Chapter Twenty Six
Pansy scooped up water in two large buckets and brushed her hair back behind her ears. It wasn't a long walk to the stream they used for washing clothes thankfully, and William and Cho tended to get the fresh water for them all as they were more stable on their brooms.
Plus this was the last two buckets needed, most of their clothes were already strung up between the nearby trees around their camp drying in the mid-October sunshine. They were already making new clothes for themselves, their muggle and modern clothes weren't holding up to the rough washing and being rung out. However Pansy and Cho's practise with embroidery was struggling to cross over into sewing.
Pansy was wondering if it would be safe to sneak off to the lake later and have a swim. It wasn't cold cold yet and she just wanted to just float for a bit, showers and the small tub they had were no replacement for the baths she was used to that were closer to swimming pools. The lake stretched down to just over half a mile away from them, she wouldn't be anywhere near Hogwarts or Hogsmead really.
It was something to think about she decided, grabbing the bucket handles and trying to walk back to camp without spilling any, something she wasn't very good at. The solid handles of the buckets made them swing with even the smallest of movements.
Pansy grumbled as she slipped on a root, causing a big splash of water up her skirt. She was too busy being annoyed at having to dry out her skirt, having only put it on clean that morning, to notice she'd gone slightly off their normal path back to the camp.
There was a sickening snap.
Pansy felt something clamp tightly around her ankle, the buckets left her hands and she was dragged into the air. It couldn't of taken more than a few seconds but it felt like she was moving in slow motion. She was thrown into the air by her ankle, barely missing hitting her head off the floor.
She felt her breath gasping in her chest as she tried to think, something that wasn't easy with blood rushing to her head.
"Help!" She screamed, the sound coming out harsh and brittle, half of the cry caught in her throat.
The pain in her ankle getting worse as it supported all of her weight from what looked like a thick rope made from ivy vines.
Any sound around her was muffled in the trees, and her thick skirt as it kept falling over her face. She tried not to panic as the lack of noise only made her feel more cut off from the world than hanging helplessly upside down would of normally done.
"Oh 'wear trousers Pansy, they're much more practical. No William, you know I'm much more of a skirt girl!' Why did I have to wear you today?!" Pansy moaned, smacking her skirt in frustration as it flopped over her face again, her arms aching in their sockets as she tired to hold the heavy fabric out the way.
She reached rather fruitlessly for the rope. It had seemed like it would have been easier in her head, in reality it was going to be impossible. Her heart was hammering in her throat and thinking was becoming even more difficult. Her shoes had fallen off as she flew into the air,and from her flailing around, making her feel even more helpless.
"Who's there?" Pansy said, her panic growing.
No one answered, but she could hear someone, or someones moving around her, leaves crunching softly.
"William?" Pansy called, fighting to keep her skirt off her face, "Cho?"
There was an intense pain in the back of her head and everything went black.
Pansy woke up no longer dangling from a tree, something that she was hugely grateful for. There was still a deep, sharp pain in the back of her head, however, which had left her feeling slightly sick. She was also blindfolded with her hands bound behind her back.
Still, her feet seemed free though, which was an improvement.
She struggled to her feet, not as easy as it would have been had her hands been free to help her. Her mother had made her practice getting up and down without using her hands, she said it improved her balance and poise. Pansy wasn't sure how much good it had done back then but it certainly came in useful just now.
One step however had Pansy falling back over as pain shot through her ankle and the joint wobbled sickeningly.
"Ok… that's not going to work." Pansy said, unclenching her teeth and taking several deep breaths.
She felt around herself, trying to work out where on earth she could be. She was on a surprisingly dry, packed dirt floor, and wherever she was was warmer than the rest of the forest had been, either that or the head injury had destroyed her inner thermometer.
With some difficulty, and falling over twice more, Pansy managed to bend herself enough to get her hands in front of her.
She pulled off the blindfold, taking a good few strands of hair with it, and saw she was in a house, a roughly built house with no windows, just a hanging lamp from the centre celling beam, but still a house.
Pansy crawled towards the door. It was made from solid wood and unfortunately locked. Pansy shoved repeatedly against the door, feeling her shoulder bruise as the door finally gave way for her.
She paused as a large group of centaurs turned to face her, standing up slowly. They were armed but none of them reached for their weapons, seeming more confused than anything about Pansy sitting in the door way.
"What…" Pansy froze, every story about centaurs she'd ever read flashing through her head, doing nothing to make her feel any calmer.
"I told you they had been snooping around our forest." A dark chestnut centaur spat, glaring at Pansy.
"We have not." Pansy spat back, flicking her hair haughtily, "We're camping outside the forest… just."
"You do not think that wizards like you have not taken enough?" A black centaur snapped, "You must creep in on our lands even further?"
Pansy forced herself not to roll her eyes or shout back; having a shouting match wasn't going to help right now. She was unarmed and still tied up, she was going to need their help to get back to her friends.
"We're not meaning to." Pansy said honestly, "As I'm sure you know, things are very complicated right now for wizards, we're just trying to do our part. My friends and I are going without our magic to-"
There was a loud rustle nearby as someone ran frantically towards them.
William had just been bringing that day's fresh water back, while Cho checked on the laundry when they'd heard the scream.
Cho called for William and they raced into the forest just in time to see a small group of centaurs carrying Pansy off, deeper into the trees.
"What the hell do we do?" William yelled, feeling his world crashing down around him.
"Wands…" Cho said, running her hands through her hair, "I need to get my wand."
"I'm going after Pansy." William said, starting after the centaurs.
"No!" Cho shouted, grabbing his arm, "Don't be an idiot! You'll need me to watch your back now come on!"
They raced back to the tents and grabbed Cho's wand before heading back to the forest. It took them a while to find the trail, and then even longer to actually follow it.
"I told you we should of gone right." William hissed as they scrabbled over yet another tree.
"Well I'm sorry!" Cho hissed back, rolling her eyes, "It's not like they taught tracking at Hogwarts!"
"There are houses there." William said, stopping suddenly, causing Cho to crash into the back of him, "Like proper houses."
"What? In the forest?" Cho looked where he was pointing, pulling a low hanging branch out of the way, "That's amazing. But there's no way we're going to be able to sneak through there, we'll just have to run for it, try and rush them."
William nodded and counted down from five. They burst through the trees, wands at the ready.
It took a few moments for Pansy's brain to catch up, seeing Cho and William bursting through the trees.
"Wait! Stop!" Pansy called quickly, putting up her still bound hands, "Please, put your wands down."
She wasn't sure it was the right thing to do, but she could see the centaurs reaching for weapons and the last thing they needed was to hurt one another.
Slowly, Cho and William lowered their wands slightly, looking around in confusion.
"Pansy are you hurt?" William asked, not taking his eyes of the centaurs, which weren't taking their eyes off him.
"My ankle is killing me but otherwise I'm good." Pansy shrugged, lowering her hands, "I'm glad to see you…"
"What do you think you're doing kidnapping people?" Cho demanded, "Pansy wasn't doing anything to hurt you!"
"We have the right to put defences around our home!" one of them snapped back, angrily.
"We must of walked two miles to get here from where you set the trap." William pointed out, "At least!"
"It doesn't matter." Pansy said, her panic over this ending up in an all out brawl only rising.
"There are more?" an elegant female centaur asked, walking between the humans and the other centaurs, looking around worriedly at her clan, "I thought we only had one human?"
Pansy gave her an awkward wave, "That would be me."
"I brought you a poultice, for your ankle?" she said, holding up a pretty wooden bowl.
"Is it safe?" Cho asked.
"Of course." the centaur smiled, giving Cho a laugh of confusion.
"Ooo that feels so good." Pansy said, as the centaur wrapped a soft, slightly damp and sweet smelling bandage around her swollen ankle, "I'm Pansy, by the way, what's your name?"
"Titania." the female centaur smiled, "I'm glad it's helping."
"Titania leave it alone." One of the other centaurs snapped, "The humans can not be trusted, how many times must we tell you this?"
"Bane is correct Titania, plus you'll catch something." another sneered.
"Rude." Pansy snapped, "You're not going to catch anything from me, or us! Just like we won't catch anything from you."
Titania gave Pansy an awkward wave and left her sitting on the ground.
"You need to leave the forest." Bane said angrily, "You have no right to be here."
"Yes, we do!" Cho snapped, "We're living without magic in tents! We've not even seen you until you kidnapped Pansy!"
The centaurs looked angrily at them, "All wizards are the same; you all rejoice at the Ministry stealing our lands."
"Yes!" William snapped, "We're just loving living in a tent, cut off from everything and everyone because we're happy with that's going on with the Ministry right now! For gods' sake!"
"Well why are you here, foals?" a red haired centaur asked, raising a hand to stop Bane from interrupting.
"We are fighting the Ministry." Cho said frankly, "Us, and our friends, we're trying to stop those who are stealing your lands and making a lot of other changes that are effecting loads of us."
"It's not just you that is being hurt by the Ministry." Pansy added, "We have friends who are no longer allowed to go to school or live out in the open just because of who they are, or who their parents are. One of our friend's sister is a werewolf and the Ministry says she can be killed on sight! She is eight years old! But we're trying. We're sorry, really sorry, if you think that we're getting in your way or something…"
"But we can't stop." William sighed, "This is it, this is our lives for the foreseeable future, so we can do everything we can to stop the Ministry. This is bigger than you are, bigger than we are, than all of us."
Bane looked angrily between the William, Cho and Pansy, "Unbind the girl. Take their wands and lock them all back in the store room. We have much to discuss."
William and Cho didn't argue as they handed over their wands. They knew full well they would have lost any fight they tried to pick. The best thing to do right now was just play along.
William flinched as a pure white centaur cut the ropes from Pansy's wrists with a very sharp looking knife.
The white centaur shoved them, rather roughly, into the hut that Pansy had woken up in.
"You OK?" Cho asked Pansy, giving her a hug.
Pansy nodded, "Yeah. I'm very glad to have circulation back in my fingers."
"Did they hurt you?" William asked, wrapping his arms tightly around Pansy.
Pansy smiled and shook her head, "No. My ankle feels a little sore still but whatever it was Titania put on really helped. The rest of it is just bruises and damaged pride, nothing I won't survive."
"Do we think they're going to just let us go?" Cho asked, "That they'll be happy for us to continue when they went out of their way to attack us in the first place?"
"Centaurs are very strange creatures." William said, "They live half in the future and forty-nine percent in the past. Firenze was… interesting as a teacher."
"Yes and the rest of the herd kicked him out for daring to be around humans!" Cho pointed out, more loudly than she wanted to, looking worriedly at the door, "Literally kicked, he was bruised for weeks!"
"Calm down." Pansy said "Look, there's nothing we can do about it right now. Either they'll leave us alone, or kick us from the forest and we'll find somewhere else to stay but panicking isn't going to help. If they wanted to hurt us, I doubt they would have healed my ankle or waited this long to do so."
"You're right." Cho said, taking a deep breath and shaking her head, "Sorry, I got freaked out for a second, I don't like feeling trapped. I belong in the air, not… boxed in."
A few hours later a handsome chestnut centaur unlocked the door, handing them a large tray of food and a jug of mead before locking the door behind him again.
They slept in shifts, Cho couldn't sleep anyway, so let Pansy and William sleep, curled up in a corner together, for a couple of hours longer than her shift. She could see the light begin to rise enough to filter through the trees and in through the crack at the bottom of the door.
"It's been overnight! How long do you think it's OK to keep someone?" William snapped, when the door finally opened.
"There has been much for us to consider." Bane said calmly, although still glaring at the three of them, "You will come with me."
Pansy, Cho and William obeyed, following Bane into a large group of centaurs sitting in a large horse shoe shape.
"Sit." Bane ordered them, taking his place amongst his fellow centaurs.
Pansy smoothed her skirt under herself as she sat down, the bottoms of her feet were now coated in dirt having been barefoot for over a day.
"We can not help you." one of the centaurs said solemnly. She was very old with greying hair and a face covered in wrinkles. The others seemed to look up to her, and she was clearly in charge.
"What do you mean?" Pansy asked nicely, "We never asked you to help us."
"We study the stars, and there are many things that must pass, threads that must be taken in this very forest, before we would be permitted to have an effect on the passings of events." the old centaur said, smiling at her with slightly milky eyes.
Pansy looked worriedly to William and Cho, who gave her equally confused look back.
"Ok…" Pansy said slowly, "I more meant… we need to be here, just by the forest's edge. Is that going to be an issue?"
"We understand you have your… reasons for not helping but are you going to stop us from doing our part?" Cho asked more directly.
The old centaur frowned, looking up to the sky for a moment, "No… times are… confusing and there is much that must be done, much that must happen."
"We're not going to get in your way or anything." William assured them, "We'll just use the stream and live in our tents which are outside the forest anyway. I doubt we'd ever have met if your traps hadn't… been placed where they were."
"You live in tents?" another female centaur that looked like an older version of Titania asked, "But you will freeze!"
"We have the best tents there are." Pansy said, feeling strangely insulted.
"We must talk." the female centaur said to the others.
Pansy rolled her eyes so hard she thought she might be able to see the back of her skull as they were marched back into the hut.
Thankfully it was only nightfall this time when they were once again summoned to be spoken to, all of them feeling achy from the hard, dirt floors. Cho was also starting to struggle from lack of sleep.
Bane wasn't the one who came to get them this time, instead he was sitting in the horse shoe of centaurs looking furious, as were several of the others.
Pansy sat down again on the now very cold ground and waited for them to speak.
"You can not live in tents, winter is near and you will not have the shelter you need." the old centaur declared.
"We can't leave." Pansy said quickly, tears prickling in her eyes from the frustration of it all, "We have to be here to help!"
The old centaur raised his hand to silence her, "We know. Some of us have agreed to help you, to show you how to build houses and learn to defend yourselves against the many dangers of the forest. We have also agreed that we will not move our traps into your way any longer. You will be safe from us as long as you stay at the edge of the forest, and into the steam where you gather water."
Pansy couldn't believe their luck, neither could William or Cho.
"We're so grateful. Any help you can give us will be amazing. Truly." William beamed.
"Why would you help us?" Cho asked, before cursing herself for possibly making them change their minds.
The old centaur looked sadly at her, "As we said, there is many things that must pass and not all of them will be easy. We should be honoured to help where we can."