It was Friday, pushing past half-past ten, and the common room of Gryffindor Tower had settled into that late-night, hushed atmosphere unique to a chilly castle. The fire in the enormous stone hearth was no longer roaring, but had mellowed into a deep, comforting coal glow, casting long, dancing shadows on the tartan armchairs.
Albert sat nestled in his usual spot, the only sounds being the occasional pop from the dying fire and the rhythmic flipping of parchment.
He was immersed in the dense, scholarly manuscript: "Advanced Translation of Runic Magic," the massive proofreading task Professor Babbling had tossed his way days ago. He made precise, minute corrections in the margins, his concentration absolute.
Nearby, the late-night procrastinators were thinning out. Angelina Johnson, having finally submitted her grueling Herbology essay, was unwinding with a game of exploding snap against Aria, a fellow fourth-year. In the next cluster of chairs, Lee Jordan, perpetually distracted, kept casting worried glances at the card game while struggling to complete a hopelessly complicated Astronomy chart under Shanna's patient but increasingly weary supervision.
"Yes! That's it, I win this round!" Angelina cheered softly, neatly stacking her deck of famous wizard cards, then glanced over at the agonizingly slow progress Lee Jordan was making. She frowned. "Jordan, seriously? How are you still on the planetary alignments? I finished that two hours ago."
"Wouldn't it be a lot smarter to finish all your actual assignments before you even think about card games?" Aria asked, shaking her head. Lee Jordan's prioritization skills were a mystery to her.
Angelina covered her mouth, stifling a heavy yawn. "Sanna, are you ready to call it a night? We could use the sleep."
"You two head off," Shanna replied, her eyes focused intently on the small, brass button balanced on the table in front of her. She was determinedly trying to transform the inert, everyday object into a live insect—a complicated piece of Transfiguration that demanded incredible focus.
Turning something inanimate into a living creature was miles harder than, say, turning a turtle into a teapot. "I have one last attempt I want to nail. It's been bugging me."
"Alright, don't stay up too late." Aria gathered up her things, grabbed Angelina's arm, and steered her toward the girls' dormitories, the promise of a warm bed pulling them away from the chill of the common room.
Shanna slumped back in her chair, a defeated sigh escaping her lips. The button remained stubbornly metallic. "Another failure," she muttered. She looked over at Albert, the wellspring of effortless magical competence. "Albert, come on. Is there some specific theory, some secret knack for animating objects that Professor McGonagall isn't telling us?"
Albert, having completed a particularly complex annotation on a runic passage, capped his quill and set the heavy manuscript aside, marking the page. "There is," he said simply.
Shanna leaned forward eagerly. "What is it?"
"Practice. And a lot of it," Albert said, smiling slightly as he put the manuscript away in his satchel.
Shanna made a frustrated noise. "Oh, you and your boring truths. You always say that!" She eyed the thick parchment Albert had been handling. "What even is that monstrous stack of paper you've been poring over all evening?"
"It's a manuscript on Ancient Runes that Professor Babbling asked me to review before it goes to press," Albert explained.
"Professor Babbling? Who's that?" Lee Jordan piped up, finally abandoning his doomed Astronomy work.
"Our Ancient Runes professor," Albert clarified patiently.
"Ancient Runes…" Lee Jordan repeated, looking thoughtful. "Oh, right, the third-year electives are coming up. What courses are you actually planning to take? You've been strangely quiet about it."
"I'm planning to take all five," Albert announced, ticking them off on his fingers: "Divination, Care of Magical Creatures, Muggle Studies, Ancient Runes, and Arithmancy."
Shanna's jaw dropped slightly. "All of them? Anderson, that's insane. Do you seriously have the time for that kind of workload?"
"I do," Albert confirmed, taking a slow sip of his now-cold milky tea. "There are ways to, shall we say, significantly multiply one's free hours."
"I've heard Ancient Runes is basically like learning three dead languages at once," Shanna admitted, looking hesitant. "I was considering it, but the rumors make it sound like a nightmare."
"Ancient Runes is exactly that: like learning a foreign, slightly arcane language," Albert agreed.
"Which you're ridiculously good at, by the way," Lee Jordan interjected, his voice full of envious admiration. "I still remember you speaking flawless French before the summer holidays. You were practically a native. It's unfair."
Shanna deliberated for a moment, then decided. "If it's truly just a language barrier and not some impenetrable magical logic, I might choose it. What about the others, Albert? Which ones are the easiest?"
"Easiest?" Albert paused, considering. "Purely in terms of effort versus outcome? Divination and Muggle Studies. Absolutely."
"Why those two?" Lee Jordan pressed, quill hovering over his notes.
Albert offered his analytical opinion. "Divination is a non-starter. It requires genuine, innate talent. If you don't have that spark, you're just making wild guesses and wasting your time manufacturing homework that means nothing. You're better off sleeping through it. Unless you're truly gifted, it's useless."
He took another sip of his tea. "As for Muggle Studies? It's a guaranteed high mark for anyone with even passing familiarity with the Muggle world. I highly doubt most wizards teaching that course understand anything past 'electricity is magic that Muggles don't know they're using.' They likely can't differentiate between a battery, a television, and a regular old light bulb."
"No way. Are they really that isolated?" Shanna looked genuinely surprised, her earlier frustration with Transfiguration momentarily forgotten.
"Do you know what a light bulb is, Lee?" Albert challenged the boy next to him.
Lee Jordan rolled his eyes with spectacular drama. "Yes, obviously! My family lives near a proper Muggle neighbourhood. But honestly, Albert's probably right about the deeply pureblood families who've been cut off for generations. They're clueless."
"That's genuinely difficult to process," Shanna muttered, shaking her head.
"It's really not," Albert countered with a playful grin. "Think of it this way: just as my Muggle father wouldn't know the first thing about brewing a potion from a preserved snail, an ultra-traditional wizard like, say, the Weasley twins' father, wouldn't have a single clue what the purpose of a simple rubber duck might be."
Shanna clamped a hand over her mouth, muffling a sudden, sharp burst of laughter.
Lee Jordan, however, was nodding seriously. "Oh yeah, I remember you giving Fred and George a rubber duck each as a gag gift before break. They were completely baffled."
"You're really… something else, Anderson," Shanna managed, finally letting out a giggle that drew several surprised, sleepy looks from the few remaining third-years. "You did that intentionally, didn't you?"
"Did what intentionally?" Albert asked, feigning utter bewilderment. He hated the word "intentional" when applied to his System-guided actions. "Speaking of the Weasleys, where are Fred and George tonight? I thought they were around earlier."
"Those two scoundrels?" Lee Jordan answered, having recovered from the slight. "They disappeared about an hour ago. Said they were starving and heading to the kitchens for a proper midnight snack."
Suddenly, two muffled voices boomed simultaneously from the entrance stairwell, echoing off the stone walls:
"Who are you calling a scoundrel, Jordan?!"
Lee Jordan swiveled around, catching sight of the twins marching towards them. Fred and George were each triumphantly gnawing on a steaming, flaky pie crust.
"We risked life and limb getting actual, decent food, and this is the thanks we get?" Fred complained, taking a massive bite. George, standing next to him, dramatically produced a grease-stained paper bag from his robe pocket and brandished it menacingly. "Hmph. No pie for the treacherous friend."
"Ahem. You clearly misheard me," Lee Jordan said, clearing his throat loudly, his eyes locked on the bag. "What, precisely, did we manage to acquire for the late-night hunger?"
The remaining students watched the exchange, trying desperately to keep their poker faces intact.
"You're absolutely deaf, Jordan," Fred scoffed, playfully pushing Lee Jordan away. George, however, was less petty. He tossed the paper bag, which was heavy and warm with residual heat, directly to Shanna. "Here, Shanna. This is for the sane people."
"Oh, thank you!" Shanna said, surprised. The bag was definitely saturated with oil, but the smell was savory. "What kind of pie is this?"
"Steak and Kidney," George announced proudly.
He extracted a piece for himself, then casually handed the oily paper bag to Albert, who was the closest.
Albert looked down at the savory, flaky pastry in his hand. Steak and kidney pie. A very traditional, very English dish. When served fresh and piping hot, it was rustic and comforting. Now, carried all the way from the kitchens, it was merely lukewarm, and the taste of the congealed kidney was less than appealing. He wasn't feeling particularly hungry anyway.
"Give this to Lee Jordan," Albert said, pushing the whole bag back toward his friend.
"Don't you dare give that traitor our pie!" Fred and George shouted in unison.
"It's from Albert, you numbskulls, so it doesn't count," Lee Jordan retaliated instantly, snatching the bag and clutching it protectively. "He clearly recognizes my superior character."
"You are a menace."
"Still, aren't you eating anything, Albert?" Lee Jordan asked, taking a huge, satisfied bite.
"No, thanks. I've lost my appetite," Albert replied, shaking his head.
Shanna, always the sensible one, smiled. "Here, let me share half with you. Eating a whole, heavy pie so late isn't good for concentration anyway." She deftly cut the pie she was holding in half with a small, sharp charm, and offered the portion to Albert.
Albert sighed inwardly. Surrounded by all these expectant eyes, he couldn't refuse a polite offering. He took a small, careful bite of the lukewarm steak and kidney pie. It was rich, slightly salty, and undeniably heavy.
"See? Pretty decent, right?" George asked, wiping his mouth on his sleeve.
"It's better hot," Albert commented mildly.
As the small group finished their snack and conversation, the common room slowly, inevitably, emptied out. The cold wind rattled the windowpanes with greater insistence, and the fire was dying down to embers.
"Right, let's get this show on the road," Albert murmured, gesturing discreetly toward the group of third-years who were still playing a stubborn game of Wizard Chess, indicating they should wait for them to clear out.
Lee Jordan's expression immediately soured with anxiety. "What if we get caught, Albert? Seriously? Last time William got busted sneaking out, McGonagall had him cleaning chamber pots for days! I do not want a ridiculous nickname like 'The Potty Prince.'"
Fred and George snickered. "The Potty Prince. Not bad, Jordan."
Albert merely smirked. "There's a Muggle prince named William. He's definitely famous enough to carry that moniker for the rest of his school career. It's unavoidable now."
"It is bad!" Lee Jordan insisted, genuinely distressed, then his worry took a sharp turn toward adrenaline. "But I mean it. I'm seriously worried about getting caught wandering around at night."
"Relax, we won't get busted," Fred and George assured him, exchanging a confident, almost reckless wink. "You have to trust Albert when it comes to night-time operations. He's meticulous."
"So what are we actually doing tonight?" Lee Jordan asked, his voice now a tense, low whisper, the fear of the punishment wrestling with the thrill of the forbidden.
"We're going to the Restricted Section," Albert confirmed, his voice barely audible above the wind's howl. "Remember Snape's disturbing ability to pry into thoughts? It's a genuine, dark-arts-adjacent piece of magic called Legilimency. I need to get into the Forbidden Wing of the library to find books on the counter-magic—Occlumency—to completely shield my mind."
Lee Jordan's eyes went wide, fear replaced by pure, unadulterated excitement. "When do we move out?"
"Didn't you just spend ten minutes whining about chamber pots?" Fred asked, rolling his eyes dramatically.
"I want to learn that spell too!" Lee Jordan declared, his adrenaline surging. "If we get caught, we're all scrubbing toilets, so what's the difference? We might as well all learn the secret, anti-Snape magic while we're at it!"
"You? Learning to defend your mind?" George scoffed, crossing his arms. "We'll be lucky if you can remember the incantation, let alone master the discipline."
You never know until you try, Lee Jordan thought stubbornly.
"He has a point, Lee," Albert added, deliberately dampening the enthusiasm just enough to maintain control. "The mental barriers required for Mind-Sealing are not easily erected. It's hard work."
Fred and George burst into knowing laughter. They knew Albert was underselling the difficulty, but they trusted his preparations implicitly. They knew the real mission wasn't just finding a book; it was doing something utterly forbidden under the cover of the night, and with Albert Anderson in charge, failure wasn't an option.
The promise of high-stakes, rule-breaking adventure was infinitely more appealing than the stale air of the common room. The only question now was how to slip past the final sentries.