My name is Crookshanks, and I am probably the most intelligent and most miserable cat in the world.
I am not one of those ordinary, interchangeable house cats from a pet shop window. As a half-Kneazle — a noble magical creature — crossed with a perfectly respectable Persian, I have considerably higher standards than the average witch or wizard deserves. This is a simple fact.
Don't misunderstand. I am very pleasant company.
I used to have an owner.
Back then, I was a carefree, relatively optimistic young cat, and I wasn't called Crookshanks. I've long forgotten what my name was — it's been too many years since anyone said it.
What I remember is my owner. She had beautiful, long red hair, even more lustrous than my ginger fur. People called her Lily. She would sit reading with me in her lap, stroking me with one hand, her bright green eyes smiling. She always prepared my favourite dried fish without being asked.
I liked her enormously. I liked to sleep on her lap, or at her feet, or anywhere she happened to be.
Her husband, James, was a born nuisance. He made fun of my flat face no fewer than three times a day. Every time I came close to catching that rat, he would grab me by the scruff of the neck and deposit me outside, declaring I was not permitted to bully his friends.
Friend. That rat was his friend. I have never in my life encountered a friend who smelled so appalling.
Her son Harry was, if anything, worse than his father. He hurtled around the house on his toy broomstick, frightening everyone for his own entertainment, and somehow it was never acceptable to be cross with him because he would immediately do something so reckless you had to switch to worrying instead.
Humans. What can you do.
And then there was Sirius Black — the one who bought Harry the toy broomstick, the one who thought it was tremendous fun to transform into a massive black dog specifically to terrify me. All because of the rat. All because I wanted to do what any sensible creature would do when presented with a known traitor.
Apart from that, life was very good. I had nothing to complain about.
I should have known the good days wouldn't last.
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On Halloween morning, I came back from my usual patrol of Godric's Hollow and found our home in ruins.
People had gathered from all directions, pointing and murmuring.
I jumped into the rubble and searched frantically — and found Lily lying on the floor, motionless, her beautiful eyes open, dried tear-tracks on her cheeks.
I licked her face with my rough tongue.
She didn't react.
I meowed. I pushed at her with my paw. I pressed my face against hers and pleaded.
Her gaze remained fixed on the empty crib in the middle of the room.
I jumped up onto the crib. The blanket was still warm. Harry was not there.
He was hiding. He had to be hiding. It was Halloween; that was the sort of thing he did —
I searched everywhere. Under the bed. On top of the wardrobe. Behind the sofa. His toy broomstick had fallen on the floor; his small handprints were still on it.
He was not there.
I went back to the stairwell. James was lying at the foot of the stairs. I stared at him. I stepped on his face, which is what I did when I wanted him to pay attention.
He didn't grab me by the scruff of the neck.
He didn't move at all.
I yowled at him. I clawed at the good robe Lily had bought him. I was furious and begging simultaneously and I couldn't make anyone understand —
He was as cold as stone.
People swarmed around us, exclaiming things I didn't want to hear. They said they would bury them.
Bury them.
Lily and James — why would you bury them? You don't bury people. They're not dead. They're not dead, because if they were dead then nothing makes any sense and I refuse to accept —
They were taken from me. I launched myself at the wall as hard as I could, intending to follow Lily.
I am a Kneazle-cross and considerably harder to kill than that. I bounced off the wall. My face, already not my finest feature, felt somewhat flatter afterwards.
I heard the crowd saying, "That poor cat."
Someone reached out to touch me. I bared every tooth I had and ran.
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From then on, I was a grumpy, pessimistic, ugly cat with a flat face and no home.
I wandered for a while. Eventually I drifted back to Diagon Alley, because that was where it had all started — where I first met Lily, years before.
I lay down in the same spot in the same pet shop. I waited.
They didn't come.
Days passed. Then more days.
From the conversations around me, eventually, I understood.
There was no Halloween prank.
They were gone.
Lily. James.
Well. I suppose I can be frightened. Any number of times. That's fine. You could have used that information.
But apparently only one person survived. Lily's son — my little master — Harry — had lived, and had become famous throughout the wizarding world for it.
Something small and stubborn stirred in me.
Whoever did this — whoever took Lily and James — I would find out. I would wait. I would help my little master take revenge.
I started eating properly again. The cat food tasted nothing like Lily's dried fish, but I stopped being picky about it.
I sharpened my claws. I fought with every other cat in the neighbourhood, three times a day, keeping myself in condition. I waited.
I waited ten years.
He never came.
A respectable young wizard, and he can't afford a pet? He's a disgrace to Lily's memory. Later I heard some fool went and bought him a snowy owl instead. No wonder.
I was tired. I thought: this is just how it will be.
Even if he won't come to me, I will go to him. Someday.
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Then something happened that knocked the wind out of ten years of rage.
I heard that the traitor had been caught.
Caught. After more than a decade of hiding, he'd been caught.
I hadn't even gotten to take my revenge myself. Someone else had done it, and my years of furious waiting deflated like a punctured balloon.
Harry had his own pet. He'd forgotten about me. Everyone had.
Gradually I went from a lean, battle-ready cat to a fat, lazy lump. I couldn't entirely bring myself to care.
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And then a brown-haired girl walked into the shop.
She was there to pick a pet.
I did what I always did. I grinned and grimaced and displayed my teeth in my most alarming fashion. Another one scared off. I'd already started anticipating the look of alarm, the hasty retreat toward the docile kittens in the corner —
She bought me anyway.
I was in her arms and out of the shop before I'd recovered from the shock.
Then I smelled it.
A familiar scent, faint but unmistakable. The scent I had spent ten years waiting for.
Harry.
She'd been near Harry. Recently. She might know him — might even be his friend.
I stopped struggling.
I let her carry me out into the sunlit street, my eyes scanning — and there he was.
The boy with the black hair and Lily's eyes.
Harry.
He looked exactly like James — the same bone structure, the same infuriating expression — but his eyes. His eyes were exactly Lily's.
I called to him for a long time. He didn't recognise me at all.
Foolish humans. Not one scrap of Lily's intelligence between the lot of them.
Fine. I would work with what I had.
I settled in with my new mistress, Hermione. She reads with me in her arms and strokes me while she does it. In this respect she is remarkably like Lily, and I have not told her this because she would not understand, but it counts for a great deal.
I also encountered a red-haired boy and a platinum-blonde boy. Their fur was acceptable. I have a somewhat warmer feeling toward the platinum-blonde one — he was the one who caught the traitor the first time around. Anyone who does my revenge for me has at least partially earned my goodwill.
I relearned how to be a cat. I roamed the Forbidden Forest. I hunted. Slowly, carefully, I found something resembling purpose again.
And I kept hunting for a specific rat.
The Forbidden Forest is full of rats. I despise rats. I caught them daily and found none of them to be the right one — until I found one that was a little smarter than a normal rat should be. Bigger. More cunning. And carrying a smell I would have known anywhere.
The dirty Animagus who had escaped from Azkaban.
I had wanted to eat that rat for more than a decade. James had stopped me every single time, grabbing me by the scruff of the neck, declaring I was not to bully his friends.
The person who used to grab me by the scruff of the neck is not here anymore.
I should like to see who tries to stop me now.
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It was a night when the moon was nearly full. My instincts told me the timing was right.
I chased the rat from the direction of the dungeon corridor, following the familiar scent through the castle grounds, all the way to the Whomping Willow.
I waited in the tree. He goes in through this entrance; he will come out through this entrance. I know how this works.
They came out. He was in his human form, unfortunately, and they walked away — there was nothing I could do but watch.
I waited.
And then, at last, after exhausting nearly every remaining reserve of my patience — the bald man grinned his rat-like grin, said "no one can catch me," and transformed.
The rat shot toward the Whomping Willow.
I dropped out of the tree like a stone. One swipe. One bite.
Done.
James, you brainless, sentimental idiot. This was so simple. You should have let me do this years ago.
I picked up the remains and walked away while the three young humans stared after me in a state of total astonishment. I allowed myself a moment of satisfaction at this.
No one can catch him, he said.
Quite right. No person could.
I am not a person. I am Crookshanks — half-Kneazle, former companion of Lily Potter, current companion of Hermione Granger, rat terminator, keeper of old scores.
An eye for an eye. He destroyed my family; I destroyed him. Simple arithmetic.
I warn any foolish creature thinking of repeating his mistakes: I have very sharp teeth, a very long memory, and absolutely nowhere better to be.
Otherwise, you'll be the next Peter Pettigrew.
Meow.