The instant the explosion rang in his ears, Harry, usually so alert, froze for a moment.
He thought he had heard an illusion!
How could there be an explosion at Hogwarts in the middle of the night? He must have heard wrong, or perhaps it was—
Almost simultaneously, Harry and Ron, standing on the second-floor landing beneath the Invisibility Cloak, along with the Disillusioned Hermione, all turned toward the door leading down to the basement on one side of the Entrance Hall.
It had to be that old wooden door finally meeting its end early after being violently battered by the hurricane!
Unfortunately, it was not.
Though rotten with age, the door was far tougher than they had imagined. Beneath the howling gale, it continued to bang against the frame, thud, thud, without the slightest sign of breaking apart. Yet the echoes of that explosion still lingered through the empty Hogwarts of the deep night!
Unlike them, Ilune, standing on the final step leading to the second-floor landing and holding up the hem of her nightgown, raised her faint brows as she looked toward the third floor from beginning to end.
Something had happened!
After roughly four or five seconds of silence, a sharp light finally flashed in Harry's green eyes. He realized that something out of the ordinary had happened!
"It was—"
Hermione, who had been holding her breath, began breathing again. She turned her head and looked upstairs.
Bang!
Several boxes of candy crashed heavily to the floor after slipping out of control.
"How rude. Weren't these gifts for us?"
All sorts of candies leaped from the cracked boxes and rolled everywhere across the stairs, some even tumbling into the Great Hall.
The little Vampire glared resentfully at Harry and the others as they took off running. Only