Early the next morning, the students packed their bags and gathered in the entrance hall to wait for the carriage to take them to the station. Harry, carried his suitcase in his left hand and the cage with Hedwig in his right, as he watched Madame Maxime and Fleur walk toward the lawn where Beauxbatons' carriage parked.
"Fleur mentioned that she intended to get a job in England, in this sensitive time ... What does she think?" Ron asked.
Harry shrugged, he has no answer to that question either. As his line of sight passed over the crowd, he saw that Hermione and Krum were exchanging their final goodbyes, Krum said something, but Hermione shook her head in embarrassment.
"They're all in their final year, aren't they?" Harry suddenly realized this.
"Exactly, which shows how valuable our trophy is." Ron said with satisfaction, "What's more, counting the reward from the 'Future World' company, I've saved almost a thousand galleons ... which is a lot of money." He said with a flushed face.
"I heard that you guys want to become an Auror?" Collins asked with a hint of smugness in her tone.
"Yeah." Ron said as he slowly looked back at her.
"Then you'll have to work harder ... or you'll have a hard time when you get in." Collins said.
Ron was still trying to figure out what she meant by that comment when Harry's eyes had widened.
"Collins, you wouldn't have already-"
"I'm glad you realize that, Harry." Collins narrowed her eyes and smiled - which made her thick eyebrows stand out even more like two caterpillars - as she said happily, "I'm already a reserve Auror, Ms. Bones wrote back to me personally-"
"That's not possible!" Ron shouted.
Collins smugly pulled a letter out of her pocket, "It arrived this morning ... a little scribbled, but understandable, I think she must have been busy these days."
Harry stared dumbfounded as the letter fluttered in front of him, the words on it could no longer be described as scribbled, it looked like chicken scratches. What struck Harry was that the handwriting looked really familiar.
It was written by Sirius.
"Wait--" Ron also found something, he narrowed his eyes to examine the letter, and seemed to have recognized it.
Harry hurriedly slapped Ron on the back and said aloud unnaturally, "Collins, you admire Ms. Bones?"
Collins grunted twice and withdrew the letter with satisfaction.
"That's for sure, I'm aiming to become our next Minister of Magic."
At that moment Hermione came back and cleared her throat behind Collins, "So, I have a rival?" She asked with a smirk on her face.
Collins looked back and shot Hermione a scrutinizing look, "You want to be Minister of Magic too?"
Sparks seemed to fly between the eyes of the two girls, making Harry and Ron wince. Hermione did her best to puff up her chest and meet Collins' gaze.
"What are you thinking? Want to make history and become the first Muggle-born Minister of Magic?"
"There already is, Nobby Leach, he's the first." Hermione said without thinking.
"So, the first Female Muggle-born Minister of Magic?" Collins instantly asked.
"I'm not really interested in that title, I just think something has to be done ..." Hermione stared at Collins' face and seemingly asked without thinking: "By the way, do you have any house-elf at your home? "
"Yup." Collins replied.
"Do you have a good relationship?" Hermione immediately followed by asking.
" Not bad-" Collins was confused.
Hermione breathed a sigh of relief, "Then we've got something in common, I founded an organization, well, it's temporarily suspended ... but if you're interested ..." she pulled Collins to the corner.
Harry and Ron looked at each other.
"Hermione shouldn't be thinking--"
"The odds are ..."
They stared unblinkingly at Collins and Hermione's faces, the entrance hall is so noisy that they can't hear what they are saying at all, so Harry and Ron observed the two girls' expressions. Within a few moments, Hermione came over smugly.
"You made it?" Ron asked incredulously.
" Well, in a way?" Hermione shook her head, "She was quite interested, but she was very resistant to that name."
"You're right." Ron said dryly, "Why the hell, the house-elf rights promotion society can't be called 'Vomit'."
"I told you! It's not Vomit, it's S.P.E.W.!" Hermione exclaimed with annoyance.
At that moment, the horse-drawn carriage "wheeled" towards them, and they hurriedly hopped into a carriage. Harry stared at the side of the carriage for a while, "There's something there, right? A horse called - uh, Thestral?"
It is strange that he had not noticed this for almost four years prior. But once he knew the name from the book, he was able to spot a lot of anomalies - the faint panting, and the sound of hooves on the ground became so obvious.
Hermione also stared at the blank space. The carriage began to move forward under the pull of an invisible force.
"I've only seen these creatures in pictures ... of course, I don't feel any regret, as they don't really have a good reputation ... it has to do with their traits, only those who have seen death can see them, probably a unique invisible principle ..."
"Luna can see Thestral." Ron suddenly said, then explained, "I eavesdropped on Ginny."
Hermione glared at Ron and said ironically, "You're not ashamed of it."
"I didn't mean to." Ron said with a shrug, "It was not long after Christmas break, and she was making a birthday present for Luna ..."
Harry suddenly remembered the experience at 'Future World Store No. 1' before school started. Luna had followed her dad along, and she had never seemed to have mentioned her mother in the long time they had known each other.
"I hope we never see it for the rest of our lives," Ron said with hope as he stepped out of the carriage, "although it's a little unlikely - I mean, very unlikely!"
Harry and Hermione smiled at that.
The sky is bright and clear, but the mood between the trio became melancholy.
They found an empty compartment on the train as soon as the train stopped at Hogsmeade station, and Harry put the cage containing Hedwig in the corner, as far away from Ron's pig as possible - the Pigwidgeon is too noisy - it would affect Hedwig's dozing, while Hermione's Crookshanks huddled in the empty seat next to her, resembling a squishy cushion.
"Does Krum want to invite you to spend the summer with him?" Harry asked, having heard Hermione mention it before.
"Yeah," Hermione said, "but I turned him down, as you know, under the circumstances ..."
At that moment, the door pulled open from the outside.
Fred poked his head in, and asked with a playful smile, " Wanna play cards?" Then he glided in, "Don't push me, George."
"I'm not - this door seems to be broken!" George slammed the door hard, making a "clunk" sound.
"Ouch!" A scream of pain sounded against George's ear when the door slammed shut.
George took a few frightened steps back and stared at the door in shock.
"There's something there." He said with certainty.
He didn't have to tell anyone in the compartment for them to notice the anomaly. Outside the glass window, a round, startled face emerged from thin air.
"It's Crabbe!" Harry shouted, he thought of something, immediately drew his wand, looked around, and kept searching the surrounding area.
"What--" Ron and Hermione questioned with a gasp, Ron had a large piece of Cauldron Cake stuffed in his mouth. But the long acquaintance made both of them pull out their wands simultaneously.
The glittering wand passed through the air, and Harry's eyes widened, then as if someone had lit a box of fireworks in the compartment, spells fired from different angles, and bright light and loud noise erupted in the small space.
When everything quieted down, Harry, Ron, and Hermione lowered their heads and looked at the unconscious Draco and Goyle in the corner and froze. Fred, crouched next to them to check them out.
"They seem to have used the Disillusionment Charm, which caused a wonderful reaction with the hex on their body ..."
Draco and Goyle looked miserable, with bruises, various hairs, and pustules growing out of their bodies.
George pulled open the compartment door, and cast a quick glance at both sides, before turning his head and saying, "The fat boy got away - who used the hairy hex?" He asked as he examined Draco on the floor.
"Me." Harry said.
"Wonderful results, Fred, whaddya think? Maybe we could develop a series of hairy people?" He said tersely.
Finally, they put Draco and Goyle in the next compartment and came back to play Exploding Snap.
Fred and George were in high spirits, and by the fifth game, Harry couldn't resist asking them, " Is there anything fun happened?"
"We're that obvious?" Fred and George looked at each other and asked in unison.
"Yeah, stop playing coy," Ron muttered, his face plastered with notes, "we're in need of a bit of fun."
"Well, then," George said with a straight face, "we can't wait."
"Can't wait for what?" Harry asked.
"The prank on the professor ... Didn't we say we'd try it on the Professor's next birthday?" Fred said with a smile, "But then, on second thought, it would be a shame to wait for a whole year."
"What did you guys do?" Harry asked, holding his breath, "Surely the professor will find out."
"That's not necessarily true," Fred retorted, "we borrowed the idea from The Strange Adventures of Mick the Little Wizard ... scare box, even the springs, and scary figures are hand-built, I don't believe he will still find it out in advance. "
"What kind of toy?" Ron gulped.
"No nose freak." Fred said without thinking.
Ron coughed violently, and crumbs of cake flew out. "God, the You-Know-Who?"
"You guessed it. Great idea, isn't it? We figured it wouldn't go out of date for another year or two." George grinned.
Hermione looked up from her runic journal and looked at the twins in surprise, it must have taken a lot of thought for them to even come up with such a scheme ...
Meanwhile, Felix sat on the roof of the train, one hand propped up on his chin, staring in boredom at the rapidly passing scenery around him. He stretched out his other free hand and flicked the bald head of the doll, which immediately swayed back and forth under the action of a spring.
"The workmanship is quite exquisite, and they're surprisingly bold ... I hope the next trip will bring in a few Death Eaters for me to practice on." Felix said with itching teeth, he would not admit for a moment that he got a fright.
...
The Hogwarts Express train passed through the countryside and drove through one town after another, and finally, stopped at King's Cross station without any incident. As he exited the platform, Harry said goodbye to his companion and caught a glimpse of a familiar figure, he turned his head but that person seemed to have disappeared all of a sudden.
Strange, was it Professor? Or was he mistaken?
"I repeat, what are you waiting for?" Uncle Vernon looked at Harry with an irritated look - or rather, at the cage with the owl on it, as the muscles in his face twitched.
Harry shrugged his shoulders, strangely there was no trace of ripples in his heart. The Dursleys aren't all that unbearable compared to the trouble that lies ahead.
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