March 15th was not a good day for this. You'd think even with the divorce from muggle literature, the wizards of Shakespeare's Britain would be a little wary of the Ides of March. Plus, it was a Tuesday, so all the seventh-years involved had to miss potions class, when just doing it on Monday would have only involved missing defense class. Which this was.
To be fair, most classes were cancelled anyway, since all the professors also had to be on the grounds with the seventh-year defense students, waiting for the horde of giant spiders to come boiling out of the Forbidden Forest.
According to Draco, this had been the only day that worked. Lucius Malfoy had been true to his word of spending the winter trying to deal with the acromantula problem in the forest. He'd hired creature experts to clear out the easy nests and cut off any avenues of escape. But the central nests held a ridiculous number of the class-quintuple-X creatures, as Hermione's crew could attest to from their misadventure the year before. Between scheduling the hit wizards and getting buy-in from the astrology-obsessed centaurs, March 15th was the day that worked for everyone.
The plan was to try to burn the central nest and force the spiders south. They'd either be forced out of the forest into open terrain where the secondary team could pick them off or they'd be stampeded into the lake. Acromantulas were not known to be excellent swimmers, and the merfolk had been convinced to clean up their drowned bodies.
But, given the geography and other hazards of the forest, everyone was pretty much assuming that there'd be no way to herd them perfectly, and it was very likely part of the horde would spill out onto the Hogwarts grounds down by the greenhouses. Thus, the most combat-capable professors and the seventh-year defense students were waiting in a battle line for the fight to commence, with the fifth- and sixth-years standing further back in case it went very wrong, or at least to quickly triage spider bites.
It wasn't even a nice day for it. Biting winds hit us from behind as we waited, but the mass of clouds above was so vast that they weren't in any danger of getting pushed ahead and giving us direct sunlight. At least the open vegetable gardens were well and truly fallow beneath the snow, so we weren't wiping out the food supply with our battleground (though venomous spider guts might not be great fertilizer).
"I still dunno why we don' jus' let the poor li'l things alone," Hagrid complained from where he'd set up near us. Despite his objections, he'd come with a full complement of crossbow quarrels. In this kind of fight, they were better than spells. Most of us were set up to banish heavy spikes at the creatures, since most spells would just roll off.
"They tried to eat the kids last year," Penny reminded him.
"They just got o'er-excited," the big man argued. "I know not t'send any more students inta their territory."
"I think we're more worried about Riddle or his people using them against the school," I explained. I'd explained it before. To be honest, though, it did feel a little bad to be planning to exterminate a bunch of sentient creatures. Too many monsters in the magical world talked.
"How is it that Aragog never told you about his queen?" Percy asked, trying a distraction for the half-giant.
"An' how inbred are they?" Oliver wondered. I heard Alexis, near me, bite back a laugh at her ex-boyfriend's joke. Things were still tense.
"Less talking, please," Remus suggested from the center of our group of NEWT students. "I think they're coming." A moment later I heard it too, the sound of spellfire and masses of large, armored creatures careening off of trees.
Dumbledore and McGonagall were with the herding force, helping transfigure the terrain to keep the spiders from charging the hit wizards or leaping over the lines from the trees, and I thought I could see the progression of the battle as trees temporarily bent themselves toward us to ground the spiders.
And then, like the wave at a sports stadium, the bowing trees reached the edge of the forest and possibly hundreds of chitinous black forms scurried onto the grounds. If these were just the ones they couldn't force into the lake or the killing field across the train tracks, then there must have been over a thousand of the monsters in the forest.
Gasping, Hagrid realized, "Aragog said there were jus' a few kids! Wha've they been eatin'?" I absently wondered how much of the normal wildlife of the forest had been made into spider food in the last half-century, but then the carpet of spiders wheeled toward us.
And then it was just the shouts of "Depulso!" to banish spikes, the twang of Hagrid's crossbow, and the students gifted in transfiguration raising obstacles from the earth. The line of charging beasts quickly began to falter against the onslaught, bending as if considering taking their chances diving into the lake after all, the spells of the herding force chasing them from behind. But then, from the center of the undulating mass, a deep voice bellowed, "No! Forward! We must escape through!"
The voice came from what I'd initially thought was several spiders clumped together, the volleys of projectiles and speed making it hard to visually distinguish the mass. Looking directly at it, though, its carapace was less shiny than the others, and the whole thing was so big it could have been a special effect mounted on a full-sized cargo van with none of the vehicle showing. While its eyes were rheumy, it apparently could sense well enough to direct the charge.
Apparently picking out a smell, upwind as we were from it, the presumed Aragog shouted, "Hagrid! Why? Why do you kill my children?" I noted that the spider wasn't exactly slowing down to parlay, and was on a direct line for the gamekeeper (and, since I was close by, me and my friends).
Groaning with the emotional pain, Hagrid yelled back, "Sorry, old friend. You was never meant to have so many! How many other critters've they killed!"
The noise was immense, our entire firing line trying to break the charge, explosions and projectiles reverberating through shattering exoskeletons as the creatures got within thirty feet… twenty… ten.
His descendents crushed beside him, the blind spider barely seemed to notice, his own thick shell deflecting all attacks until, mere feet from the man who'd raised him, one final thrum of Hagrid's immense crossbow launched a bolt into the rearing spider's underside. Aragog crashed into the turf, sliding to a stop as those nearest the gamekeeper retreated hurriedly backwards out of reach of the long, clawed legs. But the gigantic acromantula merely began to twitch in its death throes, losing hydraulic control of its extremities, and plaintively whispered, "I only did what was in my nature."
Hagrid dropped to his knees and began to sob, and I awkwardly patted him on the shoulder, regarding the still-twitching ruins of an entire family line of vicious but sentient creatures spread out in the cloudy light across the blasted field. With vanishing charms, the corpses would probably be gone as if they'd never been within a week.
Dumbledore seemed almost as sad to look out across the killing field as he walked from the forest, trees righting themselves behind him. The other professors and hit wizards that filed out behind him seemed none the worse for wear, and most looked to our side to make sure that no students had been injured.
Remus walked over to meet the headmaster and I followed because I'm nosy. "Any sign of Black?" he asked.
Dumbledore nodded, "We found a small cave that looks like it could be where he was sleeping. We could use you to confirm the scent, of course, but it looks like he hasn't been there in months."
"Maybe he found somewhere warmer for the winter?" I theorized.
"Perhaps…" the old man agreed, but then suggested, "Or perhaps your encounter with him over the holidays introduced him to allies of whom he was previously unaware."
Great. Possessed animagi and vampires teamed up together. What could go wrong?