Adventures of Harriet Potter

The Dementor's Kiss

Harriet 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, shuffling along, his unbound feet hitting each stair as they descended, held back from his usual sourness by his own wand, which was being pointed at him by Sirius. Harriet 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. Harriet could see them edging awkwardly along the tunnel in single file. Crookshanks was still in the lead. Harriet went right after Sirius, who was still making Snape walk along ahead of them; he kept bumping his head on the low ceiling. Harriet had the impression Sirius was making no effort to prevent this.
"You know what this means?" Sirius said abruptly to Harriet as they made their slow progress along the tunnel. "Turning Pettigrew in?" Harriet nodded, almost overjoyed that she might soon no longer need Contraceptive Potion for her summer holidays. "You're free," said Harriet. Figuring that would be a better start than her own problems. "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 Harriet. "Well . . . your parents appointed me your guardian," said Sirius stiffly. "If anything happened to them . . ." Harriet waited. Did Sirius mean what she thought he meant? That she'd have a guaranteed out from Uncle Vernon and his sexist ways. "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 Harriet's stomach. "What — live with you?" she said, accidentally cracking her head on a bit of rock protruding from the ceiling. "Leave the Dursleys?" Already imagining it, her own room bigger than the one she now slept in during summer holidays and no sign of Uncle Vernon barging in to try impregnating her against her will. It was what any almost fourteen girl in her situation would want.
"Of course, I thought you wouldn't want to," said Sirius quickly. "I understand, I just thought I'd —" She stopped him because he misunderstood. "Are you insane?" said Harriet, her 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?" She didn't tell him about the times she'd been violated over the years, or the hints Uncle Vernon had repeatedly dropped about her proper place being waddling around with a baby in her belly. Her godfather had already come too close to being an actual murderer already, and it was her problem to deal with anyway.
Sirius turned right around to look at him; Snape's head was scraping the ceiling from being pushed to walk harder but Sirius didn't seem to care. "You want to?" he said. "You mean it?" She playfully socked his arm. "Yeah, I mean it!" said Harriet. 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 Harriet'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 Harriet 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. Harriet's mind was buzzing. She was going to leave the Dursleys. She was going to live with Sirius Black, her parents' best friend. . . . She felt dazed. . . . What would happen when she told the Dursleys she 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 Harriet and Hermione stop. Harriet 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!" Harriet swallowed in fear as Snape struggled with his bindings, his eyes telling Sirius to give him his wand immediately. "Run," Sirius whispered. "Run. Now." But Harriet couldn't run. Ron was chained to Pettigrew and Lupin. She leapt forward but Sirius caught her just below the chest and threw her back.
"Leave it to me — RUN!" He urged her protectively. 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 Harriet'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 —
Harriet stood, transfixed by the sight, too intent upon the battle to notice anything else. It was Hermione's scream that alerted her — 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!" Harriet yelled, pointing her own wand at Pettigrew; Lupin's wand flew high into the air and out of sight. "Stay where you are!" Harriet shouted, running forward. It was too late though. Pettigrew had transformed. Harriet 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; Harriet turned to see the werewolf taking flight; it was galloping into the forest — "Sirius, he's gone, Pettigrew transformed!" Harriet yelled. Snape was still fighting his bindings, struggling to get free while glaring in the direction where Pettigrew disappeared. Sirius was bleeding; there were gashes across his muzzle and back, but at Harriet'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. Harriet and Hermione dashed over to Ron. "What did he do to him?" Hermione whispered. Ron's eyes were only half-closed, his mouth hung open; he was definitely alive, they could hear him breathing, but he didn't seem to recognize them. "I don't know. . . ." said Harriet, suspecting some form of Confundus Charm or other temporary mind scrambling spell. Without knowing for certain, and she'd check library books for the wand movement Pettigrew had used later, she wasn't sure how to counteract it even if she was trained in such magic.
Harriet looked desperately around. Black and Lupin both gone . . . they had no one but Snape for company, still struggling, near uselessly, against his bindings. "We'd better get them up to the castle and tell someone," said Harriet, pushing her hair out of her 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," Harriet muttered, staring into the darkness. She 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 —
Harriet set off at a run, Hermione right behind her. The yelping seemed to be coming from near the lake. They pelted toward it, and Harriet, 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 Harriet saw them. Dementors, at least a hundred of them, gliding in a black mass around the lake toward them. She spun around, the familiar, icy cold penetrating her insides, fog starting to obscure her vision; more were appearing out of the darkness on every side; they were encircling them. . . .
"Hermione, think of something happy!" Harriet yelled, raising her wand, blinking furiously to try and clear her vision, shaking her 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. She forced herself 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 Harriet and Hermione, and were getting closer. . . . "EXPECTO PATRONUM!" Harriet yelled, trying to blot the screaming from her ears. "EXPECTO PATRONUM!" A thin wisp of silver escaped her wand and hovered like mist before her. At the same moment, Harriet felt Hermione collapse next to her. She was alone . . . completely alone. . . . "Expecto — Expecto Patronum —" Harriet felt her knees hit the cold grass. Fog was clouding her eyes. With a huge effort, she fought to remember — Sirius was innocent — innocent — We'll be okay — I'm going to live with him —  "Expecto Patronum!" she gasped.
By the feeble light of her formless Patronus, she saw a dementor halt, very close to her. It couldn't walk through the cloud of silver mist Harriet 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 —" Harriet gasped. "He's innocent . . . Expecto — Expecto Patronum —" She could feel them watching her, hear their rattling breath like an evil wind around her. The nearest dementor seemed to be considering her. 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 Harriet so that she couldn't move or speak. Her Patronus flickered and died. White fog was blinding her. She had to fight . . . Expecto Patronum . . . she couldn't see . . . and in the distance, she heard the familiar screaming . . . Expecto Patronum . . . she 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 Harriet's neck. They were forcing her face upward. . . . She could feel its breath. . . . It was going to get rid of her first. . . . She could feel its putrid breath. . . . Her mother was screaming in her ears. . . . She was going to be the last thing she ever heard —
And then, through the fog that was drowning her, she thought she saw a silvery light growing brighter and brighter. . . . She felt herself fall forward onto the grass — Facedown, too weak to move, sick and shaking, Harriet opened her eyes. The dementor must have released her. The blinding light was illuminating the grass around her. . . . The screaming had stopped, the cold was ebbing away. . . . Something was driving the dementors back. . . . It was circling around her 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 she could muster, Harriet raised her head a few inches and saw an animal amid the light, galloping away across the lake. . . . Eyes blurred with sweat, Harriet tried to make out what it was. . . . It was as bright as a unicorn. . . . Fighting to stay conscious, Harriet watched it canter to a halt as it reached the opposite shore. For a moment, Harriet saw, by its brightness, somebody welcoming it back . . . raising their hand to pat it . . . someone who looked strangely familiar . . . but it couldn't be . . . The hair was too long and its color was wrong. Harriet didn't understand. She couldn't think anymore. She felt the last of her strength leave her, and her head hit the ground as she fainted.