It was the cusp between Wednesday and Thursday, and there was nothing else in the Castle apart from the burning oil on the walls that crackled now and then.
The Headmaster's Office was not far from Gryffindor Tower.
Holding Crookshanks in his arms, Su Er tiptoed along the corridor, occasionally turning a corner and climbing a stone step, until he reached the portrait of Sir Cadogan, who guarded the entrance to the Gryffindor Common Room, without a hitch.
Fully armed, Sir Cadogan was dozing against a tree in his portrait, while his inseparable fat, short-legged gray pony nibbled away at the weeds by his feet. Strangely, no matter how much the fat pony chewed, the weeds never seemed to diminish.
Su Er silently took a slip of paper from his side pocket. On it were Gryffindor's passwords for the week.
Let me see... oh, here we are. The password for Wednesday and Thursday is-
"Disgraceful, despicable traitor..." What kind of bizarre password was that...? Su Er could not help tilting his head.
Who was Cadogan referring to? He looked at the earlier passwords: filthy bleep-bleep (censored) dog, shameless big beard...
Judging by these passwords, there was clearly some story behind Sir Cadogan's choices. He was very curious about what the knight had been through.
Su Er shook his head, shaking away his scattered thoughts, folded the slip of paper and put it in his pocket, then took out his wand, pointed its tip at his throat, and silently recited an incantation.
It was a very minor, very easy spell to perform. Its effect was to make his voice hoarse-the same spell Su Er had used the day he went to beat Black up.
"Disgraceful, despicable traitor." A hoarse voice rang out outside the quiet Gryffindor Common Room.
The snot bubble