Stay - Mattheo Riddle

The first encounter

They walked in silence, their eyes on the ground. Every now and then a ray of moonlight through the branches above lit a spot of silver-blue blood on the fallen leaves.

As they walked, what had surprised Kirra was that Mattheo and Draco had each began to walk to the sides of her with Draco on her right and Mattheo on her left, though she wasn't sure if it was necessarily a good thing, they were probably planning to prank her or give her to whatever was out there while they ran away.

Though the truth was that the two of them were prepared to make sure that nothing happened to the girl; Though neither of them would ever admit this.

"Could a werewolf be killing the unicorns?" Kirra suddenly asked the two boys next to her, they stayed silent for a while but then Mattheo looked down at her and opened his mouth to begin to speak.

"Not fast enough," said Mattheo, thinking about all that he knew about werewolves, which was a lot, growing up in the Malfoy Mansion he read a lot about dark creatures and dark magic as well as a lot of other things to do with the wizarding world, like his father, he was very intelligent and liked to be at the top of the class. "It's not easy to catch a unicorn, they're powerful magic creatures. I never really read about them being hurt before, they are pure, you'd have to be a monster to kill a unicorn."

Kirra nodded her head softly. They walked past a mossy tree stump. Kirra could hear running water; there must be a stream somewhere close by. There were still spots of unicorn blood here and there along the winding path. 

The young Hufflepuff had a look of devastation on her face as she thought about the unicorn being hurt somewhere, who could hurt something so beautiful? Something so pure and innocent?

"You all right, little badger?" Mattheo whispered but his tone was blank, his eyes were looking at her occasionally before looking around to make sure that nothing was hiding and getting ready to jump out at them randomly. "It can't've gone far if it's this badly hurt, and then we'll be able to —

"GET BEHIND THAT TREE!" Kirra seized the two slytherin boys by their robes and dragged them off the path behind a towering oak her face was ghost white and full of fear and she could see that the two boys were also ghost white and shaking next to her. 

Fang had already ran off and Mattheo and Kirra both pulled out their wands from their pockets and held it tightly in their palms which had began to sweat, even though it was so cold. The three of them listened. Something was slithering over dead leaves nearby: it sounded like a cloak trailing along the ground.

Their breathing was heavy as they waited behind the tree and a few moments later the sound faded away, all of them closely huddled together, scared that if they were to move, they would all be killed at once.

"What the bloody hell was that thing," Draco murmured out shaking aggressively.

"there is something in these woods that shouldn't be here, I've read about magical creatures and Hogwarts a history, whatever that thing was, it wasn't mentioned in either." Mattheo said as he looked around again, ready for whatever it was to come back

"A werewolf?" Draco suggested.

"I just said that it wasn't in either of those books. That wasn't a werewolf and it wasn't a unicorn, either," said Mattheo as he continued to hold his wand tightly, ready to attack if whatever it was came out to attack them.

"we need to send red sparks up to tell hagrid what happened" Kirra muttered out and then pointed her wand into the air and jets of red sparks shot out and up high into the night sky.

It was a few minutes before Hagrid found them, neither Harry nor Hermione were with him

"wheres my brother?" Kirra quickly asked and walked towards the half giant with worry on her face

"hes alrigh' hes back in ther fores with Hermione, We saw your red sparks what happened?" Hagrid asked in concern

"we heard something and saw it a bit too, it was like this cloaked figure slithering along the ground" Kirra choked out and Hagrid looked like he was thinking for a moment before letting out a small sigh

"alrigh' lets go an find the others" Hagrid said and then lead them through the forest back to where Harry and Hermione were waiting for them impatiently and Fang was sitting next to Hermione.

"Right, we need to be more careful, there is something dangerous in the woods, we are goin back in there with the same people, weve gotta get this done" Hagrid said to them all,

So Kirra set off into the heart of the forest with Malfoy, Mattheo and Fang. They walked for nearly half an hour, deeper and deeper into the forest, until the path became almost impossible to follow because the trees were so thick. 

Kirra and Mattheo thought the blood seemed to be getting thicker. There were splashes on the roots of a tree, as though the poor creature had been thrashing around in pain close by. Kirra could see a clearing ahead, through the tangled branches of an ancient oak

"Look —" she murmured, holding out her arms to stop Mattheo and Malfoy. Something bright white was gleaming on the ground. They inched closer. It was the unicorn all right, and it was dead. Kirra had never seen anything so beautiful and sad, her eyes filled with tears instantly and she began to play with the hair tie wrapped around her wrist.

Its long, slender legs were stuck out at odd angles where it had fallen and its mane was spread pearly-white on the dark leaves. The three of them had taken one step toward it when a slithering sound made them all freeze where they stood. A bush on the edge of the clearing quivered.... Then, out of the shadows, a hooded figure came crawling across the ground like some stalking beast.

Kirra, Mattheo, Malfoy, and Fang stood transfixed. The cloaked figure reached the unicorn, lowered its head over the wound in the animal's side, and began to drink its blood. "AAAAAAAAAARGH!" Malfoy let out a terrible scream and bolted — so did Fang.

The hooded figure raised its head and looked right at Kirra and even though they couldn't really see its face, it seemed taken aback as it stopped, it stared at her for a few moments — unicorn blood was dribbling down its front. It got to its feet and came swiftly toward Kirra — she couldn't move as fear consumed her, Mattheo couldn't help it as he stumbled back in fear.

Whatever it was, all of its attention was on the girl.

Then a pain like she'd never felt before pierced Kirra's head; it was as though her scar were on fire. Half blinded, she staggered backward, gripping her head and letting out small whimpers of pain. 

Matheo finally knocked out of it and went to grab her but stopped when he heard hooves behind him, galloping, and something jumped clean over Kirra, charging at the figure. The pain in Kirra's head was so bad she fell to her knees.

Mattheo quickly went to her and kneeled down beside her "what's happening? What's wrong?" He asked her in confusion but she couldn't say anything as she cried softly with her head in her lap as she clutched it tightly in her hand. 

It took a minute or two to pass. When she looked up, the figure had gone. A centaur was standing over the two of them, it was young and he had white-blond hair and a palomino body.

"Are you all right?" said the centaur, pulling Kirra to her feet and acting as if Mattheo wasn't even there.

"Yes — thank you — what was that?" The centaur didn't answer. He had astonishingly blue eyes, like pale sapphires. He looked carefully at Kirra, his eyes lingering on the scar that stood out, livid, on Kirras's forehead.

"You are the Potter girl," he said and then looked at Mattheo for a moment and then looked straight back at the girl. "You had better get back to Hagrid. The forest is not safe at this time — especially for you. Can you ride? It will be quicker this way." Kirra nodded her head 

"My name is Firenze," he added, as he lowered himself on to his front legs so that Kirra could clamber onto his back, Mattheo looked at him and the Centaur nodded and Mattheo climbed onto his back behind Kirra, his hands hung awkwardly at his side for a moment but then he wrapped his arms around her loosely.

The two kids froze in awkwardness and then tried to brush it off as the Centaur ran off with the two of them on his back.