Disclaimer: I do not own anything classic of this story. Harry Potter and all of the notable characters belong to J.K. Rowling, aka, God. All original characters are copyright of me, however.

Magnolia Crescent

Chapter Fifteen

Leo's Tale

It was the following day at breakfast when Hagrid rushed over to the trio, tears in his eyes. Harry had just been released from the hospital wing and had yet to tell Hermione and Ron what had happened during the night. Hermione's heart sank and Harry vowed that if things hadn't gone right that Leo would be on a level equal to Malfoy.

"Hagrid," Ron said when he reached them. "What is it?"

"Beaky's gone," he sobbed. Hermione noticed a smile crinkling the corners of his eyes. "He disappeared while we was out there searching for Peter. Just took off; made the executioner so mad. Anyways, I came over here to thank ya for your help, Hermione." She beamed as Hagrid walked away.

"I guess Leo did his job," Ron said, smiling though he still disliked him.

"And now we don't have to worry about Buckbeak," Harry said. Before Harry could explain further, Leo walked up to them.

"Did it work?" he asked.

"Yes, Hagrid just told us that Buckbeak took off," Hermione replied. "How did you manage it? Half the time we try to sneak around, we get caught."

"Well, it was quite simple to be honest," Leo said. "But, I'd rather not explain it with so many ears nearby. Since its Saturday, want to walk on the grounds while I explain the hippogriff breakout?" They grabbed some toast and hurried out of the castle, eager to hear the story.

"Alright, get talking," Ron said, still not friendly with Leo. He was appreciative and that was about it.

"It's a very enticing tale, if I do say so myself," he chuckled. At a glower from Ron, he launched into his story.

Leo waited a moment before following the Gryffindor trio onto the grounds. He had no problems getting into trouble but he wasn't exactly planning on bringing them down with him. Best to put a bit of space between them. As he strolled casually across the darkening lawn, part of him wondered if maybe he should grab Dante and Alec to help him. He debated for a moment then decided that the less people that knew, the better.

"Leo! Where ya heading man?" Dante called. Leo groaned, turning to see Dante and Alec exiting the front doors.

"Son of a – What are you doing here?" Leo demanded. "Always when I don't need them," he muttered to himself.

"Dude, chill. We were wondering where you were. You hadn't come back from dinner and we didn't know if you were still in the Great Hall. When we walked into the Entrance Hall, we saw you sneaking outside," Alec explained in a slight Russian accent.

"Can you guys just go back inside now?" Leo asked, exasperated. Dante and Alec looked at each other for a second.

"Lyin', you know us. You have a knack for finding trouble and we're always along for the ride," Dante laughed.

"Fine," Leo growled. "Won't listen when I ask you to do something." He trudged across the grass, hands shoved deep in his pockets.

"So, what are we doing?" Alec whispered.

"Shut up!" Leo hissed. "We're rescuing the hippogriff."

"Isn't that stealing?" Alec asked skeptically.

"Think of it as," Dante paused to think. "Saving a helpless creature from death. Isn't that how you put it, mate?" Dante asked, gently nudging Leo. He nodded, shrugging them off. They sat hidden in the trees, Leo watching the pumpkin patch and the hippogriff. Dante and Alec were messing around and making a fair amount of noise. "We got one shot at this, so try not to make too much noise," Leo warned.

"You heard him Dante," Alec smirked, shoving the other boy. Dante frowned, pushing back at the brunet. Leo's eyes narrowed.

Leo grumbled, slapping his forehead. This was exactly the reason why he was a loner – he did things that could get him in trouble and those two knew just the way to blow a cover.

After about an hour, Leo noticed the Gryffindors walking back down the lawn. Only this time, there were three adults with them. He faintly recognized the Headmaster and the Minister but with the growing darkness, the third man was unrecognizable to him.

"Wait a minute, is that Sirius Black? That guy who's wanted for murder?" Alec asked, leaning forward. "Isn't he trying to kill Potter?"

"What do you care?" Dante remarked. "My only concern would be what they are up to. If it requires them to kill our target, we would have wasted all this time waiting," Dante added.

"Doubt it," Leo interjected. "The Ministry wouldn't bring children to an execution, duh." The way he said it sounded so childish that Dante couldn't help but snicker.

The Headmaster knocked on Hagrid's door and soon, they headed to the edge of the forest, where they stopped to wait. Leo heard a distant whistle and then the forest rumbled, as if shaking. Leo looked with wide eyes to the group on the far edge. Against the dark outline, he saw a giant three-headed dog running towards the group. His first instinct was to warn then of what was coming, but with the forest rumbling like it was, could they really not know? He decided to settle down and wait it out.

"Dude! Son of a banshee, what is that?" Dante asked with a low whistle.

"Ah, no way! You have one!" Alec said with awe, accent even more pronounced.

"Have what?" Leo hissed, trying to make them be quiet.

"A Cerberus!" Alec cried. "Drumstrang had one, even though we were told that they were quite rare. How did Hogwarts come to own one?"

"They don't," Dante contended. "It clearly lives in the forest. Maybe it belongs to that oaf."

"Settle down," Leo snapped. "And Hagrid isn't an oaf, Peak. In fact, he teaches the only class I truly enjoy." Dante looked like he wanted to further argue but Leo silenced him with a look. Instead, he slouched under a tree, straightening out his fauxhawk.

"Siding with the monster lover?" Alec asked with a smile. Leo groaned, resting his face in his hand. "What's so good about that class anyways?"

"Cause Malfoy got his in the first class, permanently making it good in my book. To be honest, I consider rescuing the hippogriff payback for all that whining we had to listen to. That'll teach him that his father can't get him everything. Now, if you two don't shut up, I will find a way to force you back to the castle," he finished with a threat.

"How much you wanna bet, he's just like his name?" Alec whispered to Dante; both sniggered. Leo sighed, ignoring them as he focused on the edge of the forest. "To be honest, Leo, I have to admit that I'm loving this idea of yours more and more."

"Not my idea," he muttered. Alec gave him a confused look. "Granger asked me to help, okay." Leo's tone made it obvious that he didn't want to explain any further. Hagrid walked back to his hut and shortly after he rejoined the group, another person had joined them. The commotion of the Cerberus had alerted some of the teachers from the castle and they rushed across the lawn to figure out what was going on. Leo didn't know what was going on but suddenly, the majority of people had rushed into the forest, wands lit and held high. He furrowed his brow, wondering what was going on.

Figuring he wasn't going to get another chance, he ran to the pumpkin patch, his mind trying to remember the correct way to approach a hippogriff. He bowed low, avoiding eye contact and noticed the hippogriff bow back half-heartedly. He grabbed the tether and gave a gentle tug but the creature didn't seem to want to move. Alec made a quiet sound and successfully got Leo's attention. He pointed to a string of dead ferrets not too far away. Leo made a gesture indicating that Alec grab them, but he only shook his head. Grumbling, Leo dropped the chain and repulsively grabbed the ferrets.

"I don't understand how that thing can eat those," Alec said, wrinkling his nose. Buckbeak perked up at this sight, standing and walking cautiously over to the Slytherins. Leo tentatively held one out and Buckbeak eagerly gobbled it up. He held out another one, slowly walking back towards the woods. Once they were deep in the safety of the trees, Leo thought of his next step: where to hide the hippogriff?

Sighing heavily, he sat down and listened carefully to the group of people running around.

"Now what?" Dante said aggressively.

"I'm going to wait," Leo said with a glower. "You two can go back to the castle. All I need is an opportunity."

"That's a tall order with all these adults running around," Dante noted. Leo glowered at him. He said nothing more and the other two Slytherins settled down to wait beside Leo. The time passed slowly while Dante watched for the group to head back to the castle. Buckbeak roamed a small area, snapping at bats and trying to steal more dead ferrets from Leo, though he usually got it in the end.

"Guys, four of them are heading back!" Dante called, running back over to his friends.

"We need them all to be gone," Leo hissed. "Get back over there!"

"He doesn't have to," Alec interjected. "Look, the rest of them are heading back as well. It looks like they're giving up their chase."

"Yeah, but more are heading out here," Dante said. "I think they just needed more man-power. Besides, we can't stay here forever."

"Let's head to that one clearing and think of something there," Alec decided, stopping Leo and Dante from arguing further.

"Excellent, let's move," Leo said, grabbing the string of ferrets. "Here Buckbeak," he called, urging the hippogriff to follow him, which he promptly did. They walked deeper into the forest until they came upon the clearing that they were looking for. The teachers had been a little too close to this spot for comfort, otherwise Leo would have led Buckbeak straight there and left. The clearing wasn't empty, however.

"Is that a dementor?" Dante asked, frozen on the spot. "It's cold all of a sudden," he noted.

"I see something, it might be Peter!" a voice shouted. The Slytherins glanced at each other, dashing behind a tree. A Ministry wizard entered the clearing. "Never mind, just a dementor. Expecto Patronum," he cast. The creature was chased away by a silver shield. Buckbeak snagged a bat out of the air as the wizard walked away. Leo glanced at his friends, all of them relaxing.

"That was close," he chuckled. The ground under the group shook as more wand lights flooded an area not too far away. The glanced at each other, all wearing a very worried and panicked expression on their faces. They watched a new scene unfold in the clearing.

Standing clearly visible in the moonlight was the Cerberus, stopping to snap at a small rodent on the ground. Each of the three heads began to snap at the ground and then at each other, fighting over who got to eat their new prey. After about five minutes of them continually fighting, the boys could no longer breathe because they had been laughing at the sight. Leo pulled two ferrets off of the string and lobbed them in front of the dog. The outer heads each snagged a ferret – which must have been more appealing than the rodent – leaving the middle head with the prey. It was promptly swallowed as one of the heads looked in the direction of the ferrets origins.

"Fluffy!" Hagrid called faintly. The dog, apparently named Fluffy, shot its head upward and, glancing back at the three boys, it bolted for Hagrid, shaking the forest as it did so.

"I thought it would never leave," Dante whispered; his voice sounded a bit weaker than normal. "I take back what I said about Hagrid." After the lights started to disappear and the dog was well out of sight, Leo led Buckbeak into the clearing and tethered him to one of the trees, dropping the pile of ferrets just out of his reach. Then he sat against a tree, figuring out what to do next.

"What did it eat?" Dante asked as the darkness became more pronounced. Leo shrugged.

"It looked like a rat," he admitted. "But now that the forest is starting to empty, where do we hide this big guy?" he asked with a frown, trying to think of some place that wouldn't be used this late at night. "What about the owlery?" he mentioned with a smirk. "Nobody goes up unless they need to use a school owl and who would go up there this late at night?"

"I don't know, Leo. Won't he try to attack the owls?" Alec brought up.

"I think he'll be fine as long as he has those ferrets," Leo said with a shrug. Alec and Dante shrugged as well before they quickly headed to the owlery. They kept to the edges of the forest as best they could. Leo glanced to one side and saw a group of wizards exiting, clearly dejected at something. When the clear was finally given, they led Buckbeak into the owlery, dropping the last of the dead ferrets beside him.

"Stay and be good," Alec said as if speaking to a dog. The creature paid him no mind and they quietly exited the tower. They paused to see a hooded man heading towards Hagrid's hut.

"Why do I have a feeling he'll be upset come chopping time," Dante said with a grin.

"Let's get out of here," Leo said, breaking into a run for the castle. Just after they made it into the front doors, they ran into Fudge.

"Oh my, what are you three doing out of bed?" he asked with a chuckle.

"We're looking for Harry Potter," Leo answered. "I thought he might have been down to visit Professor Hagrid but we didn't see him."

"Well, I say, he's in the hospital wing," Fudge offered. Leo looked only slightly concerned before thanking the Minister and heading up the stairs.

"Wait, you're really going to see Potter. I thought that was just your way of getting past that old goat," Dante scoffed.

"No, the hippogriff took a nip at me. I wanted to have Madam Pomphrey look at it, especially since I was handling dead animals," Leo lied.

"Well, see you in the common room," Alec said, walking towards the dungeons. Leo waved goodbye before heading up the stairs. Upon entering the hospital wing, he frowned slightly when he saw Harry alone. Too bad Hermione had already left.

"Leo," Harry greeted. "Any luck?" Leo gave him a small smirk.

"Lots, we had a few close shaves, but we managed to hide him in the owlery. We don't know exactly how to get him off school grounds just yet though," Leo explained. Harry nodded.

"Thanks, I'm sure the we can figure something out. See you tomorrow, then?" he asked. Leo shrugged, walking out and heading down to his common room.

"And there you have it," Leo surmised, clapping his hands together.

"Bloody brilliant plan, that was," Ron said with a grin. "But I would have expected you to change it and make you sound much better. I'm surprised he didn't even get caught."

"So what do we do about Buckbeak?" Hermione asked, stopping Ron from a rant she knew was coming.

"Already taken care of," Harry said with a knowing smile on his face. Ron wanted to ask but Leo spoke before he got a chance. He grumbled, crossing his arms.

"Yes, well, that's all fine and dandy. Granger, I'm curious – why haven't you been in Muggle Studies recently?" Leo asked, changing the topic.

"Oh, that," Hermione said, blushing ever so slightly. "At the beginning of the school year, I had arranged with McGonagall to take more classes than possible. Well, as the school year progressed and we ended up with side tasks, it became too much to handle. I dropped Muggle Studies and Divination to take Ancient Runes," she explained.

"Hang on, you're in Muggle Studies?" Ron asked with stunned curiosity. "I thought all Slytherins hated anything Muggle related."

"That's clearly not the case," Leo said with a bit of an attitude. "And I'm not even pure-blood like almost all Slytherins are. If you must know why I took that class, my father was Muggleborn but never bothered to explain anything Muggle made. I'm a very curious individual and I wanted to know how they could possibly work without magic."

"He sounds just like my dad," Ron muttered to Harry. He nodded with a small grin.

"Well, it's sad that you decided to drop Muggle Studies, but then again, you are Muggle born, you probably have a better understanding of all things Muggle than most people do," Leo added as an afterthought.

"You'll have to keep me informed if anything interesting comes up in that class," Hermione said brightly. Anything that would allow her to learn more was excellent in her mind.

"Did you hear Sirius Black was running around the school last night? The rumors say that Peter Pettigrew was actually a rat in hiding." Leo trailed off, pausing for a moment. "I still can't believe that three-headed dog actually ate an Animagus, if it's all true, that is," he chuckled. After another minute, he walked off, leaving the three Gryffindors.

"Well, that's the end of Peter," Ron smirked slightly, still a little sore about losing his rat.

"Sirius got off as well. All that's left is the house cup and end of the year exams," Hermione said cheerily. Ron groaned upon hearing that.

"Harry, where's Sirius at? I haven't seen him since last night," Ron asked.

"He left, said he had something to take care of. He should be back before the end of the year, though," Harry said with a shrug.

OMG, I actually got to write a chapter! Somebody tell the press! I'm just kidding. SWD did some lengthening and editing to this chapter, but that's about it. Not sure what else to say. Oh, this chapter should clear up that "what bird?" comment. We apologize; we thought it would have been obvious, but oh well. Anyways, please keep the R&Rs coming, we looooove reading your reviews!

~LE