DISCLAIMER:  The characters aren't mine.  I'm borrowing them from the esteemed Joss Whedon and J.K. Rawling.

      SPOILERS/BACKGROUND:  Everything from BtVS Season 1 to Season 6, AtS Seasons 1 to 3, and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

      Reviews always welcome!

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      CHAPTER 16:

      HOGSMEADE

      Buffy and Willow made better than even their ambitious schedule demanded over the next few days, finishing all four elements and moving on to the basics of Giant Strength and Centaur Speed potions; Buffy had always lagged behind Willow in Potions much more than in the other subjects they were studying together, but those two brews had come fairly easily to her.  She wondered if those two weren't really that hard or if she were just getting better.  Practicing in Lupin's office seemed to work better for her than in the library or atop Slytherin Tower; it was less stressful not having to watch what she said so much.

      By Friday night, however, Buffy was growing anxious again.  She had sent Draco two owls over the weeks since he had left.  She had gotten nothing in return.  Willow, by contrast, had sent six and received a response every time—the following day, more often than not.  He had hinted that he would try to be back by Friday night so he could make the visit to Hogsmeade on Saturday.  No one in the Slytherin dormitory had seen him, however; indeed, there were still so many rumors about where he had gone that it sounded like he really had told no one else of his destination when he left.  Despite the ubiquitous excitement among all four Houses as the Hogsmeade weekend approached, Buffy awoke on Saturday with an uneasy feeling in her stomach.  Her sleep had not gone well; she had dreamt of being chased by a rat the size of a man, with a face that seemed to change between vaguely human and completely animal.  She had also heard Draco's voice crying out in pain from the ground beneath her, sometimes mixed with a dark, fierce hissing sound, and then she had happened upon him in a dark, foul-smelling room, only to find him twenty years older than he had been, with eyes that weren't his.

      "'morning!" Willow's voice called from nearby, bringing her awareness back to the present.

      Buffy opened one sleepy eye.  "Well, you certainly seem to be all excited this morning," she noted.

      Willow shrugged.  "Well, everyone else seems to be, so it's catching.  Plus, I've never seen an all-wizarding village before.  It should be interesting."

      "Sounds more like a tourist attraction," Buffy sighed, rolling over in bed to face the wall.

      "Oh, come on, now, you've been excited about today for days," Willow reminded her.

      "True," Buffy admitted with a sigh.  "But it wasn't just for the chance to go shopping, you know."

      "He'll be back eventually.  We'd have heard if anything happened to him."  For some reason, however, Willow's voice didn't carry a lot of reassurance.

      "Maybe," Buffy sighed without turning around.  "But no news is bad news, however you slice it."

      Buffy felt magic being worked behind her.  "Come on," Willow said.  "Here.  Try this."  Buffy turned around and saw Willow holding a small cup of a steaming, dark liquid out to her.

      "What is it?"  It looked like a potion of some kind.  Buffy didn't recognize it, but it smelled familiar.

      "Mocha espresso," Willow answered with a grin.

      Buffy couldn't suppress a grin, but put a weary hand over her eyes.  "Just ten more minutes," she said.  Willow shrugged and downed the mocha, and went on about getting ready for a few more minutes.

      "You're gonna miss breakfast," Willow said, once she was finished.  "Come on."

      Buffy grunted noncommittally.  She was half thinking of flying to Hogsmeade on her broom and just getting there late.

      "Hey, no grunting, sleepyhead," Willow chided.  A mischievous tone entered her voice.  "I did learn the Tickling Charm last week, you know."

      Buffy removed her hand from her face and lifted her head from the pillow.  "You wouldn't dare," she said.

      Willow grinned and tapped her wand against her left palm suggestively.

      "All right, all right, I'm up," Buffy groaned.  Her friend had clearly not abandoned all of her evil ways.

      "Aww, what a pity," Willow said with a look of mock-disappointment.

      Breakfast that morning was short, as all the students were excited to get going, and it was generally assumed that they would be eating more than their fill in the wizarding village, anyway.  However, before the group left for the boats for the train station, Dumbledore stood and cleared his voice for silence.

      "Good morning!" he said, smiling.  "I see everyone more excited than I have in some time, particularly our younger students, and with good reason.  Let me simply remind you, however, that Hogsmeade is not Hogwarts, and is the closest unprotected place to the school.  It's likely to be watched, so be careful what you say and do there.  And do sample the new watermelon truffles at Honeydukes, they really are heavenly."

      Shortly afterward, the students filed out and down to the boats, crossed the lake to the train station, and boarded the train waiting there bound for Hogsmeade.  She took the opportunity to tell Willow about the dream she'd had the previous night, and was actually somewhat relieved to see Willow taking it seriously, asking questions about details and the emotions she'd felt along with it.  Buffy remembered that Willow had begun studying Divination as well, and wondered if she was seeing anything more in the dream than Buffy herself was, but Willow shook her head disappointedly when she asked.  A moment later, the whistle signaled their arrival at Hogsmeade.

      As Buffy got off the train, she understood what all the younger children had been so excited about.  It certainly was a village unlike anything she'd ever seen.  It looked like a Christmas card, only in the summer, and the way the younger children got off the train, they might well have believed it to be Christmas.

      "There's Ron and Hermione," she called to Willow, noting the tall figure of the youngest Weasley son sticking out above the crowd of younger children.  They were heading toward a shop that looked like a gingerbread house; the sign above the door read Honeydukes.

      They followed after the other two as best they could; they were a ways behind because of standing on the platform to take in the scene, and the crowd was dense.

      The inside of Honeydukes looked little different than the outside, and the walls were lined with shelves, barrels, and bins, from which all manner of delicious aromas were rising.  Ron and Hermione were already filling large baskets with heaps of mouthwatering desserts, the likes of which Buffy had never seen before.

      "Don't let Little Debbie see this; she'd die of envy," Buffy quipped.

      "Wonder if they give free samples?" Willow wondered.

      "Or we could just ask our more experienced shopper friends," Buffy answered, pulling Willow through the shop and over to the two Gryffindors.  Hermione smiled when she saw them; Ron's face was still impassive.

      "Willow!  Buffy!" the brown-haired Gryffindor greeted them.  "Have you tried these?"  She held out a pair of small, soft cakes that looked like pound cakes only darker and richer.  "They're a Honeydukes specialty, and absolutely amazing."

      "Of course, everything in here is a Honeydukes specialty," Ron added with a patient grin.  Hermione shot him a look.

      Willow took one of the cakes and nibbled a corner of it; a moment later, she had downed the entire thing.  Buffy took that as a sign that all was safe, and tried the other herself, and her eyes widened.  A moment later, the rest was gone as well, and she was licking the remnants off her fingers, not caring who was watching.  She was starting to understand that the appeal of this place was more than just as a tourist attraction.

      Forty-five minutes later, the four sixth-years left Honeydukes, each with a pair of bags full of a wide assortment of their favorite snacks, and had already eaten more than a handful of desserts as well; Honeydukes apparently didn't care if people sampled their wares while they were there, as they seemed to get more than a lot of business. 

      As they left, Buffy turned to look at Willow, who was bringing up the rear; her redheaded friend had slowed down and was looking around the corner of the shop.

      "What?" she asked.

      "Don't know.  Thought I saw something scampering away."

      "A mouse?"

      "Maybe.  Though I wouldn't think a place like this would have mice; the owners looked like they were kinda careful."

      Buffy shrugged.  "Oh well.  If one of your watermelon truffles tastes like Fivel, I'm sure you could ask for a refund."

      Willow grinned.  "I'll keep that in mind."  They hurried to catch up with the others.

      "So where to now?" Buffy asked.

      "Not sure," Ron answered.  "I usually went to Zonko's joke shop after Honeydukes, but Fred and George's shop is so much better, so it isn't quite the same anymore."

      "Fred and George's?" Willow asked, looking around for a sign.

      "My twin brothers," Ron explained.  "They've opened a place up in Diagon Alley.  Doing great, but they're putting poor Zonko out of business."

      "Oh," Willow said, suddenly deciding that she wasn't likely to see a Fred and George's along this road.

      "Hey, I think we saw that," Buffy added.  "Weasleys' Wizard something-or-other."

      "Weasleys' Wizarding Wheezes," Ron clarified.  He was trying to sound indifferent to whether or not his brothers owned their own store, but Buffy heard a subdued note of pride in his voice.

      "Come on, let's grab a table at the Three Broomsticks before the rush," Hermione said.  Ron shrugged and followed her, and the two Slytherins followed after him.

      The Three Broomsticks turned out to be a large and noisy but clean and cheery tavern near the center of the village.  Hermione, Buffy, and Willow went to a booth that had just opened up, while Ron went up to the bar to get everyone a round of butterbeer.

      "Butterbeer?" Willow asked.  "What's that?"

      "Just wait," Hermione answered.  "You'll see."

      Ron returned a moment later with two enormous, foaming tankards clasped in each hand, setting them down on the table before taking his seat next to Hermione.  "Good idea coming early, Hermione," he said.  "We've made happy hour.  Of course, just about any hour here is a happy hour."

      "Oh?  And why is that?" Willow asked.

      Ron smiled.  "Take a drink and see."

      Willow did just that, and another expression just like that which she had worn on her first taste of Honeydukes treats crossed her face.  "I think I'm getting the picture," she said.

      Buffy took a sip of the smooth, golden-brown liquid a moment later, and gasped.  She had been nervous about anything with the name 'beer' served warm, but she found that she needn't have worried.  It was rich and refreshing, and didn't really taste much like beer at all.

      "Wow," she gasped, when she had drunk as much as she could in one sip.  "Do they sell kegs of this stuff?"

      Ron laughed.  "Two galleons and eleven sickles apiece, but unless you're a Malfoy, you can't go shelling out for that kind of thing every day."

      Buffy and Willow looked at each other.  The Trust Fund at Gringott's had to hold several thousand galleons.

      Willow's eyes suddenly narrowed as she stared past Buffy, however, and Buffy turned a questioning look in her friend's eye.  Willow returned the look in a way that seemed to say 'act normal.'  Buffy turned back to continue the conversation with the two Gryffindors, but Hermione had noted Willow's look as well.

      "Willow, what's wrong?" she asked.

      "Oh, nothing," Willow said passively, as she turned towards the wall.  The three other students sitting at the table knew that that was not entirely the case, however, as she reached into her robes, laid a hand upon her wand, and whispered "Binoculate."

      Hermione's eyes widened imperceptibly, but she controlled herself.  Ron, however, was another story, suddenly realizing what she was doing and turning outward to survey the room.  Willow hissed, and swung back to grab a last glance at the spot she had been looking at over Buffy's shoulder.  Realizing that Ron had given them away, Buffy turned at the same time as well.  She turned to see a small, hairless tail and the rear of a small, brown creature with patchy fur disappearing through a hole in the side wall of the tavern, heading outside.

      "What was that?" she asked, turning to Willow.

      "Did you see someone?" Ron asked dully, still not comprehending that he had given them away until Hermione punched him in the shoulder.  "Ow," he winced irritably.

      "Finite," Willow said quickly, once again laying a hand on her wand within her robes.  "It was the same thing I saw outside Honeydukes.  Please don't call me crazy when I say this, all right?  It was a big, ugly brown rat, and if I didn't know better, I'd swear it was watching us."

      Buffy nodded, and before Willow had even finished speaking, was adding, "I saw it, too … what the?"

      Ron and Hermione had both stood bolt upright before Buffy had even begun talking, as soon as the word 'rat' had left Willow's lips.  She hadn't been expecting that kind of reaction.  Their wands were in their hands.

      "Bloody hell," Ron swore as he pushed out of the booth.  His butterbeer was forgotten, which alone told Buffy that Willow had stumbled on something serious.

      "Peter," Hermione spat as she followed Ron outside.

      "Who?"

      Hermione waved a brief hand at Ron to watch his mouth before he said anything, then turned and spoke softly and shortly to them.  "The man who betrayed Harry's parents to Voldemort."

      Willow's hands shot to her mouth to stifle a frightened squeak.  Hermione and Ron were already moving for the door.

      Willow was pushing at Buffy's side, trying to push the Slayer out of the booth.  "Come on, we've got to follow them!"

      Buffy turned as soon as Hermione and Ron were a short distance away and clearly were not listening.  Then she wheeled on her friend, and spoke in an even quieter but even more forceful tone.  "All right, listen," she said.  "Things are going down fast but … do … not … get … involved.  Remember why you're here?"

      Willow's eyes blazed, but she took several deep breaths, and the darkness around the edge of her eyes receded, but Buffy could sense it still lurking near the surface.  "Right," she breathed at last, sounding deflated.

      "Look at me," Buffy whispered sternly.

      Willow looked up and met Buffy's eyes.  They were unreadable.  Nonetheless, Buffy was breathing a little easier; had Willow truly lost control, she probably would have tried to push Buffy aside by now to get out of the booth … one way or another.

      Buffy nodded slowly, and slowly backed out of the booth.

      Willow calmly reached for her wand.

      "Willow …?"

      Willow looked Buffy firmly in the eyes.  "I won't let them get hurt."

      Buffy tried again to read Willow's eyes, but it was even harder now.  Willow was keeping her emotions under iron control.  Nevertheless, Willow had always been a poor liar, so Buffy guessed that if she were already intending to get involved no matter what, she would have given it away somehow.

      "All right," she said finally, now eager to catch up.  "Let's go."  Then hustled out of the Three Broomsticks as quickly as they dared.

      Ron and Hermione were already nowhere in sight.

      "Did you see two kids come running out of here?" Buffy asked a loitering wizard in green robes, who looked like he'd already had a bit too much butterbeer.  The wizard nodded and pointed off down a side street.

      Buffy and Willow ran onward.  They asked a few more people for directions, and fortunately, each one seemed to lead them on correctly, or they would not have found more people who had seen them.  Eventually, however, they came to a grassy common on the hillside at the edge of the village, and there was no one else in sight.

      Buffy looked around furiously.  "Dammit, where'd they go?"

      "There's got to be someone around we can ask," Willow called from nearby.  The iron self-control she had mustered in the Three Broomsticks was showing signs of cracking.  She looked around as though she could find their tracks in the dirt.  "Two Hogwarts students running after a rat have to attracted some attention."

      As if in answer, they heard a low hiss from off in the grass to their right.  Buffy turned, swinging her wand around, before realizing that it was only a large garter snake in the grass.

      Then another hiss reached her ears, and she nearly dropped her wand.  This hiss did not come from another snake.

It came from Willow.

      "Willow, what are you doing?" she asked.  "Are you trying to tick it off?"

      "What?" Willow asked turning around.  "I only asked it which way they'd gone!"

      "You asked it?  You can talk to it?"

      "Didn't you just hear me?"

      "I heard you hissing like Cordelia in a temper tantrum."

      "I … what?"  The snake hissed again, and she turned and hissed back.  Then she turned back to Buffy.  "You didn't just hear that?"

      "You just hissed again, Will.  I'm starting to see some serious weirdness creeping into this trip.  I don't speak Hiss, and five minutes ago, neither did you."

      "I …" she turned and hissed at the snake, and it seemed to hiss in answer.  It had also curled up and seemed to be looking at them curiously.  A moment later, Willow turned back to Buffy again.  "I guess I do," she said, as though just realizing what had been coming out of her mouth.  "Weird."

      "Are you sure you're talking to it?"

      "Buffy, I swear I'm not making this up."

      "Then what is it saying?"

      "Well, it said that it saw two kids chasing a rat up the hill thataway, towards that shack up there.  And then just now it said that you couldn't hear us talking, and that's when I realized … well, that I was making with the hissing, like you said."

      "So this isn't something you've been practicing?"

      "No," Willow answered earnestly, "or I swear I would have told you.  I'm just as confused as you here, Buffy."

      "All right," she said, waving that aside.  "Not like we're going to get better witnesses.  Let's hit that shack."

      They had not gotten very far, however, before they heard shouting and sounds like soft, sharp fireworks going off.

      "Sounds like that snake was right," Buffy noted as they ran.  "Who'd a' thunk?"

      The shack was inset into a small depression in the hillside.  It was the size of a tiny cottage, but it looked as though it had been completely boarded up until recently.  Very recently.  There was a smoking hole in the side of it, and the sounds of fighting echoed within.

      Buffy darted forward until she reached the entrance.  The first floor of the shack was a complete mess, and looked as though it had been so since well before Ron, Hermione, and the rat had arrived.  The floor was damaged and there were several holes in it.  Flashes of multicolored lights and the sounds of frenzied chanting were coming from below, and Buffy saw Hermione and Ron dueling with a man barely Hermione's height, but who seemed at least reasonably skilled with the wand in his artificial hand.  His hand was clearly a prosthetic of some kind, fashioned of a strange metallic silver material that seemed every bit as supple as flesh.

      "Willow!" Buffy called, as her friend drew alongside and reached within her robe for her wand.

      "What?" Willow asked, a note of hurried anxiety in her voice.

      Buffy took a deep breath.  "Stay here."

      Willow's face suddenly became a picture of indignation, then denial, then resignation.  Her shoulders slumped, and she took her hand off the wand within her robes.  She let out a frustrated but accepting breath through her nose before she nodded, her eyes still intent on the fighting below.

      "Hurry," Willow murmured.

      Even as she spoke, a jet of red light from the end of the man's wand flashed out in an arc and caught Ron on the wrist, who dropped his wand with a stunned cry.  A moment later, there was a burst in the air above Ron, and he dropped to the ground, reaching weakly for his wand but not completely out.  Hermione frantically hurled a counter-curse to block a third spell that the man sent to knock Ron out completely.

      The man's back was to Buffy and Willow, but Buffy could feel a grin splitting his features.  "I've been practicing," he rasped to Hermione in a high, nasal voice.  Hermione began to look more than a little frightened.  She hadn't seen Buffy and Willow arrive yet, either, and while she looked like she knew what she was doing with a wand, she also looked like she was getting tired and tight.

      "So have I!" Buffy called to distract him. 

      She leapt into the air so that she would land on the man's head if there hadn't been floor in the way.  She took care of the last part in midair, angling her wand downward and shouting "Reducto!" as she descended.

      The floor disintegrated in a shower of dust and splinters, causing both the floor and Buffy to fall on the man simultaneously, more than disrupting whatever spell he had been preparing to launch skyward at her.  He collapsed and rolled across the cellar.  He was hurt, but he shouted "Stupefy!" before he even reached his feet again, and Buffy was forced to roll and duck a jet of scarlet light headed in her direction.  She cursed silently.  She could have ended the fight before it even started had he given her another second.

      The man caught a look at her then, and a look of recognition passed across his face.  It faded a moment later, however, as a jet of flame erupted from his wand in Buffy's direction.

      Buffy smiled.  She and Willow had practiced this only two days ago.  Focusing her awareness completely on the fire, she extended her empty left hand.  "Manus infernum," she spat.

      The fire struck her left hand and stopped.  The balding man and Hermione both looked at her wide-eyed for a split second.  Buffy breathed a sigh of relief.  She wasn't sure if she'd had the power and control needed to do that in the thick of battle, but she had to show Willow that there was no need to get involved; she knew her friend's desire to be helpful was overpowering at times, for good or ill.

      "Ooh, sorry, insufficient postage, return to sender," Buffy mocked as she flung the fireball back at its sender.

      "Protego!" the man gasped as his own fireball came back at him.  He nearly managed to send it back at Buffy, but instead only managed to block it back into the remains of the floor above scattered on the ground between them.  The wood and dust immediately caught fire.

      Buffy grinned.  Her Slayer's battle instincts were taking over, and as always, her training came back to her when she needed it, with a little bit of improvisation for good measure.  She and Willow had practiced floating burning matchsticks around in Lupin's fireplace yesterday.  This wasn't really any different, just larger.

      "Pyrokinesia lignis," she chanted with a feral grin as the fire began to spread.

      As though a cyclone had arisen around her and engulfed all the burning wood, and dust on the floor, the debris on the floor rose into the air and whirled around her.  She pointed her wand, and the flaming whirlwind became a stream aimed straight at the man across from her.

      The man shouted "Protego!" again, but was also forced to duck behind a pile of empty crates to avoid the brunt of the blast, and even then, a sharp squeak from behind the crates let Buffy know that at least some of the smaller pieces of debris had gotten through.

      "Reducto!" she called.  More innocent empty boxes met their unfortunate demise.

      "Luminaris solaire!" the other man cried.  There was a note of desperation entering his voice.  Buffy shielded her eyes as a burst of golden-white light filled the basement, heard Willow shout something above her, and ducked just in case the other man somehow wasn't as blinded as her.

      When her eyes came into focus again a moment later, however, she was just in time to see the rat that she had seen earlier darting across the back of the basement wall.  She aimed a curse at it, but before she could bring her wand to bear, it had slipped behind Hermione, who was still blinded from the light and holding her hands over her eyes weakly.

      "HERMIONE, DOWN!" Buffy shouted.  Hermione quickly dove to the ground, but it was too late; the rat had vanished.  Buffy aimed another Reductor curse at the pile of crates where it had vanished.  A moment later, she barked a sharp oath.  A dark opening had revealed itself behind where the crates had been.  There had been a secret passage out of the basement of the shack.  She approached the opening guardedly, but nothing came from within.

      "Lumos solaire," she snapped, using the ray of sunlight like a searchlight to see as far as possible down the tunnel, but the rat was nowhere in sight.  Another oath escaped between her clenched teeth.

      She pointed her wand at the ground at the entrance to the tunnel. "Terrandicto," she said.  A wall of earth rose out of the ground and blocked the tunnel; she didn't put a whole lot of effort into it, so it was thin, but it would at least stop anyone taking a cheap shot at her back from the darkness.

      "Come on down, Will," she called.  As though the normal turn of voice had suddenly brought Hermione back to herself, she quickly dove to where Ron lay to check on him.

      Willow nodded.  "Wingardium Leviosa," she said simply, and stepped out over the gap Buffy had left.  She floated down to the basement.  She kept her calm while she was doing this, but as soon as her feet touched the ground, she was kneeling next to Ron as well.

      "Are you all right?" she asked.

      "Yeah … I'll be fine …" Ron said weakly.

      Willow held him and looked into his eyes.  "Maybe a light concussion," she said clinically.  "And his hand got Stunned.  Should be OK by tomorrow, especially if we can get him to the hospital wing.  Wish I'd brought some of the potions I was working on yesterday."

      "I'll be fine," Ron repeated, wincing as the feeling began to return to his wrist.

      Willow seemed to accept that at face value, as she stood up.  Gradually, the concern melted off her face, replaced by a smile both warm and predatory at the same time.  Suddenly, she leapt over and threw her arms around Buffy.

      "Buffy, that was awesome!" she cried.  She pulled away a moment later before it could get embarrassing.  Well, OK, more embarrassing, Buffy thought after a moment.  "You're completely insane, of course, but I love you anyway.  You about gave me a heart attack when you tried to catch that fireball."

      "He was already tired," Buffy demurred modestly.  "I think Hermione here had already worn him down a ways."

      "Hey, what about me?" Ron whined.

      "And Ron," Buffy added with a laugh.

      "I don't know," Hermione answered uncertainly.  "He seemed stronger than last time."  Then, more self-deprecatingly, "Or we were just careless.  He surprised us as we came in.  We never got a chance to recover."

      "Oh yeah, I got the feeling that you two had met before," Buffy answered.  "What's the scoop with that?"

      Ron's face contorted into a snarl.  "Posed as my bloody pet for a few years, he did."

      Buffy's eyes widened.  She was starting to understand why he and Hermione had vanished from the Three Broomsticks so quickly.  On the other hand, it was nice to know that she wasn't the only one whose life was a long way from simple.

      "I'm guessing that didn't end so well," Willow surmised.

      "No, it didn't," Hermione agreed.  "Professor Lupin and Sirius Black exposed him before he could do anything permanent to us, and captured him here, but he got away as soon as we'd gotten back through the tunnel to Hogwarts.  It's a long story."

      Buffy swung around.  "Waitaminit, here?!  As in, right here in this building?"

      "Yeah, this used to be called the Shrieking Shack, because of …"

      "Never mind!" Buffy cut her off.  "So you're saying that tunnel goes back to Hogwarts?!"

      Hermione's widened as the import of that struck her.  "Oh dear, we've got to get back and warn them!"

      Ron struggled to pull a watch from his pocket.  "Bloody hell, the first train back leaves in ten minutes; if we miss that, it's another two hours!" he began to stumble towards the rickety staircase.

      "Ron, take it easy, you're in no condition to run!" Hermione cried.

      "I'll go," Willow said.

      Buffy gave her friend a look, then realized Willow was right.  She had to stay here in case whoever that dark wizard was came back; Hermione and Ron were hardly in top condition, and Willow was less likely to have to fight if she played messenger than if she played guard.  "All right, hurry, don't miss that train," she said.

      "I won't," Willow promised, and put on a brave grin.  "Oh, and see if you can get our Honeydukes bags back?  We left them all in the tavern."

      Ron's hands went to his lips as if that were the most horrifying thing that had happened to them that day.

            *           *           *           *           *

      AUTHOR'S NOTES:  My first magical battle scene!  Please let me know what you thought of it!

      Thanks again for all your reviews last chapter!

      COMING SOON:  Chapter 17, "Trading Stories."  After another short conversation in Hiss, Willow gets back to Hogwarts, and the hunt for Peter Pettigrew begins.

      SNEAK PREVIEW:

      "Excellent," McGonagall said, and a feral grin split her face.  "I do believe Hagrid keeps some rather interesting creatures that eat rodents."