The Room of Requirement opened on the eighth floor of Hogwarts Castle.
In the girls' bathroom on the third floor, Moaning Myrtle, the ghost who haunted the place, watched in surprise as the head of Slytherin entered with a witch whose presence was even more sinister than hers. The witch's face was hidden beneath a wide hood. All Myrtle could see was a pale, pointed chin.
"Professor Snape!"
Myrtle was so startled she forgot to cry. She floated out of her stall, looking rather uneasy. "What are you doing here? This is the girls' bathroom!"
She put particular emphasis on "girls."
"School business."
Snape stepped onto the wet floor and looked around, his face expressionless. "Myrtle, I remember there's a tap here that never runs. Which one is it?"
"This one!"
Myrtle floated cheerfully over to a sink not far from her.
Snape soon found a tiny snake engraved on the side of a brass tap. He studied it with a dark look in his eyes, then straightened and took a step back.
"Sir Nicholas is holding a ghostly feast in his basement. If you go now, you can still make the main course."
Once Snape had deftly sent the bathroom's resident away, he turned to the black-robed witch who had stood silently behind him. "Miss Anna, unless you have other preparations, I'm going to force this entrance open."
"One moment."
The Oceania Team's vice-captain took a step forward, her voice low and hoarse. With a clatter of tiny joints, a little bone snake slipped from her sleeve and landed lightly on the brass tap. It opened its mouth and hissed, clicks threaded through the sound.
A few seconds later.
The tap flashed with dazzling white light and began spinning rapidly. The bricks around the sink shifted too. Like the