Harry Potter 06 - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

messing around outside the Room of Requirement,’ she jerked the Prophet out from under Harry’s hand and unfolded it to look at the front page, ‘you should go and find Slughorn and start appealing to his better nature.’
    ‘Anyone we know –?’ asked Ron, as Hermione scanned the headlines.
    ‘Yes!’ said Hermione, causing both Harry and Ron to gag on their breakfast, ‘but it’s all right, he’s not dead – it’s Mundungus, he’s been arrested and sent to Azkaban! Something to do with impersonating an Inferius during an attempted burglary … and someone called Octavius Pepper has vanished … oh, and how horrible, a nine-year-old boy has been arrested for trying to kill his grandparents, they think he was under the Imperius Curse …’
    They finished their breakfast in silence. Hermione set off immediately for Ancient Runes, Ron for the common room, where he still had to finish his conclusion on Snape’s Dementor essay, and Harry for the corridor on the seventh floor and the stretch of wall opposite the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy teaching trolls to do ballet.
    Harry slipped on his Invisibility Cloak once he had found an empty passage, but he need not have bothered. When he reached his destination he found it deserted. Harry was not sure whether his chances of getting inside the Room were better with Malfoy inside it or out, but at least his first attempt was not going to be complicated by the presence of Crabbe or Goyle pretending to be an eleven-year-old girl.
    He closed his eyes as he approached the place where the Room of Requirement’s door was concealed. He knew what he had to do; he had become most accomplished at it last year. Concentrating with all his might he thought, I need to see what Malfoy’s doing in here … I need to see what Malfoy’s doing in here … I need to see what Malfoy’s doing in here …
    Three times he walked past the door, then, his heart pounding with excitement, he opened his eyes and faced it – but he was still looking at a stretch of mundanely blank wall.
    He moved forwards and gave it an experimental push. The stone remained solid and unyielding.
    ‘OK,’ said Harry aloud. ‘OK … I thought the wrong thing …’
    He pondered for a moment, then set off again, eyes closed, concentrating as hard as he could.
    I need to see the place where Malfoy keeps coming secretly … I need to see the place where Malfoy keeps coming secretly …
    After three walks past, he opened his eyes expectantly.
    There was no door.
    ‘Oh, come off it,’ he told the wall irritably. ‘That was a clear instruction … fine …’
    He thought hard for several minutes before striding off once more.
    I need you to become the place you become for Draco Malfoy …
    He did not immediately open his eyes when he had finished his patrolling; he was listening hard, as though he might hear the door pop into existence. He heard nothing, however, except the distant twittering of birds outside. He opened his eyes.
    There was still no door.
    Harry swore. Someone screamed. He looked around to see a gaggle of first-years running back round the corner, apparently under the impression that they had just encountered a particularly foul-mouthed ghost.
    Harry tried every variation of ‘I need to see what Draco Malfoy is doing inside you’ that he could think of for a whole hour, at the end of which he was forced to concede that Hermione might have had a point: the Room simply did not want to open for him. Frustrated and annoyed, he set off for Defence Against the Dark Arts, pulling off his Invisibility Cloak and stuffing it into his bag as he went.
    ‘Late again, Potter,’ said Snape coldly, as Harry hurried into the candlelit classroom. ‘Ten points from Gryffindor.’
    Harry scowled at Snape as he flung himself into the seat beside Ron; half the class was still on its feet, taking out books and organising its things; he could not be much later than any of them.
    ‘Before we start, I want your Dementor essays,’ said Snape, waving his wand carelessly, so that twenty-five scrolls of parchment soared into the air and landed in a neat pile on his desk. ‘And I hope for your sakes they are better than the tripe I had to endure on resisting the Imperius Curse. Now, if you will all open your books at page – what is it, Mr Finnigan?’
    ‘Sir,’ said Seamus, ‘I’ve been wondering, how do you tell the difference between an Inferius and a ghost? Because there was something in the Prophet