Filch took the three of us down to Professor McGonagalls office.
When we arrived however, we were met with another familiar face.
Neville. He had heard Malfoy saying that he was going to catch us with the dragon, and came to warn us.
"I would never have believed it of any of you. Mr Filch says you were up the astronomy tower. It's one o'clock in the morning. Explain yourselves." McGonagall finally says, breaking the awkward silence.
I had nothing to say. My mind was racing with lies I could make up, yet none of the were convincing enough.
"I think I've got a good idea of what's been going on," Says Professor McGonagall.
"It doesn't take a genius to work it out. You fed Draco Malfoy some cock-and-bull story about a dragon, trying to get him out of bed and into trouble. I've already caught him. I suppose you think it's funny that Longbottom here heard the story and believed it, too?" Poor Neville. He was dragged into this situation when he was only trying to help.
"I'm disgusted," Says Professor McGonagall.
'Five students out of bed in one night! I've never heard of such a thing before! You, Miss Granger, I thought you had more sense. As for you, Mr Potter, I thought Gryffindor meant more to you than this. And as for you Miss Riddle, as a teachers daughter you should know better. All four of you will receive detentions - yes, you too, Mr Longbottom, nothing gives you the right to walk around school at night, especially these days, it's very dangerous - and fifty points will be taken from your houses."
Severus is going to kill me.
~~~~~~~~~~~~|||~~~~~~~~~~~
At 11:00pm the next day, I leave my common room and head down to the entrance hall. I see everyone there, including Malfoy.
"Follow me." Filch says, leading us outside.
"I bet you'll think twice about breaking school rules again eh?" He says in a smug voice.
He leads us to Hagrid's hut, where the groundskeeper is already outside waiting for us.
"Don't think you'll be having fun with him." Filch says.
"Your going into the Forrest"
"The Forrest? We can't go in there at night!" Malfoy complains. Poor Neville looks like he's about to faint, so I put my hand on his shoulder to stabilise him.
"Abou' time." Hagrid says.
"I bin waitin' fer half an hour already."
"I'll be back at dawn." Says Filch, "for what's left of them." He adds nastily, whilst turning and back towards the castle,
"Right then." Says Hagrid.
"now, listen carefully, 'cause it's dangerous what we're gonna do tonight an' I don' want no one takin' risks. Follow me over here a moment." He leads the five of us to the edge of the Forrest.
"Look there." Says Hagrid,
"See that stuff shinin' on the ground? Silvery stuff? That's unicorn blood. There's a unicorn in there bin hurt badly by summat. This is the second time in a week. I found one dead last Wednesday. We're gonna try an' find the poor thing. We might have ter put it out of its misery."
"And what if whatever hurt the unicorn finds us first?" Says Malfoy.
"There's nothin' that lives in the Forest that'll hurt yeh if yer with me or Fang." said Hagrid.
'An' keep ter the path. Right, now, we're gonna split inter two parties an' follow the trail in diff'rent directions. There's blood all over the place, it must've bin stag- gerin' around since last night at least."
"I want Fang." Says Malfoy, clearly noticing fangs large teeth.
"All right, but I warn yeh, he's a coward." Says Hagrid.
"So me, Harry an' Hermione'll go one way an' Draco, Neville, Lilith an' Fang'll go the other. Now, if any of us finds the unicorn, we'll send up green sparks, right? Get yer wands out an' practise now - that's it - an' if anyone gets in trouble, send up red sparks, an' we'll all come an' find yeh - so, be careful - let's go."
Me, Draco and Neville all go an opposite direction to the others.
"Scared Longbottom?" Draco taunts.
"Says you Malfoy, you were shaking back there." I reply. If I have to deal with Draco this entire time, I might go insane.
Th four of us keep walking, not finding anything however. But that might just be luck. We come to a particularly creepy part of the woods and Neville stops in his tracks.
"You ok Nev?" I ask, noticing his face go pale, and his hands start to shake.
Just as he's about to reply, Draco decides it a genius idea to sneak up behind him and spook him.
Neville yells and sends up red sparks in the air, alerting the others.
"Great Malfoy! Now their gonna think there's an emergency." I say, annoyed at the boy.
"It's not my fault that Neville's a scaredy-cat!" He hisses. We hear the sounds of Hagrid's large boots coming from the trees.
"Is everythin' alrigh'?" Hagrid asks, panicked.
"Draco thought it would be a genius idea to scare Neville." I say.
"It was supposed to be a joke!"
"Well it's not very funny!"
"Alrigh' calm down you two. Lets walk back to the others." Hagrid says, splitting the two of us up.
We walk back to Harry and Hermione.
"We'll be lucky ter catch anythin' now, with the racket you lot were makin'. Right, we're changin' groups - Neville and Lilith, you stay with me an' Hermione, I don't trust that Lilith won' punch Draco square in the face. Harry, you go with Fang an' this idiot." Hagrid says.
We change our groups and set off into the Forrest. After a while of useless searching, Draco and fang run back to our group. Harry is missing.
"Where's 'arry?" Hagrid asks. Draco says nothing.
"For gods sake Draco why would you leave him alone in the Forrest!"
We all run back to where Draco left Harry and see him, on the back of a centaur.
"Harry! Harry, are you all right?"
Hermione says whilst running down the path, the rest of us behind her.
"I'm fine" Harry replies.
"The unicorn's dead, Hagrid, it's in that clearing back there."
"This is where I leave you." The centaur says. Hagrid rushes off into the clearing to find the unicorn.
"You are safe now. Good luck, Harry Potter. The planets have been read wrongly before now, even by centaurs. I hope this is one of those times." Harry slips off of the centaurs back and it runs off into the Forrest.
One things for sure, I'm never coming back into this Forrest again.
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