Harry glanced at his watch again, getting rather annoyed at this point. He was sitting in the Great Hall, waiting for his two best friends to turn up, yet they were no where to be seen. Hermione was never late, something she was renowned for doing was turning up on time, nearly as annoying as her always turning her homework in on time. It was half way through dinner, and Harry had already finished his main meal, and was trying his best to eat his dessert, without worrying too bad about his friends. It was hard though, seeing as now days it was likely you could get attacked at any moment. He glanced along the Gryffindor table, again, and noticed something else was amiss. Ginny and Neville weren't around either. The worried clenching in his stomach told him something was definitely up, and he jumped out of his seat, and made his way out of the Great Hall, speedily dodging other students. The entrance hall was empty, or so he thought. One moment he was walking with full intent of not stopping until he found his friends, the next he was helping someone up from the floor.
"I'm so sorry, Luna," he said, pulling her up. She smiled at him, in the same dreamy way she usually did, picked her self up. Harry noticed a collection of bags and a heavy old book lying near where she had been.
"Where are they?" he asked desperately, as Luna leaned over to pick the stuff up. She pushed the book into his arms, and he looked at her in some sort of daze.
"Open it," she encouraged, ignoring his question. For some reason, he felt compelled to do as she said, and flipped the books cover over, to see a contents page. Luna stood right up beside him, looking down at the three story titles on the old page. Harry wondered why the book was so heavy when it was only holding three tales. He also wondered what Luna was doing; she was pushing the big and heavy pages over, searching for a particular page whilst he supported the book.
"Luna, we have to find the others!" he protested, but she ignored him, continuing to skip through pages until she found the one she was looking for.
"Read that," she said suddenly, pointing down to the first page of the story of Sleeping Beauty. Harry looked at her in amazement.
"Luna, my friends are missing and you want me to read to you a fairytale?" he said in disbelief. All Luna did was smile at him and nod. Harry shook his head, but instead of closing the book and shoving it into her arms, he did what she asked, and started to read the first few lines of the story.
"In times past there lived a king and queen..." Harry read, as Luna leaned her head on his shoulder, reading along silently with him. The more Harry read, the more he got into the story and forgot about his missing friends, and the worry that had been holding onto him released.
As soon as he got to the end of the first paragraph, a sudden invisible force from behind them pushed them forward, and they almost flew to the ground, face first.
Harry grunted in pain as he landed awkwardly on the book, which somehow had closed itself as they had gone forward. He glanced to his left and saw Luna picking herself up, her blue eyes big with amazement as she looked around. Harry followed her gaze, and moved suddenly in shock. A few seconds before they had been standing in the Entrance Hall of Hogwarts, and now they were sprawled on a forest floor.
"I'm meant to be finding my friends," Harry said weakly, getting himself off of the book and glaring at it accusingly. Luna was already on her feet and she was walking around slowly, sort of circling around Harry and the book.
"Wow," she muttered finally.
Harry sighed and closed his eyes, hoping that this was all just one nightmare and that when he opened them again he'd be in his bed, knowing that his friends were safely asleep in their beds, and everything would be ok.
"Harry?" Luna asked.
Harry opened his eyes - no such luck.
"Where are we Luna?" Harry asked desperately. He took a better look at her. "And what are you wearing?" he added, nervously stumbling upwards into a standing position. Luna just smiled at his questions and turned around looking at each tree as if it led to a path. Harry was still staring at her in silent shock.
A few seconds before she had been wearing Hogwarts robes, with light blue outlining to present she was a Gryffindor. But now she was wearing a long flowing dress, which left a slight trail behind her. It seemed to be made of pale blue silk and lace, and Harry could just see the peek of darker blue slippers on her feet which were not totally covered by the dresses trail. Around her neck were sapphires melded together into a necklace, and her long dirty blonde hair was blonder then before, being held back ever so slightly with a blue ribbon. Harry was on the verge of letting his mouth drop open in shock, but Luna didn't seem at all preturbed.
"Wha... what are you wearing?" he asked again, wondering if he was seeing things.
"Oh, just her dress," Luna said airily, still looking around the forest. Harry shook his head fiercely, beginning to feel he was missing something here. Who was 'her' and why was Luna wearing her dress?
"What's going on?" he asked feeling she knew more then he did. But all Luna did was smile at him, and lean over to pick up the book.
"Let's go find the others," she said and started to walk away.
"The others? What others?" Harry said catching up with her as she walked determinedly forwards, stepping over fallen branches and avoiding tree roots. Harry tripped and stumbled along with her waiting for her answer, but he didn't get one.
After about five minutes Harry gave up asking her what was happening, because she simply wouldn't answer, and if she did her cryptic clues did nothing for him. Yet he didn't question the route she was leading them on, he followed her but didn't know why he was doing this.
As they went further into the forest distant voices could be heard. Harry looked around cautiously wondering if where they were heading was safe, but Luna didn't seem to be worried at all. Suddenly the trees seemed to cut off into a small clearing where Harry could see a group of oddly dressed people.
"I reckon we should get out of the forest," Ron said, leaning his head against the trunk of a tree. He glanced over to the others who looked doubtful at this idea.
"You know we can't go back to the clearing we found earlier, Ron," Hermione pointed out. Yet again a silence fell over the confused friends.
Neville, who had been sitting looking rather ill for the duration of the time they had spent not moving, glanced into the trees, feeling like he was going crazy. He could of sworn he saw someone move back there.
"Maybe we should get away from this part of the forest," he suggested nervously, sidling quickly closer to Ginny who gave him a confused look.
Luna grabbed Harry's arm and pulled him out into the clearing their friends were lazing around. Neville made a loud noise and hid behind a tree, and everyone else jumped up in surprise, looking at the new arrivals with an expression of shock and amusement.
"It's ok Neville, it's only Harry and Luna," Ginny said, and Neville reappeared looking rather bashful. Ginny looked at the pair and frowned "What are you doing here?" she asked.
"Just what I was going to ask!" said Harry in exasperation, looking at each one of his friends with curiosity, taking in what they were wearing and trying to figure out who they each were.
"Harry, do you know what is going on?" Hermione asked, looking to her best friend for help.
"All I know is that we're all dressed as fairytale characters," Harry said looking around them again for confirmation. "Oh, and we must of all got here by this book," he added, pointing to the book that had gone unnoticed by the others. Luna was still holding it, but not for long as Ron and Hermione rushed over and grabbed it from her. They flipped through the pages again, in deep silence, searching for a way to get back to Hogwarts.
Ginny meanwhile was admiring Luna's dress, and they started to talk about their favourite fairy tales. After a few minutes Ron and Hermione made conjoined noises alerting the others to them; they had found something. Everyone rushed over to them and peered at what they had found in the book:
Warning, this book is magical and unpredictable.
Reading it may be a serious risk to your health.
Keep well away from it!
"That had to be in the back of the book, didn't it!" Ron said in annoyance. Hermione slowly closed the book looking pensive. Then she sighed and looked at each of her friends.
"I think I know what we have to do," she said. They all looked at her expectantly. "This book is ridiculously heavy even though it just has three Fairy Tales in it. Which means that each story holds so much magic in it, it shows from the outside..."
Everyone silently agreed that that wasn't good. Hermione continued:
"I gather the only way out of this place is to live through the Fairy Tale you were reading when transported here... I am Snow White, Ginny is Little Red Riding Hood and Luna is Sleeping Beauty." she stopped for a moment, and started to flip pages back to the first story - her story. So far she'd been driven out of the city by the axe man. As she looked at the first page where this had happened, she saw that the text that described that moment was shimmering in and out of focus.
Nobody said anything, they just stood there in deep thought, until Harry looked like he was going to say something, but a noise stopped him from letting the words out. A loud howl rang through the air again, but this time it was distinctly closer. The group looked around nervously - Neville looked like he was going to faint.
"Well," Hermione said slamming the book shut, "that's your wolf, Ginny."
Ginny's eyes grew wide. Suddenly her favourite Fairy Tale was not so much fun.
"Wait, wait, wait. You say we have to live through our Fairy Tales?" Ron said, glancing to his sister back to Hermione. She nodded her reply. "But that means Ginny'll be eaten by a wolf, right?" he said slowly, a look of faint disgust appeared over his face. When no one said otherwise, he looked at them all in shock. "That's disgusting!" he exclaimed.
"That's not the only thing that'll be happening, Ron," Hermione commented. "Luna will be thrown into a deep sleep and I'll be killed by a poisonous apple."
After that followed the longest silence yet.
"Sounds like fun," said Harry weakly. The howl sounded again, and this time was too near for comfort.
"Lets move on, shall we?" said Ron, his voice unnaturally high. The rest agreed, and they gathered themselves up quickly. Hermione held the book, sometimes opening it to a particular part just to check what was going to happen. They entered into the forest again, whilst discussing what they'd have to do to get free of this alternate reality.