Angel re: Saturday's review. Y'know, I hadn't noticed the 'R' theme. It's a pretty small sample of guests on the show, though so I don't know! Maybe they would have tried to keep the R's going, maybe not. There was that one time where Fred tried to call George Tentacula, but that was to make a point...

Anyway, this one's on the short side but the next one is longer.

This chapter has been slightly edited in light of recent information re animagi.

Escape

March 23rd, 1998
Post-Hogwarts
-

Jo poked her big furry head around a tree; she had the perfect view of the trio's camp from here, with Leili backing her up from the sky. Yesterday, they'd been waiting tables and cooking the few meals patrons of the Hog's head ordered—Jo did most of the cooking while Leili did most of the baking. They could each do both, but things always took longer if they switched. Today, they were sitting in a forest, staring at a tent. Aberfort was kind enough to let them out on these excursions.

The trio hadn't set up their enchantments, how lazy of them. They'd found the kids via tracking charm, it had taken them about half the day to pin them down but they finally had and she could just hear the current airing of Potterwatch. They had Lupin and Shacklebolt as guests today. It had been fun, being on air like that, even if there hadn't been much to contribute at the time. Now that she thought about it, Fred and Leili had been married about four and a half/five months now. She sighed, how time flies when you're being hunted by a megalomaniac…

The lights going out in the tent drew her out of her thoughts; maybe they were going to bed? And then the snatchers arrived. Jo groaned to herself and waited to see if the kids could get themselves out of this.

They couldn't.

Hermione watched the large bear barreling towards the snatchers, swiping furiously at them with large paws. They had accidentally called the Snatchers upon themselves when Harry used Voldemort's name; old habits die hard.

"What the bloody hell is that?!" Ron cried as he saw the bear.

"That is a bear, Ronald." Hermione told him.

"But what's it doing here?!"

Saving your asses. Jo wanted to say. She could hear them quite easily from where she was. She could also hear Leilani's furious chirping and squawking as she tried to get their attention. They were completely ignoring her.

"Well, we are in the woods," Hermione told him reasonably.

"Yowch!" Harry yelped, shaking his hand and shoving the webbing between his finger and thumb in his mouth. "It bit me!" He said, gesturing to a small green bird Hermione recognized as a member of the parrot family.

"Bit me!" The bird mimicked, flapping around their heads.

"It can talk!" Ron said in no small surprise.

"It?!" The bird cried.

"Of course she can talk Ronald, she's a parrot," Hermione said with a roll of her eyes.

"Parrot!" The little bird shrieked. The words were echoed but the tone was faintly scathing

"But they're just mimicked words, she doesn't understand anything she says," Hermione said matter-of-factly.

Suddenly the bear roared and in response the bird took Hermione's sleeve and tugged.

The three weren't listening and she squawked her annoyance. Jo let out another loud roar and the snatchers scurried off like the rats they were, but they would be back. Jo turned and upon seeing that Harry, Ron and Hermione were still there despite Leili's best efforts, which included everything but shifting into her human skin, she turned and lumbered towards them, wearing her best murder face.

Cowed by the bear, Harry decided now was a really good time to run. "I think we'd better listen to her, Hermione!" They hesitated for only a second longer before grabbing most of their stuff and running.

Leilani flew ahead of them with Jo running behind to keep them on course. The girls had arrived earlier in the day and while Jo had stayed near the kids to keep an eye on them, Leilani had flown around looking for safe hiding places in case of emergency.

Jo chased them right into a cave before giving them a definite nod and a snort as if to say, "Now, stay there," before she settled herself at the mouth of the cave.

"Is that bird safe with that bear?" Harry asked as Leili settled herself on Jo's head.

Hermione watched carefully as the bear made no move to eat the bird, "Looks like it."

As the night wore on, the soft breathing of the bear told the trio their savior and captor had fallen asleep and they pulled the invisibility cloak over themselves as Harry cast "Muffliato", so the bear and bird would not hear them leave.

If the trio had been paying attention to detail, they'd have caught a shimmer of gold across Jo's upper back. If they'd been paying attention, they'd have noticed that the shimmer of gold was shaped like a Thunderbird and if they'd been paying attention they'd have remembered a girl with that exact tattoo had been at Dumbledore's funeral. But, they weren't paying attention; they were too busy trying to come up with a way to escape.

They didn't know that when the girls had chosen the cave earlier, they had also placed every protective enchantment over it that they knew. So they set off through the forest back towards their tent—which, they would soon find, was being staked out by the Snatchers. Hermione had barely enough time to cast a stinging hex on Harry's face before they were captured.

PS I'd also like to offer a way to help support BLM when you can't personally donate: Search "Help BLM with NO MONEY" on Youtube, you'll get a ton of videos.