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Aurora Areli
I HAD NEVER BEEN part of a stranger group.
Crookshanks was in the lead; Uncle Remus, Pettigrew, and Ron followed him down the stairs. Next came Professor Snape, drifting creepily along, his toes hitting each stair as we descended, held up by his own wand, which was being pointed at him by Sirius. Harry, Hermione and I brought up the rear.
Getting back into the tunnel was difficult. Uncle Remus, Pettigrew and Ron had to turn sideways to manage it; Uncle Remus still had Pettigrew covered with his wand. I could see them edging awkwardly along the tunnel in single file, Crookshanks still trotting ahead of them. I followed behind Harry, who went right after Sirius. The latter was still making Snape drift along in front of them; he kept bumping his lolling head on the low ceiling. I had the impression Sirius was making no effort to prevent this.
"You know what this means?" I heard Sirius say abruptly to Harry, as we made our slow progress along the tunnel. "Turning Pettigrew in?"
"You're free," Harry said. "Rory mentioned it."
"Yes . . ." Sirius said. "But I'm also — I don't know if anyone ever told you — I'm your godfather."
"Yeah, I knew that," Harry said.
"Well . . . your parents appointed me your guardian," Sirius said stiffly. "If anything happened to them . . ."
I smiled; Harry would finally be free from the custody of his awful family.
"I'll understand, of course, if you want to stay with your aunt and uncle," Sirius said. "But . . . well . . . think about it. Once my name's cleared . . . if you wanted it . . . a different home . . ."
"What — live with you? Agh!" A soft thud and the hiss of pain told me Harry had hit his head on a bit of rock protruding from the ceiling. "Leave the Dursleys?"
"Of course, I thought you wouldn't want to," Sirius said quickly. "I understand. I just thought I'd —"
"Are you mad?" Harry said, his voice as croaky with emotion as Sirius. "Of course I want to leave the Dursleys! Have you got a house? When can I move in?"
I saw Sirius turn around to look at Harry in surprise; Snape's head was scraping the ceiling but Sirius didn't seem to care.
"You want to?" he said. "You mean it?"
"Yeah, I mean it!" Harry said.
Sirius' gaunt face broke into the first true smile I had seen upon it. The difference it made was startling, as though a person ten years younger was shining through the starved mask. Hermione and I turned to each other and smiled at the happy exchange happening before us.
Nobody spoke until we had reached the end of the tunnel. Crookshanks darted up first; he had evidently pressed his paw to the knot on the trunk, because Uncle Remus, Pettigrew, and Ron clambered upwards without any sound of swinging branches.
Sirius saw Snape up through the hole, then stood back for Harry, Hermione and I to pass. At last, all of us were out.
The grounds were very dark now; the only light came from the distant windows of the castle. Without a word, we set off. Pettigrew was still wheezing and occasionally whimpering.
"One wrong move, Peter," Uncle Remus said threateningly, ahead of us. His wand was still pointed sideways at Pettigrew's chest.
Silently, we tramped through the grounds, the castle lights growing slightly larger. Snape was still drifting weirdly ahead of Sirius, his chin bumping on his chest. And then —
A cloud shifted. There were suddenly dim shadows on the ground. Our whole group was bathed in moonlight.
My body suddenly froze up when I remembered what Professor Trelawney had said earlier that day. "There is indeed a full moon tonight, my dear . . ."
Snape collided with Uncle Remus, Pettigrew and Ron, who had stopped abruptly. Sirius froze as well. He flung out an arm to make Harry and Hermione stop.
I could see Uncle Remus' silhouette up ahead. He had gone rigid, and his limbs began to shake.
"Oh my —" Hermione gasped. "He didn't take his Potion tonight! He's not safe!"
"Run," Sirius whispered. "Run! Now!"
I stared at him in disbelief. Ron was chained to Uncle Remus and Pettigrew, did Sirius expect us to just leave him? I went to take a step towards them, but Hermione grabbed my wrist and pulled me back as Sirius did so to Harry.
"Leave it to me — RUN!"
There was a terrible snarling noise. I watched in horrible fascination as Uncle Remus' head lengthened, as well as his body. His shoulders were hunching. Hair was sprouting visibly on his face and hands, which were curling into clawed paws. Crookshanks' fur was on end again, he was backing away —
As the werewolf reared, snapping its long jaws, Sirius disappeared from beside Harry. He had transformed. The enormous, bear-like dog bounded forwards. As the werewolf wrenched itself free of the manacle binding it, the dog seized it about the neck and pulled it backwards, away from Ron and Pettigrew. They were locked, jaw to jaw, claws ripping at each other —
I was too transfixed by the intensity of the battle between the two canines to notice much else. It was Hermione's scream that snapped me out of my horrified trance.
Pettigrew had dived for Uncle Remus' dropped wand. Ron, unsteady on his bandaged leg, fell. There was a bang, a burst of light — and then Ron lay motionless on the ground. Another bang — Crookshanks flew into the air and back to the earth in a heap.
Harry yelled, "Expelliarmus!" before I even had the chance to raise my wand. Uncle Remus' own wand flew high into the air and out of sight. "Stay where you are!" Harry shouted, running forwards.
But it was too late. Pettigrew had transformed.
"Petrificus Totalus!" I shouted, aiming my wand at the rat, but he was too small of a target and it was dark, so I missed. I saw his bald tail whip through the manacle on Ron's outstretched arm, and heard a scurrying through the grass.
There was a howl and a rumbling growl; I turned to see the werewolf taking flight, galloping away into the Forest.
"Sirius, he's gone, Pettigrew transformed!" Harry yelled.
Sirius was bleeding; there were gashes across his muzzle and back, but at Harry's words he scrambled up again, and in an instant, he sound of his paws was fading to silence as he pounded away across the grounds.
Harry, Hermione and I dashed over to Ron.
"What did he do to him?" Hermione whispered.
Ron's eyes were only half-closed; his mouth hung open. He was definitely alive, I could hear him breathing, but he didn't seem to recognise us.
"I-I don't know," I said, panic setting in.
I lifted my head, pushing one side of my tangled hair behind my ears so that I could look around. Sirius and Uncle Remus were both gone . . . we had no one but an unconscious Snape for company, still hanging in mid-air.
"We'd better get them up to the castle and tell someone," Harry said, brushing his own sweaty hair out of his eyes. In any other situation, I would've been distracted by how good-looking he was in the moonlight, but this was not the time. I shook my head to clear my thoughts as Harry spoke again. "Come —"
But then, out of the darkness, there came a yelping, a whimpering, a dog in pain . . .
"Sirius," Harry muttered.
He and I exchanged glances before coming to a silent agreement. There was nothing we could do for Ron at the moment, and by the sound of it, Sirius was in trouble —
We quickly got to our feet and set off at a run, with Hermione right behind us. The yelping seemed to be coming from near the lake. We pelted towards it, with Harry leading by a short stretch, when I felt it, the familiar cold, without realising what it meant.
The yelping stopped abruptly. As we reached the lake's shore I saw why — Sirius had turned back into a man. He was crouched on all fours, his hands over his head.
"Nooo," he moaned. "Noooo . . . please . . ."
And then I saw them. Dementors, at least a hundred of them, gliding in a black mass around the lake towards us. I stared around, wide eyed with terror as the familiar, icy cold feeling filled me to the brim.
"Hermione, Rory, think of something happy!" Harry yelled, raising his wand. "Expecto patronum! Expecto patronum!"
I forced myself to think of my parents, my brother, even the little I could remember of my uncle — all of us together and happy.
"Expecto patronum!" I shouted, closing my eyes at the sight of Sirius shuddering and falling motionless on the ground, pale as death. "Expecto patronum! Expect — expecto patronum!"
"Expecto patronum! Hermione, help us! Expecto patronum!"
"Expecto —" Hermione whispered, "expecto — expecto —"
But she couldn't do it. The Dementors were closing in, barely ten feet from us. They formed a solid wall around me, Harry and Hermione . . . they were getting closer . . .
I tried to think about when we won the Quidditch Cup, the feeling of complete euphoria as Harry and I were hoisted onto the shoulders of the cheering crowd, cheering for us.
"Expecto patronum!" I chanted, watching the small, silvery wisp dance through the air. "Expecto patronum!"
It was so cold.
"EXPECTO PATRONUM!" Harry yelled desperately. "EXPECTO PATRONUM!"
A thin wisp of silver escaped his wand and hovered like mist before us, intertwining with my own. At the same moment, I felt Hermione collapse next to me. I reached over and grasped Harry's hand tightly. All we had left was each other.
"Expecto — expecto patronum —"
Harry dropped to his knees, his fingers still laced with mine. I tried so hard to recall the happy memories, but all I could think about were the times I had done something bad and my parents were disappointed in me, Ron getting struck down during our first year, Hermione getting Petrified, Harry getting stabbed by the Basilisk's fang . . .
The ground seemed to sway beneath my feet. I fell, hard, onto my knees, my wand hand scraping against the grass and dirt and rocks. I could feel Harry trembling next to me.
"Expecto patronum!" he gasped.
I saw through blurred vision that the feeble light at the end of his formless Patronus caused a Dementor to halt, very close to us. It couldn't walk through the cloud of silver mist Harry conjured. A dead, slimy hand slid out from under the cloak. It made a gesture as though to sweep the Patronus aside.
"No — no —" Harry gasped. "He's innocent . . . expecto — expecto patronum —"
I could feel them watching me, hear their rattling breath like an evil wind around us. The nearest Dementor paused before Harry, like it was making up its mind about something, then raised both its rotting hands and lowered its hood.
I couldn't make out very much in the dark, but I could see that the Dementors had no distinct features like a normal person would. Only thin, grey, scabbed skin, stretched blankly over empty sockets where eyes should have been. There was also a mouth — a gaping, shapeless hole, sucking the air with the sound of a death rattle.
Harry's Patronus flickered and died.
"No . . ." I whispered, feeling around the grass for my wand, dazed. I had to fight, I had to at least try.
I raised my wand, which felt like lead in my hands, and breathed out, "Expecto patronum . . ."
The pitiful wisp of silver that erupted from my wand quickly dissipated. Harry's grip on my hand loosened as a Dementor wrapped its scabbed hands around his neck. I felt like I was drowning. The air had turned to water. Cruel laughter rang in my ears and I couldn't think anymore. All I felt was cold, unrestrained terror.
The world around me blurred as I collapsed to the grass, unconscious.