Sharon Maloney's Arc

Chapter 2 of 3

Sharon spent Friday running through the plan again. Every word polished. Every laugh mapped. The girl she recruited would start the chain reaction, and Priya would never recover. But Saturday morning in the library, a second Ravenclaw sat down across from her. A boy she recognized from her year but never bothered tracking. He leaned forward and said he knew about Thursday too. He wanted a role in it, or everyone else would know by lunch. Sharon kept her face blank and closed her notes. She led him outside to the pumpkin patch near the greenhouses where no one came this early. The vines were thick enough to hide anyone who wanted to watch. He smiled when she asked how he knew. He pointed to the rows of pumpkins and said he'd been harvesting for Herbology when she rehearsed the Priya lines out loud two weeks ago. Then he pulled out a telegraph device from his bag, brass keys gleaming, with a strip of paper tape hanging from the spools. The tape showed her exact words in coded dots and dashes. He'd written it all down the same night. Sharon ran the numbers. Two collaborators meant two weak points. But if she refused him, he'd burn the whole plan before Thursday even arrived. She told him he could have a role, but smaller than the girl's. He'd sit in the front row and ask Priya a question right before the demonstration. Something that would make her feel confident. He nodded and tucked the telegraph back in his bag. Sharon walked away knowing her ledger just got messier. That night she stood in front of her mirror and rehearsed again, but this time she added his question into the sequence. The timing still worked. The laugh would still land. But she couldn't stop thinking about the pumpkin patch and how long he'd been watching. She didn't control the plan anymore. The plan controlled her. She kept rehearsing anyway.