Okay, people. My name is Hey I'm talking to you, and although this is not my first story, or Harry Potter story, this is my first crossover, so I'm totally open to suggestions and flames. If you haven't read the Pendragon series (they are the best books on the surface of the Earth! Well, besides the Discworld series, of course), this might be a little confusing. I don't own anybody except the DADA teacher (sort of) and the plot. Now here's to the story.
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"Come on! We're gonna be late!" Hermione Granger shouted over her shoulder as she dashed down the hallway at an almost inhuman speed. If there was one thing that Hermione would never do, that would be to arrive in class late.
"We're coming, we're coming!" gasped her red-headed friend, Ron Weasley. Despite all their training over the summer and being on the Gryffindor Quidditch team, Ron had had to run all the way from the North Dungeons to the South Tower in under 10 minutes, over a mile and up seven flights of stairs. Ron had run out of breath at the moving staircases on the 5th floor (they'd had to run up and down about five to get on the right corridor) and they still had a floor to go.
In between his two friends was Harry Potter, a 16-year-old boy of average height and messy black hair (the state of which was not being helped with all the running). He was breathing hard, but still managing to keep up his pace.
As the three friends dashed past a dark, unused corridor, Harry suddenly remembered the Marauder's Map, which he had been going over just that morning, and skidded to a stop. "Hey guys!" He called ahead. "There's a shortcut this way."
Hermione turned. "Are you sure?"
"Positive!"
Hermione quickly resumed her incredible pace, speeding down the new hallway. Anything to get to class quicker.
The three kept up their breakneck pace for about a minute, and Ron even caught up with Hermione. But then suddenly, they came to a fork. The road went in four different directions at once. The trio slowed and stopped, and both Ron and Hermione glanced expectantly at Harry.
Harry groped around in his book bag for a moment, and the pulled out a folded piece of parchment. He pulled his wand out of his pocket and tapped the paper. "I solemnly swear I am up to no good." Slowly, the words appeared: Mr.'s Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs proudly present the Marauders Map.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Harry watched impatiently as the ink spread across the page, then flipped to the seventh floor map. His eyes followed the corridor they were on, and glanced at all the different hallways in turn. All came to a dead end except one, the hall on the far right. Harry folded the map and pointed. "That one."
Hermione rolled her eyes annoyedly and set off at a brisk pace, muttering something under her breath as she rounded the corner. Ron and Harry exchanged glances, then hurried after her. Suddenly a shriek broke through the quietness of the empty corridor. "Hermione!" both boys yelled, and dashed around a corner and came face to face with—
About twenty dementors circled around Hermione, who was frantically waving her wand. "E-expect-to P-patronum!" she stuttered, and though great clouds of shapeless mist were coming out of her wand, the dementors were still swooping around her, sucking the very life from her bones.
Harry instinctively grabbed his wand and screamed, "EXPECTO PATRONUM!" A stag erupted out of his wand and galloped toward the dementors, chasing them down the hallway, away from them. The dementors turned a corner, and the stag faded from sight.
Harry turned to Ron, who was holding a shaking Hermione. "Dementors are gone, you can relax now. "
Hermione looked up, her wide, fearful eyes piercing Harry's. "Harry," she said quietly, "Those weren't dementors…"
"What?1" But no one got any chance to say more because, at that moment, the non-dementors came angrily flying back around the corner. And what Harry saw made his blood run cold.
Out of the depths of their cloaks, two yellow lights shone: deep, cruel eyes, filled with evil. And they were—looking—at the trio.
Next to him, Ron took a step in front of Hermione. "Bloody hell…" he whispered as he drew his wand.
The dementors formed a wide line, completely blocking off the hallway. As they prepared to charge, Harry whispered to Ron and Hermione, "On the count of three."
The dementors moved forward, their eyes glinting maliciously. "One…"
They were gliding at an incredible speed, within 20 yards of them. "Two…"
Within five yards now. Harry could feel the joy being peeled painfully off his soul, like skin.
"THREE!"
All three teenagers shouted, "EXPECTO PATRONUM!" A stag shot out of the tip of Harry's wand, but the mega-dementors quickly dodged it. A lion pounced out of Ron's wand, but quickly evaporated, and, as Hermione was already shaken, she produced nothing but another thick cloud of mist.
The dementors began to close in, and Harry took a defensive stance. But at that second, a hand grabbed his upper arm and yanked him through a door and into an adjacent classroom. A door slammed, and Hermione was suddenly against it, trying to keep out the dementors, whose rasping breaths were still quite audible outside the door.
Ron scowled at Hermione. "Do you really think one measly door is gonna keep the dementors out of here?"
Hermione opened her mouth to argue, despite the grave situation. "Well, do you have any better ideas?"
Ron started to reply, but (not wanting a petty argument on his hands while they were still in horrible danger) Harry held up a warning hand. All fell silent, and Harry was about to tell the other two off, when Hermione spoke. "Hey, there's no noise outside."
And indeed there was not. It was as if someone had placed a silencing charm on the room. All outside the door was silent. "Do you think they've left?" Harry asked cautiously.
"Let's not check," said Ron, and the three laughed nervously, more from relief than anything else.
The trio took a deep breath, and the Hermione said, "Let's wait a little longer, then leave."
"No duh."
Harry, Hermione, and Ron glanced around for the first time since entering the room, and found that it was actually quite large. All of a sudden Ron gasped.
"What the heck is that!"
Harry and Hermione came to a stop behind him. "That's what I was about to ask," Harry said, his eyes wide.
About five feet from the end of the room, the wooden floor and smooth slate walls turned into a craggy cave. And at the end of that cave, there was a tunnel that stretched from the ceiling to the floor. It was also made of rocks and seemed to stretch off into nowhere.
Both Harry and Ron glanced at Hermione, whose mouth was wide open. She wrenched her eyes away from the odd spectacle, and met their questioning gazes. "What?"
"Well, is there anything like this in Hogwarts, a History?" Ron asked impatiently, as if Hermione was supposed to know exactly what every look he gave her meant.
"No," Hermione replied irritably, "and you could be nicer about asking."
"Well, sorry, but you're the one who hovers around with that stupid book all day."
"And what, exactly, does that have to do with anything?"
The two began, once again, bickering violently. So what else is new? thought Harry as he turned his gaze back to the strange tunnel in the middle of the school.
As he stared at the thing, pondering what the heck it was, Harry thought he heard something. At first, it was faint, like some far-off orchestra tuning their instruments, but then it grew, until it was unmistakably coming from the strange tunnel at the end of the room. A pinpoint of light appeared in the darkness, and was rushing toward the trio quickly.
"Guys?" Hermione and Ron ignored him. "GUYS!"
They both jumped, and then suddenly the strange, jumbled music filled the room, and Ron and Hermione jumped again. Ron stared at the strange light that was unmistakably coming towards them. "WHAT'S HAPPENING?" he shouted over the music.
"I THINK SOMETHING'S COMING!" Harry yelled back. All three stepped back to a defensive step back and drew their wands. The rocky tunnel filled with light as the jumbled music got louder and louder. Suddenly, there was a flash of light, and the music faded.
Harry cautiously hand down from over his eyes, and out of his peripheral vision, he could see Ron and Hermione do the same. The light disappeared, sucked back into the tunnel as if it had never been there, and out of the tunnel stumbled a boy.
He was dressed in dark leather, which was smeared with blood. He was pretty dirty, and he had a couple of scars on his arms, and in his left hand he gripped a sword like someone who knew what he was doing. The boy looked like a warrior.
The strange boy shook his head violently, as if to clear sleep from his eyes, and dropped his sword to his side. Then he spotted the shocked faces of Harry, Ron, and Hermione.
"Who are you?" he asked slowly, his hand tightening around his sword.
"We were about to ask you the same question," said Hermione, taking a cautious step forward. "You're not a supporter of Voldemort, are you?" Harry and Ron came up behind her, all three pointing their wands at the boy. The boy took a step back, and held his hands up in the air in surrender.
"Who the heck is he, and why are you pointing sticks at me?"
Harry stared at him quizzically. "You don't know who Voldemort is?"
"Um, not really, but I'm guessing he's bad?"
Ron snorted. "Bloody hell he is."
Hermione lowered her wand slowly. "So, who are you?"
The boy smiled a wry grin. "Bobby Pendragon, at your service."
