Chapter Five: Werewolves and Animaguses
As the Fat Lady was so shaken from her encounter with Sirius Black, they had found a new portrait to take her place. As it turns out, the new portrait was Sir Cadogan. He was absolutely insane. The pompous knight changed the password twice a day, not to mention the fact that he often challenged everyone to duels so that they could get inside. But, he was there to stay; at least until the Fat Lady's painting had been repaired.
The Quidditch match was coming up and their three day practices had become a practice every day of the week except Sundays. It was going to be between Slytherin and Gryffindor. Tensions were running high and nerves even higher. Not to mention Hermione bursting into tears before breakfast one morning.
"What's wrong, Hermione?" Fred had asked.
"She's lost her cat," Daphne replied.
"Crookshanks," Ginny said.
"He's been missing for a week!"
"I'm sure he's fine!" Fred said. "Maybe you should put up missing signs."
Hermione perked up.
"I hadn't thought of that!" she exclaimed. "Oh, thank you, Fred!"
"Er, your welcome?" Fred replied.
"Problem solved!" George exclaimed, throwing an arm around his twin's shoulder. "Now, let's go get our bags. Charms starts soon."
"Oh," Hermione said to Daphne and Draco. "We probably need to get going too."
"Yeah, wouldn't want to be late," Draco replied sarcastically.
So, they went to their Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom. They were expecting to see Lupin, as he was their professor, so they were slightly shocked when it wasn't he that was at his desk, but Professor Snape.
"Where's Professor Lupin?" Hermione asked curiously.
"He says he is too ill to teach today," Snape replied with a twisted smile.
Once the class had filed in, Snape stood and said, "Today we shall discuss werewolves."
"But sir," Hermione said. "We're not supposed to start learning about werewolves for weeks. We only just finished learning about hinkypunks."
"Miss Granger," Snape said. "I am teaching this lesson. Your year is far behind where you should be. Therefore, I thought I might test you with more difficult material. I need you all to turn to page 394."
Everyone pulled out their books and flipped to the proper page.
"Which of you can tell me what the difference is between a werewolf and an animagus?"
Hermione's hand shot into the air.
"Miss Granger?"
"An animagus is a person who can transform into an animal form. They are not always wolves or dogs either. Also, the animagus can chose to change form when the werewolf has no choice."
"Correct. Five points to Slytherin."
Snape went on to explain the difference between a werewolf and a regular wolf. Then, he had them read about how to recognize a werewolf. Hermione finished the reading first and then sat back, mulling the information over. One of the ways to recognize a werewolf, was that they have more dog like tendencies (though dog Animaguses do as well). Werewolves, even when in human form, like rare meats. Also, they would disappear once a month to transform. In fact, now that she thought about it, their very own Professor Lupin fit the criteria for being a werewolf. He was always sick once a month, and he had wolf like tendencies. Hermione pulled her calendar out of her bag and checked the days he had been missing from the dinner table or class. Each of them fell on a full moon. Hermione put a hand up to her mouth in shock. Then she glanced around. No one had noticed. She figured that she should keep to herself about this. Her theory may not even be correct.
HERMIONE—BRIGHTEST-WITCH-IN-HER-YEAR
Ron and Neville sat in the Gryffindor common room. They were sitting at a table near a window, doing homework. Ron's rat, Scabbers, was quivering in the front pocket of his shirt. Ever since their trip to Egypt, Scabbers hadn't been looking very well. Where he used to be fat and sleek, he was now thin with little clumps of fur falling out.
Neville was afraid that Scabbers might die soon. He had never shown any qualities of a magical rat, so if he was just a regular one, he would be getting pretty old. Just then, an enormous ginger cat stalked into the common room.
"Who's cat is this?" Parvati cooed, petting him.
The cat purred, rubbing its face on her hand. Then, its beady eyes caught on Ron's front pocket. It seemed to sense the rat that was there. It stood there allowing itself to be petted. Seconds later, there was a loud MREEOW! And the cat had launched itself onto Ron's chest.
Ron tried to wrench it off, but it scrabbled at his shirt with its claws. Then, Neville helped him get the cat off. He took it outside the portrait and dropped it there.
"Who's cat was that?" Ron asked in disgust.
EVIL-CAT—STINKY-CAT—GO-A-WAY
Sirius had finally made it to Hogwarts. Though he was quite annoyed that the Fat Lady wouldn't let him in, he had fled the castle and hidden in the Shrieking Shack. He knew he had to leave on the full moon, so he had traveled to Hogsmeade in dog form. There he nicked some food and saw hundreds of students leave the castle together. Sirius cocked his head and sniffed a little. Then, he followed them.
All of the students went into the Quidditch pitch. Sirius guessed that this meant that there was a Quidditch match that day. So, he naturally hopped into the stands. Harry would surely been on the Quidditch team, because of his father. He had shown a love for riding the broom before…Sirius shook his head, much like shaking water off of his ears. He waited and then the two teams came out onto the pitch, Gryffindor and Slytherin. Sirius searched the Gryffindors, but he couldn't pick Harry out.
They took off, and one Slytherin boy, the Seeker no doubt, flew close by, scanning the entire stadium. Then, as their eyes caught both of them nearly fell over. Sirius recognized the shape of Lily's eyes from there. It was Harry. His eyes were paler than they used to be, and so was his hair. Though it was more of a shade of brown instead of black, Sirius still recognized James's trademark messy hair. Also, if you looked for it, you could find Lily's features in Harry's nose and jaw as well. Sirius didn't know what to think as he trotted out of the stadium…Harry was a Slytherin.
Harish nearly fell off his broom when he saw an enourmous black dog. It was the Grim. The fifth year glanced back at the stadium, but the Grim was gone. As it was the second Grim Harish had seen, he was shaken slightly. So, he zoomed off and searched for the Snitch.
The wind was blowing in full blasts now, bringing rain in with it. Harish was having a difficult time trying to stay on course. If the crowd was cheering, he couldn't hear it over the thunder. Luckily, he had already cast a spell to keep the rain off of his face so that he could see, but the rest of him was completely soaked through.
Suddenly a strange feel came over the stadium. The wind was blasting Harish off course, but it had suddenly forgotten to howl. Lightning was still flashing, illuminating the stands, but the thunder had forgotten to clap. It felt as if he had gone deaf. A chill swept over Harish as he looked down and saw hundreds of dementors standing on the ground below him, their hidden faces pointed to the sky.
It felt as if frozen water was filling and freezing Harish's insides. And then he heard it again…Someone was screaming, screaming inside his head…a woman…
"Not Harry, not Harry, please not Harry!"
"Stand aside, girl…stand aside now…"
"Not Harry, please no, take me, kill me instead—"
Numbing, swirling white fog filled Harish's brain. He might have wondered who this woman and more specifically who Harry was, but he was no longer conscious enough to wonder anything of the sort. He was falling, falling through the icy mist.
"Not Harry! Please…have mercy…have mercy…"
A shrill voice was laughing, the woman was screaming, and Harish knew no more.
"He looks a bit peaky."
"Peaky? How would you look if you fell ten stories?"
"Lucky the ground was so soft."
"I thought he was dead for sure."
It took a moment for Harish to make sense of anything as he could hear the voices of his friends.
"That was the scariest thing I've ever seen in my life."
Scariest…the scariest thing…hooded black figures…cold…screaming…
Harish's eyes snapped open. He was lying in a hospital bed with the entire Quidditch team standing around him, soaked and mud spattered. Hermione, Daphne, and Ginny were there as well, looking as though they had just climbed out of the Black Lake.
"Harish!" Fred exclaimed. He looked extremely white underneath all the mud. "How're you feeling?"
It was as though Harish's memory was on fast forward. The lightning—the Grim—the Snitch—and the dementors…
"What happened?" he asked, sitting up so suddenly they all gasped.
"You fell off," Fred replied. "Must've been—what—fifty feet?"
"We thought you'd died," Daphne said. She was shaking and her eyes were extremely bloodshot.
"I know I fell. I meant the match. Who won?"
No one answered. Everyone just looked down and shuffled their feet. The horrible truth sank into Harish like a stone in water.
"We did not—? We lost?"
"The other Seeker got the Snitch," George replied. "Just after you fell. He didn't realize what had happened. When he realized that you had fallen, he tried to call it off, but they had won fair and square."
Harish rested his head on his knees and gripped his head with his hands. He had never lost before. In all four years he had been playing, they hadn't lost once.
"Don't worry, Harish," George said shaking Harish's shoulder. "It's not over. As long as Gryffindor loses to Ravenclaw and we beat them and Hufflepuff the cup'll be ours."
Harish sat back and tried his best not to feel absolutely miserable. After about ten minutes of the others talking, Madam Pomfrey told the others to let him rest, so everyone except the twins and Draco left.
"Dumbledore was really angry," Draco said. "I have never seen him like that before. He ran onto the field as you fell and kind of slowed you down before you hit the ground. Then, he whirled his wand toward the dementors and shot silvery stuff at them, making them go away."
"Then he magicked you onto a stretcher—" Fred said.
"And sent you up to school. Everyone thought you were…"
George's voice trailed off, but Harish hardly noticed. He was thinking about what the dementors had done to him. No one else had obviously fainted. Why was he the only one that was affected so much? Not to mention the woman screaming…He didn't even have any bad memories that he could think of. That woman screaming certainly wasn't one of them.
"Did someone get my Nimbus?" he asked finally.
The twins and Draco glanced at each other. Harish noticed that George was holding an odd shaped bundle.
"Well…" George said hesitantly. "When you fell off—"
"It got blown away."
"And?"
"And it hit," Draco replied. "It hit the—Whomping Willow."
Harish's insides froze again. The Whomping Willow was a particularly vicious tree that had nearly killed him the year before. It doesn't exactly like things getting near it.
"Professor Flitwick brought it back just before you woke up," George said, laying the bundle on Harish's bed. He unwrapped the blankets to reveal several huge shards of wood and more bristles. Harish picked up one where the golden words "Nimbus 2001" were etched. They were all that was left of his faithful broomstick.