Chapter 73: Crookshanks and Scabbers

Days passed, and the last day of the summer vacations soon arrived.

Early in the morning, Ivan and Harry had just come downstairs when they saw the Weasleys coming out of the fireplace, they looked like they had just returned from Egypt, they were dressed in a mixture of normal wizard robes and traditional Egyptian costumes.

Mrs. Weasley came over and hugged them both. Mr. Weasley then booked several rooms at the bar, they were going to spend the night at the Leaky Cauldron.

A few minutes later, Tom brought breakfast.

After breakfast, Percy came over and greeted Ivan and Harry and showed them his Prefect badge, Percy acted like he was king of the world.

Fred and George didn't let Percy speak for long as they mimicked Percy's gesture and shook hands with both of them, making them laugh.

Mrs. Weasley was annoyed with them because she was proud of Percy.

The conversation turned again to the trip to Egypt, and the Weasleys told them all about the trip.

Then Ron showed Ivan and Harry his new wand, it was 14 inches, long, made of willow, and had a core of unicorn hair. As for Ginny, she was still blushing at the sight of Harry, but she was quite a bit better than last term, at least she didn't throw anything.

After everyone finished eating, Hermione and her parents walked into the bar.

Hermione was wearing a sky blue robe, a pale yellow straw hat on her head and a healthy wheat tan, Hermione looked playful and was very happy, and greeted everyone cheerfully.

They chatted for a while, but the Grangers had to leave early because they had some business to attend to. They left Hermione in the care of the Weasleys and let her stay at the Leaky Cauldron that night.

When they parted, Harry began to tell Ron how he had inflated his aunt and Hermione pulled out a large stack of papers she had written while in France.

"I heard it all from my dad, he said she was floating on the ceiling for two hours," Ron laughed and thought about how exciting it would be to inflate his aunt.

"It's not funny Ron, to be honest, I'm surprised he didn't get expelled," Hermione said with a sharp tone.

Harry said, "I thought I was going to be sent to Azkaban. Ron, does Mr. Weasley know why Fudge didn't give me any punishment?"

"Probably because you're you, aren't you?" Ron shrugged, still laughing, "The famous Harry Potter or something, if I blew up my aunt, the ministry wouldn't let me off with a simple warning. But first they'd have to dig my grave because my mother would kill me!"

Hermione interrupted and began to lecture them, "I think you two should learn from Ivan, he would never..."

"I know I was wrong, Hermione! I ended up losing control." Seeing that Hermione was a bit annoyed, Harry was quick to change the conversation, "Where should we go now?"

"I think we should go to the Magical Menagerie." Hermione looked down at her bag and said, "My birthday is in September, so my parents gave me some money so I could buy a birthday present and I want an owl."

"I think I should get Scabbers checked out, I think Egypt wasn't a suitable place for him," Ron said as he pulled the rat out of his pocket.

Ivan's eyes shifted from the parchment in his hand to the rat, who looked thinner than before, his fur had lost most of its luster.

"Ron, your rat is lacking exercise," said Ivan with a wry smile, Peter Pettigrew must have been stressed from Sirius Black's escape.

"Exercise?" said Ron as he looked at Ivan suspiciously.

Ivan nodded and said, "Yes, I suggest Hermione buys a cat so she can help you."

"Don't listen to him, Hermione!" said Ron as he unconsciously put the rat in his pocket, "Scabbers is pitiful enough, let's find the pet store quickly."

"There's Magical Menagerie over there," said Harry, after two weeks of wandering Diagon Alley, Harry was very familiar with it, "You can see if they can see what Scabbers has in there, and Hermione can also get an owl or a cat."

"You mustn't get a cat!" said Ron with a bit of fear.

The four people crossed the street and came to the store called Magical Menagerie.

There wasn't much room in the store, there were cages on every inch of the wall. The little creatures in the cages smelled bad and made a lot of noise.

"Hey, it's my pet!" said Ron to the witch behind the counter, "Can you see what's wrong with him? He's been a little under the weather since I brought him back from Egypt."

"Put him on the counter," said the witch, she pulled a pair of glasses out of her pocket and examined Scabbers.

"Hmph!" The witch said, "How old is this rat?"

"I don't know," said Ron, "But he should be very old since he used to belong to my brothers."

"What is he capable of?" asked the witch as she watched him carefully.

"Um..." Ron didn't know what to say, the reality was that the rat had never shown the slightest trace of any interesting power.

The witch's eyes flicked from Scabbers' torn ear to her front paw, where she was missing a toe, and she clicked her tongue.

"He's been through a lot," the witch said.

"It was like this when Percy gave it to me." said Ron in his own defense.

Harry nodded, the rat had been like this for as long as he'd known Ron, usually showing nothing out of the ordinary except sleeping and eating.

"From a house or garden mouse like this, you wouldn't expect it to live more than three years," The witch pointed to the black rats in the cages next to them and said, "If you want a more durable one, you might like one of those."

Ivan chuckled a little, he wondered what would happen if she had told him that the rat that she said would only live three years max, had lived in Ron's house for over ten, maybe he would have freaked out.

"Well, if you don't want to replace it, you can try this potion," the witch said, reached under the counter and pulled out a small red bottle.

"Okay, how much is...?" said Ron, but before he could finish his sentence, they saw a huge red-haired thing jump down from the top cage.

It was a strange looking cat, very large, wide-legged, ginger-colored with a rough face and it had a strange squashed look to it, as if it had run head first into a wall at some point.

It leapt over Ron's head, leaned forward and snarled at Scabbers.

"No! Crookshanks no!" the witch shouted.

Scabbers slipped through Ron's hands like a piece of slippery soap, fell to the floor and ran for the door.

"Scabbers!" shouted Ron, rushing out of the tent after him, followed by Harry.

As Scabbers disappeared, Crookshanks suddenly turned his head and looked at Ivan with a docile face, not at all the fierce and violent one he had shown before, perhaps because his animagus form was a cat, Crookshanks was very affectionate with Ivan, even coming over to lick his hand.

This surprised the witch behind the counter, who had never seen Crookshanks touch a stranger before.

"What a beautiful creature, his fur is beautiful, isn't it, Ivan?" said Hermione as she knelt down to also pet Crookshanks.

The cat was a bit wary, but accepted Hermione immediately.

"His fur is a very vibrant orange, he's like a big ball of wool," Ivan said as he looked at the cat thinking his face was not very pleasing to the eye.

"I've made up my mind!" said Hermione as she picked up Crookshanks in her arms and jumped to her feet.

"What have you decided?" Ivan glared at her, and had a bad feeling.

"You told me to buy a cat, AND I decided to buy it!" said Hermione, pointing at Crookshanks.

"Buy this cat? But if you do, Ron will kill me," said Ivan with a bitter smile.