfully.

"Wands at the ready!" yelled Lockhart. "When I count to three, cast your charms to disarm your opponents - only to disarm them - we don't want any accidents - one ... two ... three--"

A part of Saffron wanted to let Emilia disarm her. She wasn't too confident in her own abilities and would hate to hurt a first year if she were to mess up. But she also wasn't confident in Emilia's abilities, as the girl's mannerisms highlighted that she wasn't an assured spell caster yet. In spite of her thoughts, she went for it, as she trusted herself enough to not do serious damage to Emilia.

She was quicker than her and with an exclaim of "Expelliarmus!" Emilia's wand flew out of her hand and spiralled into the air above her. At the same time, the girl's knees buckled under the force of the spell and she fell down on to them.

Meanwhile, Olly had either let Luna hit him first or she had actually done so, Saffron wasn't entirely sure. All she knew was that once Luna's spell hit him, his wand flew sideways and he flew forwards. At the precise same time, the wand smacked Emilia in the face and Olly's face smacked into the floor of the Great Hall.

Saffron winced and even Luna who's expression never seemed to change looked horrified. She hurried over to Emilia, whilst Luna went to lift Olly up from where he was crouched on the floor.

"Are you alright?" Saffron asked the girl concernedly. She was lying down on her side but wasn't unconscious. The force of the wand had hit her across the face leaving a red mark on it. The girl let out a tearless sigh and accepted Saffron's hand to stand up.

"I'm okay," Emilia said, her eyes shut and arms clutching onto Saffron so as to not fall back onto the floor. "I feel really dizzy though, everything feels blurry,"

"She might be concussed," Saffron looked over her shoulder to see that Olly was standing up by himself, his hand over his forehead, next to Luna who looked extremely apologetic and forlorn. "It sounded nasty,"

"So did what happened to you," Saffron told him worriedly. "Do you feel alright?"

"I've been better," answered Olly with a small laugh. "I'll take her to the hospital wing, my heads killing me, Madam Pomfrey should have something to ease the pain,"

"Do you want us to come with you?" Saffron asked him, referring to her and Luna.

Olly shook his head. "No, it's alright. You two keep practising, I'll be able to get us there fine," He turned to Emilia. "It's Emilia, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Emilia told him, slowly opening her eyes, all the while taking rasping deep breaths.

"You can grab onto my arm if you're feeling weak, I don't feel like I'm going to fall over like you seem to feel, so I can get us to Madam Pomfrey," he assured her softly. "You'll be alright in no time,"

Saffron was surprised to see that nobody had come over to see what was going on with them, but it seemed that everyone was too caught up with their own problems. Several people had also fallen to the floor, others were sporting bruises, and some had fallen victim to nasty cuts.

"Don't miss me too much," Olly was supporting Emilia through the Great Hall towards the golden double doors, looking over his shoulder at Saffron and Luna with a grin. The two girls watched them leave before Saffron stopped staring at the now closed doors to the hall, as she was distracted by a piercing whimpering sound coming from the top of the hall.

She let out a gasp. A girl with big bushy brown hair was in a headlock and she would recognise that hair any day.

Hermione.

Saffron gestured to Luna to follow her, and together they navigated their way through many an injured student until they made their way to over to where Hermione was fighting. It was Millicent Bulstrode who had her in such a position. Hermione was kicking and thrashing all in an attempt to rid herself of Millicent.

But before Saffron even had the chance to do anything, Harry had already made his way over to the girls and with all his mite, pulled Milicent off of her. Milcent flared her nostrils at him as he helped Hermione up. Lavender had made her way over too and yelled at Milicent:

"If you want everyone to stop saying that you look like a troll, stop acting like one,"

"Says the one who looks and acts like a troll," Pansy Parkinson snapped across at her, rolling her eyes.

"Keep rolling your eyes, Pansy," swiped Lavender waspishly. "You might find your brain back there," She let out a dramatic gasp. "Oh, wait you won't. You'd need a magnifying glass to find it,"

Pansy made a start towards Lavender but both Parvati and Lockhart made a move to get in between her and Lavender, who just stood there laughing.

"Girls, girls," said Lockhart, looking around at the destruction that had been caused as a result of the duels. "Enough, now. Let's continue civilly. I think it's best that I teach you how to block unfriendly spells," Her looked to Snape for reassurance but he wasn't getting any. He cleared his throat and carried on speaking. "Let's have a volunteer pair - Longbottom and Finch-Fletchley, how about you--"

"Come, let's move back to where we were, it's too crowded here," Saffron said to Luna, and the girl obliged without delay. Saffron wasn't in any mood to have to talk to any of the Gryffindors about what had gone on and she felt like even if she wanted to, she ought to stay with Luna as that had been her intention for the night.

When Saffron returned to the edge of the hall where they had initially been, it turned out that more drama seemed to be destined for the people she knew. Snape had selected Harry and Draco as volunteers to demonstrate the next spell. Saffron sighed when she saw the two of them walk onto the stage. There was no scenario in which this would end well for anybody.

"That's Harry Potter," said Luna somewhat breathlessly, staring up at Harry as though she were seeing him for the first time. Her eyes were lively with a mixture of awe and wonder as she stared up at him.

"Yeah, it is," replied Saffron automatically.

"Many people seem to think he's the Heir of Slytherin," Luna said conversationally. "But he's not, "

"Wait, then who do you think it is?" Saffron asked her curiously. She didn't expect the answer to have any weight whatsoever. Olly had told her all about Luna's theories, that there was a new one every day and that he entertained them but never believed them.

"I don't know who it is," Luna turned to her, eyes as round as galleons. She seemed very pleased to be giving Saffron this information. "But it was the gamekeeper, Hagrid,"

"Wh-what?" stammered Saffron. The stammer was as a result of her resisting the urge to laugh and the shock of the girl's statement. There was no way that Hagrid of all people opened the Chamber of Secrets. The only scenario in which he potentially could have done so, was if he accidentally broke a floor and fell into them or something. It just was not realistic in the slightest.

Saffron came to realise that maybe Luna's first statement about Harry not being the heir of Slytherin could have been wrong. As when Malfoy conjured a long black snake out of his wand, Harry spoke to it.

The crowd backed away from the stage watching on as the snake edged its way towards Justin, but when Harry hissed at it, akin to a snake, it stopped. It instead turned its focus onto Harry and stared at him.

Saffron placed both of her hands over her hands. Why did Harry seem pleased with himself? Why was he smiling proudly at Justin? Why did he do that? She didn't know anybody who could speak to a snake, except one.

Salazar Slytherin.

"What do you think you're playing at?" Justin yelled at him, terrified of Harry. He turned on his heel and ran out of the hall, closing the double doors with a deafening bang.

Saffron gulped. Perhaps she and Hermione were right? Perhaps Harry had been the Heir of Slytherin the entire time.