Chapter 11 : The beast from the moon
Akira was looking forward to Friday. Not because it was the last day of the week or because it was a harbinger of the weekend or because Arcturus would have finally returned the bulky pile of books that he had borrowed from the library, but because it was that day that she would discover Remus' secret.
It wasn't really fair to spy on him in his back to find out but Akira was already used to act like a traitor, with her clone stationed in Dumbledore's chimney night and day to gather interesting information to pass on to Voldemort. She especially needed a break from this mission, because monitoring the Headmaster and his followers with a clone almost twenty-four hours a day was exhausting as it was sending a lot of data into her brain and needed to be replaced constantly after it disappeared.
Also, Akira wasn't alone to reach the Grounds in the middle of the night to discover what Remus was hiding from everyone. Severus was theoretically also coming as he was the one who got officially invited by James and Sirius to find out. So she wasn't doing anything wrong.
There was just one more problem and that involved leaving the castle in the middle of the night. Akira had already done this many times in the past but this year, after behaving like an out of control student, she had a close guard at her side so that she wouldn't do anything forbidden again.
Tolfius who was regularly at Hogwarts to discuss about the Order of the Phoenix with Dumbledore was probably still following her in the hallways, even though she hadn't spotted a weasel in the surroundings after she sneaked away from the castle during the Christmas holidays.
Anyway, with Arcturus around, she didn't need anyone else to keep an eye on her. Even his huge pile of reading to finish before the end of the week didn't convince him to leave her alone for a bit. He was just reading while walking around with her, resulting in numerous collisions and other accidents such as running into a wall or falling down a flight of stairs.
It was a true miracle that Arcturus was still alive day after day with this clumsiness that earned him several bruises. Akira even found herself wishing on several occasions that he would end up in the Hospital Wing so that she would get some time far away from him. However, every time that this awful idea crossed her mind when he was about to get badly injured, she put it aside and kept himself from getting hurt.
"Thank you." Arcturus told her for at least the fortieth time that day in a dreamy tone without taking his eyes off his book.
Indeed, she had just made him take a sharp turn before he collided with the wall that was facing them as they were both going to the Charms classroom.
"It's finally Friday." She pointed out to him while grabbing his arm again to make him turn into the hallway where the room was. "It's great, isn't it ?"
She waited for a comment as all the students around them were excited to finally begin the weekend but nothing came so she continued.
"You'll finally be free from your reading. You must be relieved after having done this night and day during the whole week."
Again, no response as she made him avoid the Grey Lady who then stared at him with an offended look.
"What colour do you think Flitwick's hair will be today, after the blue one from last week ?" She ended up asking at him with exasperation.
"I don't know. Pink perhaps." Arcturus finally replied.
"You're listening to me but you don't make the effort to reply, unless I'm saying some nonsense." She told him while shaking her head with disbelief. "At least, have you finished reading everything before the deadline set by Pince ?"
"Not everything but I'm not in a hurry. Let me finish first this chapter on power switches."
"Power switches ?" Akira repeated before lifting his book to see the title on its cover. "Are you still reading the one about electricity ? But it was your first book. I thought that you finished it a long time ago."
"I did. I just like looking again at the pictures." Arcturus replied in a cheerful tone like a kid.
He then showed her the detailed schema of a switch and the wires that were in the wall allowing the light to be turned on or off.
"Except that if you still have books to finish, maybe it's better to get on with them, don't you think ?" Akira tried to warn him.
"I wonder if we've switches in the Muggle Studies classroom." Arcturus said out loud while failing to listen to her advice.
Akira didn't respond. She just rolled her eyes while Arcturus got lost in his book again to the point of jostling his classmates who were waiting in line in front of the Charms room until they could enter, making them all fall like dominoes which earned him many complaints.
As for Akira, she managed to find a solution to sneak away during the night without anyone noticing. Indeed, she simply had to take the same path as her clone, namely the window of her dormitory since nobody ever spotted it as far as she knew. And from there, she could reach the Grounds and then the Whomping Willow easily, press on one of its roots like Sirius had explained to Severus and venture into the tunnel that would appear. Piece of cake for a trained ninja like her. Now, she just had to wait for the night to finally come. She would probably bump into Severus on the way as they were both going to the same place to discover the same thing but since the latter had always been on her side, they wouldn't put each other in trouble.
Akira didn't worry too much about this expedition. At best, she discreetly looked around for Remus in the Gryffindor common room where all the students were gathered for the evening as it was almost time to go to bed. And when she spotted the latter leaving on tiptoe the room after saying goodbye to James, Sirius and Peter, she acted as if nothing happened. But she couldn't help keeping an eye on James and Sirius to the point of thinking that she had seen Sirius nudging James knowingly. However, she was abruptly brought back from her spying to push her chair away from the table on which Arcturus had accidentally spilled his entire bottle of ink as he was trying to copy on a parchment the images that were fascinating him so much from his book about electricity.
"Oops. Do you think that Pince will notice this ink stain ?" He asked Akira while lifting this book with his fingertips as ink was dripping from it.
"No. No more than the nose in the middle of the face." She replied with sarcasm while contemplating the disaster.
"I'll clean it anyway." Arcturus added while taking his magic wand to cast a cleaning spell that he was using almost daily since he was used to spill a lot of things.
When Akira wished him good night, he was still focused on his drawings for which he didn't have much talent but seemed to have fun doing them anyway. She went to sleep like many Gryffindor students as it was getting late and to avoid raising any suspicion, she put on her pyjamas, slipped into her bed and closed her eyes until around one o'clock in the morning when all the girls from her dormitory were fast asleep.
While it had been almost twenty minutes that Akira had heard nothing but the calm and regular breathing of her colleagues, she decided to get up discreetly and dress warmly as it was still relatively cold outside in this month of March. She then approached the window of the room and opened it while making as little noise as possible. Like for the clones that she was sending to spy on Dumbledore, she got out in the windy and icy night by walking on the facade of the castle once she put some chakra under her feet. And before waking anyone up with the bitter cold, she quickly closed the window behind her.
For the moment, Akira didn't encounter any issues so she pushed her luck by peeking out of the window overlooking the common room from where there was still light. She found Arcturus in that room and contrary to his habit, he wasn't sleeping deeply even if it was already late, at least later than his usual bed time. From what she could see, he was reading the last book that he borrowed at the library to be able to succeed in the challenge that Madam Pince had set for him. However, he wasn't very concentrated on his reading as he was frequently scrutinizing a square parchment put next to his book and on which something was drawn. He even got perplex after giving it a quick look, which made him scan the empty common room as if he was searching for something.
But Akira didn't have time to find out why he was behaving like that. She had her own mystery to solve, and she should better keep going if she didn't want to be spotted walking along the wall in the middle of the night. She went straight towards the Grounds and once she put her feet on the frosted grass, she made sure that she was alone thanks to the rays of the moon which were lighting up the area like in bright day light. It allowed her to recognize the Whomping Willow which was swinging slowly in the icy wind and she went towards it while making sure that no one was present in the surroundings.
"Okay, now I have to find the root on which to press to immobilize that damn tree as Sirius mentioned." Akira thought once she reached the level of the Whomping Willow.
She was staying at a safe distance from it to not get hit by one of its threatening branches on the head and be knocked out cold. It allowed her to examine the tree and find a way to proceed. There weren't many options. For a ninja like her, she just had to use her skills to get near the trunk without a scratch. She started by running, ducking to avoid a bad blow, jumping to avoid a branch that wanted to sweep her legs away, sneaking left and right to finally reach the base of the Whomping Willow. She then didn't hesitate to crush its roots with the heel of her shoe for all the hit that it had given to her but it was only on the third try that she found the correct root which made the whole tree stop like a statue.
"Cool ! I'm sure that more than one student would like to know this trick." She thought excitedly as she was walking around the trunk without being bothered any longer by its branches.
She easily found the entrance of a tunnel dug under the tree. The latter was vaguely familiar to her and for good reason as she slowly remembered having been dragged into this passage last year by a group of apprentice Death Eaters who had wanted to kill her in the Shrieking Shack. She didn't realize until then that it was where James and Sirius wanted to send Severus to discover Remus' secret. She didn't know what this place had to do with it but she wanted to find out as she lit the tunnel with her magic wand to venture there.
Despite the fact that it was deserted and only rustling sounds coming from the Grounds were reaching Akira, she remained on her guard as she moved slowly and quietly through the passage. She ended up seeing the end of it in the form of a trapdoor through which some light was passing. And right above her head, muffled noises that were moving constantly could be heard before fading and then starting again. She had difficulty telling what it could be, so she decided to open the trapdoor to find out.
"Hi !" A joyful voice suddenly called out from behind her which made her jump and drop the trapdoor right on her head.
With her ninja abilities, she would have noticed that a person had also ventured into the tunnel but being too focused on what was happening on the other side of the trapdoor, she had let herself be caught off guard. Luckily, it was just Arcturus who was coming towards her with a big smile on his face even though he was tripping over every root that was sticking out from the soil floor.
"What are you doing here ?" Akira asked dryly while rubbing her head where the trapdoor had hit it.
"I simply followed you. To make sure that you don't get yourself into trouble as usual. And now, it's my turn to ask you a question. What are you doing here ?"
"I came to check something." She answered vaguely. "How did you know where I was ? I made sure that nobody saw me leaving the castle."
"I think it's about time that I reveal to you the system that I put in place to follow your track." Arcturus advised her while taking out a parchment folded in four from his pocket.
He hastened to unfold it clumsily and handed it to Akira who grabbed one side before illuminating it with her magic wand while Arcturus was still holding the other side. She saw on the parchment a rough drawn plan of the rooms on the seventh floor as well as the Grounds surrounding the castle. In the latter, next to the Whomping Willow sketch, her name was appearing which intrigued her as it was the only name on the map.
"Sirius asked me for some help during the last summer holidays to find a way to track people around the school. So I did research in some books and I found one talking about dipping a map of the area for which we are interested into a very complicated potion which would reveal the name and the position of the person. I thought in the first place that it was silly to follow people around with this method but when you gave me some issue by disappearing constantly to get in troubles, I decided to give it a try and it worked ! At least for your position, I don't know yet how to display on the map more than one person. That's thanks to my potion maker skills." He added proudly before clearing his throat to pursue his story. "I regularly check your location to make sure that you haven't wandered off where you shouldn't and this night, as I was staying up late to finish my reading, I spotted your name in the common room which was strange since I was the only one around. Anyway, your name went from floor to floor and I followed it until I ended up in the Grounds and then in this tunnel below the Whomping Willow which I was lucky enough to find perfectly still."
"Yes, really lucky." Akira mumbled while hitting her face with the palm of her hand with despair as Arcturus presence was the last thing she wanted.
Especially when they both heard a huge noise just above them as if something heavy had fallen to the ground.
"Speaking of which, why are we here ?" Arcturus asked her in a small voice while staring at the ceiling with a worried look.
"You're obviously here to follow me and I'm here to discover a secret." Akira replied as she was turning her attention towards the trapdoor that she wanted to open.
"A secret ? What secret ?" Arcturus asked with interest.
"That's what I'm trying to find out." Akira answered while carefully lifting the trapdoor again.
She peeked through the opening and seeing that nothing was moving on the ground floor of the Shrieking Shack – whose state seemed to deteriorate over the years – she ventured in without making the slightest noise.
"A little help ?" Arcturus asked her in a whisper as he was trying to follow her out of the hole.
He was using both his arms to get out but since they were really weak, he was struggling to extricate himself from the hole. Therefore, he stretched out a hand towards Akira to get her help but the latter didn't take it.
"No. You stay hidden in this tunnel while I search the place." She told him before tiptoeing towards the stairs.
"Thanks for nothing. Then, I'll manage on my own." Arcturus added annoyingly while continuing to struggle to get out from his trap.
Akira was about to tell him to give up and just wait for her to come back but at the same time, scratching coming from the last floor caught her attention. She had to quickly find out what it was so that she could get out of this gloomy place even faster.
Akira began to climb the stairs, leaving Arcturus alone - even if he begged her to stay - to follow the source of the scratchings which were occurring continuously. Grunts were soon added to these when she reached the stairs leading to the second and last floor.
She started to climb the steps very slowly before stopping when she saw something moving in the bedroom that was occupying this floor. Something covered with thick fur that was walking on its four limbs, scraping its claws on the floor and emitting growls like thunder from its muzzle containing long fangs. There was no doubt, it was a wolf that seemed particularly agitated as it was walking in circles around the room, occasionally scratching the shabby bed or the walls with pure anger.
The wolf was also scanning the area with a vivid gaze and when it shifted its attention towards the wide open door of the room, Akira was afraid that it would spot her so she threw herself back to avoid being seen. She thought that she could catch herself quickly to not fall backwards by putting a foot on the step below but by doing so in a hurry, she managed to make the latter step creak. The noise was light compared to the grunts produced by the wolf, but it didn't escape to the latter's sharp ears, as well as her scent as she heard it sniffing with insistence.
Akira – who no longer had the wolf in her field of vision – knew that she had been spotted when the sounds of the beast's footsteps moved towards the door frame, revealing the wolf at the top of the stairs on which she was still standing. The beast seemed furious to see this intruder, showing its sharp fangs while glaring at her with a murderous gaze. And in a split second, it folded its limbs before lunging at her with its mouth wide open. Akira managed to avoid this attack by throwing herself face down on the steps, causing the wolf to miss its target and crash at the foot of the stairs. However, it got up without the slightest difficulty and launched a new attack on its victim who wouldn't give up so easily.
In an attempt to get away from the enraged wolf, Akira jumped over the railing of the stairs before the wolf's mouth reached her leg and she landed on the ground of the first floor with a roll. The wolf followed her by simply jumping over the railing as well, forcing Akira to flee as it was clinging to her. If she wanted this mishap to not end in a bloodbath, she had to leave the Shrieking Shack immediately. Alone, it wouldn't have been too complicated. She would have to simply go through a window on the second floor while hoping that the wolf wouldn't jump from this height. But she remembered that she was accompanied against her will when she heard Arcturus' voice coming from the ground floor.
"What's wrong ?" The latter asked worriedly. "What did you find up there ?"
"Nothing, just keep quiet !" Akira threw at him harshly as the wolf finally managed to get its hands – rather its paws – on her.
It had jumped on her and was now crushing her on the ground. Akira tried to keep its muzzle full with sharp teeth away by using her both hands but it didn't help that the wolf was lacerating every part of her body with its claws. She was in a bad shape but she still managed to find some strength to put her foot on the wolf's stomach before throwing it far away from her. It collided with the wall right next to the staircase leading to the ground floor and collapsed on the ground as it had been stunned by this sudden attack.
"Hey, I'm still stuck in the hole so tell me what's happening !" Arcturus insisted while Akira was getting back on her feet with difficulty.
This comment woke up the wolf which shook its head several times before turning its attention to the direction from which this voice was coming.
"Oh no. Stay focused on me." Akira thought as she began to sincerely fear for her colleague's life, making her completely forget about her own bleeding injuries.
To get the attention of the wolf back, she grabbed an old book that was lying on the ground next to her position and she promptly threw it at her enemy to distract it.
But the wolf had already set off in pursuit of its second meal, and the book never reached it. The beast rushed to the ground floor, Akira on its heels, and they both found Arcturus who was trying his best with his both arms and one of his leg to extricate himself from the tunnel. However, he immediately froze and displayed a look of terror when he saw the beast that had just arrived at his level.
"AAAAAH ! A WEREWOLF !" He shouted before trying to fall back into the tunnel as he didn't want to leave it anymore.
His clumsiness didn't help, and panic also prevented him from succeeding. He simply staid stuck in the opening and the wolf – or rather the werewolf as Arcturus called it because Akira couldn't spot the difference between the two – had every chance to catch him successfully, unlike Akira's case as the latter had been far too combative for it. It was what Akira feared, and she wouldn't let anything happen to Arcturus under her watch.
So when the werewolf lunged at Arcturus with the intent to catch the arm of the latter in its muzzle, Akira didn't hesitate to jump into the air, put both feet on the ceiling and then propel herself towards the ground with high speed. One of her hands landed directly on the muzzle of the werewolf from above, closing it in the process when it was only a few centimeters away from Arcturus, and the other hand was used to tackle its body on the ground to prevent it from moving.
Akira was holding the werewolf pinned on the floor but the latter's strength and urge to kill were too much for her. She couldn't hold it like that indefinitely, so she had to get Arcturus out of there before releasing the beast. Since her hands were both occupied, she used one of her legs to kick Arcturus and make him fall in the hole. The latter – still petrified with terror – grunted when he received the hit before shouting when he finally fell backwards into the tunnel.
Akira sighed with relief when Arcturus was finally out of danger – if the werewolf didn't decide to venture into this dark place to go get him – but this brief moment of carelessness made her release her grip on the beast. The latter took that opportunity to free itself – sending Akira harshly on the ground – before jumping on her. Akira got hurt at the arm in the fight that followed and being unable to get rid of that ferocious beast that was making its fangs clicking near her limbs, she simply approached the trapdoor the best she could before letting herself fall head first in the hole.
"Stupefy !" She heard Arcturus exclaimed in panic as a red light hit the werewolf in the head that it had put in the opening in an attempt to catch its two victims.
The spell was sufficient to get the beast away from the trapdoor, allowing Akira to quickly grab it once she got back on her two feet in order to close it behind them. They heard the werewolf angrily scratching the floor above their heads but being unable to open the trapdoor on its own, Akira and Arcturus could catch their breath as they were both relieved to still be alive after such an encounter. At least until Arcturus got really worried about Akira's awful state.
"Did the werewolf bite you ?" He asked her fearfully while lighting the tunnel with his wand to take a closer look at her injuries even if he didn't like the sight of blood.
"I don't think so." Akira answered while scanning her bleeding wounds.
To tell the truth, she wasn't so sure about it as her fight with the werewolf had been so chaotic that she didn't really remember everything that happened during it.
"Are you sure ? Because only… a small bite from these creatures and… you can become a werewolf… yourself at every full moon." He advised her as he was beginning to shake uncontrollably with fear at this possibility while looking close to tears.
"Listen, I've some bruises and scrapes but otherwise I'm fine." She replied in an attempt to reassure him.
But when she put her eyes on her right arm which was a completely mess covered with blood and open wounds, she wasn't so sure about it. She might have eventually received a bite among all the injuries caused by the claws of the beast. But she was sure of nothing.
"We should better leave this place before we become a snack for that werewolf." She added while putting her left hand on her right arm in order to cover its several injuries.
"Yes, for the Hospital Wing." Arcturus said as they both followed the tunnel in the opposite direction from the Shrieking Shack. "Madam Pomfrey… could then get a look at you."
"As I said, it's only scratches. No need to reveal to anyone that we were wandering in the Shrieking Shack when everyone was sleeping." Akira replied while thinking about healing her wounds herself with her chakra even though she didn't know yet what she could do about a bite that would transform her into the ferocious beast that they just encountered.
Hello dear readers,
Wow, this chapter wasn't supposed to take such a dark turn at the end but I like it that way. I especially wanted to make Akira struggle against the werewolf as it's a beast depicted as attacking humans very violently. So all her ninja knowledge couldn't prevent her from being badly injured by this unpredictable werewolf, particularly if it didn't take Wolfsbane Potion before the transformation as it didn't exist at that time.
Let's hope that Akira will heal completely in the following chapter that will be published at the end of the month. And without lycanthropy, otherwise James and Sirius will have to explain themselves for the reason why they sent Severus facing such a beast. I think that they'll still have to explain what crossed their mind to Akira who won't let go these two troublemakers that almost killed her and her best friend with their prank.