Amazing couldn't begin to describe Harry's day.
There had been shops selling items he'd never seen on Diagon Alley, including foods that Steven had insisted that he try. Some were Wizarding foods from foreign lands that Steven had been trying for the past two weeks. Others were old favorites from Steven's homeland.
He'd particularly enjoyed the funnel cakes, although he wasn't the hot dog enthusiast that Steven was. Fortunately Amethyst was more than happy to eat anything they didn't want, including the packaging.
He'd bought Omnioculars for himself and Ron. Steven bought ones for himself and Hermione.
The game itself was nothing short of astonishing. It was Quidditch as he'd never seen it before. The Irish and Bulgarians played on a whole different level. It was brutal and visceral, and Harry loved every minute of it.
Most of all, it was a tremendous spectacle. It was everything magic was supposed to be.
Even now, sitting around the campfire with the others, Harry still hadn't come down. He felt exhausted and drained, but he still felt a little euphoric.
Steven was playing his guitar softly, with Hermione sitting next to him.
The guitar fit a little better in his hands than they had the year before. Steven had started on a Ukulele because it was smaller and easier to handle. Harry blinked as he realized that Steven was a little taller than he had been the year before. He hadn't noticed it because he'd grown even more than Steven had, but it was there.
He looked more like a second year than a first year. Harry wondered for a moment if that would affect his Quidditch game, but then he had to laugh at himself. Contrary to what Snape thought, Harry didn't only think about Quidditch.
He was glad for his friend. It wouldn't do for him to be a child forever, leaving his friends behind.
Of course, he might not ever age past adulthood, but considering that his aunts were functionally immortal, that wasn't terrible. Wizards were relatively long lived compared to Muggles, and even Muggles were living longer than ever before due to advances in medicine and science.
It was a beautiful evening, and Mr. Weasley had been right. There was something tremendously pleasant about sitting next to a campfire, it's heat washing over you and staring up at the stars.
Falling asleep would be easy.
The Irish were singing in the distance, riotous, joyful songs, but somehow the tune Steven was improvising seemed to work with them instead of against them.
Harry suspected that Mr. Weasley would have made them go to bed long ago except that he was enjoying the fire and the music too much. Given the ambient noise and the excitement of the day it would have been hard to have fallen asleep right away anyway.
They'd already argued the game back and forth, talking plays and possibilities. By now they'd all subsided into a companionable sort of silence.
Harry didn't want to go to bed, even though he knew he was very close to snoozing. Going to bed would mean that this magical day had ended, and he wasn't willing to do that any sooner than he had to.
It wasn't until the singing stopped that he knew something was wrong.
Steven frowned and his fingers went silent on the strings as they heard the sound of screaming in the distance.
Harry was suddenly wide awake. From the expressions on the faces of the others, they were too. Something was wrong.
Amethyst had been lying on her side next to the fire; she sprang to her feat and launched into the air in the shape of an owl. In the darkness her purple color wasn't obvious at all.
She wasn't gone more than a few moments when they heard the sound of people running. She was back almost instantly.
"You all need to get out of here," she said. "There's a group of wizards attacking people and they're coming this way."
"Leave the tent," Mr. Weasley said.
Steven dropped his guitar and reached into his pocket. He handed a set of keys to Harry.
"You guys drive to the woods," he said.
"What about you?" Hermione asked.
"The expansion spell has worn off," Steven said. "And if people are getting hurt I can't stand by and let it happen."
"We're going to help the Ministry," Mr. Weasley said. The older Weasley's all agreed and they were heading in the direction everyone was running from.
There was a flash of light in the distance and Harry could see a group of Faceless wizards coming. They were holding someone aloft in the air.
"Is that Filch?" Ron asked, squinting.
The crowd cheered, and it was a raucous, ugly sound.
Harry clenched the keys in his hands, hoping he remembered everything Steven had told him earlier. Before he could reach the cart, there was a flash of light from one of the wizards in the distance and the cart exploded.
Harry's ears rang.
Lit by their fire, the cart had been too tempting a target.
"To the woods," Hermione said.
Steven had stopped, seeing them in trouble, and his face was obviously twisted with indecision. When he saw that everyone was all right and on their way to the woods, his expression firmed with a new resolve.
Harry ran with the others. He was shoved by an unseen figure, and he could hear children crying as people ran past him.
In the distance he heard the distinctive crack of Amethyst's whip and sudden screams from the group that was hunting them. Harry felt a certain vindictive pleasure in knowing that at least someone was fighting back.
He heard Ron curse beside him as someone shoved him.
Harry grabbed his wand and cast a quick Lumnos. Ron was on the ground, having fallen over a tree root.
Hermione helped him to his feet and Harry let the light from his wand die out. There was no point in attracting attention any more than they absolutely had to.
He was glad they hadn't already gone to bed when this already started. It would have taken time to get dressed and get awake and from what he could see the crowd was thicker behind them than it was ahead of them. He'd have still been half asleep, and that was a state that led to mistakes being made.
They couldn't afford mistakes, not now.
He heard Ron curse again. "I've lost my wand."
Hermione's voice came from the darkness. "Could you have left it back at the camp?"
"It was in my pocket, I swear!" Ron said, his voice sounding thin and panicky.
Harry cursed and he cast a lumnos again. The light from his wand shone brightly even though he tried to make it as dim as he could. In the darkness it made them stand out far more than he would like.
They searched frantically, but the wand wasn't anywhere along the trail. In the light from his wand his friend's faces looked drawn and pale. They were both visibly frightened, and seeing it didn't make him feel at all more brave.
He finally let the light die out. They couldn't afford to leave it on any longer.
"We'll have to look for it in the morning," he said to Ron. Hopefully they'd still be around when morning came.
They set off down the path again. Somehow they'd gotten separated from most of the crowd; taken a turnoff in the darkness or gotten separated from the trail.
The only sound came from behind them and to the right. Harry spun and tried to stare into the darkness, but his night vision had vanished from the light. All he could see was pitch blackness.
"Hello?" he asked softly.
From the blackness they heard a voice speak out loudly and clearly.
"MORSEMORDRE!"
Something vast and green exploded from the darkness behind them, erupting through the canopy of trees and exploding into the sky.
It was a gigantic skull composed of emerald stars, with what looked like a snake protruding from its mouth like a tongue. It rose higher and higher in a blaze of green smoke, blotting out the constellations.
The darkness of the wood was suddenly gone. Everything was illuminated in a sickly green light, and from all around them came the sounds of screaming.
"Who's there," Harry said, his wand held out before him.
Hermione grabbed his arm. "Let's go, Harry!"
"What?" he asked.
"It's the dark mark," she moaned.
They heard the distinctive popping sound of apparition before they'd taken more than a few steps. Harry barely had time to register almost two dozen wands pointed in his direction.
"Duck!" he shouted, pulling Hermione to the ground with him even as the beams of multiple stunners flew by his head.
"Stop!" He recognized Mr. Weasley's voice. "That's my son!"
Ron had been hit by a half dozen stunners, and he was on the ground unconscious.
Mr. Weasley was suddenly beside them. "Harry, Hermione...are you all right?"
He was checking Ron quickly. He visibly relaxed after a moment; apparently Ron would be all right. Harry didn't know what the effect of being hit by multiple stunners at once were, but it didn't sound healthy.
"Which one of you cast the dark mark?" Mr. Crouch's voice cut through the air like a whip. He was striding toward them with a cadre of Ministry aurors at his back. Their wands were still outstretched.
Harry carefully laid his wand on the ground.
"We didn't do anything," he said carefully.
"Don't lie to me! We caught you at the scene of the crime!"
"They're just kids," one of the auror's muttered.
"You can check our wands," Harry said. "We didn't have anything to do with this."
"Did you see where the spell was cast from?" Mr. Weasley asked.
Harry nodded and pointed.
There was a mighty flapping of wings and the aurors turned their wands upward as a massive shape dropped toward them.
"It's just us, guys,' Steven said.
Amethyst had taken the form of a great bird and was carrying Steven in her claws. "You guys could have waited up a little. Not everybody can just warp wherever they go."
The aurors relaxed after a moment.
"We might have gotten one of them," Cedric Diggory's father said, turning to Mr. Weasley. "There were a lot of stunners pointed in that direction."
The aurors spread out and moved toward the grove with a grim sense of determination.
A moment later, Mr. Diggory returned with a small figure limp in his arms. It was Winky, Mr. Crouch's house elf.
"She had a wand," he said quietly.
As the man came forward, Harry couldn't help but stare. He glanced down at the fallen figure of his friend, and he felt his heart drop into his stomach.
The wand Mr. Diggory was holding looked exactly like Ron's wand.