On the day Gryffindor faced Hufflepuff in a Quidditch match, Scarlet didn’t join the rest of her House to cheer them on. Instead, she suited up in her battle attire, with Gáe Scáil in hand, setting a trap in Professor Snape’s office.

  She cealed herself with stealth entments, hiding in a dark er of the office, patiently waiting for her prey to step into the trap.

  The idea had struck her the moment she heard Professor Snape would be refereeing the match. She quickly drafted a proposal for capturing the culprit red-handed and arranged a meeting with Professor Snape uhe pretext of being a “hardw student eager to clear up some doubts”.

  Professor Snape’s expression remained unreadable as he reviewed her proposal. However, Scarlet caught a subtle shift in his eyes – a flicker of thought behind his perfectly posed poker face.

  “And recisely, makes you believe you, a student barely of age, could do what Dumbledore himself failed to achieve?” His voice dripped with sarcasm, yet as cold and monotone as ever. “I’d be fasated to know.”

  “Yes, I agree I’m young and inexperienced, and he is indeed a skilled wizard with quick reflexes. I wouldn’t stand a ce against him in a fair, face-to-face fight.” Scarlet maintained her polite smile. “However, as you see from my proposal, I don’t io fight him fairly. It’s a trap. I’ll have the upper hand.”

  Professor Seepled his fingers, the girl before him with a calg gaze. “Such ruthlessness,” he murmured, his lips curving in a wry smile. “Tell me, Ms. Hong – are you certain you’re a Hufflepuff, and not Gryffindor? One wonders if the Hat had an off day.”

  “No, I’m very much a Hufflepuff - one who will stand against danger when necessary,” Scarlet replied calmly. “And now, I think it’s necessary. He’s a threat to the students, and I won't let my school years be ruined by his petty and foolish ambitions.”

  Professor Snape remained silent, though his fiapped lightly against the part. She could tell he was pting whether to permit her pn.

  Scarlet pressed on, “There’s a high ce he’ll e to your office for the healing potions. I sense he’s suffering from the curse I pced on him during our enter in the Forbidden Forest. He’s already tried to break into the third flain, potions have gone missing from the hospital wing, and the strarlic smell is clearly his attempt to mask the stench of his rotting wound. During the Quidditch match, the hospital wing will be crowded with injured pyers, and Madame Pomfrey has tightened security around the potions. He’ll have little ce of stealing from there. The only pce he get top-quality healing potions is from your office, especially since you’ll be refereeing the matd won’t be here. He might try for another break-in at the third floor or targeting Harry, but I’m betting on him ing here.”

  “You sound more like a Slytherin now,” Professor Snape remarked, his gaze sharpening. “Armingly dangerous with your line of thinking.”

  “I’ll take that as a pliment. Thank you,” Scarlet replied with a smile.

  “Very well,” Professor Snape said finally, his voice a shade colder. “You may proceed. But I will have Professonagall informed, and if even a hair is mispced, you will bear full responsibility. Uood?”

  Scarlet grinned. “Yes, Professor Snape. I’ll bring you the good news when it’s done.”

  “Let’s hope, for your sake, there’s news worth sharing.” Snape’s eyes glinted with a mixture of scepticism aant intrigue.

  And that’s how she found herself lurking in the cold, dark dungeon office, waiting for her trap t.

  It ain in the o have something on her schedule that she couldn’t trol, with the oute depending on a storyline she only vaguely remembered. Scarlet didn’t trust her hazy recolles when it es to ensuring anyone’s safety. The troll i had caught her off guard, and she despised that feeling of helplessness. So, this time, she decided to take trol - to strike before the plot unfolded.

  Her breath was shallow as she became oh the shadows, cealed in a dark er of Professor Snape’s office, waiting. Breakfast had begun, and she remaiill, patiently anticipating the sound of the door creaking open.

  An hour passed. Then another.

  She wasn’t sure when the Quidditch match had started or when it would end, but she k was taking p the m. If nothing happened by lunchtime, her pn would have failed.

  Then, finally, the door creaked. A strong smell of garlic, mixed with a hint of rot, wafted into the room.

  Scarlet held her breath, watg as the man wearing a purple turban hurried inside and shut the door behind him, gng around as though searg for something.

  She didn’t move, remaining perfectly still as the man made his way to the exact spot where she had pced her hidden magic circle. In an instant, it activated.

  There were no fancy lights or dramatic effects like when she had performed the ritual for Remus Lupin. The magic circle worked quietly and subtly, sending out dark, dim s that slowly snaked around the man’s limbs as he tinued sing the room for potions. Wheempted to take aep, the tightened, binding him in pce.

  His body stiffened, his tongue went numb, and an icy chill ran down his spine. Without warning, he was lifted into the air like a puppet on strings. A gust of wind came from nowhere, sweeping across him roughly, dishevelling his robes. Theiced – his wand was wrenched from his grasp by the same gust, snapped ly in half right before his eyes!

  “Who’s there--” He tried to shout, but his voice failed him. And only then did he hear it – a voice, ting something unfamiliar, barely above a whisper.

  “O Great Guardian of the Shadowy Land, the Queen who draws the liween life ah, your humble follower summons yuidance. For a shattered soul, seeking cowardly to escape the call of death --”

  The t echoed faintly through the room, mingling with Quirrell’s boured breathing. But another sound began to grow – a moan of pain, rising from beh the purple turban. She knew why. The gaze of the deity was now fixed upon this very spot.

  The Queen was watg her, cheg to see if she was managing well. The Queen had always been a kind and g teacher, treating her more like a student than a priestess.

  “--In the name of Scáthach, the soul fragme for the nd of the dead shall now perish--” As Scarlet finished her t, a dark, ghostly figure erupted from the turban.

  It writhed and thrashed against the bindings she had cast, and Scarlet felt the force field slipping from her trol. Without hesitation, she dispelled her stealth magic, gripped her spear tightly and shouted, “Gáe Scáil!”

  The red spear, resonating with the t, left her hand as Scarlet hurled it at her target. It struck the ghostly figure square in the middle, pinning it to the stone wall with a faint glow, holding the entity in pce.

  The apparition writhed, its voice twisting into a shriek of fury and pain. “You dare – you dare defy Lord Voldemort, you wretched little Mudblood! I am eternal!” His voice grew weaker, each word ced with venom. “This is not over! I will return...and when I do, you will beg for mercy!”

  The figure’s form slowly faded, g at the air in a final act of defiance. Scarlet could feel the Queen’s presence as she grasped the soul fragment with her fiips, Scarlet a silent, approving gaze as the figure’s presence finally dissolved into nothingness.

  With a grin, Scarlet addressed the vanishing figure. “Don’t worry, I’ll send the rest of you to the shadowy nd soon. Then, you’ll finally be whole again - where you belong.”

  Perhaps the remnants of the soul tried to retort, but Scarlet could no longer hear it. The deity’s gaze lifted, and with it, the oppressive aura that had surrounded her sihe dark wizard had first tried to escape.

  As for Quirrell, when Scarlet turoward him, she noticed something grim. His soul had been cimed by the Queen as well, but his death had been grotesque. The soul fragment she had just banished had drained him of every st bit of life, leaving him mummified, shrivelled like dry, brittle weeds. He looked fragile, as though any movement might cause him to crumble to dust.

  Suddenly, the door flew open. Professonagall stormed into the room, wand at the ready, “I heard a otion – what in Merlin’s name is happening here?!” she demanded, her eyes sweeping the se before freezing on the dried-up body in the purple turban, then finally nding on Scarlet.

  The professre intensified as she spotted the student in her unusual attire, standing by the wall where a charred, bed mark pulsed with an uling aura – the only trace left of the dark wizard. Scarlet called her spear back to her hand, the a drawing further scrutiny from Professonagall.

  “Miss Scarlet Hong?!” the professor’s eyes narrowed, taking in Scarlet’s i, beaming smile. “Expin yourself!”

  “I ,” Scarlet replied cheerfully. “But I’ll need Professor Dumbledore present as well, There’s something important I o report.”

  Professonagall frowned. “And what, exactly, is that?”

  Scarlet’s grin widened. “You-Know-Who.”

  A gasp echoed through the room, the sound sharp and startled. Professonagall stared at the young student in disbelief.