4. Magic Children Ride.
Ron and Hermione took off on the run for Hogsmeade.
Harry found his Nimbus 2000 to be in fine shape. He turned to the girl. "Charlotte, my name is Harry. Are you ready to take a proper broomstick ride?"
She rubbed her eyes and looked up at him. "Och-aye -- if you'll find my friends for me?"
"We'll do our best, kiddo. We'll find them. Sit in front of me, grab the broom tight and proper, and I'll be holding you on too, okay?"
"I won't fall again, Mr. Hairy?"
"No, I shan't let you fall....that's good, and hang on...here we go!"
Harry had hardly reached around her to grab the broom when it practically leapt off the ground, and started weaving wildly, pointing toward the clouds at a steep angle of attack, as it had before.
"Uh, Charlotte? Don't think about the flying, please. Let me do the flying for you this time, okay? I'll show you how it's done soon, I promise."
"Och-aye," she said casually, and the broom calmed down, the tip settling toward the horizon. Harry was amazed; Charlotte was young and untrained, yet she had a strong natural-born broom command!
Harry turned toward Hogwarts, and they dashed across the brush-covered hills. In only a minute, he had landed at the hospital wing and left the girl with Madam Pomfrey. He spread the call for searchers, then dashed to town.
One by one, Harry picked up Hermione and Ron at Hogsmeade, where shopkeepers and farmers were already taking to their brooms.
"It's as we thought, Hermione," said Harry enroute to the school, yelling over the breeze. "I asked Charlotte how the other four seemed to vanish from the courtyard after she ran off with the broom."
"And how did she explain it?"
"She said they jumped to the roof. I did that once at school, before I knew I was a wizard. They're from two Muggle farm families in the valley-- two boys and three girls, all of them magical."
In those few minutes, word had traveled through Hogwarts as well. Madam Hooch was airborne, followed by McGonagall and other staff. More than a few Quidditch players were just lifting off -- even Karen Bletchley, of Slytherin's team. Hagrid was heading into the woods on the run, with a crossbow and a quiver of arrows.
Someone had wisely alerted the denizens of the owlery. Dozens of assorted owls burst from the open windows, Hedwig among them, all winging toward the Dark Forest to search and to carry messages.
As he dropped off Hermione, over his shoulder Harry noted students were pouring out of school, even those unqualified to fly, just to watch the massive event underway. Amidst the crowd, he spotted Dumbledore, and flew to him. "Professor!" cried Harry. "You heard it all?"
"Yes, Harry," nodded a grim Dumbledore. "Godspeed. If the children aren't home by dusk, the Muggles may come looking, enchantments or not. You'll find them safe, I hope, but be careful."
"I hope so too, sir. Sorry we have to break the Dark Forest rule." Harry had to check the busy airspace around him for other brooms and owls before turning and darting away toward the afternoon darkness of the old-growth forest, with its legendary evil snares of many kinds.
There were no answers.
It was a difficult search, with what little light penetrated to the forest floor. Some of the forest actually brightened as the sun descended below the thick tree canopy in mid-afternoon. That was deceptive, because in the mountainous country, that meant forest sunset would be in an hour or less. Soon, the darkness and cold of an Autumn night would set in.
In a Sonorus relayed around the forest from the school side, word came that the four bicycles had been found, about two miles in from Hogsmeade. The beginner flyers were despatched to carry them to town, to save time later. Still no children had turned up.
An owl came to McGonagall with a note from Hagrid. He had met the centaurs, and they had seen nothing; he was off to speak to Aragog, leader of the spiders.
The sunlight was almost gone when there was a loud, persistant squawking from an owl off to Harry's left, then a flurry of activity around it. Alex and James had been found!
Harry darted there immediately. The boys were scared but well. They had been hiding under leafy branches by the edge of the Great Bog.
Alex, the oldest at 9, related how the four of them had followed an odd sound, like someone calling out names. They continued on foot where the bicycles could not be used off the trail.
In no time at all, they were lost. Then the source of the alluring sound had appeared: an odd creature, their size, intent on attack! The boys said they had waved sticks to scare it away, but that did little to stop its ferocity.
The creature ran at them first, then at the girls, herding them farther and farther apart until they couldn't see the terrified girls any more. At its next approach, Alex managed to hurl a good-sized rock and injure the creature; it wandered off aimlessly, out of sight.
They had called out to the girls right off -- but there was no answer.
The boys had been in hiding ever since, fearing all the strange sounds and cries they heard, thinking it was the creature's friends. It had been especially terrifying when a myriad of echoing voices from high off the ground began calling them by name... Alex! James! Georgina! Samantha!
James and Alex were evacuated to Madam Pomfrey for a checkover before taking them to Hogsmeade to await further developments.
Harry and the searchers spread out around the discovery spot and carefully examined everything, from the ground to above the treetops, for any sign.
Angelina Johnson was the next to get lucky. "Found a wounded beast! Over here!"
McGonagall and others dashed to the new find. It was curled up and quietly moaning from its injury, but the pointy head identified it right off. "That would be our violent creature, all right," said McGonagall. "It's an erkling, fully grown and quite dangerous. Most unusual to find one off the continent, but not unheard of. It's carniverous; they're very fortunate the boy injured it."
"Could its friends have taken the girls, Professor?" asked Angelina.
"Erklings usually hunt alone, with large roaming territories. No, I think something else has happened to the girls. Keep looking for clues." She mercifully immobilized the creature, and sent an owl for Hagrid to come for the erkling when he could. She then called out another sonorus, telling all the searchers to shout just the girls' names, and tell them the boys were okay.
Where the girls' paths seemed to end nearby, the searchers found spoor: hoof prints. But the centaurs had said they didn't have the girls..... ?
As the light dimmed to almost nothing, another owl arrived from Hagrid with a note.
McGonagall read it by wand-light, then muttered something in Latin that Harry didn't recognize from class. Her tirade seemed to go on at length and had a lot of sputtery consonants in it. He thought she might be swearing, but he said nothing.
Once more, she put out a Sonorus. "All searchers! Return to the school immediately, and assemble in the field near the gamekeeper's hut. Spread the word, and bring all the searchers and owls near you out of the forest." Then a Quietus, and more Latin under her breath, and something about "That man!"
"Did Hagrid find them?" asked Harry. "Are they all right?"
"You know him, Harry," she said. "Hagrid's a good-hearted man, but I could scream some times. All he said was, recall all the searchers and wait for him by his house. That's all he wrote, if you please, not a syllable more. That infuriating man!"
It was like a candlelight vigil; hundreds of charms and a few torches lit the field as Harry circled. Here, outside the woods, the twilight sky was still bright enough, and he soon spotted Hermione, his dorm mates and a few other Gryffindors gathered near the front door of the hut, and he landed near them. They were sharing their experiences in the forest, so Harry told them all he knew. Everyone waited for Hagrid, dreading the possibilities.
Then, shadowy figures strode from the edge of the woods.
So that's what the hoofprints were! thought Harry.
The whole field of searchers and onlookers gaped.
It was Hagrid, and to either side of him were Georgina and Samantha -- tired but smiling, astride silvery young unicorns.
Meanwhile, the girls were quickly checked for injuries and reunited with the others at Hogsmeade. They were returned to their respective homes -- and none too soon, as the parents were about to rouse a search.
Accompanying the children were McGonagall and Lupin in plain clothing, asking to speak with the parents without the prying ears of farmhands and neighbours.
The time has come, the walrus said, to talk of many things....
That evening, Mr. and Mrs. Mulholland learned an amazing thing about all four of their young'uns, while the McGees similarly heard about Charlotte. They took it surprisingly well. But then, the people in northern and western Britain who work the soil have always been closer to the legends of the middangeard of magical beings that live among us all.
