Harry Potter : In the shadow of divinity45.24%

Chapter - 38 : The Shrieking Revelation

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(P).(A).(T).(R).(E).(O).(N)

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The trek up was made in silent save for their quiet breaths and soft grunts whenever they reached a particularly steep hill, until suddenly Scabbers began squealing wildly, running around in the cage and trying to gnaw through the bars.

"What the hell?" Ron cried bringing the cage up to his eyes. "What's wrong with you, Scabbers?"

"Look," Harry pointed ahead, "I think it's Crookshanks that's got him frightened."

They all turned to watch as Hermione's bowlegged cat crept toward them, his body low to the ground, wide yellow eyes glinting eerily in the darkness.

"Crookshanks, go away," Hermione told her cat firmly. "Scabbers is not a snack."

Crookshanks hissed angrily, but otherwise listened to his mistress. Everyone was so focused on watching the cat slink off, none of them noticed that Crookshanks wasn't the animal they needed to be worried about until it was much too late.

The soft pounding of gigantic paws was the noise that first alerted them to oncoming danger, followed by the sound of heavy pants and Scabbers squeals reaching a crescendo of terror. Harry spun around just in time to see something bounding toward them, quiet as a shadow, an enormous, pale-eyed, jet-black dog. He reached for his wand, but it was too late, the dog had made an enormous leap and the front paws hit him on the chest. But the force of its leap had carried it too far, it rolled off him but, far from deterred, the beast skidded around for a new attack.

The dog sprang toward Ron and fastened it jaws around Ron's outstretched arm. Harry lunged forward, he seized a handful of the brute's hair, but it was dragging Ron away as easily as though he were a rag doll. And then, out of nowhere, something hit Harry so hard across the face he was knocked off his feet again, he heard the others cry out with pain as well.

Harry groped for his wand, blinking blood out of his eyes. "Lumos."

The dim wand light illuminated the scene and Harry realized that they were standing in the shadow of the Whomping Willow who didn't seem to appreciate their presence at all.

"Let go of me you bloody beast!"

Harry turned just in time to see Ron's foot disappear into a large gap in the roots, and then he was off, dodging the trees flying branches all the while praying he wasn't too late until he was nestled safely among the roots watching as his friends danced just out of the tree's reach. "What to do? What to do?" he muttered, he couldn't leave his friends, not after what happened the last two times, but Ron needed his help.

"You have to find a way to immobilize the tree, Harry," Hermione called out to him.

"With what, a stunning spell?" he called back sarcastically, but already he was leaning against the trunk thinking up different ways to freeze the tree just as quickly as he was discarding them. As he frantically attempted to come up with something, a small form darted beside him and pressed an inconspicuous knot on the tree's trunk, and just like that the Whomping Willow froze, looking for all the world as if it hadn't just been trying to beat them into the ground.

Harry turned just in time to see a fluffy bottlebrush tail disappear into the gap in the roots. "Come on," he called to his friends, then dove in after Crookshanks. The tunnel under the tree was a low, cramped place that sloped steeply, and seemed to go on forever, Harry felt as if he were walking for hours before he finally saw a patch of dim light glowing from an opening up ahead. Moving even faster now that the end was in sight, he quickly reached the end of the tunnel and found himself in a room heavy with dust and debris.

"Where are we?" Neville asked as he and the others joined Harry in the disorderly room.

Harry looked around contemplatively. "My guess is the Shrieking Shack," he whispered. Above their heads, something creaked ominously, someone was up there. "This is your last chance to turn back." he told them.

Draco was paler than usual, but he snorted and spoke with his usual bravado. "Please, Potter, and let you have all the fun?"

Harry grinned at him, then they began to move. As quietly as the old floorboards would allow, they crept out into the hall and up the crumbling staircase. Along the ground ran a wide shiny stripe that had been made by something being dragged upstairs.

When they reached the landing, Harry paused to put out the light at the end of his wand, and then moved toward the only room with an open door. "Wands out," he whispered, then pushed the door as wide as it could go.

The room, like the rest of the house, was filthy and run down, most of the space was taken up by a large four poster bed that both Ron and Crookshanks were perched on. Crookshanks was sitting in the center purring happily at the sight of them, and Ron was bunched in the corner, pale with fright and with his arms wrapped protectively around Scabbers' cage.

He looked over to the group when they entered the room and gave them a small, grim smile. "I hope we were right, about him being innocent," he said shakily, "because, like it or not, we found Black."

Harry spun around just in time to see the man in the shadows close the door behind them with a decisive snap.

"Sirius Black," he said softly.

"Harry Potter," the man replied with a voice hoarse and croaky from disuse.

"I must say you've seen better days." A mass of filthy, matted hair hung to his elbows in greasy clumps, if eyes hadn't been shining out of the deep, dark sockets, he might have been a corpse. The waxy skin was stretched so tightly over the bones of his face, it looked like a skull.

Black laughed scratchily and looked at Harry with something akin to curiosity. "Is that all you have to say to me? After all these years, weren't you able to think of one thing you'd like to say to your parent's murderer?"