Navigating Hogwarts

Chapter 25

When I finally was outside, I didn't see the dog at all. Who I did see were Harry and Hermione going into the Whomping Willow. Naturally, I followed after them.

The Whomping Willow somehow wasn't moving at all, which surprised me, but wasn't something I was worried about now. When I went into the tree, I discovered it was a tunnel.

"Harry!" I yelled through the tunnel. "Hermione?"

"Skye?" I heard two voices yelling back.

I run a bit further through the tunnel and finally found the two, but no Ron.

"Skye, what are you doing here?" Harry asked me surprised.

"I saw this black dog that I've seen a couple of times now. What are you doing here?"

"That just dog stole Ron from us!" He explained the whole story of what happened.

"Crazy" I was so confused.

"Let's keep on moving" Hermione suggested and we walked further.

"I think we're in the Shrieking Shack." Hermione whispered.

The Three walked upstairs until they ended up in a new room. Only one door was open. As we crept toward it, we heard movement from behind it; a low moan, and then a deep, loud purring. We exchanged a last look, a last nod.

Wand held tightly before me, Harry kicked the door wide open.

There was a big dusty bed and on the floor beside the bed, clutching his leg, which stuck out at a strange angle, was Ron.

Harry and Hermione dashed across to him.

"Ron — are you okay?" The two asked worried about him.

'Where's the dog?" I just asked him.

"Not a dog," Ron moaned. His teeth were gritted with pain. "It's a trap —"

"What —"

"He's the dog . . . he's an Animagus. . . ."

With a snap, the man in the shadows closed the door behind them.

A mass of filthy, matted hair hung to his elbows. If eyes hadn't been shining out of the deep, dark sockets, he might have been a corpse. The waxy skin was stretched so tightly over the bones of his face, it looked like a skull. His yellow teeth were bared in a grin. It was Sirius Black.

"Expelliarmus!" he croaked, pointing Ron's wand at us.

All of our wands shot out of our hands, high in the air, and Black caught them.

"I thought you'd come and help your friend," Black said hoarsely. "Your father would have done the same for me. Brave of you, not to run for a teacher. I'm grateful . . . it will make everything much easier. . . ."

A boiling hate erupted in my chest, leaving no place for fear. I wanted my wand back, not to defend myself, but to attack . . . I looked at Harry and without knowing what He was thinking, I could feel it. He wanted to kill him. Harry clearly didn't know what he was doing, as he started forward, but there was a sudden movement on either side of him and two pairs of hands grabbed him and held him back... "No, Harry!" Hermione gasped in a petrified whisper; Ron, however, spoke to Black.

"If you want to kill Harry, you'll have to kill us too!"

Something flickered in Black's shadowed eyes.

"Lie down," he said quietly to Ron. "You will damage that leg even more."

"Did you hear me?" Ron said weakly, though he was clinging painfully to Harry to stay upright. "You'll have to kill all four of us!"