Term Forty-Eight: Flight of the Hawk
| House Point Totals |
| Slytherin | 1752 |
| Gryffindor | 1395 |
| Hufflepuff | 1337 |
| Ravenclaw | 886 |
Plot summary by Zoe
The time has come for the Hawk to Fly
After the dramatics of last term still on the mind's of many, the staff and students surprisingly kicked off the term with a smooth start. The first few weeks of classes went just like they do at any other school, and Quidditch finally made its return. The hawk that was painted above the bulletin board nearly a year ago dried and began to fade. Will there finally be a quiet year at Hogwarts? The school sure could use a break!
A trip to Hogsmeade on Hallowe'en brings the magical school out of its heavenly grace period and drags it back to reality. While students are trick-or-treating in the village, the mysterious red hawk from the term prior resurfaces. A number of students, among them Ravenclaw Cassandra McNally and Gryffindor Rylee Prichard, were found in a trance-like state as they sprawled bloody hawks on the walls of Dervish and Banges, Honeydukes, Madame Puddifoot's, and Simply Stylish Salon.
It eventually became clear that this was no simple Hallowe'en prank. Another red hawk, this time painted on the swinging pendulum in the Clock Tower and moving as if in flight, demanded everyone's attention: whoever was behind the shenanigans of last term had unfinished business and they were back in action.
In the months that followed, more hawk graffiti appeared throughout the corridors of the castle in the dead of night (later to be revealed that had Slytherin Maxton Carden and Hufflepuff Emmalyn Walsh been possessed). Fear of the mysterious red hawk sprang again throughout Hogwarts, this time a number of students, such as Slytherin Valkyrie Atwater, were found painting more red hawks around the school.
Adding onto the fear was the very public spectacle that occurred during the Hogwarts Job Fair in the Great Hall. The candles floating overhead unexpectedly began dripping red, forming the shape of a hawk on the floor. Then, to top it all off, the ominous "EXPOSE THE INEQUALITY. END THE STRUGGLE." slogan from the term before made a reappearance. Needless to say, it made quite a scene for the students, staff, and those running the booths.
Time continued moving onward, bringing more red hawks and possessions. It also brought an envelope, looking just like the one from the term before -- black and with the name Kaysha Stewart scrawled in red. The message, however, was not the same. This time it read: "The time has come for the Hawk to Fly."
Days later, a trip to Dufftown was arranged courtesy of Stewart. She, along with co-chaperones Kalen Kennedy and Laurel Vance, loaded students up onto a bus and travelled to the Muggle town for a weekend getaway right before final exams were in session.
What was meant to be an innocent and fun trip of wandering the streets of Dufftown and interacting with its local Muggles, though, quickly took quite a turn. Stewart 'stumbled' upon two familiar faces: Melanie and Duncan Williams, the latter of whom blew a fresh handful of powder onto the Muggle Studies professor and thus prompted her to reveal a bag full of items that had been stolen from students and cursed with Dark Magic months prior to the field trip.
With a wave, the owners of these items started changing the ominous slogan that had appeared on the ceiling of the Great Hall during the job fair. Hufflepuff Derfael Ashburry-Hawthorne, Slytherin Valkyrie Atwater, Ravenclaw Jessa Cambridge, Gryffindor Ronan Carter, Gryffindor Faith Chosen, Gryffindor Stasya Dalgaard-Volkova, Slytherin Vivian Fairfield, Ravenclaw Dorian Katharos, Slytherin Flynn Kowalski, Ravenclaw Cassandra McNally, Gryffindor Rylee Prichard, Hufflepuff Scarlett Reynolds, Hufflepuff Emmalyn Walsh, and others fell victim to the possession.
Those not possessed were quick to be concerned about this exposure and breaking of the Statute of Secrecy, whereas the local Muggles found the possessions to be part of some sort of an attack. The Williams twins, however, found an error in their grand scheme: too many students had been possessed, making their mission of exposing the magical world to the Muggles a failure.
Professors Curtains, Hawthorne, Hirsch, Marchand, and Noble were called to the scene. Some began to create Portkeys to whisk students back to the castle; others tried to stop Stewart and keep the Williams twins from escaping. Stewart's bag was set on fire by Vance (which awoke students from their possessions); Gaston Marchand, with the help of Slytherin Skylar Diggory and Ravenclaw Jacen Reed, attempted to chase after Duncan before he made his escape; Gryffindors Olivia Phillips and Ronan Carter brought down Stewart; and Regina Hawthorne tied up Melanie just in time for employees of the Magical Law Enforcement and Accidents & Catastrophes to be called. It was learned that the twins were behind getting Stewart to do their bidding from afar through the use of mind-altering corpse powder and revealed their cause of taking down Statue and eradicating the Pure-bloods from their positions with the help of Muggles.
In the end, the Muggles in Dufftown were promptly Obliviated, Melanie Williams was taken into custody, and the remaining students were taken back to the school. The remainder of the school year ended quietly with exams and the End-of-Term Feast.
Term 47 | Term 48 | Term 49
