Harry, Hermione and their friends, who now included Luna among their number, pushed their way through the crowded carriage on the Hogwarts Express. As soon as they'd hit the platform, Percy had departed to be with Penelope Clearwater. His girlfriend had earned some serious points with his mother by sticking with them when they'd thought Ginny was dying, and the two prefects were spending as much time together as they could. Unfortunately, the crowded conditions on the train meant that they were forced to share compartments with others, such as Neville going with Susan Bones and her best friend Hannah Abbott and a few other Hufflepuffs. Then they came across another compartment held by Fred, George and their friend Lee Jordan, where Ron, Ginny and Luna sat down.
"It's okay, Ron," Harry reassured his friend. "We'll be fine finding somewhere else to sit, and your family should be sticking together for now at least. We'll have plenty of time to catch up at Hogwarts."
"Yeah, but then she'll make us study," the red-head mock-whined, indicating Hermione with a huge grin. "Then who knows what'll happen? I may even [shudder] learn something!"
Hermione raised her face in a show of dignity, called him a prat, and stuck her tongue out at him. With that, she grabbed her mate's arm and set off down the corridor. Laughing, Ron followed, promising Ginny he'd be back, and that he just wanted to know which compartment the kitty couple wound up in. It turned out that the only one with any room left in it was near the end of the train.
Sirius Black was grateful to his old friend, really he was, but if he kept snoring like that, he tempted to stuff marshmallows in his nose. The only thing staying his hand from this course of action was the memory of his last year at Hogwarts, when he'd done exactly that, and been chased around the Gryffindor Common Room for two hours by an irate Moony. Well, that and a distinct lack of marshmallows.
When his old friend showed up at their childhood meeting place, Sirius had been given a chance to explain the past. It was there that the Marauder duo had both learned a lot. Sirius' innocence made a lot more sense once Moony was told of his Padfoot's discoveries, and when Padfoot heard of Harry bringing his parents' wills into the open, he almost wept. The news of his godson's transformation and the reasons for it hadn't been noticed by the escapee, and Moony didn't notice Padfoot missing the information. Obviously, with Madam Bones investigating, they would quickly get to the bottom of things. Sirius could remember her from his own school-days, and knew he didn't want to be on her bad side. The problem was in getting evidence that would clear him. The muggle witnesses from that terrible day had long since been obliviated, and not even the greatest master-healer in all of Britain could retrieve wiped memories from twelve years ago. So the Marauders rode again, to capture the traitor who had once been one of them. The best place for this was at Hogwarts itself, and that meant getting Sirius, or more accurately, Padfoot, past the dementors and through the wards. So Moony was going to take up a job offer from Dumbledore, of the most dangerous post in Hogwarts (it had to be dangerous, no-one had managed to hold the post for more than a year for the last thirty years), that of the Professor for Defence Against the Dark Arts. Which led, through a logic chain the canine animagus had to call fuzzy, at best, to Moony bringing his big black dog with him, and the temptation of marshmallows.
He heard the students in the corridor and the rattle of the compartment door as it opened, and as one of the three parted from the others to dash back up the train, the scent hit him. CAT!
Having spent so much of the past decade and change in canine form, the former Prisoner of Azkaban was very much in tune with his canine instincts, almost too much so. Before he could even try to assess what was happening, he was up on all four feet, barking madly, which definitely woke his snoring friend, and lunging towards the door. In any other situation, this would have been a sort of good thing, keeping his cover as a dog, but in this case...
Having said "see you around" to Ron, Hermione reached for the compartment door. With Harry right behind her, she opened it, only to be immediately assaulted by the noise and motion of an enormous dog, a black wolfhound by first glance, fiercely defending its territory. Hissing loudly in fright and anger, she set her feet wide and dropped her hands to the floor instinctively, the scent of dog and wolf in this compartment almost overpowering, as she set herself for a fight.
Harry heard his mate hiss, saw her drop into a combat stance, and scented the canine and lupine odour in the compartment. With a tiger's roar that shook the windows up and down the corridor,he launched himself over the amber-eyed feline, pouncing bodily onto the dog and driving the very surprised and suddenly frightened hound to the floor. With his claws less than an inch from the dog's throat, there was stillness and silence as everyone in the compartment froze, both broken by the catgirl's voice.
"Ummm, Harry," she said, "I think this is a teacher."
Remus John Lupin had had a very interesting month. First, he'd received an offer to be this year's DADA professor at Hogwarts, courtesy of the man who'd managed to pull enough strings to get him an education. It had been a job that the werewolf wizard had been thinking of turning down, since at that time he'd recently finished a freelance security job in the muggle world, and was going to spend the next month or two as he had for the past ten years, once he'd managed to crawl back out of the firewhiskey bottle: ransacking stories and documents trying to prove his remaining friend's innocence. Then he'd received that fateful edition of the Daily Prophet, in which Sirius had left, in Marauder Crossword Code, no less, a cry for help, and their meeting had become a council of war... sort of. But nothing had prepared him for this.
Before him were Harry Potter and Hermione Granger, he recognised that much from the will reading, but he was taken aback by the speed and ferocity of their actions. Before he could so much as reach for his wand, they'd taken down Padfoot and were still on edge about it. If he made the wrong move, he was certain the amber-eyed feline would have his legs off in a trice.
It was humbling. It was embarrassing. It was a learning experience. Then the bubble of stillness was burst by the kneazle kitten that poked its sleepy head up from Hermione's pocket, yawned, and mewed.
I heard a dog, Mama Mai. Pakhet looked around, and seeing that 'Papa' had everything under control, with Padfoot in a belly-up pose that said he wasn't starting anything, no, not him, yawned again. Neither one's what they seem, but they're okay, I guess. With that, she sank back into the comfort of Hermione's pocket.
"Was that a kneazle?" the teacher asked. As Hermione nodded, straightening from her stance, she recognised the man from the will reading, by the greying hair and worn tweed.
"You must be professor Lupin," she said, holding out her hand. "Pleased to meet you."
For a moment, the werewolf wizard was startled. "How...? Are you using Legilimency?"
Harry spoke up. "Briefcase, actually, your name's on the front."
Since the dog seemed to know who was in charge, he stood up, stepping back cautiously so as not to tempt the canine with easy targets. Once he had, the wolfhound moved itself quickly to the seat next to Lupin's briefcase, just as Ron and Ginny flared out of thin air.
"Are you guys alright?" they asked. "We heard this huge roar, just after Malfoy and his troll-boys went past. Then they went past in the other direction, much faster, so we thought we'd find out what was up."
Harry sat across from the wolfhound while his mate took her spot beside him, and started purring. Little Pakhet must have liked the noise, as another purr soon emanated from the catgirl's pocket.
"The dog got a little excited when it smelled us, Ron," the emerald-eyed feline explained. "No damage to anything except his pride."
The dog looked like he was considering glaring at Harry. After a few minutes spent reassuring both Weasleys, who then returned to their compartment, the teenage felines turned to the teacher and his dog.
"So," said the catboy. "DADA teacher, right? Unless something has changed since last year, that's the only position open." He placed his arm over his mate's shoulders.
"Yes, actually," the greying professor answered. He measured the youth in front of him, barely thirteen and already faced the Dark Lord three times, and triumphed each time. In that situation, either Harry was very powerful, or Voldemort was not. Since he already knewVoldemort was strong, that left only one conclusion. "This is my best friend, Padfoot," he continued, introducing the dog. As he did, the hound raised his head, trying to give the feline couple 'puppy-dog eyes' as no other creature could. "He's a bit excited and hard to keep in line, but he just came out of a very difficult home."
Hermione smiled. "I'm sure once the misunderstanding is behind us, we'll get on like a house on fire." Harry chuckled.
"Yeah. Flames, screams, people fleeing in fear, house on fire." He was promptly on the receiving end of his mate's glare. Oddly, Padfoot seemed to find the comment funny.
Professor Lupin claimed his side of the compartment, citing a long night and little sleep, and went back to sleep, and as Harry and Hermione hauled out their school texts and began to read ahead for their classes.
The sudden shock of the Hogwarts Express stopping would have thrown the kitty couple to the floor had they not possessed feline reflexes. They leaped to their feet as a strange chill filled the air, accompanied by the distant smell of tomb-dust and dried meat.
"We're not there yet, are we?" Harry whispered, not entirely sure why he was doing so. Hermione confirmed his thought.
"It should be another two hours," she muttered, as the DADA teacher struggled from sleep, and the dog, so full of energy earlier, cowered in fear.
The thing that opened the door to their compartment certainly fit the physical description of the dementors Mr Weasley had warned them about: a tattered black cloak with a hood; long, thin fingers that seemed human enough at first glance, but were too long and thin for that to be true; and floating through the air like a wound in the world, defying existence with their very being, bringing the chill of soul-raking terror and despair where-ever they went. For a moment that stretched into an eternity, it sought something in the compartment, something it seemed unable to find, as though whatever it was looking for, it couldn't 'see'.
As Remus scrabbled for his wand, and while Sirius' worst nightmares rose up again and again, the Duati Bast'et moved. Driven by instinct, Hermione plucked Pakhet from her pocket and deposited her in front of the dog, with a low growl telling him to guard. At the same time, Harry smashed the wraith-like monstrosity back into the corridor, before rolling away from it, the chill of the contact not even penetrating his fur, as his mate took up a position within the compartment, in front of the door. Again, the tiger-like roar sounded up and down the carriage, this time in stereo, as Hermione joined her mate in a declaration of battle joined.
The dementor, finally sensing that it was in over its much-concealed head, began to flee, but neither of the felines were having any of that. As Remus watched, his wand finally to hand, the eyes of the Duati Bast'et glowed, an eldritch energy lighting them from within, and they struck, driving their claws deep, Hermione at the 'neck', neatly severing it, and Harry through the back of the dementor's torso, dragging a withered, dusty lump from the cavity therein.
Agony erupted in the heads of everyone in the carriage, as the dementor's final scream pierced the air, a high-pitched keening that announced its dissolution in no uncertain terms, swiftly fading away as the tattered cloak and emaciated body scattered into dust on the wind.
Silence reigned as the kitty couple stood frozen for a moment, and then collapsed where they stood.