"Lumos maxima!" I tried, the overpowered lighting charm causing my amulet to flare like a spotlight from my chest. It barely did anything to the myrk surrounding the horde of fae beasts, other than make their silhouettes contrast slightly against the cloud of shadow. It was enough to pick a target, and my follow up "Bombarda maxima!" heaved an enormous chunk of turf over half the formation.
My tendency to blow up the ground to deal with magic resistant creatures was probably not endearing me to the house elves tasked with landscaping.
Hagrid had also used my flash of light for useful targeting, and two screeches seemed to indicate that his heavy quarrel had kept going into the hob behind the one he'd aimed at. Fang, of course, had whimpered and took off like the cowardly dog he was. He honestly had a good plan. "Fall back!" I suggested to Hagrid.
I saw stars in my vision as I turned and sprinted away from the monsters, hopefully slowed a bit by our attack. Using two powerful spells like that in succession wasn't great for my magical reserves, and hopefully I'd be able to manage a brief sprint without passing out. I could feel Hagrid continuing along right beside me, the ground shaking with his footfalls. I doubted the square-cube law would let him do a marathon, but nine feet of height and an active lifestyle made him surprisingly fast over short distances.
He was even managing to reload his crossbow while he ran. I guess if you're going to have one preferred combat method, you get really good at it.
"See the plan?" I huffed at the big guy, gesturing with my staff at our objective and almost tripping with the upset to my already tenuous running balance. I could hear the clamoring of the hobs behind me.
"Gonna be real close," Hagrid agreed, backhanding an ape trailing darkness that leaped on his back.
I saw that and managed to dodge one that tried the same to me, stumbling on the uneven grass and turning my final sprint into a staggering charge. I felt a weight on my back as another tenebrous ape made the leap and had better aim, angrily hooting at me as it plowed me face-first into the dirt in preparation of biting or ripping my head off. Hagrid hit the ground rolling at about the same time, more gracefully, dodging a blur of shadow and clawed arms that just missed him.
And then got unceremoniously punted through the air in the direction of the castle with a sound like a baseball bat striking a side of beef.
The one on my back hooted in surprise before I felt it, also, get driven off of me with a golf swing that very nearly missed me. Whomping Willow two, hobs zero. Well, if you counted my mouthful of dirt and grass burn, give them half a point. I could hear several more surprised, pained hoots and the rapid creaking of wood like an old ship in a dangerous sea as the ornery osier offed our onyx opponents.
Look, when you're hunkered down in the dirt while tons of hardwood smash around you, you can alliterate all you want too.
"And roll," Hagrid suggested, when the sounds of branches narrowly missing us moved on to the other side of the tree's radius of denial. Sheathing my rod and pulling my staff close, I started to try to roll back toward the castle and away from the trunk. Hagrid had simply tossed his crossbow ahead before he began rolling, and was pulling ahead of me: he had a lot more girth to work with, so he covered more ground with each rotation.
I'd just cleared the area where the grass barely grew, not even the sod safe from the tree's occasional tantrums, when a massive black spear was barely deflected by my coat and into the ground. If I'd been rolling a little slower, it probably would have hit. "Clever, but insufficient," the shadowy sidhe sneered, standing slightly separate, sequestered safely, suspicious.
Look, I'm not proud of it—the alliterating—but it's hard to focus when there's a fae-built cheater weapon that just nearly impaled you. Obsidian shouldn't even be able to get that long without shattering unless you use magic. I did not want to get hit with the spear.
"Depulso!" I said, too scared of the follow up thrust for a one-liner, my right hand coming up out of my belt pouch that I'd been grabbing for while rolling. I'd planned to use my staff to banish the iron nails at our opponents from a distance, but in melee range a wandless charm was sufficient.
Tiny sparks of bright fire lit up the front of the black-clad sidhe knight as he screamed in pain and flung himself away from me. He even let go of the spear and I was able to grab it one-handed where it still stuck in the ground and toss it behind me back into the willow's danger zone. I didn't want to try running with two long shafts of wood.
The thrum of Hagrid's crossbow informed me that he'd manage to lever himself back up, and had impaled the first hob that had been knocked in our direction, recovering and reforming its shadows. "Way's clear!" the gamekeeper grunted, glancing my way and then beginning to trundle toward the castle doors.
Somehow we crashed through before I completely exhausted myself. Maybe my light cardio needed to become a real exercise set, all the sprinting I was doing. I slid across the stone of the castle atrium and clocked Oliver slamming the door shut again behind me. Hagrid barked out a variation on the locking charm, his command over the gates giving him the authority to engage the barrier enchantments on the building. Finally feeling safe, I slumped back down against the stone.
I got about three seconds of rest before a massive tongue swiped my face, Fang apologizing for fleeing and checking that I was okay.
While Hagrid handled explaining to the quidditch team what had just happened, I idly pet the giant boarhound with my free hand, laying on the cold stone and getting my breath back. While it seemed like forever in adrenaline-fueled moments, it had probably only been a few minutes since the attacks started, so it was still just the refugees from the fae onslaught in the room. I started to think about next steps, and wonder how long it would take for the professors to get down and start reinforcing the wards.
Honestly, it should still be at least an hour until curfew. Where was everyone?
"Where is everyone?" I put that thought to words, directed at the twins. Everyone else looked at them expectantly as well.
"It doesn't work right if you all watch," Fred groused, while George hid behind him and pulled out the map that we all pretended we didn't know they had, tapping it with his wand and whispering the activation phrase.
After a moment of perusal, George explained, "Everyone's in bed, looks like. Where they're supposed to be. Nobody but us is moving." I was willing to take for granted that some kind of Sleeping Beauty fairy bullshit had happened, rather than everyone being dead. If everyone was dead, we had real problems.
"Maeve?" I wondered, aloud.
He moved down to one of the bottom corners of the map and said, "In the dungeons, with the other snakes."
That was good, at least. I'd rather have her getting her alibi sorted rather than ready to run interference in the castle. I tiredly sat up and suggested, "Split up and see if we can figure out why everyone's asleep? I'll see if I can wake up Dumbledore."
"I'll protect the doors," Hagrid offered, slotting in another crossbow bolt.
"Harry, take Ginny with you and check Gryffindor," Angelina took charge. She was the prefect for her year, and Wood's likely replacement as quidditch captain the next year, so it made sense. She quickly sorted the rest of the team into pairs to check the other common rooms and nearby professors' quarters.
As we hiked up the stairs toward the seventh floor, Ginny mused, "It's not like it is in the books, is it?"
"Words have a hard time with the smell, at the very least," I agreed, seeing where the little adventure-novel aficionado was going. Battles were hard enough without dwelling on the scents of blood, unwashed monsters, and flesh burned by spellfire and iron.
"I need to get better," she nodded. "It's one thing when they're meeting you on the field of battle. It's another when they're pouncing on you in the dark."
"Yeah. Nobody really stands in a line and trades shots anymore. It was kind of dumb that they ever did it that way. And dueling isn't like real fighting."
What the tiniest Weasley decided was lost as we were surprised by actual sunlight streaming in from the top floor windows as we crested the stairs to our common room entrance. Sunrise was happening at a rapid pace, when as far as I knew it was not even nine at night. "Time weirdness," I growled, remembering all the stories of people walking into the land of the faeries and coming out years later unchanged. "We need to solve this fast."
The painting of the fat lady that guarded our common room door was also asleep, but fortunately the password magic didn't actually rely on her (a fact that many first years caught out after curfew failed to realize). We stepped in to see several students sprawled out on the couches and chairs. Mathilda was in her classic "waiting up" chair, with a good view of the door. Percy, Alexis, and a few of the other kids that were usually the last up to bed were also zonked out as if they'd fallen asleep wherever they were sitting.
"Time acceleration and a sleep spell," I guessed, aloud. Ginny just shrugged, and went to shake her brother. I moved over and gently tried shaking my girlfriend's shoulder. "Hey. 'Thilda. Wake up." Neither roused, not even making the normal noises of a deeply sleeping teen refusing to get up. "Finite incantatem." I tried the general counterspell, and then, "Ennervate." Neither worked. "We don't even have spinning wheels in the castle," I complained.
Ginny, having tried shaking the rest of the kids gave me a look, caught my reference, and grinned. "Well… there's one thing only you can try."
I blanched, getting her meaning. Trust the story-obsessed teen to realize the skeleton key to fairy-induced comas. I leaned over, nervous.
This would be a really embarrassing time to find out that what I had wasn't true love.