The idea, of course, was to try and find out if the unicorns were still being hunted, and if so, by what. Whatever Quirrell (Riddle?) was, he'd taken one of Hagrid's crossbow bolts to the chest and lived (?) to tell the tale, but unless they could catch him red-handed, none of the other professors were likely to believe them. If Snape was working with Quirrell, he'd no doubt lie and get them in trouble, and if Snape wasn't working with Quirrell, he probably still wouldn't be any help, because this was Snape they were talking about. Which meant it was, in a best case scenario, their word against one of their professors, and somehow the twins sincerely doubted that that was a conversation with the Headmaster that would go anything resembling well.

So they needed proof.

Therefore they needed to find the unicorns, or some evidence of what had happened to them, in order to form a coherent accusation that they could take to Dumbledore. Right now all they had was "probably Quirrell is evil?" and despite all the circumstantial evidence they had, they still weren't sure what evil thing he was even doing. Killing unicorns, however, counted as evil all by itself, so that would be a good place to start, in theory.

The flaw in the plan, of course, was that the forest was rather large.

They had been wandering through the forest for about an hour, absently wondering whether Percy would even be able to contain the amount of annoyance required to respond properly to this level of irresponsibility or if he would just explode, when the faint sound of clicking made both the twins freeze in place. They'd eschewed lights in hopes that letting their eyes adjust would allow them to see better, but it was unfortunately quite a bit darker than they'd expected, and although they had adjusted they still couldn't actually see very well. All either could see were great black masses shifting in the trees, which they had previously assumed were the trees moving. It was beginning to be obvious, however, that there was something in the trees. Something very large, and something that was probably not a unicorn.

Something dropped into the path in front of them. Eight feet of black hairy something, to be specific, clicking ominously.

Fred said, "Lumos!", giving George light by which to aim. George obliged with "Tarantallegra!" and hit a giant spider right in the middle of its eight eyes. It did not even flinch. By the light of Fred's wand, they saw clearly that they were surrounded by enormous spiders, black and hairy and fanged, and evidently rather resistant to jinxes. They were thirteen and did not know any more dangerous magic than jinxes, which meant that they were not well-equipped to defend themselves with any effectiveness from this hazard.

It was at this point, finally, that they realized how amazingly stupid they were being.

(Then they ran for their lives.)


Ron and Neville were going over their Charms homework, ostensibly with Percy's help. More accurately, what was happening was that they asked questions mostly to each other, and Percy intermittently interrupted his ongoing panic attack to answer them. Neville had asked at one point, quietly, if they shouldn't maybe leave Percy alone, and Ron had grinned and said, equally quietly, "I think it calms him down, actually," which was completely true, if non-obvious to non-Weasleys. Neville certainly hadn't noticed any appreciable difference in the level of tension that Percy (twitchy and surrounded by parchment) radiated, but he supposed Ron probably knew best.

Even Percy looked up and inhaled sharply, however, when Fred and George tumbled through the portrait hole and sort of half-ran, half-stumbled over to Ron.

"We are - "

" - so sorry - "

" - about the spider - "

" - when you were five - "

" - that was awful - "

" - so sorry - "

" - never again - "

" - never ever - "

" - spiders are scary!"

After this torrent of words, the twins bolted up the stairs to their dormitory, and the sound of a door slamming could be heard in the distance. Ron stared at the stairs, looking confused and slightly alarmed.

"That was weird," observed Neville.

Percy, his expression faintly puzzled, agreed, "I feel the distinct sense that I should be yelling at them for something."

"Well, that's normal, at least," said Ron.


The next day at breakfast the twins gave Ron a giant bar of Honeydukes' finest chocolate and apologized several more times, before they ran off again, without pausing to actually eat any breakfast or even sit down at the table. Dean tilted his head at Ron as the redhead blinked at the belated gift in his hand, which was quite possibly the first thing the twins had ever given him without condition, ever. "What, did they kill your rat or something?" Dean asked.

"Er ... no," said Ron, patting the pocket where Scabbers was slumbering peacefully, quite unharmed. He considered, and tried to recall the flurry of apologetic words from the previous evening. After a moment he offered, "Apparently it's got something to do with the fact that they turned my teddy bear into a giant spider when I was five?" Everyone winced at the mental image. Ron snapped a section off the chocolate bar and shrugged dismissively. "If I get free candy out of the deal," he said, taking a bite, "I am not going to ask questions."

"Fair enough," said Dean amiably, "can I have a piece?"


It took the twins several days to regain anything resembling an ordinary level of calmness, after which time they managed to have a basically coherent discussion about what had happened. Clearly they should not have gone into the forest so inadequately prepared. No wonder it was Forbidden to students with a capital F. So, they maybe needed a different approach to the problem ...

... also, they were never, ever going to make fun of anyone for being afraid of spiders ever again.