Magic? || Years 1-5

Flying Away: Year 3

"Now what?" Harry asked, glancing around and bouncing from foot to foot.

"We'll have to hide in here. We need to wait until they've gone back to the castle. Then we wait until it's safe to fly Buckbeak up to Sirius's window. He won't be there for another couple of hours... Oh, this is going to be difficult..." Hermione replied nervously.

"We're going to have to move. We've got to be able to see the Whomping Willow, or we won't know what's going on," Harry pointed out.

"Okay. But we've got to keep out of sight, Harry, remember..." Hermione tightened her grip on Buckbeak's rope, and the three of them skirted around the edge of the forest until they reached a place where they could see the tree.

"There's Ron!" Harry whispered suddenly, pointing through the thick foliage at a shadowy figure running in the darkness.

"Get away from him -- get away -- Scabbers, come here -- " Past Ron shouted angrily.

Then two more human figures appeared, a tiny canine silhouette racing between their legs.

Ron dived, "Gotcha! Get off, you stinking cat -- "

"There's Sirius," Present Harry whispered once more.

The dog raced toward them, knocking Harry to the ground, swatting Amisty aside (the present girl rubbed her head in memory) and then grab Ron's leg.

"Looks even worse from here, doesn't it?" Harry commented casually. "Ouch -- look, I just got walloped by the tree -- and so did you, Hermione -- this is weird -- "

The Whomping Willow suddenly froze, lower branches halting in their attack against the three figures below it.

"That was Crookshanks pressing the knot," Hermione narrated.

"And there we go... We're in," Harry nodded.

As soon as Past them disappeared under the tree, footsteps approached. The execution party was walking back up to the castle.

"Right after we'd gone down into the passage! If only Dumbledore had come with us..." Hermione groaned.

"Macnair and Fudge would've come too. I bet you anything Fudge would've told Macnair to murder Sirius on the spot," Harry replied darkly.

Amisty couldn't help but agree. There was silence for a while, and then another man appeared.

"There's Professor Lupin," Amisty whispered, pointing out as the man raced down from the castle and toward the Willow.

He grabbed a stick, poking the knot to stop the tree, and then disappeared below.

"If he'd only grabbed the Cloak. It's just lying there..." Harry's voice was wistful as he turned to Hermione. "If I just dashed out now and grabbed it, Snape'd never be able to get it and -- "

"Harry, we mustn't be seen!" Hermione repeated sharply.

But Amisty was having difficulty paying attention to their bickering, her attention on the slight off-key music coming from further down the grounds.

She tugged on Hermione's cloak, but she didn't seem to notice her.

"How can you stand this? Just standing here and watching it happen? I'm going to grab the Cloak!" Harry decided, about to take a step forward when Amisty grabbed his robes and pulled him back with the help of Hermione.

"Harry, no!" Hermione hissed.

Hagrid rounded the corner near them, singing heartfully with a slight drag in his step. He was drunk judging by the bottle held tight in his hand.