It hurt, it hurt, it-

Oh. In a flash, the grindylow that had chomped down on his foot was gone and, momentarily forgetting about the pain, he looked towards the source of the jet of boiling water to see Eria. Too dazed to say a word, he nodded gratefully at her, making sure to thank her properly once they were out of that whole mess.

Finally, Bartholomew and professor Wayland were there, so he wasted no time to push himself up to the surface, already feeling the effects of the gillyweed fading away as he approached the shore. Once out, he sat down near the lake, enjoying the feeling of air filling his lungs once again as his gills were disappearing, and his hands and feet were turning back to normal. Speaking of which...

He was afraid to look at his foot, which was throbbing in pain from where the grindylow had bitten. It was- oh, he looked, and he could only bite his lip to keep himself from whining. Did he carry any dittany in his bag? He couldn't remember, but he took his wand out of its holster and summoned his bag to search for anything useful through it, no longer caring that he was dripping wet and cold and getting his bag wet, as well.

Sorry, professor Wayland, but no swimming lessons for him. He was just fine with staying on solid ground for the rest of his life.

Vivian's number one priority at the moment was to make sure the ickles were safe, but it was a horrifying sight to see those grindylows attack. How long have they not eaten? The Head Girl didn't want to stay long enough to know. She tried not to seem terrified, but honestly, this was just terrible.

"Lydia, hey!" Vivian called out for one of her Slytherin ickles. "Come on. Let's go. Everyone else too, please!" She'd buy them some time to swim away if she had to. But that was until one of the grindylows had bitten her, and the seventh year yelled in pain. Mostly bubbles, but that HURT. She was not going to cry, she was not. They were underwater. They wouldn't see, right?

Thankfully, whoever had sent the charm on the beast on her leg had saved her, and Vivian had to force herself not to let the pain take control. She needed to get to the surface, and fast. Vivian waited for the rest of the younger ones to swim ahead before she followed, like the good student leader she was supposed to. But it still hurt, the bite. She wasn't going to turn into a grindylow, right?!

Pain pain pain pain.

It was painful - exciting in a way too - but PAINFUL and the worst part of it all was that the grindylow was NOT budging since it managed to sink its teeth pretty far into his muscly legs. Though, thankfully, in the next moment there was a flash of light and someone's spell had struck the creature and dislodged it from his leg. Eyes frantically looking around, Derf just barely managed to catch the Slytherin girl, Lydia, pointing her wand in his direction for just a second before she began swimming like mad towards the surface.

He would thank her once he got out of the water THAT was for sure.

AND THERE WAS BARTHOLOMEW HENRY! FOR THE LOVE OF MERLIN THANK MERLIN.

It was complete chaos, and all the motion between people and grindylow and spells was making the visibility in turbulent and murky water even more difficult to process for his gillyweed enhanced eyes. But the fifth year continued to blast spells when he hear the holy voice that was Professor Wayland's. Well, yeah, that was. Yeah. Okay. SWIMMING!

Spotting an injured classmate nearby, Derf pushed through his own agony as a steady stream of crimson oozed from his own leg and swam towards them. Quickly draping their arm over his shoulders, the fifth year kicked firmly with his feet and, for a time, the adrenaline was enough to dull the pain. But soon it was more than a throb and he could feel his muscles giving out from the puncture wound. "H-Hold on to me," he instructed frantically as he readied his wand. "ASCENDIO!"

AND SHOOOOOOOOOOOM up they went until their heads popped out of the water and into the crisp and glorious fresh air. Now to just swim to shore, which would be accomplished with some difficulty considering how far out they were, but Derf tried his best with a side paddle while not letting go of his companion.

Kye-Shark was fighting a losing battle, and she wished she had better control of her magic while underwater. If she had, she would have turned back to human and been shooting spells, but noooooooooooooo she had to try being a shark for a time. Kye-Shark wondered how well she had cast the spell on herself. When would she turn back? She kept trying to scatter the grindylows, seeing students swim and fly back to the surface. Yes, good, get back to safety! Kye-Shark turned around, the smell of blood still coursing through her nose. She could almost feel her eyes dilating, the urge to eat the grindylows growing... She heard a scream. How she could hear it was beyond her, but when she turned she noticed Eria there. Kye-Shark was able to get rid of her disgusting 'eat the grindylows' goal, and decided to help round up the students. What if their gillyweed began to fail or something? They didn't need any casualties, thanks.

After Professor Wayland told them to start returning to the surface, Kye-Shark offered herself as a boost to a few of the kiddies before feeling the spell beginning to wear off. She swam back towards the surface, wishing she could have helped get more students out of the lake. Imagine if things had gone as planned and they were having a nice conversation with a mermaid right now instead of children just shooting out of the lake?! But this was Hogwarts after all. And when was there ever a boring year at Hogwarts?

All hell had broken loose as soon as Nettie had gotten her little hands on the treasure, with grindylows coming out of NOWHERE and attacking them again! She shrugged off Quinn's grip on her arm and then, letting out a little yell that came out as a stream of bubbles, she swam behind a nearby rock and was able to hide from the attack. Thank MERLIN for being small! She seemed to go completely unnoticed behind the giant water boulder she found.

Her hands were curled in to fists with a few small pieces of treasure still locked in a vice grip around them. Once the coast seemed clear, she looked down at her hands and debated what she should do before swimming back to the surface. Did she keep it? Did she toss it and leave it behind? What did she dooooooo? Derf had warned her that maybe it was the treasure belonging to the mermaids, and it could be considered stealing, but WHY would they leave it all the way out here? Where they had to go through a pack of angry grindylows to get it?

Biting her lip, she dropped most of the treasure - except one shiny dubloon, which she tucked into the bun she'd tied up on the top of her head. Then, she followed Professor Wayland's instructions and started to swim up to the surface - which was actually super convenient timing, since she could feel her breathing becoming a bit more difficult as the gillyweed was starting to wear off.

Bartholomew was not about to give up so easily. Years upon years of experience with grindylows helped him to not feel sorry for packing the punches. Old Bart was just as stubborn about defeating them with the help of the students and Tristan. Everything was working. The spells and the slaps and punches were drawing the grindylows back. Then they retreated to their cave. Bartholomew was relieved and happy at the same time.

"What wonderful teamwork. Tristan, the students all need to go immediately.'' Bartholomew, in the meanwhile, would keep a sharp lookout should the retreated grindylows decided to try rushing at them again. Or if any of those affected by spells started becoming free of them.

Eria was determined to stand her ground, stubborn to a fault and enraged from the pain. However,...she didn't happen to be good at healing spells and the blood was visibly flowing from her leg. While in a defensive position, the lanky brunette was getting foggier by the moment....all her little person things were okay...Beth, Quinn, Daniel, Reese...so it was okay.

Hey, if she died they'd never know she cared. Okay, dramatic but funny to her. She was debating the best angle of retreat now that his Squidness and the professor had this...but then a searing pain engulfed her hand and wrist. The snake's green eyes flashed and a hiss roared from her lips...but she realized it wasn't a denizen of the deep and relented.

She was a bloody Hufflepuff and causing agony...but the older girl meant well so Eria started to swim as hard as she could with a wounded appendage. Her hand felt like it was being crushed to pieces...it wasn't the girl's fault, she didn't know...but it took everything in the 5th year not to scream. Keeping her face turned away, she used a mermaid like thrust to just keep swimming.

Once they broke the surface, once she was on shore, Eria flopped onto the ground just letting her body collapse. Anything to get away from the blonde's grasp and to just let her leg be...although she couldn't tell if she was still bleeding, heck or even if she was missing a chunk. Was she tasty you nasty little gremlins!? ......Was the sky always this blue...was it always fuzzy???

The one good thing about having allowed her hesitation to take hold of her was that Stasya was relatively out of the range of the grindylow attack. At least, they’d seemed much more focused on the others, going after the treasure further inside the cave or rushing in to rescue people like the bleeding Slytherin girl. It ought to have been easy to flee, but the Gryffindor in the prefect had kept her floating just inside the lip of the cave, wand still out, but she’d avoided casting any spells out of a worry that she’d accidentally hit one of the other students in the chaos. Or the professor or Bartholomew Henry as the two had arrived to join the fight.

As it was, she was definitely not okay with how many people were bleeding. Lots of ickles. That Slytherin girl. Rylee. Vivian. Professor Wayland. Derf.

Nope. She was not okay with this at all, and considering she wasn’t even sure if her and Derf’s red spark spell had helped in the rescue anyway as she had seen Bel swimming off earlier. But she also refused to leave until she knew for a fact everyone else was out of the cave and safe, and therefore, her wandwas staying out and she was rapidly going through the dueling spells in her mental inventory for what might work underwater the best.

Chaos, it had been utter chaos. The searing pain that played in her classmates eyes as they were bitten…and that feeling of defeat as they had tried to latch on to her as well. It took a moment for Beth to make it to the surface, and truly it was all thanks to Eria, Prefect Paton, and the Squid that she had truly made it out, well, and Professor Wayland. He was a hero.

Beth knew of course, that she needed to thank them…but there was something else she needed to do. Hobbling a bit the blonde made her way over towards where her Gryffindor friend was. ”D-Daehyun? I’m sorry that I got you into danger…” she was apologizing to him not because of the danger, but because he had been the one to try and stop her.

Had she stayed closer to him maybe – maybe he wouldn’t have been attacked? Maybe none of this would have happened.

Honestly Harriet didn't care if she was hurting the girl. If the girl passed out then she'd have no chance of surviving. A little pain was a lot better than dying. So Hattie was not going to get go. Not until they were up on solid ground. The girl could be healed, so the pain wouldn't matter. She just needed to get her out of the water. Maybe she could apologise later? But she wasn't going to say sorry for saving her life. The pain would go away, and she'd be alive. That was all that mattered to her.

She sighed, glad to be out of the water. That was a good thing. "Are you feeling okay?" The blonde asked, kneeling down to look over the girl. Now she was wishing she had let her mother teach her some healing spells. She did kind of know what they needed to do. "You need to put pressure on your wound.... to stop the bleeding....." She had no idea if she girl was even up to doing it right now. If not, well potentially she could now bleed to death. Goodness would this ever end.

The blonde glanced around. hmm. Maybe someone should go get the healer? Maybe Professor Wayland would send for her when he was out of the water.

Once everyone reached the surface, those requiring medical attention were immediately taken to the hospital wing and checked out by Healer Macmillan.

Students that brought with them items that were found in the underwater cave were promptly asked to hand them over.

A number of staff members and the Giant Squid later returned to the underwater cave to retrieve the rest of the treasure. These items were taken to a secure location in the castle to be thoroughly examined.

The mystery still remains and many questions are left unanswered. How did these items get in the lake? Who put them there? Why? And what does this discovery have in store for Hogwarts?