They hurried down the spiral staircase in Dumbledore's wake, their hearts beating, a cloud of fear fogging their thoughts. It seemed crucial to Dumbledore that they remained under the cloak. With all the effort they could muster, they kept their feet and ankles hidden, determined not to be seen, as they creeped down the empty Entrance Hall, opened the double doors and spilled into the grounds.

A blanket of snow covered the ground for yards and emitted a pearly glow, playing tricks on their eyes. They neared Hagrid's hut, their feet sinking in the snow. Harry wasn't sure if Hagrid was even there and the sight of no smoke trickling out of his chimney and the hostile, dark windows made his heart sink.

'Do you think he's sleeping?' Hermione whispered.

'I dunno,' was Ron's reply.

After they knocked a couple of times and heard no thuds of huge feet walking and no booming barks from Fang, they decided he wasn't there. But Hermione said, 'Look!' pointing at the snowy ground. Footprints the size of watermelons had been made and continued in the direction of the Forbidden Forest.

'So, we've got to go in there?' Ron said grimly, his breath condensing in the cold air.

'Looks like it,' Harry said.

'Do you think we should take the cloak off? It'd slow us down ,'Hermione said.

'Directly disobeying Dumbledore's orders?' Ron said. 'I don't think so.'

Drawing their wands, they followed Hagrid's huge footprints and soon they were at the edge of the Forest.

'It's our fault if anyone died, you know that right?' Hermione said and Harry looked sideways at her to see tears running down her face.

'Blimey,' Ron muttered.

As they began to walk down a snow-free, earthy path, Harry imagined a body lying on the floor in the Fat Lady's corridor surrounded by sobbing teachers and students. The body belonging to Rhonda or Paula or Ginny, with strangle marks on the neck and chin area. The Hevera also had a taste for raw meat and Harry visualised a chunk of flesh missing from the abdomen, blooding oozing onto the stone floor.

'No,' he said firmly to Hermione, ' no one's dead.'

After jogging under the cloak for a few minutes, past silent, watching owls and snow-clad trees, they stopped near a cluster of bushes and decided to call Hagrid's name into the darkness.

'Hagrid! Hagrid!'

He didn't answer, maybe because he was too far away or he didn't want to scare whatever creature he had come in the Forest for.

'You know, I don't think Hagrid's the only person who can control this thing,' Ron said.

'Yeah, but he IS the one who knows these creatures the most,' said Harry.

'I wonder who screamed,' Hermione said, her eyes fixed at a far-off point, lost in thought. 'It sounded like it came from the kitchens.'

Hufflepuff, Harry thought. If anyone at Hogwarts deserved to be attacked, it wouldn't be a Hufflepuff. So at least Rhonda and Ginny were safe. But what about Paula?

'What's that?' Hermione said very sharply. She pointed at something lying on the ground, something large. Harry heart skipped a beat as he moved closer to the mound. All was quiet and still.

'No!' cried Hermione, breaking the silence.

Hagrid lay face down on the snow, motionless, his arms spread out.

'Hagrid!' Harry said, his voice quivering, but before he could do so much as touch Hagrid, he saw the eyes, gleaming in the darkness, as red as blood. They could've been Voldermort's if they weren't so big. And standing beside it, in league with it, it seemed, was a pale-faced Seamus Finnigan.

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