Jupiter | Harry James Potter

xviii ; under the tree

"Scabbers!" Ron gasped, quickly reaching for his rat. "Scabbers, what are you doing here?"

"Oh, no way." I scoffed, leaning away from the rat. "There is no way a rat like Scabbers made his way all the way down here and into Hagrid's milk jug."

"Who would've put him there, Jo?" Harry asked, his eyebrows furrowed as he stared at me with his head cocked to the side.

"I don't know, but I'm telling you right now, that mother-fucker is not a rat." I said, and Scabbers suddenly began to squeal and squirm like crazy.

"It's okay, Scabbers!" Ron said, trying to keep his grip on Scabbers. "There's no cats! Nothing here to hurt you."

"They're comin'." Hagrid said as he stood up, his puffy eyes fixated on the people walking towards his cabin outside his window. "Yeh' gotta go. They mustn't find yeh' here."

Ron stuffed Scabbers in his pocket and Hermione grabbed the cloak. Hagrid opened his back door and we all hurried out of it and into his back garden and behind a few pumpkins.

"It's okay, Beaky." Hagrid stuttered. Buckbeak was calmly laying in front of the pumpkins we were behind. "Go on! Ge' goin'!"

None of us moved an inch.

"Hagrid, we've gotta do something."

"They can't kill him!"

"We'll tell them what happened!"

"We can set him free!"

"Go!" Hagrid boomed. "It's bad enough withou' you lot in trouble!"

Hagrid hustled back into his hut and shut the door just as Fudge knocked on his front door, the executioner and Dumbledore close behind.

There was a snap of a tree branch, and Hermione's head whipped around.

"What?" Harry asked, and her eyebrows furrowed as she stared into the woods behind us.

"Nothing." She muttered as she threw the cloak over us. "Let's go." We ran up the large grassy hill to the castle, all of us nearly tripling over one another.

"Ron, what're you doing?" I asked as Ron stopped in his tracks.

"It's Scabbers! He won't stop moving!" He said, fumbling with the rat in his hands as it tried to bite him.

"Okay, Ron, please let's move." Hermione begged as she looked back to Hagrid's hut where the executioner was moving closer to Buckbeak.

"I can't hold him!" Ron grumbled. "Scabbers, stay put!"

Although Scabbers' squeals and Ron's frustrated noises were loud, nothing could've masked the booming thud of an axe behind us.

"They... they actually did it." Hermione muttered, her eyes filling with tears.

"We should've done something." I said, biting my lip as I looked down to the grass with guilt.

"Hagrid..." Harry said, taking a step forward towards Hagrid's hut.

"Harry, no." Ron said as Hermione and I both grabbed him by the arms. "He'll be in worse trouble if they know we're down here."

"I can't believe they did it." Hermione choked, tears streaming down her cheeks as she dug her fingers into Harry's eyes.

"We've gotta keep moving." I sighed, my heart turning to lead as I took one final glance towards Hagrid's pumpkin patch and didn't see the head of Buckbeak sticking above the plants. We continued to walk, the sky turning from a ruby-red to a pitch black.

"Scabbers! Hold still!" Ron hissed as the rat squirmed helplessly beneath his grip. "What's the matter with you? Stay still- OUCH! He bit me!"

Ron dropped Scabbers from his grasp, and the rat scurried through the grass.

"Scabbers!" Ron yelled, throwing the cloak off of himself. "Come back!"

We all took the cloak off and sprinted after Ron, leaving it sitting on the grass. Ron had vanished on the other side of the hill, and his calls to Scabbers had stopped. Once we reached the other side, we quickly realized why.

Something was bounding towards us in the dark. An enormous, blue-eyed, pitch-black dog. Before any of us could even begin to reach for our wands, the dog leaped for Harry. Harry was knocked to the grass by the dog's large two front paws, and as Harry tried to stand back up, the dog took a hold of Ron's leg.

"Help!" Ron yelled as the dog dragged him down the hill, and towards the Whomping Willow.

"Ron!" Harry yelled as I helped him get back to his feet, and he took off running after the dog.

"Harry, watch out!" I called as Hermione and I took a step back, and Harry was instantly hit by a large tree branch. It was now extremely dark, and all we could see of Ron was his fingers gripping the base of the trunk. The dog had pulled him under the tree.

"Harry, we've got to go for help!" Hermione cried, dodging a wild branch that had come swinging her way.

"No! That things big enough to eat him- look out!" Harry yelled, pointing behind me. I turned around, and quickly ducked down. A branch had been aiming for my head.

"We're never going to get in without help!" Hermione argued.

"If that dog can get in, so can we." Harry said, but before either of us could respond, we were all hit by the largest branch of the tree.

The painful blow had swung us to the front of the tree, and sent us rolling down towards and under the trunk. We all landed in the dirt under the tree, and I had felt like I had broken a few ribs at least as a sharp pain in my chest began to spread.

"You guys alright?" Harry asked weakly as he slowly got to his feet. Hermione just coughed in response and clung onto the dirt wall beside her to stand up.

"I will be." I winced as Harry held out a hand to help me up. "Thanks."

"Don't mention it." He said as he pulled me off the ground.

"Where do you think this goes?" Hermione asked as she peered into a long, dark tunnel that lead away from the castle. Harry's face turned pale as he looked down the tunnel.

"I have a hunch." He muttered. "Let's just hope I'm wrong."

We moved as fast as we could, and after being beaten to a pulp by a tree, it wasn't very quick. My breathing was resorting to small, sharp gasps as we hurried down the never-ending tunnel.

Suddenly, the tunnel started to rise, and there was a patch of light showing through a small opening. As we reached the opening, we all drew our wands from our pockets, preparing to face the dog.

On the other end of the opening was a very dusty, dingy room. There were claw marks all along the old, blue wallpaper and every bit of furniture had been smashed to pieces.

"We're in the Shrieking Shack." Hermione gasped as she looked out of a small gap in the boarded-up windows.

"Ghosts didn't do this." Harry muttered, his eyes traveling from one piece of broken furniture to the next.

"No..." I said, trailing my fingers down a huge claw mark in the wall paper. "Definitely not a ghost."

At that moment, there was a creak in the floorboard above us. We quietly creeped down the dusty hall, and up the crumbling staircase. I could feel myself clinging onto Harry's arm in fear, possibly a bit too hard, but he didn't seem to mind.

Harry pushed open the weak door at the end of the staircase as we quietly walked in, and the first sight to come into view was Ron, sitting on the floor in the corner, clutching his leg.

"Watch out!" Ron yelled instantly, and he pointed a bloody finger behind us. "It's him! He's an animagus!"

The door shut behind us aggressively, and standing on the opposite side of the room was a man with matted black curls that reached the striped, dirty prison robes which were draped around his underfed body. His yellow teeth were bared in a mad grin, and there seemed to be nothing but revenge behind his chilling blue eyes. I had seen this man all too many times, but nothing compared to seeing him in person. I stood in the center of the room, unable to move as I stared down my father.