The Slytherin dormitory felt too small for the amount of air Draconia was breathing. She sat on the edge of her four-poster bed, staring at the dark silk of the hangings, while the silence of the common room settled into the stone walls. Every girl in the dormitory was asleep, or at least pretending to be, but the restlessness in her legs felt impossible to suppress. The rumours of the escape had moved through the castle like a fever, and the tension of the guards in the corridors had left her feeling trapped. She stood up, her movements sharp and practiced, and began to pull on her heavy travelling robes over her silk nightgown.
Walking through the dungeons was a slow process of navigating the damp, dark corridors. She moved with a quiet efficiency, her boots making almost no sound on the stone floor. The air in the castle was warmer than the air outside, but she could already feel the transition as she approached the entrance to the grounds. She reached the heavy oak doors and stepped out into the night. The cold hit her instantly, a sharp, biting sensation that made her skin prickle and her lungs ache. It was a clean, biting cold that smelled of wet earth and dying leaves.
Draconia pulled her cloak tighter around her waist, cinching the belt to keep the warmth in. The moon was high and bright, casting long, stark shadows across the grass of the grounds. She was not supposed to be out of her dormitory, let alone wandering the edges of the Forbidden Forest, but the stillness of the castle felt suffocating. She needed to move, to feel the resistance of the wind against her face. She began to walk, her pace steady and purposeful, though she had no destination in mind.
The grass was damp under her boots, and the moisture seeped through the leather, making her feet feel heavy. She was walking towards the forest edge, moving away from the safety of the stone walls and the warmth of the hearths. The darkness felt thick, but not in a way that obscured her vision; it was simply a vast, empty space that she was intruding upon. She passed the edge of the Great Lake, where the water looked like liquid obsidian under the moonlight. A low wind rolled off the surface, cooling the back of her neck.
"You are a fool for being out here," Greta whispered to her, though the girl was not actually there. Draconia shook the thought away and kept walking. She felt the need to prove she could handle the isolation of the night. She was not a girl who succumbed to whims, yet she felt a strange, magnetic pull toward the treeline. The trees stood like silent giants, their branches reaching out into the dark, and she felt a sudden urge to see what lay beyond the first layer of shadow.
A sudden movement caught her eye near a cluster of shrubs. She froze, her heart thudding against her ribs. The sound of a twig snapping echoed through the night, startling her. She waited, holding her breath, expecting to see a creature or a misplaced student. The silence returned, heavier than before, but she did not turn back toward the castle. Instead, she pressed forward, her curiosity overriding the instinct to seek shelter.
"Is someone there?" she asked, her voice barely a murmur. The question was ridiculous, as she was alone in the dark, but the need to hear a sound in the void was overwhelming. She took a few more steps, her boots sinking into the soft, uneven terrain. The ground was uneven, and she had to watch her footing to avoid tripping over hidden roots or stones. The air grew colder as she neared the forest, the temperature dropping a few degrees with every step she took.
The sound came again, a rhythmic thudding that was far too deliberate to be a random animal. It was the sound of something heavy hitting the earth with force. Draconia stopped, her eyes scanning the dark periphery of the trees. She was walking towards a sound instead of away from it, a realization that should have made her turn back toward the warmth of the Slytherin common room. Instead, she found herself leaning into the dark, her senses heightened by the chill.
She moved closer to the edge of the treeline, where the shadows of the trees bled into the open grass. The sound was clearer now, a frantic, uneven pace that suggested someone was in a hurry. It was not the graceful stride of a prefect or the light step of a younger student. It was a heavy, desperate movement that spoke of urgency and perhaps a lack of control. She felt a strange prickle of anticipation in her gut, a sensation that was entirely unrefined and entirely new.
"Wait," she whispered to the darkness, though she wasn't sure why she wanted to be caught. She stepped over a low-hanging branch, her robes catching on a briar, but she did not pause to fix it. The wind picked up, whipping a strand of hair across her face, and she brushed it away with a gloved hand. The world felt enormous, and she felt very small, yet the pull of the sound was irresistible. She was no longer a girl walking in the night; she was a seeker of something she could not yet name.
The sound grew louder, a heavy, rhythmic thumping that seemed to vibrate through the soles of her feet. It was a frantic pace, the sound of someone running through the dark as if they were being chased or were chasing something elusive. Draconia stood perfectly still, her eyes searching the gloom for a shape, a silhouette, or a flash of movement. The tension in her chest tightened, a knot of both fear and excitement. The sound was approaching her, cutting through the stillness of the night with a violent, singular purpose.
She held her breath as the footsteps drew nearer, the cadence of the movement becoming unmistakable in its imperfection. The sound was heavy, a bit clumsy, and entirely determined. She felt a jolt of recognition that bypassed her logic and went straight to her pulse. She heard running and knew, by the gait, who it was.