Chapter 125 — Before They Came Down the Hill

I took the food Harry offered and ate a few mouthfuls on the way to the entrance hall. Missing lunch wouldn’t help Hagrid. Hermione held his note so tightly that the lower edge had begun to tear, and I folded the wrapping over what remained of my food while she said we should have had more time.

Nobody offered a useful number of days. Before we went outside, I waited for a group coming in from the grounds to pass, then told the others Snape had confirmed something about Lupin. They stopped beside me as I lowered my voice.

‘He’s a werewolf. Snape makes the potion that helps him keep his mind when he changes, but it has to be taken properly.’ I repeated the warning about the full-moon arrangements and not going to find him just because we had thought of something he ought to hear.

Harry looked towards the stairs. ‘That’s why he keeps being ill,’ he said. Hermione pressed her lips together before admitting she had suspected it after the essay.

Ron stayed quiet until we had walked a few more paces. ‘Does Dumbledore know?’ he asked. I reminded him that Snape was preparing the treatment at school; we could be fairly certain that much hadn’t escaped the headmaster.

‘And Sirius being a dog—’ Ron began. I stopped beside the door rather than letting the thought run ahead of us.

‘Doesn’t tell us who betrayed Harry’s parents,’ I said. ‘We still need to find out who Scabbers is.’

Harry nodded, though he looked troubled. He remembered Lupin staying with us after the boggart lessons, making sure we were all right, and I told him I remembered too. We went out together without finding an answer that made the new information simple.

The man from the Ministry stood near the path, drawing a whetstone along the edge of an axe. The scrape carried further than I expected. I had heard similar work in sheds and workshops, where the finished edge was intended for wood; knowing what this one had been brought to cut made me tighten my grip on the folded food.

Ron moved closer as we passed. Below us, smoke rose from Hagrid’s chimney, making the hut look so ordinary that I wanted to reach it before anything changed. Then Goyle laughed, and Hermione’s head turned sharply towards the sound.

He stood off the path with Crabbe and Malfoy, looking down towards the pumpkins. Malfoy had his hands in his pockets and hadn’t joined in the laughter. Goyle suggested asking his father to keep Buckbeak’s head and send it to Gryffindor; Crabbe began deciding where we could hang it.

Hermione changed direction before either of them finished. I saw her wand leave her robes as Harry nearly walked into her, then she was in front of Crabbe, asking whether he thought it funny. He opened his mouth, and she raised the wand towards his throat.

‘Go on,’ she said. ‘Tell me the rest.’

Crabbe backed away, finding no further use for his voice. Malfoy stepped between them, and Hermione’s wand followed him. He stopped with his eyes on its tip before telling her to be careful.

‘Now you want people to be careful?’ she asked. Her arm stayed raised as he looked from the wand to her face.

‘Are you actually going to use it?’ Malfoy said. Ron told her not to, and I moved to her side, leaving room for her to lower her arm.

‘Hagrid’s waiting for us,’ I said. Hermione didn’t turn, but I could see the tension in her fingers.

‘You heard what they said.’ Her voice shook on the last word. Crabbe and Goyle had retreated far enough that Malfoy stood alone in front of her.

‘I did. And I don’t want our chance to see Hagrid today spent explaining a curse to McGonagall.’ I looked at Malfoy. He had told me he had tried speaking to his father, but that didn’t tell me why he had come down here now. ‘We’re going to the hut. Get out of our way.’

Hermione kept her wand raised for another moment, then lowered it herself. Malfoy told the other two to come with him. They left without recovering their enthusiasm for the joke, and I watched until there was a reasonable stretch of path between us.

‘I nearly did it,’ Hermione said, putting her wand away. Her fingers were still shaking when she folded her arms across herself.

‘You stopped,’ I told her. She pointed out that she had only stopped after aiming it at them, and I had no reason to argue with that.

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‘They won’t be laughing about that part,’ Ron said. His attempt to help brought a brief, unsteady smile to her face. Harry waited beside her until she was ready, and we continued down the slope without discussing which curse she might have chosen.

Buckbeak lay beside the pumpkins with his chain secured to a post and food within reach. He lifted his head as we approached. We bowed, waited for his acknowledgement and went past more quietly than we had come down the path.

I remembered the lift of his wings beneath me and the grounds falling away, then the turn above the water that I hadn’t known to expect. Hagrid’s whistle had brought us back to the clearing. I had climbed down with shaking knees, unable to find a measured answer to how it had felt.

Now I stood near the same animal with the remains of my lunch in one hand. We had written down what happened in the lesson, including my own part and the warnings before Draco crossed the rope. The papers had reached the people making the decision. The axe had come anyway.

Hagrid opened the door before I knocked a second time. Four cups were waiting, though he had to shift a pile of documents to make room for us. Hermione straightened the stack after he moved it, and I recognised the corner of one of our accounts beneath the latest letter.

He poured tea, spilled some into a saucer and wiped it slowly with a cloth. I told him we had seen the man with the axe. Hagrid nodded without looking at me, then set the pot down with both hands.

‘Dumbledore’s comin’ down. Minister too,’ he said. ‘Said he wouldn’t leave me on my own with it.’

I asked whether there had been any further word about the appeal. Hagrid shook his head and rested his hand on the papers. He wanted us to know we had done good work, all of us, and had plainly decided to say so even if he couldn’t manage much else.

‘I wanted it to work,’ I said. He answered that he knew, then went to the window. Buckbeak had raised his beak towards the wind coming from the forest.

‘Likes that,’ Hagrid said. ‘When the wind comes this way.’ His voice failed before he could add anything. Harry got up and stood beside him, close enough to offer company without making him turn from the window.

Ron stared into his tea. ‘What if he wasn’t here when they came?’ he asked. Hagrid closed his eyes, and Ron hurried on. ‘I know they’d be angry, but if he got away—’

‘They’d know where to come lookin’. Dumbledore would have to answer for me after all he’s done already.’ Hagrid rubbed his face with the cloth. ‘I’ve thought about it.’

Ron put down his cup. I could think of ways to undo the chain; I couldn’t promise what would happen to Hagrid afterwards. He had to live with more of that answer than any of us standing in his kitchen.

‘We’ll stay with you,’ Hermione said. Hagrid turned so quickly that Harry moved back a step, then insisted we were only staying for tea. He didn’t want us watching what came after.

She began to protest. Hagrid said ‘Please’, quietly enough that she stopped, and nobody tried to fill the silence while he returned to the table. He folded the cloth, unfolded it and suddenly looked towards Ron.

‘There’s one thing I do need yeh here for. Found a rat outside a few minutes before yeh came. Think it might be yours.’

Ron was on his feet before Hagrid finished. Hagrid moved a jug from the far end of the worktop, revealing an upturned metal colander on a broad wooden board. A heavy kitchen weight rested on top, and something grey pressed briefly against the holes before withdrawing.

‘Haven’t forgotten what Professor McGonagall told me,’ Hagrid said. ‘Kept him here till Dumbledore gets down.’ He stepped aside so Ron could look without disturbing the arrangement.

‘It is,’ Ron said. Relief filled his voice as he bent closer. ‘That’s Scabbers.’

His hand moved towards the weight and stopped. The rat hurried around the edge of the colander, claws scratching against the board, and I crouched beside Ron to see it properly.

‘Don’t open it yet,’ I said. Ron drew his hand back before answering that he wasn’t going to; he had remembered. For a moment, the look he gave me contained more than tonight’s instructions, and I left the weight alone too.

The animal looked like the rat that had slept in his pocket and stolen crumbs from our table. I could see no man’s name through its fur. Hagrid described finding it trying to squeeze behind the woodpile and getting the colander over it before it reached another hole.

‘Lupin needs to check him,’ I said. ‘Or Dumbledore. Someone who can make certain.’

‘That’s why he’s under there.’ Hagrid touched the weight with one large finger. The colander sat flat beneath it, and I checked the surrounding space without trying to lift or carry anything. Dumbledore was already coming to this room.

‘Then we wait for him,’ I said. ‘Tell him about the rat before he goes outside.’ Hagrid nodded, and Ron stayed beside the worktop, watching the grey shape with a different expression now.

Finding Scabbers had given him a few seconds of uncomplicated happiness. Then the possibility we had been discussing all week caught up with it. ‘He’s been with us for years,’ he said, as though the animal might finally explain itself if somebody repeated that often enough.

Hermione stood beside him, leaving space between their hands on the edge of the board. ‘Crookshanks didn’t eat him,’ she said. Ron looked at her, then back at the colander.

‘No.’ He swallowed before continuing. ‘I’m sorry I said he had.’

She thanked him and stayed where she was. Neither tried to settle every argument at once, and I was glad of it. I had promises of my own to keep, whatever emerged from beneath that weight.

Hagrid reached for the kettle while Harry moved a cup from his way. I turned towards the window to see whether Dumbledore was coming, and something struck the jar beside my elbow. Pottery burst across the worktop.

I jerked back and caught Ron’s sleeve before his hand went among the fragments. Hagrid demanded to know what had happened. Between two broken pieces lay a small stone, with the open window just beyond it.

I looked up, still holding Ron’s sleeve. The stone hadn’t come from inside the hut.