Previously:
The Trio received a date for Buckbeak's execution.
Orissa successfully completed the Animagus transformation, after a large amount of pain.
My first act as a newly-minted canine? Learn how to walk.
It was bloody hard! I had been studying the general habits of dogs similar to myself since August – it was now late May – as was necessary for the transformation; I needed to know how this dog walked and talked – er, barked – down to the muscle movement.
Despite that, not much could prepare me for the fact that I was now having to use four legs instead of four and was as unsteady as a toddler.
Get it together! my internal voice says, and hey, internal monologs work as a dog too! You know what you're doing here, so get up and do it!
Right. I shake my fur out – that was going to take some getting used to – and take a tentative step forward. I don't fall, although I am a bit stiff, so I move my back paw to correspond with the front one. And then repeat it with the other side, and then back again, and again…
And I find myself walking in circles around the room.
I give a celebratory bark, which echoes off the stone walls and floor and makes me sit, blink, then quirk my lips into what I suppose was the dog equivalent of a smirk. Well, everyone does always tell me I'm loud, so why should this be any different?
I get up and shake myself out again, trotting over to the large, cathedral-style and put my front paws on the windowsill – it was only about nose-level on me.
The window looked out upon the grounds of Hogwarts, although I had no idea whether or not this was a real view or not. Either way, it showed a dark, starlit sky with a half-moon looking down at the quiet school grounds.
I suddenly get the overwhelming urge to run and hunt down mice that I knew were out there – a predator's instincts at their finest. Why was I locked up in this drafty old castle? I wanted out!
No. My mind – my human mind – snaps back into focus like I had flipped a switch. The fact of the matter was that I couldn't go outside because the sun had set and those trolls at the Ministry had locked me inside a giant cage. I twist around to look mournfully at my hind leg, fully expecting to find the disgustingly familiar silver-green band.
But it's not there.
My first reaction is a crippling panic: had it been lost in the transformation? Did the Ministry know about the transformation now? Was I going to be arrested?
A flicker of green in my peripheral vision catches my eye, and I turn to see a familiar band lying on the floor near the door.
I trot over and cautiously prod it with a paw, sniffing it and finding it completely intact, still glowing green and just…laying there.
I sit down, feeling the equivalent of a grin come on as it all clicks. The band had simply fallen off. After all the spell work the Ministry had taken to ensure that I was under their thumb, the ankle cuff had fallen off when my ankles got thinner. I had no doubts that I had to put it back on, somehow, when I turned back, but until then…I was free.
I give a puppy-like yelp as I spin around, completely exuberant. I could go outside! I could run and hunt – well, okay, not hunt – and – Merlin, who knew what else? I'd never seen the grounds as anything but human. The world was my oyster.
With that thought in mind, I head for the door with a spring in my step. As I make my way out, I allow my mind to wander to my new form.
From what I could tell about the mind of a dog, it was much, much simpler than that of a human. I didn't have as many complex thoughts and emotions were much simpler – which I was thankful for because dog-me couldn't comprehend the intricate tension that had been surrounding me for months.
And speaking of tension, I freeze in the middle of a fourth-floor corridor as my ears perk up, picking up the faint sound of footsteps, still pretty far off but enough for me to shimmy behind a suit of armor.
I watch as a figure appears around a corner – Lupin, I quickly recognize, even in the almost-dark hallway. He carries a distinct scent of the forest, wool, and a scent I instinctually recognize as a wolf.
But why was he out here? It was late at night, or maybe early morning, and the full moon wasn't for another few days. Was he doing corridor patrols? If so, my luck was horrible, but it could've been Snape.
I accidentally bump the armor and then freeze as Lupin snaps his head over in my direction, his wand instantly in his hand. "Who's there?" he whispers harshly. "Come out, now."
I can hear his muttered Lumos, and then he stops, presumably seeing me, or my shadow, in the wand-light. A look of fear comes across his face as he stares at me – but I don't think it was because I did look similar to the Grim, just a few inches smaller. No, this fear is different, but it's quickly replaced by sadness, a sadness that makes my heart sink and my whole body shiver, rattling the armor next to me.
Professor Lupin opens his mouth; to say something or hex me I'll never know because all he does is turn on his heel and hurries off in the direction he came. I stare for only a moment more before bolting in the other direction, my nails beating a quick tempo against the stone floor.
I make it to the Entrance Hall and wriggle through a small gap in the doors, making my way outside and standing on the castle steps.
I stick my nose in the air and take a deep breath – there were so many scents! The was the sticky-sweet scent of pine coming from the Forest, seaweed and water coming from the direction of the Black Lake, and even a whiff of owls, even though the Owlery was on the other side of the school. Everything was overlaid with the mingled scents of hundreds of students that had passed over these grounds every day for years and years.
One scent that catches my attention is that of another dog – an adult male that I've never met before, but something within me was telling me to follow the scent. Seeing as I had all night and nothing else to do, I lowered my nose to the ground and set out to do just that.
I manage to follow the scent to the edge of the Forbidden Forest before hesitating. Thanks to dogs' enhanced night vision, the forest wasn't as dark as it normally would be, but it still held the same foreboding chill it had the first year and then the second.
I shake my head and give a low growl and, summoning my Gryffindor courage, I walk into the forest.
I follow the scent of the other dog through the woods and into a small clearing surrounded by large trees, and then stop dead once I realize what I'm looking at.
It's the big, Grim-like dog I had seen back in January when I went flying after getting my Firebolt back. I crashed into a shrub and saw a dog – this dog.
The bigger dog raises his hackles and snarls at me, causing the dog side of me to shrink back– this dog was half a head taller than me and he was showing his teeth, and the half of my mind that belonged to the dog was telling me to run, run and never look back!
Except human-me could never get the hang of listening to orders, so I raise my hackles and rise to my full height of about twenty-eight inches – the other dog was six to eight inches taller than I was – and snarl straight back, looking him dead in the eye and growling low in my chest.
Yeah, that's right, I'm not scared of you, you overgrown Chihuahua!
We glare at each other for a very long time before the other dog slowly lowers his hackles, not taking his eyes off me as he sits down, leaves rustling as he moves.
Watching the other dog, I'm suddenly overwhelmed with the feeling that I should know who I'm looking at, I should know who this is-
Who? I mentally ask. This is a dog, you idiot, not a person. Just a dog.
I shake my head and shake my coat out again before turning around and going back the way I came, deliberately ignoring the odd feeling that had enveloped me, even as I leave the forest and head for the castle, slipping inside and quickly finding a secret passage that leads up to the seventh floor.
The 'Come and Go Room' hadn't changed since I left it, meaning that my band was just where I left it. I walk over to it and put my rear right leg into the center, quietly picturing myself as human again.
Silently, and thankfully without much pain, I find myself as a thirteen-year-old girl lying stomach-down on the floor, thankfully clothed.
I wait until the dog has completely receded from my mind and body, although I do find that I can smell and hear better than I could before this whole ordeal. My band is also securely locked around my ankle once more, to my dismay.
I leave the Room quietly, making my way down to and inside the Common Room without incident, which was important, seeing as it was probably hours before everyone else woke up. I sneak up the girls' staircase and nudge the door open, grimacing as it squeaks.
None of the girls stir, although Crookshanks does try – unsuccessfully – to make a break for freedom. I nudge him back towards Hermione's bed and change into my pajamas, slipping under the scarlet covers on my bed.
I quickly sink into sleep's embrace, completely exhausted from the night's events.