"What?" said Christina blankly.
"He left!" said Mrs. Figg, wringing her hands. "Left to see someone about a batch of cauldrons that fell off the back of a broom! I told him I'd flay him alive if he went, and now look! Dementors! It's just lucky I put Mr. Tibbies on the case! But we haven't got time to stand around! Hurry, now, we've got to get you back! Oh, the trouble this is going to cause! I will kill him!"
"But —you're — you're a witch?" Harry uttered.
"I'm a Squib, as Mundungus knows full well, so how on earth was I supposed to help you fight off dementors? He left you completely without cover and you-" she waved a finger at Christina" "You shouldn't even be here! What did Dumbledore tell you—"
"This bloke Mundungus has been following me?" Harry interrupted.
"Yes, yes, yes, but luckily I'd stationed Mr. Tibbies under a car just in case, and Mr. Tibbies came and warned me, but by the time I got to your house, Harry, you'd gone — and now — oh, what's Dumbledore going to say? You!" she shrieked at Dudley, still supine on the alley floor. "Get your fat bottom off the ground, quick!"
"You know Dumbledore?" said Christina, staring at her.
"Of course I know Dumbledore, who doesn't know Dumbledore? But come on — I'll be no help if they come back, I've never so much as Transfigured a teabag —" She stooped down, seized one of Dudley's massive arms in her wizened hands, and tugged. "Get up, you useless lump, get up!" But Dudley either could not or would not move. He was still on the ground, trembling and ashen-faced, his mouth shut very tight.
"I'll do it." Harry took hold of Dudley's arm and heaved: With an enormous effort he managed to hoist Dudley to his feet. Dudley seemed to be on the point of fainting: His small eyes were rolling in their sockets and sweat was beading his face; the moment Harry let go of him he swayed dangerously.
"Hurry up!" said Mrs. Figg hysterically. Harry pulled one of Dudley's massive arms around his own shoulders and dragged him toward the road, sagging slightly under his weight. Mrs. Figg tottered along in front of them, peering anxiously around the corner. "Keep your wand out, Christina, what are you still doing here? Go!" she told them, and Christina stopped confused and waved goodbye to the odd trio. She dematerialized and went off in the wind to America where her muggle parents were, unknowing of the events that had just transpired.
She went straight to her room and laid on her bed, looking up at the ceiling. What had just happened? Harry was being watched and or followed? Why? What could he have done to make Dumbledore so uneasy? Was she also being followed? She wanted desperately to talk to Fred but they had agreed to only meet in places that weren't their homes. She figured it was because of the intense mess Fred and George were surely making from their experiments but she also had a distinct feeling that there was a deeper reason that she chose to ignore. Ever since the graveyard it was like a sense of dread followed her wherever she went, but when she ignored everything around her and just focused on who she was with, she was happy.
She snapped back to reality when she heard the sharp rap at her window. She got up to see that it was an grey owl with an envelope, one she did not recognize. Christina opened the window and took the note, and the bird flew off. She noticed the ministry seal on the edge instantly:
Dear Ms. Bataskill,
We have received intelligence that you performed the Patronus Charm at twenty-five minutes past nine this evening in a Muggle-inhabited area and in the presence of a Muggle. The severity of this breach of the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery has resulted in your expulsion from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Ministry representatives will be calling at your place of residence shortly to destroy your wand. We regret to inform you that your presence is required at a disciplinary hearing at the Ministry of Magic at 9 a.m. on August 12th. Hoping you are well,
Yours sincerely,
Mafalda Hopkirk
Improper Use of Magic Office
Ministry of Magic
Christina read the letter through twice. She found it hard to believe that she almost laughed, this must be a prank from Fred and George surely. . .but they didn't know about what had happened . . . She felt icy and numb. One fact had penetrated her consciousness like a paralyzing dart. She was expelled from Hogwarts. Her coldness fell and a hot burning rage awoke within her. Who were they to take her wand! She had natural power! She could fight them, and win! Christina paced her room furiously and remembered,
'Ministry representatives will be calling at your place of residence shortly to destroy your wand.'
There was no way, just no way. She packed up everything she could and considered rushing downstairs to convince her parents she had to leave. She collected the last bits of her belongings when a second owl rapped at her window. Her head was in a fog and she almost didn't read the letter, but it was not from the ministry so she took the letter and opened it:
Christina —
Dumbledore's just arrived at the Ministry, and he's trying to sort it all out. DO NOT LEAVE YOUR HOUSE. DO NOT DO ANY MORE MAGIC. DO NOT SURRENDER YOUR WAND.
Arthur Weasley
Dumbledore was trying to sort it all out. . . . What did that mean? How much power did Dumbledore have to override the Ministry of Magic? Was there a chance that she might be allowed back to Hogwarts, then? A small shoot of hope burgeoned in Christina's chest, almost immediately strangled by panic — how was she supposed to refuse to surrender her wand without doing magic? She'd have to duel with the Ministry representatives, and if she did that, she'd be lucky to escape Azkaban, let alone expulsion.
Her mind was racing. . . . She could run for it and risk being captured by the Ministry, or stay put and wait for them to find her here. She was much more tempted by the former course, but she knew that Mr. Weasley had her best interests at heart . . . and, after all, Dumbledore had sorted out much worse than this before. . . .just then there was a familiar crack behind her and she turned to see Fred Weasley.
"Oh thank God!" Christina said and leaped over to embrace him. He held her tightly, running his hands down her hair.
"What on earth have you done now. . ." he said exhaling. She sighed and sat down on the edge of her bed, he joined her. "Oh you know, the usual expulsion threats"
"Yeah my Dad said something like that. . . ." he said and laid back on her bed. She laid back too and explained everything, from Harry oddly brutish behavior to the black, dead hands clasping around her throat. He turned over and spooned her. Kissing her neck he exhaled once more, "I'm sorry" Her face scrunched in confusion, "Why?"
"I know it hasn't been easy for you, I can only imagine what this-" but for a third time that night there was a peck at the window. Christina considered just leaving it open. She took the third letter from the owl and recognized the ministry seal, "Maybe they changed their mind already?" she said showing Fred the emblem:
Dear Ms. Bataskill,
Further to our letter of approximately twenty-two minutes ago, the Ministry of Magic has revised its decision to destroy your wand forthwith. You may retain your wand until your disciplinary hearing on 12th August, at which time an official decision will be taken. Following discussions with the Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, the Ministry has agreed that the question of your expulsion will also be decided at that time. You should therefore consider yourself suspended from school pending further inquiries. With best wishes,
Yours sincerely,
Mafalda Hopkirk
Improper Use of Magic Office
Ministry of Magic
She had read the letter to Fred who snatched it the second she had finished reading. The miserable knot in her chest loosened slightly at the thought that she was not definitely expelled, though her fears were by no means banished. Everything seemed to hang on this hearing on the twelfth of August.
"I'll kill em'" Fred said in a huff.
"Ha, ha. Maybe then at least we can share a cell in Azkaban together"
"Seriously! This is mad! They've got to be off their - I mean honestly!" Fred continued. Christina continued putting her things in her trunk. "What're you doing?"
"Packing"
"You can't leave, my dad-"
"I know, but I can't stay here, Fred." Fred walked over a took the books from Christina's hands and placed them on the bed. She looked at him hard, trying to figure out why he was so adamant on following his father's words. But she suddenly realized,
"Harry! Do you think he's expelled too? Do you think we have the same hearing date?" she said quickly, Fred didn't answer, he instead was going to the window.
"Incoming!" a fourth owl landed on her window and held out its leg to deliver a note. She took it quickly and recognized the handwriting, Remus Lupin's.
Arthur's just told us what's happened. Don't leave the house again, whatever you do.
After what had happened between her and Remus only a month previously she found this such an inadequate response to everything that had happened tonight. She turned the piece of parchment over, looking for the rest of the letter, but there was nothing there, now her temper was rising again. Wasn't anybody going to say "well done" for fighting off two dementors single-handedly? Both Mr. Weasley and Remus were acting as though she'd misbehaved and they were saving their tellings-off until they could ascertain how much damage had been done. She felt very much like a child.
She and Fred were quiet for a while, she was too mad to say anything and he seemed to scared to set her off. They just laid on the bed and watched the ceiling, waiting for anymore owls to arrive.
She didn't remember falling asleep. It felt like she was there lying with Fred on the bed, blinked, and it was daytime. Although when she awoke, Fred was gone. He left her there to stew in confusion and misery. The next few days came and went with no ceremony, no one visited her, no one wrote to her, she watched TV with her family and ate mundane dinners. It was the life she knew she'd had, had she'd not attended Hogwarts. The boring complacency, she couldn't stand it. Christina decided that if no one showed up after a week that she'd leave, and deal with the repercussions later.
The fourth night she was sitting on her bed again, this time on her laptop, scrolling through newsfeeds. One thing she missed while at Hogwarts was her laptop, she might never have to miss it again. . .she got up and looked out her main window. It was dark and her family had gone out to a tupperware party, she politely declined. On her dresser she grabbed her fabric spray and sprayed her room, she loved the smell and she always sprayed it right before she got into bed, a weird tradition she started over the summer. Before she got under the covers there was a creak coming along the hallway from her room. She lifted the dust particles on the floor outside her room and instantly grabbed her wand from her bedside table.
Many figures were outside in her hallway, tall and large figures, she could feel out at least twelve feet. She got to her knees on her bed and pointed her wand at the door, bracing for impact.
Next moment she jumped as the lock gave a loud click and her door swung open. Christina motionless, staring through the open door at the dark upstairs landing, straining her ears for further sounds, but none came. She hesitated for a moment and then moved swiftly and silently towards her open door.
Her heart shot upward into her throat. There were people standing in the shadowy hall below, silhouetted against the streetlight glowing through the glass door; eight or nine of them, all, as far as she could see, looking up at her.
"Lower your wand, before you take someone's eye out," said a low, growling voice. Christina's heart was thumping uncontrollably. She knew that voice, Alastor Moody, but she did not lower her wand. Instead she rushed back into her room and slammed the door shut, sitting in front of the door. She had recently spent nine months in what she had thought was Mad-Eye Moody's company only to find out that it wasn't Moody at all, but an impostor; an impostor, moreover, who had tried to kill Christina before being unmasked. But before she could make a decision about what to do next, a second, slightly hoarse voice floated upstairs.
"It's all right, Christina. We've come to take you away." It was Remus Lupin, now at her door. She hesitantly opened her door a crack to see the familiar face and scar. He smiled,
"I swear it's me, please don't attack me" he said sweetly. She lowered her wand and opened the door. They hugged momentarily.
"Why are we all standing in the dark?" said a third voice, this one completely unfamiliar, a woman's. "Lumos." A wand tip flared, illuminating the hall with magical light. Christina blinked. The people below were crowded around the foot of the stairs, gazing intently up at her, some craning their heads for a better look. Remus stood nearest to her. Though still quite young, he looked tired and rather ill; he had more gray hair than when Christina had last spoke to him, and his robes were more patched and shabbier than ever. Nevertheless, he was smiling broadly at Christina, who tried to smile back through her shock.
"Oooh, she looks just like I thought he would," said the witch who was holding her lit wand aloft. She looked the youngest there; she had a pale heart-shaped face, dark twinkling eyes, and short spiky hair that was a violent shade of violet. "Wotcher, Christina!"
"Yeah, I see what you mean, Remus," said a bald black wizard standing farthest back; he had a deep, slow voice and wore a single gold hoop in his ear. "She looks exactly like her mother."
Mad-Eye Moody, who had long grizzled gray hair and a large chunk missing from his nose, was squinting suspiciously at Christina through his mismatched eyes. One of the eyes was small, dark, and beady, the other large, round, and electric blue — the magical eye that could see through walls, doors, and the back of Moody's own head. "Are you quite sure it's her, Lupin?" he growled. "It'd be a nice lookout if we bring back some Death Eater impersonating her. We ought to ask her something only the real girl would know. Unless anyone brought any Veritaserum?"
"Are you serious? Are we quit sure it isn't Barty Crouch Jr.!" Christina said wavering, still frightened of Mad-Eye from their last encounter.
"Smart girl!" Mad-Eye beamed, but Remus spoke for Moody "He is the real Alastor. Christina, what form does your Patronus take?" said Lupin.
"A fox," said Christina nervously.
"That's her, Mad-Eye," said Lupin. Christina descended the stairs, very conscious of everybody still staring at her, stowing her wand into the back pocket of her jeans as she came.
"Don't put your wand there, girl!" roared Moody. "What if it ignited? Better wizards than you have lost buttocks, you know!"
"Who d'you know who's lost a buttock?" the violet-haired woman asked Mad-Eye interestedly.
"Never you mind, you just keep your wand out of your back pocket!" growled Mad-Eye. "Elementary wand safety, nobody bothers about it anymore. . . ." He stumped off toward the kitchen. "And I saw that," he added irritably, as the woman rolled her eyes at the ceiling. Lupin held out his hand and shook Christina's.
"How are you?" he asked, looking at Christina closely.
"Confused . . ." Christina could hardly believe this was real. Four weeks with nothing, not the tiniest hint of a plan to remove her from America, and suddenly a whole bunch of wizards was standing matter-of-factly in the house as though this were a long-standing arrangement. She glanced at the people surrounding Lupin; they were still gazing avidly at her.
"We are leaving, aren't we?" she asked. "Soon?"
"Almost at once," said Lupin, "we're just waiting for the all-clear."
"Where are we going? The Burrow?" Christina asked hopefully.
"Not the Burrow, no," said Lupin, motioning Christina toward the kitchen; the little knot of wizards followed, all still eyeing Christina curiously.
"Too risky. We've set up headquarters somewhere undetectable. It's taken a while. . . ." Mad-Eye Moody was now sitting at the kitchen table swigging from a hip flask, his magical eye spinning in all directions, taking in the many labor-saving appliances. "This is Alastor Moody, Christina," Lupin continued, pointing toward Moody.
"Yeah, I know," said Christina uncomfortably; it felt odd to be introduced to somebody she'd thought she'd known for a year. "And this is Nymphadora —"
"Don't call me Nymphadora, Remus," said the young witch with a shudder. "It's Tonks."
"— Nymphadora Tonks, who prefers to be known by her surname only," finished Lupin. "So would you if your fool of a mother had called you 'Nymphadora,' " muttered Tonks. "And this is Kingsley Shacklebolt" — he indicated the tall black wizard, who bowed — "Elphias Doge" — the wheezy-voiced wizard nodded — "Dedalus Diggle —"
"We've met before," squeaked the excitable Diggle, dropping his top hat. "— Emmeline Vance" — a stately looking witch in an emeraldgreen shawl inclined her head — "Sturgis Podmore" — a square-jawed wizard with thick, straw-colored hair winked — "and Hestia Jones." A pink-cheeked, black-haired witch waved from next to the toaster. Christina inclined her head awkwardly at each of them as they were introduced. She wished they would look at something other than her; it was as though she had suddenly been ushered onstage. She also wondered why so many of them were there.
"A surprising number of people volunteered to come and get you," said Lupin, as though he had read Christina's mind; the corners of his mouth twitched slightly. "Yeah, well, the more the better," said Moody darkly. "We're your guard, Bataskill."
"We're just waiting for the signal to tell us it's safe to set off," said Lupin, glancing out of the kitchen window. "We've got about fifteen minutes."
"Very clean, aren't they, these Muggles?" said the witch called Tonks, who was looking around the kitchen with great interest. "My dad's Muggle-born and he's a right old slob. I suppose it varies, just like with wizards?"
"Er — yeah," said Christina. "Look" — she turned back to Lupin — "what's going on, I haven't heard anything from anyone, what's Vol — ?" Several of the witches and wizards made odd hissing noises; Dedalus Diggle dropped his hat again, and Moody growled, "Shut up!"
"What?" said Christina.
"We're not discussing anything here, it's too risky," said Moody, turning his normal eye on Christina; his magical eye remained pointing up at the ceiling. "Damn it," he added angrily, putting a hand up to the magical eye, "it keeps sticking — ever since that scum wore it —" And with a nasty squelching sound much like a plunger being pulled from a sink, he popped out his eye.
"Mad-Eye, you do know that's disgusting, don't you?" said Tonks conversationally. "Get me a glass of water, would you, Christina?" asked Moody. Christina crossed to the dishwasher, took out a clean glass, and filled it with water at the sink, still watched eagerly by the band of wizards. Their relentless staring was starting to annoy her. "Cheers," said Moody, when Christina handed him the glass. He dropped the magical eyeball into the water and prodded it up and down; the eye whizzed around, staring at them all in turn.
"I want three-hundred-and-sixty degrees visibility on the return journey."
"How're we getting — wherever we're going?" Christina asked. "Brooms," said Lupin. "Only way. You're too young to Apparate, they'll be watching the Floo Network, and it's more than our life's worth to set up an unauthorized Portkey."
"Remus says you're a good flier," said Kingsley Shacklebolt in his deep voice. "She's excellent," said Lupin, who was checking his watch. "Anyway, you'd better go and get packed, Christina, we want to be ready to go when the signal comes."
"I'll come and help you," said Tonks brightly. She followed Christina back into the hall and up the stairs, looking around with much curiosity and interest. "Funny place," she said, "it's a bit too clean, d'you know what I mean? Bit unnatural. Oh, this is better," she added, as they entered Christina's bedroom and Christina turned on the light. Her room was certainly much messier than the rest of the house. Confined to it for four days in a very bad mood, Christina had not bothered tidying up after herself. Most of the books she owned were strewn over the floor where she'd tried to distract herself with each in turn and thrown it aside. Her owl Tulip's cage needed cleaning out and was starting to smell, and her trunk lay open, revealing a jumbled mixture of Muggle clothes and wizard's robes that had spilled onto the floor around it.
Christina started picking up books and throwing them hastily into her trunk. Tonks paused at her open wardrobe to look critically at her reflection in the mirror on the inside of the door.
"You know, I don't think purple's really my color," she said pensively, tugging at a lock of spiky hair. "D'you think it makes me look a bit peaky?"
"Er —" said Christina, looking up at her.
"Yeah, it does," said Tonks decisively. She screwed up her eyes in a strained expression as though she were struggling to remember something. A second later, her hair had turned bubble-gum pink.
"How did you do that?" said Christina, gaping at her as she opened her eyes again.
"I'm a Metamorphmagus," she said, looking back at her reflection and turning her head so that she could see her hair from all directions. "It means I can change my appearance at will," she added, spotting Christina's puzzled expression in the mirror behind her. "I was born one. I got top marks in Concealment and Disguise during Auror training without any study at all, it was great."
"You're an Auror?" said Christina, impressed. Being a Dark wizard catcher was the only career she'd ever considered after Hogwarts.
"Yeah," said Tonks, looking proud. "Kingsley is as well; he's a bit higher up than I am, though. I only qualified a year ago. Nearly failed on Stealth and Tracking, I'm dead clumsy, did you hear me break that plate when we arrived downstairs?"
"Can you learn how to be a Metamorphmagus?" Christina asked her, straightening up, completely forgetting about packing. Tonks chuckled. "Bet you wouldn't mind hiding that scar sometimes, eh?" Her eyes found the lightning-shaped scar on Christina's hand.
"No, I wouldn't mind," Christina mumbled, turning away. She did not like people staring at her scar.
"Well, you'll have to learn the hard way, I'm afraid," said Tonks. "Metamorphmagi are really rare, they're born, not made. Most wizards need to use a wand or potions to change their appearance. But we've got to get going, Christina, we're supposed to be packing," she added guiltily, looking around at all the mess on the floor.
"Oh — yeah," said Christina, grabbing up a few more books.
"Don't be stupid, it'll be much quicker if I — pack!" cried Tonks, waving her wand in a long, sweeping movement over the floor. Books, clothes, telescope, and scales all soared into the air and flew pell-mell into the trunk.
"It's not very neat," said Tonks, walking over to the trunk and looking down at the jumble inside. "My mum's got this knack of getting stuff to fit itself in neatly — she even gets the socks to fold themselves — but I've never mastered how she does it — it's a kind of flick —" She flicked her wand hopefully; one of Christina's socks gave a feeble sort of wiggle and flopped back on top of the mess within.
"Ah, well," said Tonks, slamming the trunk's lid shut, "at least it's all in. That could do with a bit of cleaning, too — Scourgify —" She pointed her wand at Tulip's cage; a few feathers and droppings vanished. "Well, that's a bit better — I've never quite got the hang of these sort of householdy spells. Right — got everything? Cauldron? Broom? Wow! A lunit!" Her eyes widened as they fell on the broomstick in Christina's right hand.
"And I'm still riding a Comet Two Sixty," said Tonks enviously. "Ah well . . . wand still in your jeans? Both buttocks still on? Okay, let's go. Locomotor Trunk." Christina's trunk rose a few inches into the air. Holding her wand like a conductor's baton, Tonks made it hover across the room and out of the door ahead of them, Tulip's cage in her left hand. Christina followed her down the stairs carrying her broomstick.
Back in the kitchen, Moody had replaced his eye, which was spinning so fast after its cleaning it made Christina feel sick. Kingsley Shacklebolt and Sturgis Podmore were examining the microwave and Hestia Jones was laughing at a potato peeler she had come across while rummaging in the drawers. Lupin was sealing a letter addressed to her adopted family.
"Excellent," said Lupin, looking up as Tonks and Christina entered. "We've got about a minute, I think. We should probably get out into the garden so we're ready. Christina, I've left a letter telling your parens not to worry —"
"They won't," said Christina.
"That you're safe and you'll see them next summer."
"Do I have to?" Christina asked jokingly. Lupin smiled but made no answer.
"Come here, girl," said Moody gruffly, beckoning Christina toward him with his wand. "I need to Disillusion you."
"You need to what?" said Christina nervously.
"Disillusionment Charm," said Moody, raising his wand. "It'll disguise you better. Here you go —" He rapped Christina hard on the top of the head and Christina felt a curious sensation as though Moody had just smashed an egg there; cold trickles seemed to be running down her body from the point the wand had struck.
"Nice one, Mad-Eye," said Tonks appreciatively, staring at Christina's midriff. Christina looked down at her body, or rather, what had been her body, for it didn't look anything like his anymore. It was not invisible; it had simply taken on the exact color and texture of the kitchen unit behind him. She seemed to have become a human chameleon.
"Come on," said Moody, unlocking the back door with his wand. They all stepped outside onto the beautifully kept lawn.
"Clear night," grunted Moody, his magical eye scanning the heavens. "Could've done with a bit more cloud cover. Right, you," he barked at Christina, "we're going to be flying in close formation. Tonks'll be right in front of you, keep close on her tail. Lupin'll be covering you from below. I'm going to be behind you. The rest'll be circling us. We don't break ranks for anything, got me? If one of us is killed —"
"Is that likely?" Christina asked apprehensively, but Moody ignored her. "— the others keep flying, don't stop, don't break ranks. If they take out all of us and you survive, Christina, the rear guard are standing by to take over; keep flying east and they'll join you."
"Stop being so cheerful, Mad-Eye, she'll think we're not taking this seriously," said Tonks, as she strapped Christina's trunk and Tulip's cage into a harness hanging from her broom.
"I'm just telling the girl the plan," growled Moody. "Our job's to deliver her safely to headquarters and if we die in the attempt —"
"No one's going to die," said Kingsley Shacklebolt in his deep, calming voice.
"Mount your brooms, that's the first signal!" said Lupin sharply, pointing into the sky. Far, far above them, a shower of bright red sparks had flared among the stars. Christina recognized them at once as wand sparks. She swung her right leg over her Lunit, gripped its handle tightly, and felt it vibrating very slightly, as though it was as keen as she was to be up in the air once more.
"Second signal, let's go!" said Lupin loudly, as more sparks, green this time, exploded high above them. Christina kicked off hard from the ground. The cool night air rushed through his hair as the neat square gardens of Los Angeles fell away, shrinking rapidly into a patchwork of dark greens and blacks, and every thought of the Ministry hearing was swept from her mind as though the rush of air had blown it out of her head. For a few glorious moments, all her problems seemed to recede into nothing, insignificant in the vast, starry sky.
"Hard left, hard left, there's a Muggle looking up!" shouted Moody from behind her. Tonks swerved and Christina followed her, watching her trunk swinging wildly beneath Tonks' broom. "We need more height. . . . Give it another quarter of a mile!" Christina's eyes watered in the chill as they soared upward; she could see nothing below now but tiny pinpricks of light that were car headlights and streetlamps.
"Bearing south!" shouted Mad-Eye. "Town ahead!" They soared right, so that they did not pass directly over the glittering spiderweb of lights below. "Bear southeast and keep climbing, there's some low cloud ahead we can lose ourselves in!" called Moody.
"We're not going through clouds!" shouted Tonks angrily. "We'll get soaked, Mad-Eye!" Christina was relieved to hear her say this; her hands were growing numb on the broom's handle. She wished she had thought to put on a coat; she was starting to shiver. They altered their course every now and then according to MadEye's instructions. Christina's eyes were screwed up against the rush of icy wind that was starting to make her ears ache. She could remember being this cold on a broom only once before, during the Quidditch match against Hufflepuff in her third year, which had taken place in a storm. The guard around her was circling continuously like giant birds of prey. Christina lost track of time. She wondered how long they had been flying; it felt like an hour at least.
"Turning southwest!" yelled Moody. "We want to avoid the motorway!" Christina was now so chilled that she thought longingly for a moment of the snug, dry interiors of the cars streaming along below, then, even more longingly, of traveling by Floo powder; it might be uncomfortable to spin around in fireplaces but it was at least warm in the flames. . . .
Kingsley Shacklebolt swooped around her, bald pate and earring gleaming slightly in the moonlight. . . . Now Emmeline Vance was on her right, her wand out, her head turning left and right . . . then she too swooped over her, to be replaced by Sturgis Podmore. . . .
"We ought to double back for a bit, just to make sure we're not being followed!" Moody shouted. "ARE YOU MAD, MAD-EYE?" Tonks screamed from the front. "We're all frozen to our brooms! If we keep going off course we're not going to get there until next week! We're nearly there now!"
"Time to start the descent!" came Lupin's voice. "Follow Tonks, Christina!" Christina followed Tonks into a dive. They were heading for the largest collection of lights he had yet seen, a huge, sprawling, crisscrossing mass, glittering in lines and grids, interspersed with patches of deepest black. Lower and lower they flew, until Christina could see individual headlights and streetlamps, chimneys, and television aerials. She wanted to reach the ground very much, though she felt sure that someone would have to unfreeze her from her broom.
"Here we go!" called Tonks, and a few seconds later Tonks had landed. Christina touched down right behind her and dismounted on a patch of unkempt grass in the middle of a small square. Tonks was already unbuckling Christina's trunk. Shivering, Christina looked around. The grimy fronts of the surrounding houses were not welcoming; some of them had broken windows, glimmering dully in the light from the streetlamps, paint was peeling from many of the doors, and heaps of rubbish lay outside several sets of front steps.
"Where are we?" Christina asked, but Lupin said quietly, "In a minute." Moody was rummaging in his cloak, his gnarled hands clumsy with cold. "Got it," he muttered, raising what looked like a silver cigarette lighter into the air and clicking it. The nearest streetlamp went out with a pop. He clicked the unlighter again; the next lamp went out. He kept clicking until every lamp in the square was extinguished and the only light in the square came from curtained windows and the sickle moon overhead.
"Borrowed it from Dumbledore," growled Moody, pocketing the Put-Outer. "That'll take care of any Muggles looking out of the window, see? Now, come on, quick." He took Christina by the arm and led her from the patch of grass, across the road, and onto the pavement. Lupin and Tonks followed, carrying Christina's trunk between them, the rest of the guard, all with their wands out, flanking them. The muffled pounding of a stereo was coming from an upper window in the nearest house. A pungent smell of rotting rubbish came from the pile of bulging bin-bags just inside the broken gate.
"Here," Moody muttered, thrusting a piece of parchment toward Christina's Disillusioned hand and holding his lit wand close to it, so as to illuminate the writing. "Read quickly and memorize." Christina looked down at the piece of paper. The narrow handwriting was vaguely familiar. It said:
The headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix may be found at number twelve, Grimmauld Place, London.
