Butterfly Effect ; H. Potter

3. hippogriff flights.

"All righ'?" he said eagerly, passing them on the way to the staff table. "Yer in my firs' ever lesson! Right after lunch! Bin up since five gettin' everythin' ready ... hope it's OK ... me, a teacher ... hones'ly ..."

He grinned broadly at them and headed off to the staff table, still swinging the polecat.

"Wonder what he's been getting ready?" said Ron, a note of anxiety in his voice.

The Hall was starting to empty as people headed off towards their first lesson. Ron checked his timetable.

"We'd better go, look, Divination's at the top of North Tower. It'll take us ten minutes to go there ..."

The four finished their breakfast hastily, said goodbye to Fred and George, and walked back through the Hall. As they passed the Slytherin table, Malfoy did yet another impression of a fainting fit.

The journey through the castle to the North Tower was a long one. Two years at Hogwarts hadn't taught them everything about the castle, and they had never been inside the North Tower before.

"There's - got - to - be - a - short - cut," Ron panted, as they climbed their seventh long staircase and emerged on an unfamiliar landing, where there was nothing but a large painting of a bare stretch of grass hanging on the stone wall.

"I think it's this way," said Hermione, peering down the empty passage to the right.

"Can't be," said Ron. "That's south. Look, you can see a bit of the lake out of the window ..."

Antheia felt like fainting. Her legs on fire, she examined the painting. A fat, dapple-grey pony had just ambled onto the grass and was grazing nonchalantly. Antheia was used to the subjects of Hogwarts paintings moving around and leaving their frames to visit each other, but she always enjoyed watching them. A moment later, a short, squat knight in a suit of armour had clanked into the picture after his pony.

"Aha!" he yelled, seeing Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Antheia. "What villains are these that trespass upon my private lands? Come to scorn at my fall, perchance? Draw, you knaves, you dogs!"

They watched in astonishment as the little knight tugged his sword out of his scabbard and began brandishing it violently, hopping up and down in rage But the sword was too long for him; a particularly wild swing made him overbalance, and he landed face down in the grass.

"Are you all right?" asked Antheia, moving closer to the painting.

"Get back, you scurvy braggart! Back, you rogue!"

Antheia raised her hands, rolled her eyes, and started to complain to Ron.

The knight seized his sword again and used it to push himself back up, but the blade sank deeply into the grass and, though he pulled with all his might, he couldn't get it out again. Finally, he had to flop back down onto the grass and push up his visor to mop his sweating face.

"Listen," said Harry, taking advantage of the knight's exhaustion, "we're looking for the North Tower. You don't know the way, do you?"

"A quest!" The knight's rage seemed to vanish instantly/ He clanked to his feet and shouted, "Come follow me, dear friends, and we shall find out goal, or else perish bravely in the charge!"

He gave the sword another fruitless tug, tried and failed to mount the fat pony, and cried, "On foot then good sirs and gentle ladies! On! On!"

And he ran, clanking loudly, into the left-hand side of the frame and out of sight.

They hurried after him along the corridor, following the sound of his armour. Every now and then they spotted him running through a picture ahead.

"Be of stout heart, the worst is yet to come!" yelled the knight, and they saw him reappear in front of an alarmed group of women in crinolines, whose picture hung on the wall of a narrow spiral staircase.