The end of the summer vacation came too quickly for Lyla's liking. She was looking forward to getting back to Hogwarts, but her month spent at the Burrow had been one of the happiest moments of her life so far.

On their last evening before, Mrs. Weasley conjured up a sumptuous dinner that included all of their guest's favorite things, ending with a mouthwatering treacle pudding. Fred and George rounded off the evening with a display of Filibuster fireworks; they filled the kitchen with red and blue stars that bounced from ceiling to wall for at least half an hour. Then it was time for a last mug of hot chocolate and bed.

It took a long while to get started the next morning. They were up at dawn, but somehow they still seemed to have a great deal to do. Mrs. Weasley dashed about in a bad mood looking for spare socks and quills; people kept colliding on the stairs, half-dressed with bits of toast in their hands; and Mr. Weasley nearly broke his neck, tripping over a stray chicken as he crossed the yard carrying Ginny's trunk to the car.

Lyla shot her sister a quizzical look, unable to see how eight people, six large trunks, two owls, and a rat were going to fit into one small Ford Anglia. She had reckoned, of course, without the special features that Mr. Weasley had added.

"Not a word to Molly," he whispered carefully to Lyla as he opened the trunk and showed him how it had been magically expanded so that the luggage fitted easily.

When at last they were all in the car, Mrs. Weasley glanced into the back seat, where Harry, Ron, Fred, George, and Percy were all sitting comfortably side by side, and said, "Muggles do know more than we give them credit for, don't they?" She and Ginny got into the front seat, which had been stretched so that it resembled a park bench. "I mean, you'd never know it was this roomy from the outside, would you?"

Arabella had to bite her lip to keep from laughing. Mr. Weasley started up the engine and they trundled out of the yard, Lyla turning back for a last look at the house. She barely had time to wonder when she'd see it again when they were back— George had forgotten his box of Filibuster fireworks. Five minutes after, they skidded to a halt in the yard so that Fred could run in for his broomstick. They had almost reached the highway when Ginny shrieked that she'd left her diary. By the time she had clambered back into the car, they were running very late, and tempers were running high.

Mr. Weasley glanced at his watch and then at his wife.

"Molly, dear—"

"No, Arthur—"

"No one would see— this little button here is an Invisibility Booster I installed— that'd get us up in the air— then we fly above the clouds. We'd be there in ten minutes and no one would be any the wiser—"

"I said no, Arthur," said his wife firmly, "not in broad daylight—"

They reached King's Cross at a quarter to eleven. Mr. Weasley dashed across the road to get trolleys for their trunks and they all hurried into the station.

The Potter girls had caught the Hogwarts Express the previous year. The tricky part was getting onto platform nine and three-quarters, which wasn't visible to the Muggle eye. What you had to do was walk through the solid barrier dividing platforms nine and ten. It didn't hurt, but it had to be done carefully so that none of the Muggles noticed you vanishing.

"Percy first," said Mrs. Weasley breathlessly, looking nervously at the clock overhead, which showed they had only five minutes to disappear casually through the barrier.

Percy strode briskly forward and vanished. Mr. Weasley went next; Fred and George followed.

"I'll take Ginny and you three come right after us," Mrs. Weasley said, grabbing Ginny's hand and setting off. In the blink of an eye, they were gone.

"Let's go together, we've only got a minute," Ron said nervously.

Lyla made sure that Merlin's cage was safely wedged on top of her trunk and wheeled his trolley around to face the barrier, while Arabella tucked in any last bits of clothes that dangled from her trunk. All three of them subtly bent low over the handles of their trolleys and walked purposefully toward the barrier, gathering speed. A few feet away from it, they broke into a run and—

CRASH!

All trolleys hit the barrier and bounced backward; Ron's trunk fell off with a loud thump, as Lyla flew backward. Arabella wasn't very lucky either, knocked to her feet while watching helplessly as her owl Nicolas screeched as his cage bounced and rolled away. People all around them stared and a guard nearby yelled, "What in blazes d'you think you're doing?"

"L-lost control of the trolley," Arabella gasped, clutching her ribs as he got up.

"Why can't we get through?" Lyla hissed.

"I dunno—" breathed Arabella, feverishly running her hands over the very solid wall.

Ron looked wildly around. A dozen curious people were still watching them.

"We're going to miss the train," Ron whispered urgently. "I don't understand why the gateway's sealed itself—"

Lyla could feel her blood curdle as she looked up at the giant clock. Ten seconds… nine seconds… eight seconds…

Ron wheeled his trolley forward cautiously until it was right against the barrier and pushed with all his might. The metal remained solid.

Three seconds… two seconds… one second…

"It's gone," said Ron, sounding stunned. "The train's left. What if Mum and Dad can't get back through to us?"

Lyla pressed his ear to the cold barrier.

"Can't hear a thing," she said tensely. "What're we going to do? I don't know how long it'll take Mum and Dad to get back to us."

They looked around. People were still watching them, mainly because of the two owls continuing screeches.

"I think we'd better go and wait by the car," said Lyla finally. "We're attracting too much atten—"

"Hey!" shouted Ron, his eyes gleaming. "The car!"

"What about it?" asked Arabella with a defeated sigh.

"We can fly the car to Hogwarts!"

"But I thought —"

"We're stuck, right? And we've got to get to school, haven't we? And even underage wizards are allowed to use magic if it's a real emergency, section nineteen or something of the Restriction of Thingy —"

"But your mum and dad… " said Arabella frowning, pushing against the barrier again in the vain hope that it would give way. "How will they get home?"

"They don't need the car!" said Ron impatiently. "They know how to Apparate! You know, just vanish and reappear at home! They only bother with Floo powder and the car because we're all underage and we're not allowed to Apparate yet."

The feeling of panic suddenly turned to excitement.

"Can you fly it?" asked Lyla with a skeptical expression.

"Course I can," said Ron confidently, wheeling his trolley around to face the exit. "C'mon, let's go. If we hurry we'll be able to follow the Hogwarts Express—"

And they marched off through the crowd of curious Muggles, out of the station and back onto the side road where the old Ford Anglia was parked.

Ron unlocked the cavernous trunk with a series of taps from his wand and heaved their luggage back in.

"Check that no one's watching," said Ron, starting the ignition with another tap of his wand. Arabella shifted into the passenger seat and stuck her head out of the window: Traffic was rumbling along the main road ahead, but their street was empty.

"Okay, you're clear," she said.

Ron pressed a tiny silver button on the dashboard. The car around them vanished— and so did they. Lyla could feel the seat vibrating beneath her, hear the engine grumble, feel his hands on his knees, but for all he could see, they all had become pairs of eyeballs, floating a few feet above the ground in a dingy street full of parked cars.

"Let's go," said Ron's voice from the driver's seat.

And the ground and the dirty buildings on either side fell away, dropping out of sight as the car rose; in seconds, the whole of London lay, smokey and glittering, below them.

Then there was a popping noise and the car, and the car reappeared in a blink.

"Uh-oh," said Ron, jabbing at the Invisibility Booster. "It's faulty—"

All of them pummeled it. The car vanished. Then it flickered back again.

"The Muggles will see us!" shrieked Lyla, "Ron! Do something!"

"Alright, hold on everyone!" the gingery boy yelled, slamming his foot on the accelerator and they shot straight into the low, woolly clouds until everything turned dull and foggy.

"Now what?" said Arabella quizzically, blinking at the solid mass of cloud pressing in on them from all sides.

"We need to see the train to know what direction to go in," said Ron, thinking hard. "Dip back down again— quickly—"

They dropped back beneath the clouds and twisted around in their seats, squinting at the ground.

"I can see it!" Arabella shouted excitedly. "Right ahead— there!"

The Hogwarts Express was streaking along below them like a scarlet snake.

"Due north," said Ron, checking the compass on the dashboard. "Okay, we'll just have to check on it every half hour or so— hold on—"

And they shot up through the clouds once more. A minute later, they burst out into a blaze of sunlight. It was an entirely different world. The wheels of the car skimmed the sea of fluffy clouds, the sky a bright, endless blue under the blinding white sun.

"All we've got to worry about now are airplanes," said Lyla.

They looked at each other and burst into fits of laughter, and for a long time, they couldn't stop.

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