[Part 6] "Harry Potter and Prisoner of Azkaban" by Rowling J.K.

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𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐗𝐈𝐗. 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐀𝐍𝐓 𝐎𝐅 𝐋𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐕𝐎𝐋𝐃𝐄𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐓

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Hermione screamed.

Black leapt to his feet.

Harry jumped as though he’d received a huge electric shock.

“I found this at the base of the Whomping Willow,” said Snape, throwing the Cloak aside, careful to keep his wand pointing directly at Lupin’s chest.

“Very useful, Potter, I thank you. . . .”

Snape was slightly breathless, but his face was full of suppressed triumph.

“You’re wondering, perhaps, how I knew you were here?” he said, his eyes glittering.

“I’ve just been to your office, Lupin. You forgot to take your potion tonight, so I took a gobletful along. And very lucky I did . . . lucky for me, I mean. Lying on your desk was a certain map. One glance at it told me all I needed to know. I saw you running along this passageway and out of sight.”

“Severus —” Lupin began, but Snape overrode him.

“I’ve told the headmaster again and again that you’re helping your old friend Black into the castle, Lupin, and here’s the proof. Not even I dreamed you would have the nerve to use this old place as your hideout —”

“Severus, you’re making a mistake,” said Lupin urgently.

“You haven’t heard everything — I can explain — Sirius is not here to kill Harry —”

“Two more for Azkaban tonight,” said Snape, his eyes now gleaming fanatically.

“I shall be interested to see how Dumbledore takes this. . . . He was quite convinced you were harmless, you know, Lupin . . . a tame werewolf —”

“You fool,” said Lupin softly.

“Is a schoolboy grudge worth putting an innocent man back inside Azkaban?”

BANG! Thin, snakelike cords burst from the end of Snape’s wand and twisted themselves around Lupin’s mouth, wrists, and ankles; he overbalanced and fell to the floor, unable to move.

With a roar of rage, Black started toward Snape, but Snape pointed his wand straight between Black’s eyes.

“Give me a reason,” he whispered.

“Give me a reason to do it, and I swear I will.”

Black stopped dead.

It would have been impossible to say which face showed more hatred.

Harry stood there, paralyzed, not knowing what to do or whom to believe.

He glanced around at Ron and Hermione.

Ron looked just as confused as he did, still fighting to keep hold on the struggling Scabbers.

Hermione, however, took an uncertain step toward Snape and said, in a very breathless voice, “Professor Snape — it — it wouldn’t hurt to hear what they’ve got to say, w-would it?”

“Miss Granger, you are already facing suspension from this school,” Snape spat.

“You, Potter, and Weasley are out-of-bounds, in the company of a convicted murderer and a werewolf. For once in your life, hold your tongue.”

“But if — if there was a mistake —”

“KEEP QUIET, YOU STUPID GIRL!” Snape shouted, looking suddenly quite deranged.

“DON’T TALK ABOUT WHAT YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND!” A few sparks shot out of the end of his wand, which was still pointed at Black’s face.

Hermione fell silent.

“Vengeance is very sweet,” Snape breathed at Black.

“How I hoped I would be the one to catch you. . . .”

“The joke’s on you again, Severus,” Black snarled.

“As long as this boy brings his rat up to the castle” — he jerked his head at Ron — “I’ll come quietly. . . .”

“Up to the castle?” said Snape silkily.

“I don’t think we need to go that far. All I have to do is call the dementors once we get out of the Willow. They’ll be very pleased to see you, Black . . . pleased enough to give you a little Kiss, I daresay. . . .”

What little color there was in Black’s face left it.

“You — you’ve got to hear me out,” he croaked.

“The rat — look at the rat —”

But there was a mad glint in Snape’s eyes that Harry had never seen before.

He seemed beyond reason.

“Come on, all of you,” he said.

He clicked his fingers, and the ends of the cords that bound Lupin flew to his hands.

“I’ll drag the werewolf. Perhaps the dementors will have a Kiss for him too —”

Before he knew what he was doing, Harry had crossed the room in three strides and blocked the door.

“Get out of the way, Potter, you’re in enough trouble already,” snarled Snape.

“If I hadn’t been here to save your skin —”

“Professor Lupin could have killed me about a hundred times this year,” Harry said.

“I’ve been alone with him loads of times, having defense lessons against the dementors. If he was helping Black, why didn’t he just finish me off then?”

“Don’t ask me to fathom the way a werewolf’s mind works,” hissed Snape.

“Get out of the way, Potter.”

“YOU’RE PATHETIC!” Harry yelled.

“JUST BECAUSE THEY MADE A FOOL OF YOU AT SCHOOL YOU WON’T EVEN LISTEN —”

“SILENCE! I WILL NOT BE SPOKEN TO LIKE THAT!” Snape shrieked, looking madder than ever.

“Like father, like son, Potter! I have just saved your neck; you should be thanking me on bended knee! You would have been well served if he’d killed you! You’d have died like your father, too arrogant to believe you might be mistaken in Black — now get out of the way, or I will make you. GET OUT OF THE WAY, POTTER!”

Harry made up his mind in a split second.

Before Snape could take even one step toward him, he had raised his wand.

“Expelliarmus!” he yelled — except that his wasn’t the only voice that shouted.

There was a blast that made the door rattle on its hinges; Snape was lifted off his feet and slammed into the wall, then slid down it to the floor, a trickle of blood oozing from under his hair.

He had been knocked out.

Harry looked around.

Both Ron and Hermione had tried to Disarm Snape at exactly the same moment.

Snape’s wand soared in a high arc and landed on the bed next to Crookshanks.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” said Black, looking at Harry.

“You should have left him to me. . . .”

Harry avoided Black’s eyes.

He wasn’t sure, even now, that he’d done the right thing.

“We attacked a teacher. . . . We attacked a teacher . . . ,” Hermione whimpered, staring at the lifeless Snape with frightened eyes.

“Oh, we’re going to be in so much trouble —”

Lupin was struggling against his bonds.

Black bent down quickly and untied him.

Lupin straightened up, rubbing his arms where the ropes had cut into them.

“Thank you, Harry,” he said.

“I’m still not saying I believe you,” Harry retorted.

“Then it’s time we offered you some proof,” said Black.

“You, boy — give me Peter. Now.”

Ron clutched Scabbers closer to his chest.

“Come off it,” he said weakly.

“Are you trying to say he broke out of Azkaban just to get his hands on Scabbers? I mean . . .” He looked up at Harry and Hermione for support.

“Okay, say Pettigrew could turn into a rat — there are millions of rats — how’s he supposed to know which one he’s after if he was locked up in Azkaban?”

“You know, Sirius, that’s a fair question,” said Lupin, turning to Black and frowning slightly.

“How did you find out where he was?”

Black put one of his clawlike hands inside his robes and took out a crumpled piece of paper, which he smoothed flat and held out to show the others.

It was the photograph of Ron and his family that had appeared in the Daily Prophet the previous summer, and there, on Ron’s shoulder, was Scabbers.

“How did you get this?” Lupin asked Black, thunderstruck.

“Fudge,” said Black.

“When he came to inspect Azkaban last year, he gave me his paper. And there was Peter, on the front page . . . on this boy’s shoulder. . . . I knew him at once . . . how many times had I seen him transform? And the caption said the boy would be going back to Hogwarts . . . to where Harry was. . . .”

“My God,” said Lupin softly, staring from Scabbers to the picture in the paper and back again.

“His front paw . . .”

“What about it?” said Ron defiantly.

“He’s got a toe missing,” said Black.

“Of course,” Lupin breathed.

“So simple . . . so brilliant . . . he cut it off himself?”

“Just before he transformed,” said Black.

“When I cornered him, he yelled for the whole street to hear that I’d betrayed Lily and James. Then, before I could curse him, he blew apart the street with the wand behind his back, killed everyone within twenty feet of himself — and sped down into the sewer with the other rats. . . .”

“Didn’t you ever hear, Ron?” said Lupin.

“The biggest bit of Peter they found was his finger.”

“Look, Scabbers probably had a fight with another rat or something! He’s been in my family for ages, right —”

“Twelve years, in fact,” said Lupin.

“Didn’t you ever wonder why he was living so long?”

“We — we’ve been taking good care of him!” said Ron.

“Not looking too good at the moment, though, is he?” said Lupin.

“I’d guess he’s been losing weight ever since he heard Sirius was on the loose again. . . .”

“He’s been scared of that mad cat!” said Ron, nodding toward Crookshanks, who was still purring on the bed.

But that wasn’t right, Harry thought suddenly. . . . Scabbers had been looking ill before he met Crookshanks . . . ever since Ron’s return from Egypt . . . since the time when Black had escaped. . . .

“This cat isn’t mad,” said Black hoarsely.

He reached out a bony hand and stroked Crookshanks’s fluffy head.

“He’s the most intelligent of his kind I’ve ever met. He recognized Peter for what he was right away. And when he met me, he knew I was no dog. It was a while before he trusted me. . . . Finally, I managed to communicate to him what I was after, and he’s been helping me. . . .”

“What do you mean?” breathed Hermione.

“He tried to bring Peter to me, but couldn’t . . . so he stole the passwords into Gryffindor Tower for me. . . . As I understand it, he took them from a boy’s bedside table. . . .”

Harry’s brain seemed to be sagging under the weight of what he was hearing.

It was absurd . . . and yet . . .

“But Peter got wind of what was going on and ran for it. . . .” croaked Black.

“This cat — Crookshanks, did you call him? — told me Peter had left blood on the sheets. . . . I supposed he bit himself. . . . Well, faking his own death had worked once. . . .”

These words jolted Harry to his senses.

“And why did he fake his death?” he said furiously.

“Because he knew you were about to kill him like you killed my parents!”

“No,” said Lupin, “Harry —”

“And now you’ve come to finish him off!”

“Yes, I have,” said Black, with an evil look at Scabbers.

“Then I should’ve let Snape take you!” Harry shouted.

“Harry,” said Lupin hurriedly, “don’t you see? All this time we’ve thought Sirius betrayed your parents, and Peter tracked him down — but it was the other way around, don’t you see? Peter betrayed your mother and father — Sirius tracked Peter down —”

“THAT’S NOT TRUE!” Harry yelled.

“HE WAS THEIR SECRETKEEPER! HE SAID SO BEFORE YOU TURNED UP. HE SAID HE KILLED THEM!”

He was pointing at Black, who shook his head slowly; the sunken eyes were suddenly overbright.

“Harry . . . I as good as killed them,” he croaked.

“I persuaded Lily and James to change to Peter at the last moment, persuaded them to use him as Secret-Keeper instead of me. . . . I’m to blame, I know it. . . . The night they died, I’d arranged to check on Peter, make sure he was still safe, but when I arrived at his hiding place, he’d gone. Yet there was no sign of a struggle. It didn’t feel right. I was scared. I set out for your parents’ house straightaway. And when I saw their house, destroyed, and their bodies . . . I realized what Peter must’ve done . . . what I’d done. . . .”

His voice broke.

He turned away.

“Enough of this,” said Lupin, and there was a steely note in his voice Harry had never heard before.

“There’s one certain way to prove what really happened. Ron, give me that rat.”

“What are you going to do with him if I give him to you?” Ron asked Lupin tensely.

“Force him to show himself,” said Lupin.

“If he really is a rat, it won’t hurt him.”

Ron hesitated.

Then at long last, he held out Scabbers and Lupin took him.

Scabbers began to squeak without stopping, twisting and turning, his tiny black eyes bulging in his head.

“Ready, Sirius?” said Lupin.

Black had already retrieved Snape’s wand from the bed.

He approached Lupin and the struggling rat, and his wet eyes suddenly seemed to be burning in his face.

“Together?” he said quietly.

“I think so,” said Lupin, holding Scabbers tightly in one hand and his wand in the other.

“On the count of three. One — two — THREE!”

A flash of blue-white light erupted from both wands; for a moment, Scabbers was frozen in midair, his small gray form twisting madly — Ron yelled — the rat fell and hit the floor.

There was another blinding flash of light and then —

It was like watching a speeded-up film of a growing tree.

A head was shooting upward from the ground; limbs were sprouting; a moment later, a man was standing where Scabbers had been, cringing and wringing his hands.

Crookshanks was spitting and snarling on the bed; the hair on his back was standing up.

He was a very short man, hardly taller than Harry and Hermione.

His thin, colorless hair was unkempt and there was a large bald patch on top.

He had the shrunken appearance of a plump man who has lost a lot of weight in a short time.

His skin looked grubby, almost like Scabbers’s fur, and something of the rat lingered around his pointed nose and his very small, watery eyes.

He looked around at them all, his breathing fast and shallow.

Harry saw his eyes dart to the door and back again.

“Well, hello, Peter,” said Lupin pleasantly, as though rats frequently erupted into old school friends around him.

“Long time, no see.”

“S-Sirius . . . R-Remus . . .” Even Pettigrew’s voice was squeaky.

Again, his eyes darted toward the door.

“My friends . . . my old friends . . .”

Black’s wand arm rose, but Lupin seized him around the wrist, gave him a warning look, then turned again to Pettigrew, his voice light and casual.

“We’ve been having a little chat, Peter, about what happened the night Lily and James died. You might have missed the finer points while you were squeaking around down there on the bed —”

“Remus,” gasped Pettigrew, and Harry could see beads of sweat breaking out over his pasty face, “you don’t believe him, do you . . .? He tried to kill me, Remus. . . .”

“So we’ve heard,” said Lupin, more coldly.

“I’d like to clear up one or two little matters with you, Peter, if you’d be so —”

“He’s come to try and kill me again!” Pettigrew squeaked suddenly, pointing at Black, and Harry saw that he used his middle finger, because his index was missing.

“He killed Lily and James and now he’s going to kill me too. . . . You’ve got to help me, Remus. . . .”

Black’s face looked more skull-like than ever as he stared at Pettigrew with his fathomless eyes.

“No one’s going to try and kill you until we’ve sorted a few things out,” said Lupin.

“Sorted things out?” squealed Pettigrew, looking wildly about him once more, eyes taking in the boarded windows and, again, the only door.

“I knew he’d come after me! I knew he’d be back for me! I’ve been waiting for this for twelve years!”

“You knew Sirius was going to break out of Azkaban?” said Lupin, his brow furrowed.

“When nobody has ever done it before?”

“He’s got Dark powers the rest of us can only dream of!” Pettigrew shouted shrilly.

“How else did he get out of there? I suppose He-Who-Must-Not-BeNamed taught him a few tricks!”

Black started to laugh, a horrible, mirthless laugh that filled the whole room.

“Voldemort, teach me tricks?” he said.

Pettigrew flinched as though Black had brandished a whip at him.

“What, scared to hear your old master’s name?” said Black.

“I don’t blame you, Peter. His lot aren’t very happy with you, are they?”

“Don’t know what you mean, Sirius —” muttered Pettigrew, his breathing faster than ever.

His whole face was shining with sweat now.

“You haven’t been hiding from me for twelve years,” said Black.

“You’ve been hiding from Voldemort’s old supporters. I heard things in Azkaban, Peter. . . . They all think you’re dead, or you’d have to answer to them. . . . I’ve heard them screaming all sorts of things in their sleep. Sounds like they think the double-crosser double-crossed them. Voldemort went to the Potters’ on your information . . . and Voldemort met his downfall there. And not all Voldemort’s supporters ended up in Azkaban, did they? There are still plenty out here, biding their time, pretending they’ve seen the error of their ways. . . . If they ever got wind that you were still alive, Peter —”

“Don’t know . . . what you’re talking about . . . ,” said Pettigrew again, more shrilly than ever.

He wiped his face on his sleeve and looked up at Lupin.

“You don’t believe this — this madness, Remus —”

“I must admit, Peter, I have difficulty in understanding why an innocent man would want to spend twelve years as a rat,” said Lupin evenly.

“Innocent, but scared!” squealed Pettigrew.

“If Voldemort’s supporters were after me, it was because I put one of their best men in Azkaban — the spy, Sirius Black!”

Black’s face contorted.

“How dare you,” he growled, sounding suddenly like the bear-sized dog he had been.

“I, a spy for Voldemort? When did I ever sneak around people who were stronger and more powerful than myself? But you, Peter — I’ll never understand why I didn’t see you were the spy from the start. You always liked big friends who’d look after you, didn’t you? It used to be us . . . me and Remus . . . and James. . . .”

Pettigrew wiped his face again; he was almost panting for breath.

“Me, a spy . . . must be out of your mind . . . never . . . don’t know how you can say such a —”

“Lily and James only made you Secret-Keeper because I suggested it,” Black hissed, so venomously that Pettigrew took a step backward.

“I thought it was the perfect plan . . . a bluff. . . . Voldemort would be sure to come after me, would never dream they’d use a weak, talentless thing like you. . . . It must have been the finest moment of your miserable life, telling Voldemort you could hand him the Potters.”

Pettigrew was muttering distractedly; Harry caught words like “farfetched” and “lunacy,” but he couldn’t help paying more attention to the ashen color of Pettigrew’s face and the way his eyes continued to dart toward the windows and door.

“Professor Lupin?” said Hermione timidly.

“Can — can I say something?”

“Certainly, Hermione,” said Lupin courteously.

“Well — Scabbers — I mean, this — this man — he’s been sleeping in Harry’s dormitory for three years. If he’s working for You-Know-Who, how come he never tried to hurt Harry before now?”

“There!” said Pettigrew shrilly, pointing at Ron with his maimed hand.

“Thank you! You see, Remus? I have never hurt a hair of Harry’s head! Why should I?”

“I’ll tell you why,” said Black.

“Because you never did anything for anyone unless you could see what was in it for you. Voldemort’s been in hiding for twelve years, they say he’s half dead. You weren’t about to commit murder right under Albus Dumbledore’s nose, for a wreck of a wizard who’d lost all of his power, were you? You’d want to be quite sure he was the biggest bully in the playground before you went back to him, wouldn’t you? Why else did you find a wizard family to take you in? Keeping an ear out for news, weren’t you, Peter? Just in case your old protector regained strength, and it was safe to rejoin him. . . .”

Pettigrew opened his mouth and closed it several times.

He seemed to have lost the ability to talk.

“Er — Mr. Black — Sirius?” said Hermione.

Black jumped at being addressed like this and stared at Hermione as though being spoken to politely was something he’d long forgotten.

“If you don’t mind me asking, how — how did you get out of Azkaban, if you didn’t use Dark Magic?”

“Thank you!” gasped Pettigrew, nodding frantically at her.

“Exactly! Precisely what I —”

But Lupin silenced him with a look.

Black was frowning slightly at Hermione, but not as though he were annoyed with her.

He seemed to be pondering his answer.

“I don’t know how I did it,” he said slowly.

“I think the only reason I never lost my mind is that I knew I was innocent. That wasn’t a happy thought, so the dementors couldn’t suck it out of me . . . but it kept me sane and knowing who I am . . . helped me keep my powers . . . so when it all became . . . too much . . . I could transform in my cell . . . become a dog. Dementors can’t see, you know. . . .”

He swallowed.

“They feel their way toward people by sensing their emotions. . . . They could tell that my feelings were less — less human, less complex when I was a dog . . . but they thought, of course, that I was losing my mind like everyone else in there, so it didn’t trouble them. But I was weak, very weak, and I had no hope of driving them away from me without a wand. . . .

“But then I saw Peter in that picture . . . I realized he was at Hogwarts with Harry . . . perfectly positioned to act, if one hint reached his ears that the Dark Side was gathering strength again. . . .”

Pettigrew was shaking his head, mouthing noiselessly, but staring all the while at Black as though hypnotized.

“. . . ready to strike at the moment he could be sure of allies . . . and to deliver the last Potter to them. If he gave them Harry, who’d dare say he’d betrayed Lord Voldemort? He’d be welcomed back with honors. . . .

“So you see, I had to do something. I was the only one who knew Peter was still alive. . . .”

Harry remembered what Mr. Weasley had told Mrs. Weasley.

“The guards say he’s been talking in his sleep . . . always the same words . . . ‘He’s at Hogwarts.’”

“It was as if someone had lit a fire in my head, and the dementors couldn’t destroy it. . . . It wasn’t a happy feeling . . . it was an obsession . . . but it gave me strength, it cleared my mind. So, one night when they opened my door to bring food, I slipped past them as a dog. . . . It’s so much harder for them to sense animal emotions that they were confused. . . . I was thin, very thin . . . thin enough to slip through the bars. . . . I swam as a dog back to the mainland. . . . I journeyed north and slipped into the Hogwarts grounds as a dog. I’ve been living in the forest ever since, except when I came to watch the Quidditch, of course. You fly as well as your father did, Harry. . . .”

He looked at Harry, who did not look away.

“Believe me,” croaked Black.

“Believe me, Harry. I never betrayed James and Lily. I would have died before I betrayed them.”

And at long last, Harry believed him.

Throat too tight to speak, he nodded.

“No!”

Pettigrew had fallen to his knees as though Harry’s nod had been his own death sentence.

He shuffled forward on his knees, groveling, his hands clasped in front of him as though praying.

“Sirius — it’s me . . . it’s Peter . . . your friend . . . you wouldn’t . . .”

Black kicked out and Pettigrew recoiled.

“There’s enough filth on my robes without you touching them,” said Black.

“Remus!” Pettigrew squeaked, turning to Lupin instead, writhing imploringly in front of him.

“You don’t believe this . . . Wouldn’t Sirius have told you they’d changed the plan?”

“Not if he thought I was the spy, Peter,” said Lupin.

“I assume that’s why you didn’t tell me, Sirius?” he said casually over Pettigrew’s head.

“Forgive me, Remus,” said Black.

“Not at all, Padfoot, old friend,” said Lupin, who was now rolling up his sleeves.

“And will you, in turn, forgive me for believing you were the spy?”

“Of course,” said Black, and the ghost of a grin flitted across his gaunt face.

He, too, began rolling up his sleeves.

“Shall we kill him together?”

“Yes, I think so,” said Lupin grimly.

“You wouldn’t . . . you won’t . . . ,” gasped Pettigrew.

And he scrambled around to Ron.

“Ron . . . haven’t I been a good friend . . . a good pet? You won’t let them kill me, Ron, will you . . . you’re on my side, aren’t you?”

But Ron was staring at Pettigrew with the utmost revulsion.

“I let you sleep in my bed!” he said.

“Kind boy . . . kind master . . .” Pettigrew crawled toward Ron, “you won’t let them do it. . . . I was your rat. . . . I was a good pet. . . .”

“If you made a better rat than a human, it’s not much to boast about, Peter,” said Black harshly.

Ron, going still paler with pain, wrenched his broken leg out of Pettigrew’s reach.

Pettigrew turned on his knees, staggered forward, and seized the hem of Hermione’s robes.

“Sweet girl . . . clever girl . . . you — you won’t let them. . . . Help me. . . .”

Hermione pulled her robes out of Pettigrew’s clutching hands and backed away against the wall, looking horrified.

Pettigrew knelt, trembling uncontrollably, and turned his head slowly toward Harry.

“Harry . . . Harry . . . you look just like your father . . . just like him. . . .”

“HOW DARE YOU SPEAK TO HARRY?” roared Black.

“HOW DARE YOU FACE HIM? HOW DARE YOU TALK ABOUT JAMES IN FRONT OF HIM?”

“Harry,” whispered Pettigrew, shuffling toward him, hands outstretched.

“Harry, James wouldn’t have wanted me killed. . . . James would have understood, Harry . . . he would have shown me mercy. . . .”

Both Black and Lupin strode forward, seized Pettigrew’s shoulders, and threw him backward onto the floor.

He sat there, twitching with terror, staring up at them.

“You sold Lily and James to Voldemort,” said Black, who was shaking too.

“Do you deny it?”

Pettigrew burst into tears.

It was horrible to watch: He looked like an oversized, balding baby, cowering on the floor.

“Sirius, Sirius, what could I have done? The Dark Lord . . . you have no idea . . . he has weapons you can’t imagine. . . . I was scared, Sirius, I was never brave like you and Remus and James. I never meant it to happen. . . . He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named forced me —”

“DON’T LIE!” bellowed Black.

“YOU’D BEEN PASSING INFORMATION TO HIM FOR A YEAR BEFORE LILY AND JAMES DIED! YOU WERE HIS SPY!”

“He — he was taking over everywhere!” gasped Pettigrew.

“W-what was there to be gained by refusing him?”

“What was there to be gained by fighting the most evil wizard who has ever existed?” said Black, with a terrible fury in his face.

“Only innocent lives, Peter!”

“You don’t understand!” whined Pettigrew.

“He would have killed me, Sirius!”

“THEN YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED!” roared Black.

“DIED RATHER THAN BETRAY YOUR FRIENDS, AS WE WOULD HAVE DONE FOR YOU!”

Black and Lupin stood shoulder to shoulder, wands raised.

“You should have realized,” said Lupin quietly, “if Voldemort didn’t kill you, we would. Good-bye, Peter.”

Hermione covered her face with her hands and turned to the wall.

“NO!” Harry yelled.

He ran forward, placing himself in front of Pettigrew, facing the wands.

“You can’t kill him,” he said breathlessly.

“You can’t.”

Black and Lupin both looked staggered.

“Harry, this piece of vermin is the reason you have no parents,” Black snarled.

“This cringing bit of filth would have seen you die too, without turning a hair. You heard him. His own stinking skin meant more to him than your whole family.”

“I know,” Harry panted.

“We’ll take him up to the castle. We’ll hand him over to the dementors. . . . He can go to Azkaban . . . but don’t kill him.”

“Harry!” gasped Pettigrew, and he flung his arms around Harry’s knees.

“You — thank you — it’s more than I deserve — thank you —”

“Get off me,” Harry spat, throwing Pettigrew’s hands off him in disgust.

“I’m not doing this for you. I’m doing it because I don’t reckon my dad would’ve wanted his best friends to become killers — just for you.”

No one moved or made a sound except Pettigrew, whose breath was coming in wheezes as he clutched his chest.

Black and Lupin were looking at each other.

Then, with one movement, they lowered their wands.

“You’re the only person who has the right to decide, Harry,” said Black.

“But think . . . think what he did. . . .”

“He can go to Azkaban,” Harry repeated.

“If anyone deserves that place, he does. . . .”

Pettigrew was still wheezing behind him.

“Very well,” said Lupin.

“Stand aside, Harry.”

Harry hesitated.

“I’m going to tie him up,” said Lupin.

“That’s all, I swear.”

Harry stepped out of the way.

Thin cords shot from Lupin’s wand this time, and next moment, Pettigrew was wriggling on the floor, bound and gagged.

“But if you transform, Peter,” growled Black, his own wand pointing at Pettigrew too, “we will kill you. You agree, Harry?”

Harry looked down at the pitiful figure on the floor and nodded so that Pettigrew could see him.

“Right,” said Lupin, suddenly businesslike.

“Ron, I can’t mend bones nearly as well as Madam Pomfrey, so I think it’s best if we just strap your leg up until we can get you to the hospital wing.”

He hurried over to Ron, bent down, tapped Ron’s leg with his wand, and muttered, “Ferula.”

Bandages spun up Ron’s leg, strapping it tightly to a splint.

Lupin helped him to his feet; Ron put his weight gingerly on the leg and didn’t wince.

“That’s better,” he said.

“Thanks.”

“What about Professor Snape?” said Hermione in a small voice, looking down at Snape’s prone figure.

“There’s nothing seriously wrong with him,” said Lupin, bending over Snape and checking his pulse.

“You were just a little — overenthusiastic. Still out cold. Er — perhaps it will be best if we don’t revive him until we’re safely back in the castle. We can take him like this. . . .”

He muttered, “Mobilicorpus.”

As though invisible strings were tied to Snape’s wrists, neck, and knees, he was pulled into a standing position, head still lolling unpleasantly, like a grotesque puppet.

He hung a few inches above the ground, his limp feet dangling.

Lupin picked up the Invisibility Cloak and tucked it safely into his pocket.

“And two of us should be chained to this,” said Black, nudging Pettigrew with his toe.

“Just to make sure.”

“I’ll do it,” said Lupin.

“And me,” said Ron savagely, limping forward.

Black conjured heavy manacles from thin air; soon Pettigrew was upright again, left arm chained to Lupin’s right, right arm to Ron’s left.

Ron’s face was set.

He seemed to have taken Scabbers’s true identity as a personal insult.

Crookshanks leapt lightly off the bed and led the way out of the room, his bottlebrush tail held jauntily high.

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𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐗𝐗. 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐃𝐄𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐎𝐑’𝐒 𝐊𝐈𝐒𝐒

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Harry had never been part of a stranger group.

Crookshanks led the way down the stairs; Lupin, Pettigrew, and Ron went next, looking like entrants in a six-legged race.

Next came Professor Snape, drifting creepily along, his toes hitting each stair as they descended, held up by his own wand, which was being pointed at him by Sirius.

Harry and Hermione brought up the rear.

Getting back into the tunnel was difficult.

Lupin, Pettigrew, and Ron had to turn sideways to manage it; Lupin still had Pettigrew covered with his wand.

Harry could see them edging awkwardly along the tunnel in single file.

Crookshanks was still in the lead.

Harry went right after Sirius, who was still making Snape drift along ahead of them; he kept bumping his lolling head on the low ceiling.

Harry had the impression Sirius was making no effort to prevent this.

“You know what this means?” Sirius said abruptly to Harry as they made their slow progress along the tunnel.

“Turning Pettigrew in?”

“You’re free,” said Harry.

“Yes . . . ,” said Sirius.

“But I’m also — I don’t know if anyone ever told you — I’m your godfather.”

“Yeah, I knew that,” said Harry.

“Well . . . your parents appointed me your guardian,” said Sirius stiffly.

“If anything happened to them . . .”

Harry waited.

Did Sirius mean what he thought he meant?

“I’ll understand, of course, if you want to stay with your aunt and uncle,” said Sirius.

“But . . . well . . . think about it. Once my name’s cleared . . . if you wanted a . . . a different home . . .”

Some sort of explosion took place in the pit of Harry’s stomach.

“What — live with you?” he said, accidentally cracking his head on a bit of rock protruding from the ceiling.

“Leave the Dursleys?”

“Of course, I thought you wouldn’t want to,” said Sirius quickly.

“I understand, I just thought I’d —”

“Are you insane?” said Harry, his voice easily as croaky as Sirius’s.

“Of course I want to leave the Dursleys! Have you got a house? When can I move in?”

Sirius turned right around to look at him; 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!” said Harry.

Sirius’s gaunt face broke into the first true smile Harry had seen upon it.

The difference it made was startling, as though a person ten years younger were shining through the starved mask; for a moment, he was recognizable as the man who had laughed at Harry’s parents’ wedding.

They did not speak again until they had reached the end of the tunnel.

Crookshanks darted up first; he had evidently pressed his paw to the knot on the trunk, because Lupin, Pettigrew, and Ron clambered upward without any sound of savaging branches.

Sirius saw Snape up through the hole, then stood back for Harry and Hermione to pass.

At last, all of them were out.

The grounds were very dark now; the only light came from the distant windows of the castle.

Without a word, they set off.

Pettigrew was still wheezing and occasionally whimpering.

Harry’s mind was buzzing.

He was going to leave the Dursleys.

He was going to live with Sirius Black, his parents’ best friend. . . .

He felt dazed. . . .

What would happen when he told the Dursleys he was going to live with the convict they’d seen on television?

“One wrong move, Peter,” said Lupin threateningly ahead.

His wand was still pointed sideways at Pettigrew’s chest.

Silently they tramped through the grounds, the castle lights growing slowly 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.

Their party was bathed in moonlight.

Snape collided with Lupin, Pettigrew, and Ron, who had stopped abruptly.

Sirius froze.

He flung out one arm to make Harry and Hermione stop.

Harry could see Lupin’s silhouette.

He had gone rigid.

Then 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.”

But Harry couldn’t run.

Ron was chained to Pettigrew and Lupin.

He leapt forward but Sirius caught him around the chest and threw him back.

“Leave it to me — RUN!”

There was a terrible snarling noise.

Lupin’s head was lengthening.

So was his body.

His shoulders were hunching.

Hair was sprouting visibly on his face and hands, which were curling into clawed paws.

Crookshanks’s hair was on end again; he was backing away —

As the werewolf reared, snapping its long jaws, Sirius disappeared from Harry’s side.

He had transformed.

The enormous, bearlike dog bounded forward.

As the werewolf wrenched itself free of the manacle binding it, the dog seized it about the neck and pulled it backward, away from Ron and Pettigrew.

They were locked, jaw to jaw, claws ripping at each other —

Harry stood, transfixed by the sight, too intent upon the battle to notice anything else.

It was Hermione’s scream that alerted him —

Pettigrew had dived for Lupin’s dropped wand.

Ron, unsteady on his bandaged leg, fell.

There was a bang, a burst of light — and Ron lay motionless on the ground.

Another bang — Crookshanks flew into the air and back to the earth in a heap.

“Expelliarmus!” Harry yelled, pointing his own wand at Pettigrew; Lupin’s wand flew high into the air and out of sight.

“Stay where you are!” Harry shouted, running forward.

Too late.

Pettigrew had transformed.

Harry 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; Harry turned to see the werewolf taking flight; it was galloping 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, the sound of his paws faded to silence as he pounded away across the grounds.

Harry and Hermione dashed over to Ron.

“What did he do to him?” Hermione whispered.

Ron’s eyes were only halfclosed, his mouth hung open; he was definitely alive, they could hear him breathing, but he didn’t seem to recognize them.

“I don’t know. . . .”

Harry looked desperately around.

Black and Lupin both gone . . . they had no one but Snape for company, still hanging, unconscious, in midair.

“We’d better get them up to the castle and tell someone,” said Harry, pushing his hair out of his eyes, trying to think straight.

“Come —”

But then, from beyond the range of their vision, they heard a yelping, a whining: a dog in pain. . . .

“Sirius,” Harry muttered, staring into the darkness.

He had a moment’s indecision, but there was nothing they could do for Ron at the moment, and by the sound of it, Black was in trouble —

Harry set off at a run, Hermione right behind him.

The yelping seemed to be coming from near the lake.

They pelted toward it, and Harry, running flat out, felt the cold without realizing what it must mean —

The yelping stopped abruptly.

As they reached the lakeshore, they 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 Harry saw them.

Dementors, at least a hundred of them, gliding in a black mass around the lake toward them.

He spun around, the familiar, icy cold penetrating his insides, fog starting to obscure his vision; more were appearing out of the darkness on every side; they were encircling them. . . .

“Hermione, think of something happy!” Harry yelled, raising his wand, blinking furiously to try and clear his vision, shaking his head to rid it of the faint screaming that had started inside it —

I’m going to live with my godfather.

I’m leaving the Dursleys.

He forced himself to think of Sirius, and only Sirius, and began to chant: “Expecto Patronum! Expecto Patronum!”

Black gave a shudder, rolled over, and lay motionless on the ground, pale as death.

He’ll be all right.

I’m going to go and live with him.

“Expecto Patronum! Hermione, help me! Expecto Patronum!”

“Expecto —” Hermione whispered, “Expecto — Expecto —”

But she couldn’t do it.

The dementors were closing in, barely ten feet from them.

They formed a solid wall around Harry and Hermione, and were getting closer. . . .

“EXPECTO PATRONUM!” Harry yelled, trying to blot the screaming from his ears.

“EXPECTO PATRONUM!”

A thin wisp of silver escaped his wand and hovered like mist before him.

At the same moment, Harry felt Hermione collapse next to him.

He was alone . . . completely alone. . . .

“Expecto — Expecto Patronum —”

Harry felt his knees hit the cold grass.

Fog was clouding his eyes.

With a huge effort, he fought to remember — Sirius was innocent — innocent —

We’ll be okay — I’m going to live with him —

“Expecto Patronum!” he gasped.

By the feeble light of his formless Patronus, he saw a dementor halt, very close to him.

It couldn’t walk through the cloud of silver mist Harry had 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 —”

He could feel them watching him, hear their rattling breath like an evil wind around him.

The nearest dementor seemed to be considering him.

Then it raised both its rotting hands — and lowered its hood.

Where there should have been eyes, there was only thin, gray scabbed skin, stretched blankly over empty sockets.

But there was a mouth . . . a gaping, shapeless hole, sucking the air with the sound of a death rattle.

A paralyzing terror filled Harry so that he couldn't move or speak.

His Patronus flickered and died.

White fog was blinding him.

He had to fight . . . Expecto Patronum . . . he couldn't see . . . and in the distance, he heard the familiar screaming . . . Expecto Patronum . . . he groped in the mist for Sirius, and found his arm . . . they weren't going to take him. . . .

But a pair of strong, clammy hands suddenly attached themselves around Harry’s neck.

They were forcing his face upward. . . .

He could feel its breath. . . .

It was going to get rid of him first. . . .

He could feel its putrid breath. . . .

His mother was screaming in his ears. . . .

She was going to be the last thing he ever heard —

And then, through the fog that was drowning him, he thought he saw a silvery light growing brighter and brighter. . . .

He felt himself fall forward onto the grass —

Facedown, too weak to move, sick and shaking, Harry opened his eyes.

The dementor must have released him.

The blinding light was illuminating the grass around him. . . .

The screaming had stopped, the cold was ebbing away. . . .

Something was driving the dementors back. . . .

It was circling around him and Sirius and Hermione. . . .

The rattling, sucking sounds of the dementors were fading.

They were leaving. . . .

The air was warm again. . . .

With every ounce of strength he could muster, Harry raised his head a few inches and saw an animal amid the light, galloping away across the lake. . . .

Eyes blurred with sweat, Harry tried to make out what it was. . . .

It was as bright as a unicorn. . . .

Fighting to stay conscious, Harry watched it canter to a halt as it reached the opposite shore.

For a moment, Harry saw, by its brightness, somebody welcoming it back . . . raising his hand to pat it . . . someone who looked strangely familiar . . . but it couldn’t be . . .

Harry didn’t understand.

He couldn’t think anymore.

He felt the last of his strength leave him, and his head hit the ground as he fainted.

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𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐗𝐗𝐈. 𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐌𝐈𝐎𝐍𝐄’𝐒 𝐒𝐄𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐓

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Shocking business . . . shocking . . . miracle none of them died . . . never heard the like . . . by thunder, it was lucky you were there, Snape. . . .”

“Thank you, Minister.”

“Order of Merlin, Second Class, I’d say. First Class, if I can wangle it!”

“Thank you very much indeed, Minister.”

“Nasty cut you’ve got there. . . . Black’s work, I suppose?”

“As a matter of fact, it was Potter, Weasley, and Granger, Minister. . . .”

“No!”

“Black had bewitched them, I saw it immediately. A Confundus Charm, to judge by their behavior. They seemed to think there was a possibility he was innocent. They weren’t responsible for their actions. On the other hand, their interference might have permitted Black to escape. . . . They obviously thought they were going to catch Black single-handed. They’ve got away with a great deal before now. . . . I’m afraid it’s given them a rather high opinion of themselves . . . and of course Potter has always been allowed an extraordinary amount of license by the headmaster —”

“Ah, well, Snape . . . Harry Potter, you know . . . we’ve all got a bit of a blind spot where he’s concerned.”

“And yet — is it good for him to be given so much special treatment? Personally, I try and treat him like any other student. And any other student would be suspended — at the very least — for leading his friends into such danger. Consider, Minister — against all school rules — after all the precautions put in place for his protection — out-of-bounds, at night, consorting with a werewolf and a murderer — and I have reason to believe he has been visiting Hogsmeade illegally too —”

“Well, well . . . we shall see, Snape, we shall see. . . . The boy has undoubtedly been foolish. . . .”

Harry lay listening with his eyes tight shut.

He felt very groggy.

The words he was hearing seemed to be traveling very slowly from his ears to his brain, so that it was difficult to understand. . . .

His limbs felt like lead; his eyelids too heavy to lift. . . .

He wanted to lie here, on this comfortable bed, forever. . . .

“What amazes me most is the behavior of the dementors . . . you’ve really no idea what made them retreat, Snape?”

“No, Minister . . . by the time I had come ’round they were heading back to their positions at the entrances. . . .”

“Extraordinary. And yet Black, and Harry, and the girl —”

“All unconscious by the time I reached them. I bound and gagged Black, naturally, conjured stretchers, and brought them all straight back to the castle.”

There was a pause.

Harry’s brain seemed to be moving a little faster, and as it did, a gnawing sensation grew in the pit of his stomach. . . .

He opened his eyes.

Everything was slightly blurred.

Somebody had removed his glasses.

He was lying in the dark hospital wing.

At the very end of the ward, he could make out Madam Pomfrey with her back to him, bending over a bed.

Harry squinted.

Ron’s red hair was visible beneath Madam Pomfrey’s arm.

Harry moved his head over on the pillow.

In the bed to his right lay Hermione.

Moonlight was falling across her bed.

Her eyes were open too.

She looked petrified, and when she saw that Harry was awake, pressed a finger to her lips, then pointed to the hospital wing door.

It was ajar, and the voices of Cornelius Fudge and Snape were coming through it from the corridor outside.

Madam Pomfrey now came walking briskly up the dark ward to Harry’s bed.

He turned to look at her.

She was carrying the largest block of chocolate he had ever seen in his life.

It looked like a small boulder.

“Ah, you’re awake!” she said briskly.

She placed the chocolate on Harry’s bedside table and began breaking it apart with a small hammer.

“How’s Ron?” said Harry and Hermione together.

“He’ll live,” said Madam Pomfrey grimly.

“As for you two . . . you’ll be staying here until I’m satisfied you’re — Potter, what do you think you’re doing?”

Harry was sitting up, putting his glasses back on, and picking up his wand.

“I need to see the headmaster,” he said.

“Potter,” said Madam Pomfrey soothingly, “it’s all right. They’ve got Black. He’s locked away upstairs. The dementors will be performing the Kiss any moment now —”

“WHAT?”

Harry jumped up out of bed; Hermione had done the same.

But his shout had been heard in the corridor outside; next second, Cornelius Fudge and Snape had entered the ward.

“Harry, Harry, what’s this?” said Fudge, looking agitated.

“You should be in bed — has he had any chocolate?” he asked Madam Pomfrey anxiously.

“Minister, listen!” Harry said.

“Sirius Black’s innocent! Peter Pettigrew faked his own death! We saw him tonight! You can’t let the dementors do that thing to Sirius, he’s —”

But Fudge was shaking his head with a small smile on his face.

“Harry, Harry, you’re very confused, you’ve been through a dreadful ordeal, lie back down, now, we’ve got everything under control. . . .”

“YOU HAVEN’T!” Harry yelled.

“YOU’VE GOT THE WRONG MAN!”

“Minister, listen, please,” Hermione said; she had hurried to Harry’s side and was gazing imploringly into Fudge’s face.

“I saw him too. It was Ron’s rat, he’s an Animagus, Pettigrew, I mean, and —”

“You see, Minister?” said Snape.

“Confunded, both of them. . . . Black’s done a very good job on them. . . .”

“WE’RE NOT CONFUNDED!” Harry roared.

“Minister! Professor!” said Madam Pomfrey angrily.

“I must insist that you leave. Potter is my patient, and he should not be distressed!”

“I’m not distressed, I’m trying to tell them what happened!” Harry said furiously.

“If they’d just listen —”

But Madam Pomfrey suddenly stuffed a large chunk of chocolate into Harry’s mouth; he choked, and she seized the opportunity to force him back onto the bed.

“Now, please, Minister, these children need care. Please leave —”

The door opened again.

It was Dumbledore.

Harry swallowed his mouthful of chocolate with great difficulty and got up again.

“Professor Dumbledore, Sirius Black —”

“For heaven’s sake!” said Madam Pomfrey hysterically.

“Is this a hospital wing or not? Headmaster, I must insist —”

“My apologies, Poppy, but I need a word with Mr. Potter and Miss Granger,” said Dumbledore calmly.

“I have just been talking to Sirius Black —”

“I suppose he’s told you the same fairy tale he’s planted in Potter’s mind?” spat Snape.

“Something about a rat, and Pettigrew being alive —”

“That, indeed, is Black’s story,” said Dumbledore, surveying Snape closely through his half-moon spectacles.

“And does my evidence count for nothing?” snarled Snape.

“Peter Pettigrew was not in the Shrieking Shack, nor did I see any sign of him on the grounds.”

“That was because you were knocked out, Professor!” said Hermione earnestly.

“You didn’t arrive in time to hear —”

“Miss Granger, HOLD YOUR TONGUE!”

“Now, Snape,” said Fudge, startled, “the young lady is disturbed in her mind, we must make allowances —”

“I would like to speak to Harry and Hermione alone,” said Dumbledore abruptly.

“Cornelius, Severus, Poppy — please leave us.”

“Headmaster!” sputtered Madam Pomfrey.

“They need treatment, they need rest —”

“This cannot wait,” said Dumbledore.

“I must insist.”

Madam Pomfrey pursed her lips and strode away into her office at the end of the ward, slamming the door behind her.

Fudge consulted the large gold pocket watch dangling from his waistcoat.

“The dementors should have arrived by now,” he said.

“I’ll go and meet them. Dumbledore, I’ll see you upstairs.”

He crossed to the door and held it open for Snape, but Snape hadn’t moved.

“You surely don’t believe a word of Black’s story?” Snape whispered, his eyes fixed on Dumbledore’s face.

“I wish to speak to Harry and Hermione alone,” Dumbledore repeated.

Snape took a step toward Dumbledore.

“Sirius Black showed he was capable of murder at the age of sixteen,” he breathed.

“You haven’t forgotten that, Headmaster? You haven’t forgotten that he once tried to kill me?”

“My memory is as good as it ever was, Severus,” said Dumbledore quietly.

Snape turned on his heel and marched through the door Fudge was still holding.

It closed behind them, and Dumbledore turned to Harry and Hermione.

They both burst into speech at the same time.

“Professor, Black’s telling the truth — we saw Pettigrew —”

“— he escaped when Professor Lupin turned into a werewolf —”

“— he’s a rat —”

“— Pettigrew’s front paw, I mean, finger, he cut it off —”

“— Pettigrew attacked Ron, it wasn’t Sirius —”

But Dumbledore held up his hand to stem the flood of explanations.

“It is your turn to listen, and I beg you will not interrupt me, because there is very little time,” he said quietly.

“There is not a shred of proof to support Black’s story, except your word — and the word of two thirteen-year-old wizards will not convince anybody. A street full of eyewitnesses swore they saw Sirius murder Pettigrew. I myself gave evidence to the Ministry that Sirius had been the Potters’ Secret-Keeper.”

“Professor Lupin can tell you —” Harry said, unable to stop himself.

“Professor Lupin is currently deep in the forest, unable to tell anyone anything. By the time he is human again, it will be too late, Sirius will be worse than dead. I might add that werewolves are so mistrusted by most of our kind that his support will count for very little — and the fact that he and Sirius are old friends —”

“But —”

“Listen to me, Harry. It is too late, you understand me? You must see that Professor Snape’s version of events is far more convincing than yours.”

“He hates Sirius,” Hermione said desperately.

“All because of some stupid trick Sirius played on him —”

“Sirius has not acted like an innocent man. The attack on the Fat Lady — entering Gryffindor Tower with a knife — without Pettigrew, alive or dead, we have no chance of overturning Sirius’s sentence.”

“But you believe us.”

“Yes, I do,” said Dumbledore quietly.

“But I have no power to make other men see the truth, or to overrule the Minister of Magic. . . .”

Harry stared up into the grave face and felt as though the ground beneath him were falling sharply away.

He had grown used to the idea that Dumbledore could solve anything.

He had expected Dumbledore to pull some amazing solution out of the air.

But no . . . their last hope was gone.

“What we need,” said Dumbledore slowly, and his light blue eyes moved from Harry to Hermione, “is more time.”

“But —” Hermione began.

And then her eyes became very round.

“OH!”

“Now, pay attention,” said Dumbledore, speaking very low, and very clearly.

“Sirius is locked in Professor Flitwick’s office on the seventh floor. Thirteenth window from the right of the West Tower. If all goes well, you will be able to save more than one innocent life tonight. But remember this, both of you: You must not be seen. Miss Granger, you know the law — you know what is at stake. . . . You — must — not — be — seen.”

Harry didn’t have a clue what was going on.

Dumbledore had turned on his heel and looked back as he reached the door.

“I am going to lock you in. It is —” he consulted his watch, “five minutes to midnight. Miss Granger, three turns should do it. Good luck.”

“Good luck?” Harry repeated as the door closed behind Dumbledore.

“Three turns? What’s he talking about? What are we supposed to do?”

But Hermione was fumbling with the neck of her robes, pulling from beneath them a very long, very fine gold chain.

“Harry, come here,” she said urgently.

“Quick!”

Harry moved toward her, completely bewildered.

She was holding the chain out.

He saw a tiny, sparkling hourglass hanging from it.

“Here —”

She had thrown the chain around his neck too.

“Ready?” she said breathlessly.

“What are we doing?” Harry said, completely lost.

Hermione turned the hourglass over three times.

The dark ward dissolved.

Harry had the sensation that he was flying very fast, backward.

A blur of colors and shapes rushed past him, his ears were pounding, he tried to yell but couldn’t hear his own voice —

And then he felt solid ground beneath his feet, and everything came into focus again —

He was standing next to Hermione in the deserted entrance hall and a stream of golden sunlight was falling across the paved floor from the open front doors.

He looked wildly around at Hermione, the chain of the hourglass cutting into his neck.

“Hermione, what — ?”

“In here!” Hermione seized Harry’s arm and dragged him across the hall to the door of a broom closet; she opened it, pushed him inside among the buckets and mops, then slammed the door behind them.

“What — how — Hermione, what happened?”

“We’ve gone back in time,” Hermione whispered, lifting the chain off Harry’s neck in the darkness.

“Three hours back . . .”

Harry found his own leg and gave it a very hard pinch.

It hurt a lot, which seemed to rule out the possibility that he was having a very bizarre dream.

“But —”

“Shh! Listen! Someone’s coming! I think — I think it might be us!”

Hermione had her ear pressed against the cupboard door.

“Footsteps across the hall . . . yes, I think it’s us going down to Hagrid’s!”

“Are you telling me,” Harry whispered, “that we’re here in this cupboard and we’re out there too?”

“Yes,” said Hermione, her ear still glued to the cupboard door.

“I’m sure it’s us. It doesn’t sound like more than three people . . . and we’re walking slowly because we’re under the Invisibility Cloak —”

She broke off, still listening intently.

“We’ve gone down the front steps. . . .”

Hermione sat down on an upturned bucket, looking desperately anxious, but Harry wanted a few questions answered.

“Where did you get that hourglass thing?”

“It’s called a Time-Turner,” Hermione whispered, “and I got it from Professor McGonagall on our first day back. I’ve been using it all year to get to all my lessons. Professor McGonagall made me swear I wouldn’t tell anyone. She had to write all sorts of letters to the Ministry of Magic so I could have one. She had to tell them that I was a model student, and that I’d never, ever use it for anything except my studies. . . . I’ve been turning it back so I could do hours over again, that’s how I’ve been doing several lessons at once, see? But . . . Harry, I don’t understand what Dumbledore wants us to do. Why did he tell us to go back three hours? How’s that going to help Sirius?”

Harry stared at her shadowy face.

“There must be something that happened around now he wants us to change,” he said slowly.

“What happened? We were walking down to Hagrid’s three hours ago. . . .”

“This is three hours ago, and we are walking down to Hagrid’s,” said Hermione.

“We just heard ourselves leaving. . . .”

Harry frowned; he felt as though he were screwing up his whole brain in concentration.

“Dumbledore just said — just said we could save more than one innocent life. . . .” And then it hit him.

“Hermione, we’re going to save Buckbeak!”

“But — how will that help Sirius?”

“Dumbledore said — he just told us where the window is — the window of Flitwick’s office! Where they’ve got Sirius locked up! We’ve got to fly Buckbeak up to the window and rescue Sirius! Sirius can escape on Buckbeak — they can escape together!”

From what Harry could see of Hermione’s face, she looked terrified.

“If we manage that without being seen, it’ll be a miracle!”

“Well, we’ve got to try, haven’t we?” said Harry.

He stood up and pressed his ear against the door.

“Doesn’t sound like anyone’s there. . . . Come on, let’s go. . . .”

Harry pushed open the closet door.

The entrance hall was deserted.

As quietly and quickly as they could, they darted out of the closet and down the stone steps.

The shadows were already lengthening, the tops of the trees in the Forbidden Forest gilded once more with gold.

“If anyone’s looking out of the window —” Hermione squeaked, looking up at the castle behind them.

“We’ll run for it,” said Harry determinedly.

“Straight into the forest, all right? We’ll have to hide behind a tree or something and keep a lookout —”

“Okay, but we’ll go around by the greenhouses!” said Hermione breathlessly.

“We need to keep out of sight of Hagrid’s front door, or we’ll see us! We must be nearly at Hagrid’s by now!”

Still working out what she meant, Harry set off at a sprint, Hermione behind him.

They tore across the vegetable gardens to the greenhouses, paused for a moment behind them, then set off again, fast as they could, skirting around the Whomping Willow, tearing toward the shelter of the forest. . . .

Safe in the shadows of the trees, Harry turned around; seconds later, Hermione arrived beside him, panting.

“Right,” she gasped.

“We need to sneak over to Hagrid’s. . . . Keep out of sight, Harry. . . .”

They made their way silently through the trees, keeping to the very edge of the forest.

Then, as they glimpsed the front of Hagrid’s house, they heard a knock upon his door.

They moved quickly behind a wide oak trunk and peered out from either side.

Hagrid had appeared in his doorway, shaking and white, looking around to see who had knocked.

And Harry heard his own voice.

“It’s us. We’re wearing the Invisibility Cloak. Let us in and we can take it off.”

“Yeh shouldn’ve come!” Hagrid whispered.

He stood back, then shut the door quickly.

“This is the weirdest thing we’ve ever done,” Harry said fervently.

“Let’s move along a bit,” Hermione whispered.

“We need to get nearer to Buckbeak!”

They crept through the trees until they saw the nervous hippogriff, tethered to the fence around Hagrid’s pumpkin patch.

“Now?” Harry whispered.

“No!” said Hermione.

“If we steal him now, those Committee people will think Hagrid set him free! We’ve got to wait until they’ve seen he’s tied outside!”

“That’s going to give us about sixty seconds,” said Harry.

This was starting to seem impossible.

At that moment, there was a crash of breaking china from inside Hagrid’s cabin.

“That’s Hagrid breaking the milk jug,” Hermione whispered.

“I’m going to find Scabbers in a moment —”

Sure enough, a few minutes later, they heard Hermione’s shriek of surprise.

“Hermione,” said Harry suddenly, “what if we — we just run in there and grab Pettigrew —”

“No!” said Hermione in a terrified whisper.

“Don’t you understand? We’re breaking one of the most important Wizarding laws! Nobody’s supposed to change time, nobody! You heard Dumbledore, if we’re seen —”

“We’d only be seen by ourselves and Hagrid!”

“Harry, what do you think you’d do if you saw yourself bursting into Hagrid’s house?” said Hermione.

“I’d — I’d think I’d gone mad,” said Harry, “or I’d think there was some Dark Magic going on —”

“Exactly! You wouldn’t understand, you might even attack yourself! Don’t you see? Professor McGonagall told me what awful things have happened when wizards have meddled with time. . . . Loads of them ended up killing their past or future selves by mistake!”

“Okay!” said Harry.

“It was just an idea, I just thought —”

But Hermione nudged him and pointed toward the castle.

Harry moved his head a few inches to get a clear view of the distant front doors.

Dumbledore, Fudge, the old Committee member, and Macnair the executioner were coming down the steps.

“We’re about to come out!” Hermione breathed.

And sure enough, moments later, Hagrid’s back door opened, and Harry saw himself, Ron, and Hermione walking out of it with Hagrid.

It was, without a doubt, the strangest sensation of his life, standing behind the tree, and watching himself in the pumpkin patch.

“It’s okay, Beaky, it’s okay . . . ,” Hagrid said to Buckbeak.

Then he turned to Harry, Ron, and Hermione.

“Go on. Get goin’.”

“Hagrid, we can’t —”

“We’ll tell them what really happened —”

“They can’t kill him —”

“Go! It’s bad enough without you lot in trouble an’ all!”

Harry watched the Hermione in the pumpkin patch throw the Invisibility Cloak over him and Ron.

“Go quick. Don’ listen. . . .”

There was a knock on Hagrid’s front door.

The execution party had arrived.

Hagrid turned around and headed back into his cabin, leaving the back door ajar.

Harry watched the grass flatten in patches all around the cabin and heard three pairs of feet retreating.

He, Ron, and Hermione had gone . . . but the Harry and Hermione hidden in the trees could now hear what was happening inside the cabin through the back door.

“Where is the beast?” came the cold voice of Macnair.

“Out — outside,” Hagrid croaked.

Harry pulled his head out of sight as Macnair’s face appeared at Hagrid’s window, staring out at Buckbeak.

Then they heard Fudge.

“We — er — have to read you the official notice of execution, Hagrid. I’ll make it quick. And then you and Macnair need to sign it. Macnair, you’re supposed to listen too, that’s procedure —”

Macnair’s face vanished from the window.

It was now or never.

“Wait here,” Harry whispered to Hermione.

“I’ll do it.”

As Fudge’s voice started again, Harry darted out from behind his tree, vaulted the fence into the pumpkin patch, and approached Buckbeak.

“It is the decision of the Committee for the Disposal of Dangerous Creatures that the hippogriff Buckbeak, hereafter called the condemned, shall be executed on the sixth of June at sundown —”

Careful not to blink, Harry stared up into Buckbeak’s fierce orange eyes once more and bowed.

Buckbeak sank to his scaly knees and then stood up again.

Harry began to fumble with the knot of rope tying Buckbeak to the fence.

“. . . sentenced to execution by beheading, to be carried out by the Committee’s appointed executioner, Walden Macnair . . .”

“Come on, Buckbeak,” Harry murmured, “come on, we’re going to help you. Quietly . . . quietly . . .”

“ . . . as witnessed below. Hagrid, you sign here. . . .”

Harry threw all his weight onto the rope, but Buckbeak had dug in his front feet.

“Well, let’s get this over with,” said the reedy voice of the Committee member from inside Hagrid’s cabin.

“Hagrid, perhaps it will be better if you stay inside —”

“No, I — I wan’ ter be with him. . . . I don’ wan’ him ter be alone —”

Footsteps echoed from within the cabin.

“Buckbeak, move!” Harry hissed.

Harry tugged harder on the rope around Buckbeak’s neck.

The hippogriff began to walk, rustling its wings irritably.

They were still ten feet away from the forest, in plain view of Hagrid’s back door.

“One moment, please, Macnair,” came Dumbledore’s voice.

“You need to sign too.”

The footsteps stopped.

Harry heaved on the rope.

Buckbeak snapped his beak and walked a little faster.

Hermione’s white face was sticking out from behind a tree.

“Harry, hurry!” she mouthed.

Harry could still hear Dumbledore’s voice talking from within the cabin.

He gave the rope another wrench.

Buckbeak broke into a grudging trot.

They had reached the trees. . . .

“Quick! Quick!” Hermione moaned, darting out from behind her tree, seizing the rope too and adding her weight to make Buckbeak move faster.

Harry looked over his shoulder; they were now blocked from sight; they couldn’t see Hagrid’s garden at all.

“Stop!” he whispered to Hermione.

“They might hear us —”

Hagrid’s back door had opened with a bang.

Harry, Hermione, and Buckbeak stood quite still; even the hippogriff seemed to be listening intently.

Silence . . . then —

“Where is it?” said the reedy voice of the Committee member.

“Where is the beast?”

“It was tied here!” said the executioner furiously.

“I saw it! Just here!”

“How extraordinary,” said Dumbledore.

There was a note of amusement in his voice.

“Beaky!” said Hagrid huskily.

There was a swishing noise, and the thud of an axe.

The executioner seemed to have swung it into the fence in anger.

And then came the howling, and this time they could hear Hagrid’s words through his sobs.

“Gone! Gone! Bless his little beak, he’s gone! Musta pulled himself free! Beaky, yeh clever boy!”

Buckbeak started to strain against the rope, trying to get back to Hagrid.

Harry and Hermione tightened their grip and dug their heels into the forest floor to stop him.

“Someone untied him!” the executioner was snarling. “We should search the grounds, the forest —”

“Macnair, if Buckbeak has indeed been stolen, do you really think the thief will have led him away on foot?” said Dumbledore, still sounding amused.

“Search the skies, if you will. . . . Hagrid, I could do with a cup of tea. Or a large brandy.”

“O’ — o’ course, Professor,” said Hagrid, who sounded weak with happiness. “Come in, come in. . . .”

Harry and Hermione listened closely.

They heard footsteps, the soft cursing of the executioner, the snap of the door, and then silence once more.

“Now what?” whispered Harry, looking around.

“We’ll have to hide in here,” said Hermione, who looked very shaken. “We need to wait until they’ve gone back to the castle. Then we wait until it’s safe to fly Buckbeak up to Sirius’s window. He won’t be there for another couple of hours. . . . Oh, this is going to be difficult. . . .”

She looked nervously over her shoulder into the depths of the forest. The sun was setting now.

“We’re going to have to move,” said Harry, thinking hard. “We’ve got to be able to see the Whomping Willow, or we won’t know what’s going on.”

“Okay,” said Hermione, getting a firmer grip on Buckbeak’s rope. “But we’ve got to keep out of sight, Harry, remember. . . .”

They moved around the edge of the forest, darkness falling thickly around them, until they were hidden behind a clump of trees through which they could make out the Willow.

“There’s Ron!” said Harry suddenly.

A dark figure was sprinting across the lawn and its shout echoed through the still night air.

“Get away from him — get away — Scabbers, come here —”

And then they saw two more figures materialize out of nowhere.

Harry watched himself and Hermione chasing after Ron. Then he saw Ron dive.

“Gotcha! Get off, you stinking cat —”

“There’s Sirius!” said Harry.

The great shape of the dog had bounded out from the roots of the Willow.

They saw him bowl Harry over, then seize Ron. . . .

“Looks even worse from here, doesn’t it?” said Harry, watching the dog pulling Ron into the roots. “Ouch — look, I just got walloped by the tree — and so did you — this is weird —”

The Whomping Willow was creaking and lashing out with its lower branches; they could see themselves darting here and there, trying to reach the trunk.

And then the tree froze.

“That was Crookshanks pressing the knot,” said Hermione.

“And there we go . . . ,” Harry muttered. “We’re in.”

The moment they disappeared, the tree began to move again.

Seconds later, they heard footsteps quite close by.

Dumbledore, Macnair, Fudge, and the old Committee member were making their way up to the castle.

“Right after we’d gone down into the passage!” said Hermione. “If only Dumbledore had come with us . . .”

“Macnair and Fudge would’ve come too,” said Harry bitterly. “I bet you anything Fudge would’ve told Macnair to murder Sirius on the spot. . . .”

They watched the four men climb the castle steps and disappear from view.

For a few minutes the scene was deserted. Then —

“Here comes Lupin!” said Harry as they saw another figure sprinting down the stone steps and haring toward the Willow.

Harry looked up at the sky. Clouds were obscuring the moon completely.

They watched Lupin seize a broken branch from the ground and prod the knot on the trunk.

The tree stopped fighting, and Lupin, too, disappeared into the gap in its roots.

“If he’d only grabbed the Cloak,” said Harry. “It’s just lying there. . . .”

He turned to Hermione.

“If I just dashed out now and grabbed it, Snape’d never be able to get it and —”

“Harry, we mustn’t be seen!”

“How can you stand this?” he asked Hermione fiercely. “Just standing here and watching it happen?”

He hesitated. “I’m going to grab the Cloak!”

“Harry, no!”

Hermione seized the back of Harry’s robes not a moment too soon.

Just then, they heard a burst of song.

It was Hagrid, making his way up to the castle, singing at the top of his voice, and weaving slightly as he walked.

A large bottle was swinging from his hands.

“See?” Hermione whispered. “See what would have happened? We’ve got to keep out of sight! No, Buckbeak!”

The hippogriff was making frantic attempts to get to Hagrid again; Harry seized his rope too, straining to hold Buckbeak back.

They watched Hagrid meander tipsily up to the castle. He was gone.

Buckbeak stopped fighting to get away. His head drooped sadly.

Barely two minutes later, the castle doors flew open yet again, and Snape came charging out of them, running toward the Willow.

Harry’s fists clenched as they watched Snape skid to a halt next to the tree, looking around.

He grabbed the Cloak and held it up.

“Get your filthy hands off it,” Harry snarled under his breath.

“Shh!”

Snape seized the branch Lupin had used to freeze the tree, prodded the knot, and vanished from view as he put on the Cloak.

“So that’s it,” said Hermione quietly. “We’re all down there . . . and now we’ve just got to wait until we come back up again. . . .”

She took the end of Buckbeak’s rope and tied it securely around the nearest tree, then sat down on the dry ground, arms around her knees.

“Harry, there’s something I don’t understand. . . . Why didn’t the dementors get Sirius? I remember them coming, and then I think I passed out . . . there were so many of them. . . .”

Harry sat down too.

He explained what he’d seen; how, as the nearest dementor had lowered its mouth to Harry’s, a large silver something had come galloping across the lake and forced the dementors to retreat.

Hermione’s mouth was slightly open by the time Harry had finished.

“But what was it?”

“There’s only one thing it could have been, to make the dementors go,” said Harry. “A real Patronus. A powerful one.”

“But who conjured it?”

Harry didn’t say anything.

He was thinking back to the person he’d seen on the other bank of the lake.

He knew who he thought it had been . . . but how could it have been?

“Didn’t you see what they looked like?” said Hermione eagerly. “Was it one of the teachers?”

“No,” said Harry. “He wasn’t a teacher.”

“But it must have been a really powerful wizard, to drive all those dementors away. . . . If the Patronus was shining so brightly, didn’t it light him up? Couldn’t you see — ?”

“Yeah, I saw him,” said Harry slowly. “But . . . maybe I imagined it. . . . I wasn’t thinking straight. . . . I passed out right afterward. . . .”

“Who did you think it was?”

“I think —” Harry swallowed, knowing how strange this was going to sound. “I think it was my dad.”

Harry glanced up at Hermione and saw that her mouth was fully open now.

She was gazing at him with a mixture of alarm and pity.

“Harry, your dad’s — well — dead,” she said quietly.

“I know that,” said Harry quickly.

“You think you saw his ghost?”

“I don’t know . . . no . . . he looked solid. . . .”

“But then —”

“Maybe I was seeing things,” said Harry. “But . . . from what I could see . . . it looked like him. . . . I’ve got photos of him. . . .”

Hermione was still looking at him as though worried about his sanity.

“I know it sounds crazy,” said Harry flatly.

He turned to look at Buckbeak, who was digging his beak into the ground, apparently searching for worms.

But he wasn’t really watching Buckbeak.

He was thinking about his father and about his three oldest friends . . . Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs. . . .

Had all four of them been out on the grounds tonight?

Wormtail had reappeared this evening when everyone had thought he was dead. . . .

Was it so impossible his father had done the same?

Had he been seeing things across the lake?

The figure had been too far away to see distinctly . . . yet he had felt sure, for a moment, before he’d lost consciousness. . . .

The leaves overhead rustled faintly in the breeze.

The moon drifted in and out of sight behind the shifting clouds.

Hermione sat with her face turned toward the Willow, waiting.

And then, at last, after over an hour . . .

“Here we come!” Hermione whispered.

She and Harry got to their feet. Buckbeak raised his head.

They saw Lupin, Ron, and Pettigrew clambering awkwardly out of the hole in the roots, followed by the unconscious Snape drifting weirdly upward.

Next came Harry, Hermione, and Black.

They all began to walk toward the castle.

Harry’s heart was starting to beat very fast.

He glanced up at the sky.

Any moment now, that cloud was going to move aside and show the moon. . . .

“Harry,” Hermione muttered as though she knew exactly what he was thinking, “we’ve got to stay put. We mustn’t be seen. There’s nothing we can do. . . .”

“So we’re just going to let Pettigrew escape all over again. . . .” said Harry quietly.

“How do you expect to find a rat in the dark?” snapped Hermione. “There’s nothing we can do! We came back to help Sirius. We’re not supposed to be doing anything else!”

“All right!”

The moon slid out from behind its cloud.

They saw the tiny figures across the grounds stop.

Then they saw movement —

“There goes Lupin,” Hermione whispered. “He’s transforming —”

“Hermione!” said Harry suddenly. “We’ve got to move!”

“We mustn’t, I keep telling you —”

“Not to interfere! Lupin’s going to run into the forest, right at us!”

Hermione gasped.

“Quick!” she moaned, dashing to untie Buckbeak. “Quick! Where are we going to go? Where are we going to hide? The dementors will be coming any moment —”

“Back to Hagrid’s!” Harry said. “It’s empty now — come on!”

They ran as fast as they could, Buckbeak cantering along behind them.

They could hear the werewolf howling behind them. . . .

The cabin was in sight; Harry skidded to the door, wrenched it open, and Hermione and Buckbeak flashed past him; Harry threw himself in after them and bolted the door.

Fang the boarhound barked loudly.

“Shh, Fang, it’s us!” said Hermione, hurrying over and scratching his ears to quieten him.

“That was really close!” she said to Harry.

“Yeah . . .”

Harry was looking out of the window.

It was much harder to see what was going on from here.

Buckbeak seemed very happy to find himself back inside Hagrid’s house.

He lay down in front of the fire, folded his wings contentedly, and seemed ready for a good nap.

“I think I’d better go outside again, you know,” said Harry slowly. “I can’t see what’s going on — we won’t know when it’s time —”

Hermione looked up. Her expression was suspicious.

“I’m not going to try and interfere,” said Harry quickly. “But if we don’t see what’s going on, how’re we going to know when it’s time to rescue Sirius?”

“Well . . . okay, then . . . I’ll wait here with Buckbeak . . . but Harry, be careful — there’s a werewolf out there — and the dementors —”

Harry stepped outside again and edged around the cabin.

He could hear yelping in the distance.

That meant the dementors were closing in on Sirius. . . .

He and Hermione would be running to him any moment. . . .

Harry stared out toward the lake, his heart doing a kind of drumroll in his chest. . . .

Whoever had sent that Patronus would be appearing at any moment. . . .

For a fraction of a second he stood, irresolute, in front of Hagrid’s door.

You must not be seen.

But he didn’t want to be seen.

He wanted to do the seeing. . . . He had to know. . . .

And there were the dementors.

They were emerging out of the darkness from every direction, gliding around the edges of the lake. . . .

They were moving away from where Harry stood, to the opposite bank. . . .

He wouldn’t have to get near them. . . .

Harry began to run.

He had no thought in his head except his father. . . . If it was him . . . if it really was him . . . he had to know, had to find out. . . .

The lake was coming nearer and nearer, but there was no sign of anybody.

On the opposite bank, he could see tiny glimmers of silver — his own attempts at a Patronus —

There was a bush at the very edge of the water.

Harry threw himself behind it, peering desperately through the leaves.

On the opposite bank, the glimmers of silver were suddenly extinguished.

A terrified excitement shot through him — any moment now —

“Come on!” he muttered, staring about. “Where are you? Dad, come on —”

But no one came.

Harry raised his head to look at the circle of dementors across the lake.

One of them was lowering its hood.

It was time for the rescuer to appear — but no one was coming to help this time —

And then it hit him — he understood.

He hadn’t seen his father — he had seen himself —

Harry flung himself out from behind the bush and pulled out his wand.

“EXPECTO PATRONUM!” he yelled.

And out of the end of his wand burst, not a shapeless cloud of mist, but a blinding, dazzling, silver animal.

He screwed up his eyes, trying to see what it was.

It looked like a horse.

It was galloping silently away from him, across the black surface of the lake.

He saw it lower its head and charge at the swarming dementors. . . .

Now it was galloping around and around the black shapes on the ground, and the dementors were falling back, scattering, retreating into the darkness. . . .

They were gone.

The Patronus turned.

It was cantering back toward Harry across the still surface of the water.

It wasn’t a horse. It wasn’t a unicorn, either.

It was a stag.

It was shining brightly as the moon above . . . it was coming back to him. . . .

It stopped on the bank.

Its hooves made no mark on the soft ground as it stared at Harry with its large, silver eyes.

Slowly, it bowed its antlered head.

And Harry realized . . .

“Prongs,” he whispered.

But as his trembling fingertips stretched toward the creature, it vanished.

Harry stood there, hand still outstretched.

Then, with a great leap of his heart, he heard hooves behind him — he whirled around and saw Hermione dashing toward him, dragging Buckbeak behind her.

“What did you do?” she said fiercely. “You said you were only going to keep a lookout!”

“I just saved all our lives . . . ,” said Harry. “Get behind here — behind this bush — I’ll explain.”

Hermione listened to what had just happened with her mouth open yet again.

“Did anyone see you?”

“Yes, haven’t you been listening? I saw me but I thought I was my dad! It’s okay!”

“Harry, I can’t believe it. . . . You conjured up a Patronus that drove away all those dementors! That’s very, very advanced magic. . . .”

“I knew I could do it this time,” said Harry, “because I’d already done it. . . . Does that make sense?”

“I don’t know — Harry, look at Snape!”

Together they peered around the bush at the other bank.

Snape had regained consciousness.

He was conjuring stretchers and lifting the limp forms of Harry, Hermione, and Black onto them.

A fourth stretcher, no doubt bearing Ron, was already floating at his side.

Then, wand held out in front of him, he moved them away toward the castle.

“Right, it’s nearly time,” said Hermione tensely, looking at her watch.

“We’ve got about forty-five minutes until Dumbledore locks the door to the hospital wing. We’ve got to rescue Sirius and get back into the ward before anybody realizes we’re missing. . . .”

They waited, watching the moving clouds reflected in the lake, while the bush next to them whispered in the breeze.

Buckbeak, bored, was ferreting for worms again.

“D’you reckon he’s up there yet?” said Harry, checking his watch.

He looked up at the castle and began counting the windows to the right of the West Tower.

“Look!” Hermione whispered. “Who’s that? Someone’s coming back out of the castle!”

Harry stared through the darkness.

The man was hurrying across the grounds, toward one of the entrances.

Something shiny glinted in his belt.

“Macnair!” said Harry. “The executioner! He’s gone to get the dementors! This is it, Hermione —”

Hermione put her hands on Buckbeak’s back and Harry gave her a leg up.

Then he placed his foot on one of the lower branches of the bush and climbed up in front of her.

He pulled Buckbeak’s rope back over his neck and tied it to the other side of his collar like reins.

“Ready?” he whispered to Hermione. “You’d better hold on to me —”

He nudged Buckbeak’s sides with his heels.

Buckbeak soared straight into the dark air.

Harry gripped his flanks with his knees, feeling the great wings rising powerfully beneath them.

Hermione was holding Harry very tight around the waist; he could hear her muttering, “Oh, no — I don’t like this — oh, I really don’t like this —”

Harry urged Buckbeak forward.

They were gliding quietly toward the upper floors of the castle. . . .

Harry pulled hard on the left-hand side of the rope, and Buckbeak turned.

Harry was trying to count the windows flashing past —

“Whoa!” he said, pulling backward as hard as he could.

Buckbeak slowed down and they found themselves at a stop, unless you counted the fact that they kept rising up and down several feet as the hippogriff beat his wings to remain airborne.

“He’s there!” Harry said, spotting Sirius as they rose up beside the window.

He reached out, and as Buckbeak’s wings fell, was able to tap sharply on the glass.

Black looked up.

Harry saw his jaw drop.

He leapt from his chair, hurried to the window, and tried to open it, but it was locked.

“Stand back!” Hermione called to him, and she took out her wand, still gripping the back of Harry’s robes with her left hand.

“Alohomora!”

The window sprang open.

“How — how — ?” said Black weakly, staring at the hippogriff.

“Get on — there’s not much time,” said Harry, gripping Buckbeak firmly on either side of his sleek neck to hold him steady.

“You’ve got to get out of here — the dementors are coming — Macnair’s gone to get them.”

Black placed a hand on either side of the window frame and heaved his head and shoulders out of it.

It was very lucky he was so thin.

In seconds, he had managed to fling one leg over Buckbeak’s back and pull himself onto the hippogriff behind Hermione.

“Okay, Buckbeak, up!” said Harry, shaking the rope. “Up to the tower — come on!”

The hippogriff gave one sweep of its mighty wings and they were soaring upward again, high as the top of the West Tower.

Buckbeak landed with a clatter on the battlements, and Harry and Hermione slid off him at once.

“Sirius, you’d better go, quick,” Harry panted. “They’ll reach Flitwick’s office any moment, they’ll find out you’re gone.”

Buckbeak pawed the ground, tossing his sharp head.

“What happened to the other boy? Ron?” croaked Sirius.

“He’s going to be okay. He’s still out of it, but Madam Pomfrey says she’ll be able to make him better. Quick — go —”

But Black was still staring down at Harry.

“How can I ever thank —”

“GO!” Harry and Hermione shouted together.

Black wheeled Buckbeak around, facing the open sky.

“We’ll see each other again,” he said. “You are — truly your father’s son, Harry. . . .”

He squeezed Buckbeak’s sides with his heels.

Harry and Hermione jumped back as the enormous wings rose once more. . . .

The hippogriff took off into the air. . . .

He and his rider became smaller and smaller as Harry gazed after them . . . then a cloud drifted across the moon. . . .

They were gone.

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𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐗𝐗𝐈𝐈. 𝐎𝐖𝐋 𝐏𝐎𝐒𝐓 𝐀𝐆𝐀𝐈𝐍

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“Harry!”

Hermione was tugging at his sleeve, staring at her watch.

“We’ve got exactly ten minutes to get back down to the hospital wing without anybody seeing us — before Dumbledore locks the door —”

“Okay,” said Harry, wrenching his gaze from the sky, “let’s go. . . .”

They slipped through the doorway behind them and down a tightly spiraling stone staircase.

As they reached the bottom of it, they heard voices.

They flattened themselves against the wall and listened.

It sounded like Fudge and Snape.

They were walking quickly along the corridor at the foot of the staircase.

“. . . only hope Dumbledore’s not going to make difficulties,” Snape was saying.

“The Kiss will be performed immediately?”

“As soon as Macnair returns with the dementors.

This whole Black affair has been highly embarrassing.

I can’t tell you how much I’m looking forward to informing the Daily Prophet that we’ve got him at last. . . .

I daresay they’ll want to interview you, Snape . . . and once young Harry’s back in his right mind, I expect he’ll want to tell the Prophet exactly how you saved him. . . .”

Harry clenched his teeth.

He caught a glimpse of Snape’s smirk as he and Fudge passed Harry and Hermione’s hiding place.

Their footsteps died away.

Harry and Hermione waited a few moments to make sure they’d really gone, then started to run in the opposite direction.

Down one staircase, then another, along a new corridor — then they heard a cackling ahead.

“Peeves!” Harry muttered, grabbing Hermione’s wrist.

“In here!”

They tore into a deserted classroom to their left just in time.

Peeves seemed to be bouncing along the corridor in boisterous good spirits, laughing his head off.

“Oh, he’s horrible,” whispered Hermione, her ear to the door.

“I bet he’s all excited because the dementors are going to finish off Sirius. . . .”

She checked her watch.

“Three minutes, Harry!”

They waited until Peeves’s gloating voice had faded into the distance, then slid back out of the room and broke into a run again.

“Hermione — what’ll happen — if we don’t get back inside — before Dumbledore locks the door?” Harry panted.

“I don’t want to think about it!” Hermione moaned, checking her watch again.

“One minute!”

They had reached the end of the corridor with the hospital wing entrance.

“Okay — I can hear Dumbledore,” said Hermione tensely.

“Come on, Harry!”

They crept along the corridor.

The door opened.

Dumbledore’s back appeared.

“I am going to lock you in,” they heard him saying.

“It is five minutes to midnight.

Miss Granger, three turns should do it.

Good luck.”

Dumbledore backed out of the room, closed the door, and took out his wand to magically lock it.

Panicking, Harry and Hermione ran forward.

Dumbledore looked up, and a wide smile appeared under the long silver mustache.

“Well?” he said quietly.

“We did it!” said Harry breathlessly.

“Sirius has gone, on Buckbeak. . . .”

Dumbledore beamed at them.

“Well done.

I think —”

He listened intently for any sound within the hospital wing.

“Yes, I think you’ve gone too — get inside — I’ll lock you in —”

Harry and Hermione slipped back inside the dormitory.

It was empty except for Ron, who was still lying motionless in the end bed.

As the lock clicked behind them, Harry and Hermione crept back to their own beds, Hermione tucking the Time-Turner back under her robes.

A moment later, Madam Pomfrey came striding back out of her office.

“Did I hear the headmaster leaving?

Am I allowed to look after my patients now?”

She was in a very bad mood.

Harry and Hermione thought it best to accept their chocolate quietly.

Madam Pomfrey stood over them, making sure they ate it.

But Harry could hardly swallow.

He and Hermione were waiting, listening, their nerves jangling. . . .

And then, as they both took a fourth piece of chocolate from Madam Pomfrey, they heard a distant roar of fury echoing from somewhere above them. . . .

“What was that?” said Madam Pomfrey in alarm.

Now they could hear angry voices, growing louder and louder.

Madam Pomfrey was staring at the door.

“Really — they’ll wake everybody up!

What do they think they’re doing?”

Harry was trying to hear what the voices were saying.

They were drawing nearer —

“He must have Disapparated, Severus.

We should have left somebody in the room with him.

When this gets out —”

“HE DIDN’T DISAPPARATE!” Snape roared, now very close at hand.

“YOU CAN’T APPARATE OR DISAPPARATE INSIDE THIS CASTLE!

THIS — HAS — SOMETHING — TO — DO — WITH — POTTER!”

“Severus — be reasonable — Harry has been locked up —”

BAM.

The door of the hospital wing burst open.

Fudge, Snape, and Dumbledore came striding into the ward.

Dumbledore alone looked calm.

Indeed, he looked as though he was quite enjoying himself.

Fudge appeared angry.

But Snape was beside himself.

“OUT WITH IT, POTTER!” he bellowed.

“WHAT DID YOU DO?”

“Professor Snape!” shrieked Madam Pomfrey.

“Control yourself!”

“See here, Snape, be reasonable,” said Fudge.

“This door’s been locked, we just saw —”

“THEY HELPED HIM ESCAPE, I KNOW IT!” Snape howled, pointing at Harry and Hermione.

His face was twisted; spit was flying from his mouth.

“Calm down, man!” Fudge barked.

“You’re talking nonsense!”

“YOU DON’T KNOW POTTER!” shrieked Snape.

“HE DID IT, I KNOW HE DID IT —”

“That will do, Severus,” said Dumbledore quietly.

“Think about what you are saying.

This door has been locked since I left the ward ten minutes ago.

Madam Pomfrey, have these students left their beds?”

“Of course not!” said Madam Pomfrey, bristling.

“I would have heard them!”

“Well, there you have it, Severus,” said Dumbledore calmly.

“Unless you are suggesting that Harry and Hermione are able to be in two places at once, I’m afraid I don’t see any point in troubling them further.”

Snape stood there, seething, staring from Fudge, who looked thoroughly shocked at his behavior, to Dumbledore, whose eyes were twinkling behind his glasses.

Snape whirled about, robes swishing behind him, and stormed out of the ward.

“Fellow seems quite unbalanced,” said Fudge, staring after him.

“I’d watch out for him if I were you, Dumbledore.”

“Oh, he’s not unbalanced,” said Dumbledore quietly.

“He’s just suffered a severe disappointment.”

“He’s not the only one!” puffed Fudge.

“The Daily Prophet’s going to have a field day!

We had Black cornered and he slipped through our fingers yet again!

All it needs now is for the story of that hippogriff’s escape to get out, and I’ll be a laughingstock!

Well . . . I’d better go and notify the Ministry. . . .”

“And the dementors?” said Dumbledore.

“They’ll be removed from the school, I trust?”

“Oh yes, they’ll have to go,” said Fudge, running his fingers distractedly through his hair.

“Never dreamed they’d attempt to administer the Kiss on an innocent boy. . . .

Completely out of control . . . no, I’ll have them packed off back to Azkaban tonight. . . .

Perhaps we should think about dragons at the school entrance. . . .”

“Hagrid would like that,” said Dumbledore with a swift smile at Harry and Hermione.

As he and Fudge left the dormitory, Madam Pomfrey hurried to the door and locked it again.

Muttering angrily to herself, she headed back to her office.

There was a low moan from the other end of the ward.

Ron had woken up.

They could see him sitting up, rubbing his head, looking around.

“What — what happened?” he groaned.

“Harry?

Why are we in here?

Where’s Sirius?

Where’s Lupin?

What’s going on?”

Harry and Hermione looked at each other.

“You explain,” said Harry, helping himself to some more chocolate.

When Harry, Ron, and Hermione left the hospital wing at noon the next day, it was to find an almost deserted castle.

The sweltering heat and the end of the exams meant that everyone was taking full advantage of another Hogsmeade visit.

Neither Ron nor Hermione felt like going, however, so they and Harry wandered onto the grounds, still talking about the extraordinary events of the previous night and wondering where Sirius and Buckbeak were now.

Sitting near the lake, watching the giant squid waving its tentacles lazily above the water, Harry lost the thread of the conversation as he looked across to the opposite bank.

The stag had galloped toward him from there just last night. . . .

A shadow fell across them and they looked up to see a very bleary-eyed Hagrid, mopping his sweaty face with one of his tablecloth-sized handkerchiefs and beaming down at them.

“Know I shouldn’ feel happy, after wha’ happened las’ night,” he said.

“I mean, Black escapin’ again, an’ everythin’ — but guess what?”

“What?” they said, pretending to look curious.

“Beaky!

He escaped!

He’s free!

Bin celebratin’ all night!”

“That’s wonderful!” said Hermione, giving Ron a reproving look because he looked as though he was close to laughing.

“Yeah . . . can’t’ve tied him up properly,” said Hagrid, gazing happily out over the grounds.

“I was worried this mornin’, mind . . . thought he mighta met Professor Lupin on the grounds, but Lupin says he never ate anythin’ las’ night. . . .”

“What?” said Harry quickly.

“Blimey, haven’ yeh heard?” said Hagrid, his smile fading a little.

He lowered his voice, even though there was nobody in sight.

“Er — Snape told all the Slytherins this mornin’. . . .

Thought everyone’d know by now . . . Professor Lupin’s a werewolf, see.

An’ he was loose on the grounds las’ night. . . .

He’s packin’ now, o’ course.”

“He’s packing?” said Harry, alarmed.

“Why?”

“Leavin’, isn’ he?” said Hagrid, looking surprised that Harry had to ask.

“Resigned firs’ thing this mornin’.

Says he can’t risk it happenin’ again.”

Harry scrambled to his feet.

“I’m going to see him,” he said to Ron and Hermione.

“But if he’s resigned —”

“— doesn’t sound like there’s anything we can do —”

“I don’t care.

I still want to see him.

I’ll meet you back here.”

Lupin’s office door was open.

He had already packed most of his things.

The grindylow’s empty tank stood next to his battered old suitcase, which was open and nearly full.

Lupin was bending over something on his desk and looked up only when Harry knocked on the door.

“I saw you coming,” said Lupin, smiling.

He pointed to the parchment he had been poring over.

It was the Marauder’s Map.

“I just saw Hagrid,” said Harry.

“And he said you’d resigned.

It’s not true, is it?”

“I’m afraid it is,” said Lupin.

He started opening his desk drawers and taking out the contents.

“Why?” said Harry.

“The Ministry of Magic don’t think you were helping Sirius, do they?”

Lupin crossed to the door and closed it behind Harry.

“No.

Professor Dumbledore managed to convince Fudge that I was trying to save your lives.”

He sighed.

“That was the final straw for Severus.

I think the loss of the Order of Merlin hit him hard.

So he — er — accidentally let slip that I am a werewolf this morning at breakfast.”

“You’re not leaving just because of that!” said Harry.

Lupin smiled wryly.

“This time tomorrow, the owls will start arriving from parents. . . .

They will not want a werewolf teaching their children, Harry.

And after last night, I see their point.

I could have bitten any of you. . . .

That must never happen again.”

“You’re the best Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher we’ve ever had!” said Harry.

“Don’t go!”

Lupin shook his head and didn’t speak.

He carried on emptying his drawers.

Then, while Harry was trying to think of a good argument to make him stay, Lupin said, “From what the headmaster told me this morning, you saved a lot of lives last night, Harry.

If I’m proud of anything, it’s how much you’ve learned. . . .

Tell me about your Patronus.”

“How d’you know about that?” said Harry, distracted.

“What else could have driven the dementors back?”

Harry told Lupin what had happened.

When he’d finished, Lupin was smiling again.

“Yes, your father was always a stag when he transformed,” he said.

“You guessed right . . . that’s why we called him Prongs.”

Lupin threw his last few books into his case, closed the desk drawers, and turned to look at Harry.

“Here — I brought this from the Shrieking Shack last night,” he said, handing Harry back the Invisibility Cloak.

“And . . .”

He hesitated, then held out the Marauder’s Map too.

“I am no longer your teacher, so I don’t feel guilty about giving you this back as well.

It’s no use to me, and I daresay you, Ron, and Hermione will find uses for it.”

Harry took the map and grinned.

“You told me Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs would’ve wanted to lure me out of school . . . you said they’d have thought it was funny.”

“And so we would have,” said Lupin, now reaching down to close his case.

“I have no hesitation in saying that James would have been highly disappointed if his son had never found any of the secret passages out of the castle.”

There was a knock on the door.

Harry hastily stuffed the Marauder’s Map and the Invisibility Cloak into his pocket.

It was Professor Dumbledore.

He didn’t look surprised to see Harry there.

“Your carriage is at the gates, Remus,” he said.

“Thank you, Headmaster.”

Lupin picked up his old suitcase and the empty grindylow tank.

“Well — good-bye, Harry,” he said, smiling.

“It has been a real pleasure teaching you.

I feel sure we’ll meet again sometime.

Headmaster, there is no need to see me to the gates, I can manage. . . .”

Harry had the impression that Lupin wanted to leave as quickly as possible.

“Good-bye, then, Remus,” said Dumbledore soberly.

Lupin shifted the grindylow tank slightly so that he and Dumbledore could shake hands.

Then, with a final nod to Harry and a swift smile, Lupin left the office.

Harry sat down in his vacated chair, staring glumly at the floor.

He heard the door close and looked up.

Dumbledore was still there.

“Why so miserable, Harry?” he said quietly.

“You should be very proud of yourself after last night.”

“It didn’t make any difference,” said Harry bitterly.

“Pettigrew got away.”

“Didn’t make any difference?” said Dumbledore quietly.

“It made all the difference in the world, Harry.

You helped uncover the truth.

You saved an innocent man from a terrible fate.”

Terrible.

Something stirred in Harry’s memory.

Greater and more terrible than ever before . . . Professor Trelawney’s prediction!

“Professor Dumbledore — yesterday, when I was having my Divination exam, Professor Trelawney went very — very strange.”

“Indeed?” said Dumbledore.

“Er — stranger than usual, you mean?”

“Yes . . . her voice went all deep and her eyes rolled and she said . . . she said Voldemort’s servant was going to set out to return to him before midnight. . . .

She said the servant would help him come back to power.”

Harry stared up at Dumbledore.

“And then she sort of became normal again, and she couldn’t remember anything she’d said.

Was it — was she making a real prediction?”

Dumbledore looked mildly impressed.

“Do you know, Harry, I think she might have been,” he said thoughtfully.

“Who’d have thought it?

That brings her total of real predictions up to two.

I should offer her a pay raise. . . .”

“But —” Harry looked at him, aghast.

How could Dumbledore take this so calmly?

“But — I stopped Sirius and Professor Lupin from killing Pettigrew!

That makes it my fault if Voldemort comes back!”

“It does not,” said Dumbledore quietly.

“Hasn’t your experience with the Time-Turner taught you anything, Harry?

The consequences of our actions are always so complicated, so diverse, that predicting the future is a very difficult business indeed. . . .

Professor Trelawney, bless her, is living proof of that. . . .

You did a very noble thing, in saving Pettigrew’s life.”

“But if he helps Voldemort back to power — !”

“Pettigrew owes his life to you.

You have sent Voldemort a deputy who is in your debt.

When one wizard saves another wizard’s life, it creates a certain bond between them . . . and I’m much mistaken if Voldemort wants his servant in the debt of Harry Potter.”

“I don’t want a bond with Pettigrew!” said Harry.

“He betrayed my parents!”

“This is magic at its deepest, its most impenetrable, Harry.

But trust me . . . the time may come when you will be very glad you saved Pettigrew’s life.”

Harry couldn’t imagine when that would be.

Dumbledore looked as though he knew what Harry was thinking.

“I knew your father very well, both at Hogwarts and later, Harry,” he said gently.

“He would have saved Pettigrew too, I am sure of it.”

Harry looked up at him.

Dumbledore wouldn’t laugh — he could tell Dumbledore . . .

“Last night . . . I thought it was my dad who’d conjured my Patronus.

I mean, when I saw myself across the lake . . . I thought I was seeing him.”

“An easy mistake to make,” said Dumbledore softly.

“I expect you’ll tire of hearing it, but you do look extraordinarily like James.

Except for the eyes . . . you have your mother’s eyes.”

Harry shook his head.

“It was stupid, thinking it was him,” he muttered.

“I mean, I knew he was dead.”

“You think the dead we have loved ever truly leave us?

You think that we don’t recall them more clearly than ever in times of great trouble?

Your father is alive in you, Harry, and shows himself most plainly when you have need of him.

How else could you produce that particular Patronus?

Prongs rode again last night.”

It took a moment for Harry to realize what Dumbledore had said.

“Last night Sirius told me all about how they became Animagi,” said Dumbledore, smiling.

“An extraordinary achievement — not least, keeping it quiet from me.

And then I remembered the most unusual form your Patronus took, when it charged Mr. Malfoy down at your Quidditch match against Ravenclaw.

So you did see your father last night, Harry. . . .

You found him inside yourself.”

And Dumbledore left the office, leaving Harry to his very confused thoughts.

Nobody at Hogwarts knew the truth of what had happened the night that Sirius, Buckbeak, and Pettigrew had vanished except Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Professor Dumbledore.

As the end of term approached, Harry heard many different theories about what had really happened, but none of them came close to the truth.

Malfoy was furious about Buckbeak.

He was convinced that Hagrid had found a way of smuggling the hippogriff to safety, and seemed outraged that he and his father had been outwitted by a gamekeeper.

Percy Weasley, meanwhile, had much to say on the subject of Sirius’s escape.

“If I manage to get into the Ministry, I’ll have a lot of proposals to make about Magical Law Enforcement!” he told the only person who would listen — his girlfriend, Penelope.

Though the weather was perfect, though the atmosphere was so cheerful, though he knew they had achieved the near impossible in helping Sirius to freedom, Harry had never approached the end of a school year in worse spirits.

He certainly wasn’t the only one who was sorry to see Professor Lupin go.

The whole of Harry’s Defense Against the Dark Arts class was miserable about his resignation.

“Wonder what they’ll give us next year?” said Seamus Finnigan gloomily.

“Maybe a vampire,” suggested Dean Thomas hopefully.

It wasn’t only Professor Lupin’s departure that was weighing on Harry’s mind.

He couldn’t help thinking a lot about Professor Trelawney’s prediction.

He kept wondering where Pettigrew was now, whether he had sought sanctuary with Voldemort yet.

But the thing that was lowering Harry’s spirits most of all was the prospect of returning to the Dursleys.

For maybe half an hour, a glorious half hour, he had believed he would be living with Sirius from now on . . . his parents’ best friend. . . .

It would have been the next best thing to having his own father back.

And while no news of Sirius was definitely good news, because it meant he had successfully gone into hiding, Harry couldn’t help feeling miserable when he thought of the home he might have had, and the fact that it was now impossible.

The exam results came out on the last day of term.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione had passed every subject.

Harry was amazed that he had got through Potions.

He had a shrewd suspicion that Dumbledore might have stepped in to stop Snape failing him on purpose.

Snape’s behavior toward Harry over the past week had been quite alarming.

Harry wouldn’t have thought it possible that Snape’s dislike for him could increase, but it certainly had.

A muscle twitched unpleasantly at the corner of Snape’s thin mouth every time he looked at Harry, and he was constantly flexing his fingers, as though itching to place them around Harry’s throat.

Percy had got his top-grade N.E.W.T.s; Fred and George had scraped a handful of O.W.L.s each.

Gryffindor House, meanwhile, largely thanks to their spectacular performance in the Quidditch Cup, had won the House Championship for the third year running.

This meant that the end of term feast took place amid decorations of scarlet and gold, and that the Gryffindor table was the noisiest of the lot, as everybody celebrated.

Even Harry managed to forget about the journey back to the Dursleys the next day as he ate, drank, talked, and laughed with the rest.

As the Hogwarts Express pulled out of the station the next morning, Hermione gave Harry and Ron some surprising news.

“I went to see Professor McGonagall this morning, just before breakfast.

I’ve decided to drop Muggle Studies.”

“But you passed your exam with three hundred and twenty percent!” said Ron.

“I know,” sighed Hermione, “but I can’t stand another year like this one.

That Time-Turner, it was driving me mad.

I’ve handed it in.

Without Muggle Studies and Divination, I’ll be able to have a normal schedule again.”

“I still can’t believe you didn’t tell us about it,” said Ron grumpily.

“We’re supposed to be your friends.”

“I promised I wouldn’t tell anyone,” said Hermione severely.

She looked around at Harry, who was watching Hogwarts disappear from view behind a mountain.

Two whole months before he’d see it again. . . .

“Oh, cheer up, Harry!” said Hermione sadly.

“I’m okay,” said Harry quickly.

“Just thinking about the holidays.”

“Yeah, I’ve been thinking about them too,” said Ron.

“Harry, you’ve got to come and stay with us.

I’ll fix it up with Mum and Dad, then I’ll call you.

I know how to use a fellytone now —”

“A telephone, Ron,” said Hermione.

“Honestly, you should take Muggle Studies next year. . . .”

Ron ignored her.

“It’s the Quidditch World Cup this summer!

How about it, Harry?

Come and stay, and we’ll go and see it!

Dad can usually get tickets from work.”

This proposal had the effect of cheering Harry up a great deal.

“Yeah . . . I bet the Dursleys’d be pleased to let me come . . . especially after what I did to Aunt Marge. . . .”

Feeling considerably more cheerful, Harry joined Ron and Hermione in several games of Exploding Snap, and when the witch with the tea cart arrived, he bought himself a very large lunch, though nothing with chocolate in it.

But it was late in the afternoon before the thing that made him truly happy turned up. . . .

“Harry,” said Hermione suddenly, peering over his shoulder.

“What’s that thing outside your window?”

Harry turned to look outside.

Something very small and gray was bobbing in and out of sight beyond the glass.

He stood up for a better look and saw that it was a tiny owl, carrying a letter that was much too big for it.

The owl was so small, in fact, that it kept tumbling over in the air, buffeted this way and that in the train’s slipstream.

Harry quickly pulled down the window, stretched out his arm, and caught it.

It felt like a very fluffy Snitch.

He brought it carefully inside.

The owl dropped its letter onto Harry’s seat and began zooming around their compartment, apparently very pleased with itself for accomplishing its task.

Hedwig clicked her beak with a sort of dignified disapproval.

Crookshanks sat up in his seat, following the owl with his great yellow eyes.

Ron, noticing this, snatched the owl safely out of harm’s way.

Harry picked up the letter.

It was addressed to him.

He ripped open the letter, and shouted, “It’s from Sirius!”

“What?” said Ron and Hermione excitedly.

“Read it aloud!”

Dear Harry,

I hope this finds you before you reach your aunt and uncle.

I don’t know whether they’re used to owl post.

Buckbeak and I are in hiding.

I won’t tell you where, in case this falls into the wrong hands.

I have some doubt about the owl’s reliability, but he is the best I could find, and he did seem eager for the job.

I believe the dementors are still searching for me, but they haven’t a hope of finding me here.

I am planning to allow some Muggles to glimpse me soon, a long way from Hogwarts, so that the security on the castle will be lifted.

There is something I never got around to telling you during our brief meeting.

It was I who sent you the Firebolt —

“Ha!” said Hermione triumphantly.

“See! I told you it was from him!”

“Yes, but he hadn’t jinxed it, had he?” said Ron.

“Ouch!”

The tiny owl, now hooting happily in his hand, had nibbled one of his fingers in what it seemed to think was an affectionate way.

Crookshanks took the order to the Owl Office for me.

I used your name but told them to take the gold from Gringotts vault number seven hundred and eleven — my own.

Please consider it as thirteen birthdays’ worth of presents from your godfather.

I would also like to apologize for the fright I think I gave you that night last year when you left your uncle’s house.

I had only hoped to get a glimpse of you before starting my journey north, but I think the sight of me alarmed you.

I am enclosing something else for you, which I think will make your next year at Hogwarts more enjoyable.

If ever you need me, send word.

Your owl will find me.

I’ll write again soon.

Sirius

Harry looked eagerly inside the envelope.

There was another piece of parchment in there.

He read it through quickly and felt suddenly as warm and contented as though he’d swallowed a bottle of hot butterbeer in one gulp.

I, Sirius Black, Harry Potter’s godfather, hereby give him permission to visit Hogsmeade on weekends.

“That’ll be good enough for Dumbledore!” said Harry happily.

He looked back at Sirius’s letter.

“Hang on, there’s a P.S. . . .”

I thought your friend Ron might like to keep this owl, as it’s my fault he no longer has a rat.

Ron’s eyes widened.

The minute owl was still hooting excitedly.

“Keep him?” he said uncertainly.

He looked closely at the owl for a moment; then, to Harry’s and Hermione’s great surprise, he held him out for Crookshanks to sniff.

“What d’you reckon?” Ron asked the cat.

“Definitely an owl?”

Crookshanks purred.

“That’s good enough for me,” said Ron happily.

“He’s mine.”

Harry read and reread the letter from Sirius all the way back into King’s Cross station.

It was still clutched tightly in his hand as he, Ron, and Hermione stepped back through the barrier of platform nine and threequarters.

Harry spotted Uncle Vernon at once.

He was standing a good distance from Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, eyeing them suspiciously, and when Mrs. Weasley hugged Harry in greeting, his worst suspicions about them seemed confirmed.

“I’ll call about the World Cup!” Ron yelled after Harry as Harry bid him and Hermione good-bye, then wheeled the trolley bearing his trunk and Hedwig’s cage toward Uncle Vernon, who greeted him in his usual fashion.

“What’s that?” he snarled, staring at the envelope Harry was still clutching in his hand.

“If it’s another form for me to sign, you’ve got another —”

“It’s not,” said Harry cheerfully.

“It’s a letter from my godfather.”

“Godfather?” spluttered Uncle Vernon.

“You haven’t got a godfather!”

“Yes, I have,” said Harry brightly.

“He was my mum and dad’s best friend.

He’s a convicted murderer, but he’s broken out of Wizard prison and he’s on the run.

He likes to keep in touch with me, though . . . keep up with my news . . . check if I’m happy. . . .”

And, grinning broadly at the look of horror on Uncle Vernon’s face, Harry set off toward the station exit, Hedwig rattling along in front of him, for what looked like a much better summer than the last.

THE END.