There was a definite end-of-the-holidays gloom in the air when Kirra awoke the next morning. Heavy rain was still splattering against the window as she got dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt; they would change into their school robes on the Hogwarts Express.
She, Ginny and Hermione had just reached the first-floor landing on their way down to breakfast, when Mrs. Weasley appeared at the foot of the stairs, looking harassed. "Arthur!" she called up the staircase. "Arthur! Urgent message from the Ministry!"
Kirra flattened herself against the wall as Mr. Weasley came clattering past with his robes on back-to-front and hurtled out of sight and not far behind, the rest of the boys all came tumbling down the stairs.
When Harry and the others entered the kitchen, they saw Mrs. Weasley rummaging anxiously in the drawers — "I've got a quill here somewhere!" — and Mr. Weasley bending over the fire, talking to — Amos Diggory who's head was sitting in the middle of the flames like a large, bearded egg.
It was talking very fast, completely unperturbed by the sparks flying around it and the flames licking its ears. ". . . Muggle neighbors heard bangs and shouting, so they went and called those what-d'you-call-'ems — please-men. Arthur, you've got to get over there —"
"Here!" said Mrs. Weasley breathlessly, pushing a piece of parchment, a bottle of ink, and a crumpled quill into Mr. Weasley'shands.
"— it's a real stroke of luck I heard about it," said Mr. Diggory's head. "I had to come into the office early to send a couple of owls, and I found the Improper Use of Magic lot all setting off — if Rita Skeeter gets hold of this one, Arthur —"
"What does Mad-Eye say happened?" asked Mr. Weasley, unscrewing the ink bottle, loading up his quill, and preparing to take notes, Kirra suddenly began to pay attention at the mention of Mad-eye moody, they had been quite close in her past life when she was part of the order.
Mr. Diggory's head rolled its eyes. "Says he heard an intruder in his yard. Says he was creeping toward the house, but was ambushed by his dustbins."
"What did the dustbins do?" asked Mr. Weasley, scribbling frantically.
"Made one hell of a noise and fired rubbish everywhere, as far as I can tell," said Mr. Diggory. "Apparently one of them was still rocketing around when the please-men turned up —"
Mr. Weasley groaned. "And what about the intruder?"
"Arthur, you know Mad-Eye," said Mr. Diggory's head, rolling its eyes again. "Someone creeping into his yard in the dead of night? More likely there's a very shell-shocked cat wandering around somewhere, covered in potato peelings. But if the Improper Use of Magic lot get their hands on Mad-Eye, he's had it — think of his record — we've got to get him off on a minor charge, something in your department — what are exploding dustbins worth?"
"Might be a caution," said Mr. Weasley, still writing very fast, his brow furrowed. "Mad-Eye didn't use his wand? He didn't actually attack anyone?"
"I'll bet he leapt out of bed and started jinxing everything hecould reach through the window," said Mr. Diggory, "but they'll have a job proving it, there aren't any casualties."
"All right, I'm off," Mr. Weasley said, and he stuffed the parchment with his notes on it into his pocket and dashed out of the kitchen again. Mr. Diggory's head looked around at Mrs. Weasley.
"Sorry about this, Molly," it said, more calmly, "bothering you so early and everything . . . but Arthur's the only one who can get mad-Eye off, and Mad-Eye's supposed to be starting his new job today. Why he had to choose last night . . ."
"Never mind, Amos," said Mrs. Weasley. "Sure you won't have a bit of toast or anything before you go?"
"Oh go on, then," said Mr. Diggory. Mrs. Weasley took a piece of buttered toast from a stack on the kitchen table, put it into the fire tongs, and transferred it into Mr.Diggory's mouth.
"Fanks," he said in a muffled voice, and then, with a small pop, vanished.
Kirra could hear Mr. Weasley calling hurried good-byes to everyone as he grabbed all of the stuff that he would be needing for work. Within five minutes, he was back in the kitchen, his robes on the right way now, dragging a comb through his hair.
"I'd better hurry — you have a good term, boys, and you too girls" said Mr. Weasley to Kirra, Ginny, Hermione Harry, Ron, and the twins, fastening a cloak over his shoulders and preparing to Disapparate. "Molly, are you going to be all right taking the kids to King's Cross?"
"Of course I will," she said. "You just look after Mad-Eye, we'll be fine." As Mr. Weasley vanished, Bill and Charlie entered the kitchen.
"Did someone say Mad-Eye?" Bill asked. "What's he been up to now?"
"He says someone tried to break into his house last night," said Mrs. Weasley.
"Mad-Eye Moody?" said George thoughtfully, spreading marmalade on his toast. "Isn't he that nutter —"
"He isnt a nutter, he is actually very brilliant," Kirra interupeted and George raised his eyesbrows for a second before shrugging his shoulders
"Kirra is right. Your father thinks very highly of Mad-Eye Moody," said Mrs.Weasley sternly. "Yeah, well, Dad collects plugs, doesn't he?" said Fred quietly as Mrs. Weasley left the room. "Birds of a feather . . ."
"Moody was a great wizard in his time," said Bill.
"He's an old friend of Dumbledore's, isn't he?" said Charlie.
"Dumbledore's not what you'd call normal, though, is he?" said Fred. "I mean, I know he's a genius and everything . . ."
"I knew him in my past life actually, he was one of the best wizards I knew," Kirra told them and Bill and Charlie seemed intersted but Harry just seemed confused
"Who is Mad-Eye?" asked Harry.
"He's retired, used to work at the Ministry," said Charlie. "I met him once when Dad took me into work with him. He was an Auror — one of the best . . . a Dark wizard catcher," he added, seeing Harry's blank look.
Kirra quickly spoke up, "Half the cells in Azkaban are full because of him. He made himself loads of enemies, though . . . the families of people he caught, mainly . . ."
Bill then cut in as he nodded his head, "and I heard he's been getting really paranoid in his old age. Doesn't trust anyone anymore. Sees Dark wizards everywhere."
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Bill and Charlie decided to come and see everyone off at King's Cross station, but Percy, apologizing most profusely, said that he really needed to get to work.
"I just can't justify taking more time off at the moment," he told them. "Mr. Crouch is really starting to rely on me."
"Yeah, you know what, Percy?" said George seriously while Fred and Kirra were snickering behind him, already knowing what George was about to say. "I reckon he'll know your name soon."
Mrs. Weasley had braved the telephone in the village post office to order three ordinary Muggle taxis to take them into London. "Arthur tried to borrow Ministry cars for us," Mrs. Weasley whispered to Kirra as they stood in the rain-washed yard, watching the taxi drivers heaving six heavy Hogwarts trunks into their cars.
"But there weren't any to spare. . . . Oh dear, they don't look happy, do they?" Kirra didn't like to tell Mrs. Weasley that Muggle taxi drivers rarely transported over excited owls, and Pigwidgeon was making an earsplitting racket.
Nor did it help that a number of Filibuster's Fabulous Wet-Start, No-Heat Fireworks went off unexpectedly when Kirra's trunk sprang open, causing the driver carrying it to yell with fright and pain as Crookshanks and whiskers clawed their way up the man's legs
The journey was uncomfortable, owing to the fact that they were jammed in the back of the taxis with their trunks. Crookshanks and Whiskers took quite a while to recover from the fireworks, and by the time they entered London, Kirra, George, Fred, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were all severely scratched. They were very relieved to get out at King's Cross, even though the rain was coming down harder than ever, and they got soaked carrying their trunks across the busy road and into the station.
Kirra was well beyond getting used to getting onto platform nine and three-quarters by now. It was a simple matter of walking straight through the apparently solid barrier dividing platforms nine and ten.
The only tricky part was doing this in an unobtrusive way, so as to avoid attracting Muggle attention. They did it in groups today; Kirra, Harry, Ron,and Hermione (the most conspicuous, since they were accompanied by Pigwidgeon, Whiskers and Crookshanks) went first; they leaned casually against the barrier, chatting unconcernedly, and slid sideways through it . . . and as they did so, platform nine and three-quarters materialized in front of them.
The Hogwarts Express, a gleaming scarlet steam engine, was already there, clouds of steam billowing from it, through which the many Hogwarts students and parents on the platform appeared like dark ghosts.
Kirra couldnt help it as she looked around for Mattheo, her eyes danced along the crowd of people looking for the familiar brown eyes, but she had no luck finding him, nor did she have any luck finding Theodore or Jasper.
Pigwidgeon became noisier than ever in response to the hooting of many owls through the mist. Kirra, Harry, Ron, and Hermione set off to find seats, and were soon stowing their luggage in a compartment halfway along the train.
They then hopped backdown onto the platform to say good-bye to Mrs. Weasley, Bill, and Charlie.
"I might be seeing you all sooner than you think," said Charlie, grinning, as he hugged Kirra good-bye.
"Why?" said Fred keenly.
"You'll see," said Charlie. "Just don't tell Percy I mentioned it . . . it's 'classified information, until such time as the Ministry sees fit to release it,' after all."
"Yeah, I sort of wish I were back at Hogwarts this year," said Bill, hands in his pockets, looking almost wistfully at the train.
"Why?" said George impatiently.
"You're going to have an interesting year," said Bill, his eyestwinkling. "I might even get time off to come and watch a bit of it. . . ."
"A bit of what?" said Kirra
"I can't tell you, but you in particular will like it," Charlie tells Kirra with a grin.
She went to ask why but at that moment, the whistle blew, and Mrs. Weasley chivvied them toward the train doors.
"Thanks for having us to stay, Mrs. Weasley," said Kirra as they climbed on board, closed the door, and leaned out of the window to talk to her.
"Yeah, thanks for everything, Mrs. Weasley," said Harry.
"Oh it was my pleasure, dears," said Mrs. Weasley. "I'd inviteyou for Christmas, but . . . well, I expect you're all going to want to stay at Hogwarts, what with . . . one thing and another."
"Mum!" said Ron irritably. "What d'you three know that we don't?"
"You'll find out this evening, I expect," said Mrs. Weasley, smiling. "It's going to be very exciting — mind you, I'm very glad they've changed the rules —"
"What rules?" said Kirra, Fred, and George together.
"I'm sure Professor Dumbledore will tell you. . . . Now, behave, won't you? Won't you, Fred? And you, George? Oh Kirra, do make sure that they behave."
The pistons hissed loudly and the train began to move. "Tell us what's happening at Hogwarts!" Fred bellowed out of the window as Mrs. Weasley, Bill, and Charlie sped away from them. "What rules are they changing?"
But Mrs. Weasley only smiled and waved. Before the train had rounded the corner, she, Bill, and Charlie had Disapparated.
Kirra, Harry, Ron, and Hermione went back to their compartment. The thick rain splattering the windows made it very difficult to see out of them. Ron undid his trunk, pulled out his maroon dress robes, and flung them over Pigwidgeon's cage to muffle his hooting.
"Bagman wanted to tell us what's happening at Hogwarts," he said grumpily, sitting down next to Harry while Hermione and Kirra sat across from them. "At the World Cup, remember? But my own mother won't say. Wonder what —"
"Shh!" Hermione whispered suddenly, pressing her finger to herlips and pointing toward the compartment next to theirs. Kirra, Harry and Ron listened, and heard a familiar drawling voice drifting inthrough the open door.
". . . Father actually considered sending Mattheo and I to Durmstrang rather than Hogwarts, you know. He knows the headmaster, you see. Well, you know his opinion of Dumbledore — the man's such a Mudblood-lover — and Durmstrang doesn't admit that sort of riffraff. But Mother didn't like the idea of me going to school so far away and aparantly Mattheo's father requested for Mattheo to come here. Father says Durmstrang takes a far more sensible line than Hogwarts about the Dark Arts. Durmstrang students actually learn them, not just the defense rubbish we do. . . ."