Disclaimer: These are JK's characters, everyone knows that. I use them as a sign of respect to her and her incredible stories.
Author's Notes: This is my first story for FF.net. I have no idea what people will think of it, so I am eager for reviews (good and bad) so that I can see how best to improve my writing style for the coming chapters. Please be honest, rather than kind!
Looking up at the sky, Harry could just distinguish between the end of one iron grey cloud and the start of the next. It was, without doubt going to rain soon, but right now the weather didn't seem to be ready to accept the pending thunderstorm. It had been a hot day, too hot for Harry's liking, and the distant rumble of thunder was a welcome relief to him.
His mouth was wet, not with saliva, but with the sweat that had run down his face from his forehead, over that now famous lightening scar, until it eventually trickled into his mouth. He could taste the salt from it on his tongue, and wanted desperately to wash it out with a fresh, cool drink. He would have given anything to get up off his stomach, where he lay in the mud, and walk those few miles to Hogsmead, where his thirst could b quenched.
He had been lying there for nearly five hours now without moving a single muscle, except for the occasional quick movement of his eyelids as he blinked. He'd stayed in this agonisingly uncomfortable position ever since he had seen a large rat with a missing toe disappear down a small hole in the corner of the field in which he now waited. Harry almost envied the repulsive little creature, who had, at least been able to shield himself from the beating sun all afternoon by skulking in the deep retreats of the hole, which may once have been a fox's den. Harry half wondered whether there was another entrance to the hole, somewhere over the old stone wall, which the subject of his exhausting wait had long since escaped by. He would have gone and had a look; anything to allow him to stand up but he could not afford to risk taking his eyes off the hole for a single minute, not after all this time.
He had, after all, been chasing Peter for several years now, ever since he had left Hogwarts and become an Auror. It was, of course, largely thanks to his extraordinary talents in the field that the capture and imprisonment of all the Death Eaters had been made possible. After the death of Voldemort each of the Death Eaters went their separate ways. Some, like Malfoy, tried to go back to their homes, and claimed that they had been forced by the Dark Lord to do what they did. This was, however, disproved by many witnesses who had seen them murdering many innocent wizards nearly a whole day after Voldemort had been killed, but before the news had been released by the Ministry. Others had gone in to hiding, or left the country. However, every single one of them had been rounded up within six months, and were, even now, serving life sentences in that most feared of prisons. All had been caught, except one...
Harry's mind was brought back to the present with a jolt as the first bolt of lightening illuminated the rapidly darkening sky. He was unsure whether this twilight was a result of the storm alone, or whether night was already upon him. He looked up at the sky, and just as the lightening lit the surroundings once again, and the first drops of rain began to fall, the ground in front of him exploded, throwing him onto his back and showering him with clods of damp soil which blinded him for a moment. He cleared his eyes just in time to see Peter, short and fat as always, but now in his human form, brushing the dirt off his robes, before disappearing from sight with a small pop that was all but muted by the simultaneous crash of thunder overhead.
Harry lay there in the dirt. For all his spying and tracking of Peter over the last week, he had not realised that the cowardly, pathetic little man had acquired himself a wand. Harry's own wand was somewhere in the dirt beside him, and he dug it out before getting slowly and painfully to his feet. He could not help but be angry with himself for letting Peter slip through the net, especially since this was the closest he had come to capturing him in months. If it had been any other rat, he would have simply stuck his hand down the hole and grabbed him, but a rat with a human brain, and an unusual ability to perform fairly powerful magic without the use of a wand was a different matter. The muggle farmer ploughing the next field all afternoon had prevented Harry from using any magic, as he couldn't risk being seen. He had not told anyone at the Ministry about the lead he had received in the Leaky Cauldron the previous week. The source had been a very shadowy member of the vast world of informants who had helped the Ministry ever since Voldemort himself had entered the Ministry of Magic several years earlier, hoping to acquire the prophecy. The information that this particular informant had given him had led him to within a few miles of the school where he had first learned the truth about Scabbers, the boring fat little rat that his friend Ron had been so attached to. Harry wished that Ron was here now, to walk the long journey back to Hogsmead with him. But Ron had gone to Egypt to visit his brother and wouldn't be back for another week. Hermione was also away, on holiday with her boyfriend somewhere in Africa. As he walked through the rain, Harry realised just how much he missed the long years spent with them at Hogwarts.