"Alright, I'm snapping his wand," Harry announced when he was done.
"Again? His father will be furious after this is over..." Hermione surmised. "Even Neville isn't clumsy enough to break two wands in a year. Oh well, let's see what you did."
Hermione probed Draco's mind with legilimency to see how well the memories appeared to be. She did another minor memory charm to fix up small errors, like the sounds of extra voices that shouldn't have been there. Harry did as well, finding other small errors like Hermione brushing her hair away from her face when it was supposed to be Draco's memory. All in all, they ended up doing five memory charms on him in total.
Next came the problem of getting him into the forest itself. The staff would be searching desperately for Draco by now, even if they hadn't bothered to make the announcement to students yet. They decided to open the door they were standing beside and keep walking up the tunnel. Since it was so long, it must have led somewhere far from the castle- and that probably meant the forest.
"It would explain how the basilisk found food to eat. This is kind of exciting! I'm exploring a tunnel that no wizard has seen since Salazar Slytherin built it! I could make my own entry in Hogwarts: A History!" Hermione declared as they continued up the tunnel.
"I'd rather keep this place a secret, wouldn't you, Hermione? At least there won't be any acromantulas where the exit is... I hope. They should be smart enough to stay away from the basilisk's normal hunting grounds," Harry said, thinking of more practical matters.
They finally reached another door with a small snake pattern. Harry opened it, and it turned out to be a gigantic, hollowed log that presumably had been turned into a hidden entrance. It was certainly large enough for the basilisk to slither out. Surrounding them were equally large trees, unlike the ones that grew closer to the castle.
"Magestine Oak trees. I think I know where we are," Hermione said. Pulling out her wand, she said, "Point me." Her wand spun and pointed north. "The castle's this way," she said, pointing East. "It should be a three kilometre hike back."
"You said that spell in English," Harry observed. "How...?"
"I was reading a book on spellcrafting. Most wizards use Mage's Latin for the same reason that scientists use Latin for taxonomy, but it's usually easier to craft new spells in your own language. That was just a simple compass spell. I'll teach it to you when we get back."
They trudged along the thick forest for a while, until they were far from the secret exit. Setting Draco down on the forest floor, they revived him. Both of them kept their wands trained on him this time, wondering how he would react.
Draco shrieked as he woke, screaming, "Spiders! Acromantulas! Help!" Harry and Hermione both breathed a sigh of relief as it was obvious their memory charms had worked properly, although they weren't sure if Draco' cries would attract any predators. They cast a silencing charm on him to be safe.
"Quiet, Malfoy. Do you want those spiders to come after you again? Now follow us if you want to make it out of here," Harry told him. They began marching with Harry in the lead and Hermione behind, keeping Draco at wandpoint.
The two-hour trip was fairly uneventful. A few wild wolves stalked them for a short while until Harry shot a harmless flare spell at them, scaring them off. The majority of the trip was simply fighting the foliage and making sure they were walking in the right direction. Draco, unfortunately, collapsed when they were nearly there, forcing Hermione to levitate him the rest of the way.
"I can't believe I'm going to be an accessory to kidnapping," Hermione muttered under her breath as she trudged along.
"You didn't kidnap him, I did," Harry told her. "You helped rescue him, that's all."
"Why did you leave him down in the chamber again?" Hermione asked with a hint of bitterness in her voice. It obviously hadn't been easy for her to decide between Harry and the law.
"Err... mostly to make sure you got better and that what he told me was correct. I had to be able to find him again just in case he lied to me."
"Did he tell you how he did it? I always keep an eye on him in Potions... I'm pretty sure he never came near my cauldron or my ingredients."
"Oh, bollocks. I forgot to ask him that, too... how did you get the powders mixed up?"
"I didn't... Snape handed the packets out..." Their eyes went wide at the same time.
"I'm going to kill him!" Harry screamed out loud. "He tried to kill you! I can't believe it!"
"Actually... it's not as bad as it sounds... it would have given me a really bad cough that would have kept me in bed for months if you hadn't found out and treated it so quickly... I wouldn't have died..." Hermione tried to correct his facts, but it obviously wasn't what Harry was looking for.
"That's not the point! Oh, that greasy bastard is dead, I swear. I bet he did it just because he finally realized he couldn't bully me this year, so he went after you instead. I don't care if I get expelled... he's not staying in this castle any longer."
"Speak of the devil..." Hermione said as they finally emerged from the forest. They could see the front doors of the castle, where Snape, aurors, and Lucius Malfoy were having a heated discussion. Seeing the two teens approach, Snape strode up to them first, his robes billowing menacingly behind him.
"What have you done to my student, Potter?" Snape snarled.
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