"We have to go to the Ministry of Magic, now, and save Sirius!"
Harry snarled the words under his breath, like a trapped animal hurling itself at the bars of its cage. The savagery in his face was so naked that everyone in the room instinctively drew back half a step.
Professor McGonagall finally understood that something might be badly wrong with the boy in front of her. She drew herself up to her full height, and her stern, narrow eyes fixed on his face.
"In your present state, Potter, I think the best thing you can do is stay in the hospital wing and rest for the night. This ward will do very well. I shall ask Poppy to look you over. Yes, yes, that's quite settled. And now I must go and write to Bryan and Albus!"
She spoke briskly, as if closing a door on the matter, and then she turned and looked at Ron, Hermione and the others, who had crowded in together behind her. She hesitated for a moment, weighing them up.
"The rest of you will stay here, and keep an eye on him. You will not go back to your dormitories to sleep until I have returned. Is that understood?"
With that, she swept out of the ward, her robes whisking round the door frame, to settle matters with Madam Pomfrey in the corridor outside.
Crash!
"Damn it!"
Harry kicked the bed behind him in a fury, with such force that the iron frame went screeching across the flagstones and fetched up against the wall, with the sheet trailing off it like a flag of surrender.
"You've got to calm down, Harry!"
Harry's dreadful state had left even Hermione at a loss. Her cheeks had gone a sickly pale. She stepped forward and laid her hand on his arm, gently, as one touches a horse that may bolt.
"It could simply be—"
"How many times do I have to tell you, Hermione?"
Harry wrenched his wrist free of her fingers and shouted back at her, his voice cracking.
"I saw it! I saw it with my own eyes! Has a single one of these visions ever turned out to be false?"
"But—"
Hermione bit her lip, and said in a small, hurt voice,
"Do you remember, Harry? Over the summer, Professor Watson told you not to put your trust in what you see in dreams."
Professor Watson had said that…
Hermione's words did calm him a little, but he had not had time even to take a few steady breaths before Sirius's screams broke out in his ears once more.
His mind was in chaos, as though a burning poker had been thrust into his skull and was stirring it about!
"Who cares what he said!"
Harry doubled over, with sweat running in beads down his forehead, and the veins at his temples standing out like cords.
"He and Dumbledore have both been led round by the nose! They should have stayed at Hogwarts tonight, the both of them!"
The room fell silent. Hermione and the others looked at Harry with worried eyes, not knowing how to comfort him.
"I'm going to the Ministry of Magic!"
Suddenly Harry straightened up and looked around at each of them, one by one, with a fierce, resolute stare.
Hermione pressed her lips together and sighed to herself. She had expected nothing less.
"G-go to the Ministry of Magic?"
Ron, for one, was startled by the idea.
"But the Ministry's in London, mate… There aren't any trains at this hour, and besides—"
Under the weight of Harry's fierce gaze, Ron began to stammer.
"And even if we did get there… You said You-Know-Who has already c-caught Sirius, so—so he'll already—"
"There's still time!"
Harry's ringing voice made Ron jump.
"Voldemort won't kill Sirius right away. He's forcing Sirius to get him a crystal ball… Oh, don't ask me what he wants it for—I don't know. But I know Sirius won't give in right away. He—he held out in Azkaban for thirteen years!"
Ron stood with his mouth open, quite unable to answer.
"But how do you mean to get to the Ministry, Harry?"
Neville stepped forward then and fixed Harry with a grave, steady stare.
"Professor McGonagall will be back any minute, and she won't allow it. As I see it, once she's back, we'll have a hard time even getting out of the hospital wing, let alone out of the castle!"
That reminded Harry that he had to move fast.
But the problem before him was a practical one, and an enormous one: how was he going to reach the Ministry?
He could not Apparate. The fireplaces at Hogwarts could be connected to the Floo Network only on the orders of Professor Dumbledore or Professor Watson. And if he waited until morning for the Hogwarts Express, by the time he arrived at the Ministry, the only thing left for him to attend would be Sirius's memorial service.
"Accio Firebolt!"
Suddenly Harry raised his wand and cried out.
"You're going to fly to London?"
Neville's eyes went wide with shock.
"It's the only way!"
Harry said it firmly, grinding his teeth.
At the speed of a Firebolt, there was a chance. There just might be a chance.
"Your Ministry of Magic… it's in London, is it?"
The little vampire, who had slipped into the room some time ago and had been listening to the argument from the sidelines, tapped one finger lightly against her crimson lips, and asked, thoughtfully.
"What do you think?"
Neville turned to look at her. Of everyone there, he was the relatively calm one.
"You know—"
The little vampire leaned against the door, and her clear red eyes caught and held the reflections of all their faces.
"When I was coming back from Hogsmeade a little while ago, I ran into that Malfoy in the tunnel. Oh, I didn't want any trouble, and I didn't want a lecture from you lot, so I decided not to meet him."
Elune shot a sidelong glance at Hermione, whose brows were drawn tight together.
"But I was curious about what he was up to, so I left a drop of my blood on him as he went by."
Seeing the baffled looks all round her, Elune curled her lip.
"It's only a mark. It lets me find where he is, any time I like. Hm. And just now, he seems to have got to London."
In the dim ward, the whole group stared at the little vampire, and even Harry could not help being startled.
"Malfoy's gone to London? How did he get there so quickly? He can't Apparate either!"
"I think it must have been the Knight Bus, Harry."
A light flashed in Hermione's brown eyes.
"The Death Eaters used the Knight Bus in the Battle of Diagon Alley."
From Hermione's tone, it seemed that she was finally ready to face the fact that Malfoy was a Death Eater.
"There's another idea, you know…"
Ron mumbled, sneaking a couple of glances at Hermione, but the glare she shot back was enough to frighten him into silence at once.
"I'll take you to London."
Elune said it briskly, looking at Harry.
"Since you're the ones who introduced me to such delicious sweets."
From somewhere, Elune produced another blood lollipop and stuck it in her mouth.
Crack!
A black shape smashed through the window and landed in Harry's hand, and the cold wind that surged into the ward behind it made him shudder.
"Thank you!"
Harry nodded to Elune with deep gratitude. He would never have imagined that, in the end, it would be this ill-tempered young vampire who helped him so enormously.
He decided that if they managed to save Sirius tonight, he would never again hold it against Elune that she had kept from him the fact that Malfoy had been trying for so long to get into Professor Watson's office.
"Ron, Ginny, we'll need both your brooms too. Once we get to London, we may still have a long way to go, and we can hardly hail a Muggle taxi!"
Hermione was already issuing orders to Ron and Ginny.
"What?"
Harry knitted his brows.
"You—oh, there's no need for that at all—it's far too dangerous, you can't—"
"I'm glad you realize that what we're doing is dangerous, Potter!"
Hermione's eyes blazed. Huffing with indignation, she jabbed a finger hard into Harry's chest.
"It sounds exciting."
Ginny looked at Harry quite calmly.
"So I'm coming with you."
"I like Professor Black a lot."
Neville shrugged, too, and added,
"And this is a good chance for me to see my dad. Mum says he's been sleeping at the Ministry lately and not coming home at all, because of work."
That strange, ethereal smile rose at the corners of Luna's mouth again. She said nothing, only hummed a curious little tune, cheerfully, as if she were already packed and ready to set out.
"But… really, there's no need…"
Looking at the faces before him, Harry felt his fury drain away, and the red flush that had lingered in his green eyes faded a little.
"We're doing it of our own free will, mate."
Ron grinned at Harry and used the Summoning Charm to fetch his new broom.
"I can't Apparate within the grounds of Hogwarts, mind," Elune warned them.
The group rushed out of the ward. Amid Madam Pomfrey's panicked shouts, Elune led them back up to the fourth floor and, knowing the way by heart, went straight to the statue of the hunchbacked witch.
"We have to get beyond the boundary of Hogwarts first."
So Ginny took Luna on one broom, and Neville and Ron climbed onto another, while Harry carried Hermione, and they flew through the narrow tunnel in a single file, with Elune out in front, borne up on a cloud of blood-red glow that lit the wet stone walls.
The last surprise on the way to London came when they emerged outside Honeydukes. Just as they burst out of the shop, leaving the owner shrieking in fright behind them, they ran straight into Fred and George. The twins, who had been idling about on their brooms above Hogsmeade, happened to be coming down to land.
"Something this fun, and you didn't even bring us along!"
George glared at them indignantly.
"That's enough. There's no time to say more. Elune!"
Harry called out to Elune, and at the same moment a sheet of blood-red glow rose from her body and wrapped itself round them all, and quiet Hogsmeade vanished from everyone's sight.
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