Despite the darkened corridor of the Hogwarts Express and the handful of flames flickering in Professor Lupin's hand, the darkness within the cabinet stood out.
It wasn't just darker than the surroundings.
It held an emotion.
The moment the cabinet's doors had swung open, that emotion came rushing out, drenching the entire compartment and its occupants.
Fear.
An absolute sense of dread.
Black, Harry, Ron, Darcie, Daphne, and Hermione's hearts sank. Even Professor Lupin stumbled back, his mouth hanging open, less in fear and more in shock and absurdity of the situation.
But they weren't the worst.
Crookshanks hissed, squirming deeper into Hermione's lap.
Uncle Black, on the other hand… whined. There wasn't much space left behind the dog and the wall, as Black was seated near the window. But Uncle Black kept whining, his paws dragging across the floor as he pushed himself against the compartment's wall.
Then, as if the Fear the darkness within the cabin had magically induced in their hearts wasn't enough, it revealed Despair.
Two hands with extremely long fingers appeared from the darkness and grabbed the sides of the cabinet, both glistening, grayish, slimy-looking, and scabbed, like something dead that had decayed in water.
In the next moment, with a jerk, the entire thing hurled itself out of the cabinet.
A thin layer of frost slithered over the windows. Breath misted as coldness seeped into the compartment, all hearts reaching their mouths as stomachs contracted.
It was a cloaked figure that towered to the ceiling, with its face completely hidden beneath its hood.
Then, gliding inside the compartment, the figure drew a long, slow, rattling breath, as though it were trying to suck something more than air from its surroundings.
Uncle Black yelped.
Harry felt his own breath catch in his chest. The cold went deeper than his skin. It was inside his chest, it was inside his very heart…
Harry's eyes rolled up into his head. He couldn't see. He was drowning in cold.
There was a rushing in his ears as though of water. He was being dragged downward, the roaring growing louder…
And then, from far away, he heard screaming—terrible, terrified, pleading screams. He wanted to help whoever it was; he tried to move his arms, but couldn't… a thick white fog was swirling around him, inside him—
"Harry! Harry! Are you all right?"
Someone was slapping his face.
"W—what?"
Harry opened his eyes; there were lanterns above him, and the floor was shaking—the Hogwarts Express was moving again, and the lights had come back on. He seemed to have slid out of his seat onto the floor.
He wasn't alone in that.
Next to him, still passed out cold, was the big black dog, drool piling under its open, fanged mouth.
Ron and Black were kneeling next to Harry and the dog, and above them were the girls and Professor Lupin.
Harry felt very sick; when he put up his hand to push his glasses back on, he felt cold sweat on his face.
The boys hauled him back onto his seat.
"Are you okay?" Ron asked nervously.
"Yeah," said Harry, looking quickly toward the door. The hooded creature had vanished. "What happened? Where's the Dementor? Who screamed?"
"It was only Uncle Black," Black replied, frowning. "No one screamed."
A loud snap made them all jump. Professor Lupin was breaking an enormous slab of chocolate into pieces.
"Here," he said to Harry, handing him a large piece. "Eat it. It'll help."
Professor Lupin then looked around, his eyes first landing on the dog before hurriedly moving toward Darcie.
"Ms. Malfoy," he said, with a clear ring of praise in his voice. "Absolutely magnificent use of Riddikulus Charm."
Riddikulus?! The word brought old memories rushing into Harry's mind.
"It was not a Dementor, Harry," Ron explained. "It was a Boggart."
"A Boggart?!" Harry exclaimed. "That can't be…"
In their first year, Harry, Daphne, Hermione, Ron, and Draco had survived not one, but dozens of Boggarts to get the key to the next chamber in their quest to reach the Philosopher's Stone.
None of the children was proficient enough to use the Boggart-Banishing Charm at that time.
So, on Draco's recommendation, they had tricked the Boggarts by standing in a group, confusing them. The Boggart had then repeatedly shifted from one form to another, never assuming the form of one child's worst fear for long.
Even Dumbledore had praised the children's ingenuity later.
However, he had also told Harry that their trick of closing their eyes to send the Boggart back to the cabinet worked only because they were in a group. Otherwise, if he had been alone, that wouldn't have been enough to stop it from shape-shifting.
That's exactly why a big question mark appeared in Harry's mind, learning that it was a Boggart.
With so many occupants in such a tight space, the Boggart shouldn't have been capable of shape-shifting into a Dementor for so long.
Also, as far as Harry knew, a Dementor wasn't the worst fear of anyone here.
Only three legions of Dementors remained in Britain, as the rest had already revolted in favor of the Dark Lord and the Dark Alliance after the Azkaban incident. Two of them were stationed at Gringotts, guarding high-value Vaults, while one was still under the Ministry of Magic.
"It was indeed a Boggart," Professor Lupin said. "Now, excuse me. I need to have a chat with the driver."
He strolled past Harry and disappeared into the corridor.
"I don't get it… What happened?" said Harry, wiping more sweat off his face.
Together, the children in the compartment looked at the only person who could explain the situation.
Darcie sighed. "With the Order of Black Phoenix's business, the ministry is severely lacking manpower," she said. "It's clear from the absence of a compartment full of Aurors this time. So, they have been looking for a viable replacement for long now. I think… they have found a solution."
"Boggarts?" Daphne asked, confused.
"Boggarts are sapient amortal beings," Darcie said, nodding. "Professor Dumbledore must have contracted a few of them through some extraordinary means to ignore the children's fear and focus on the worst fear in a group of people that aligned with Azkaban's environment."
Harry and the others' eyes widened.
"You think the Boggart was…" he asked.
"Hmm…" Darcie looked at all of them. "It was looking for Sirius Black."
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