Hazel followed Harry as he stormed through Little Whinging. He was walking so fast that she was nearly jogging to keep up with him. There was clearly no destination in mind as he kept taking random turns, left then left then right, not heading anywhere important.
She didn't dare break the silence. The anger was still pounding in her chest like a second heartbeat. What if he blew her up like a balloon as well? And that look he had given Uncle Vernon…Harry had never looked like that, ever. It just wasn't him.
He stopped at last and sat on a low wall in Oakview Crescent. They were well away from Privet Drive now, practically on the other side of town. She hesitated and sat down beside him. He put his head in his hands, barely lit by the nearby streetlamp. The pulsing of anger was starting to fade away.
She bit her lip; her mouth was very dry.
"Harry?" She tried.
He didn't answer.
"Are you okay?" It was the stupidest question in the world, but she couldn't think of anything else to ask.
There was another long silence before…
"I'm in so much trouble," he said at last.
"No, you're not," she said it automatically.
"Is Aunt Marge okay?"
She bit her lip again. How could she tell him that the last they'd seen of Aunt Marge was her floating away over Privet Drive in the breeze?
"She will be," That would do, "I've seen Madam Pomfrey fix worse at Hogwarts."
"Hogwarts," Harry pulled at his messy black hair, and she felt a horrible pang of fear, "I'm going to be expelled for sure."
She hadn't thought of that. It was just last summer that the Ministry had warned him about doing magic in front of muggles. But it wasn't even him who'd done it! It had been a house elf trying to stop him going back to Hogwarts. The Ministry couldn't expel him for this!
She wouldn't let them!
"I'll tell them I did it," She said, "I've not gotten a warning yet."
"No," Harry shook his head, "You're not putting your place in Hogwarts at risk for me."
"But-"
"I did it. I'll take responsibility."
"But that's not fair!"
"I shouldn't have lost my temper, but the things she was saying…" Harry looked up at the stars, "I just couldn't take it anymore."
"I know," She rested her head against his shoulder and shivered. It might have been the middle of summer, but the breeze was quite chilly, and she was only wearing a t-shirt.
They sat for a while before Harry gently stood up, "We need to go, or we'll have the police here in a minute wondering asking why we're out in our slippers."
"Would they arrest us?"
"Much worse. They'd bring us back to Privet Drive."
Hazel's skin crawled at the very idea. But where was there to go? They had no muggle money to get to London, so Diagon Alley was out. Goodness knew where Hogwarts was, even if they had a way to travel there. They couldn't even ask for help; the Weasleys were in Egypt, Colin and Hermione were in France and Atia had fallen off the face of the earth. Not to mention they had no Hedwig to get in touch with any of them anyway. Brilliant.
"Any ideas?" She asked, finally.
"Not yet."
"We should get off the street anyway. We could go down to the park, climb over that broken gate? We can think about what we can do from there."
"Yeah, good idea," Harry turned to look at her.
And froze on the spot. His eyes were wide behind his glasses, and she felt a sharp stab of fear.
"What?" It was a narrow alleyway between two houses. It was dark and creepy, sure, but there was nothing there.
"I saw something."
"A cat, maybe?" The fear wasn't going.
"It was bigger than that. Way bigger," He pulled his wand out of his pocket, "Get your wand ready."
"I don't have it."
"How can you not have it?" He hissed.
"I didn't exactly have a chance to pack!"
"Get behind me!" He pointed his wand at the alleyway, "Lumos!"
There was nothing in the brightened alleyway.
"Maybe it was just a trick of the lig-"
The words died in her throat. The very edge of the light fell on a shape, shrouded in darkness. It was huge!
Crack!
Harry yelled and jumped. Hazel cried out as he stood on her slipper and they tumbled to the pavement in a tangle of limbs.
Harry's wand landed at the feet of a woman dressed in a dark suit. She couldn't be that old, but her face was lined like Mrs Figg's, and her greying hair was tied up in a severe bun.
Hazel's stomach lurched uncomfortably. How did they explain the glowing stick lying at her feet? But she didn't seem to have noticed. She was glaring down at the pile of Potters on the pavement.
Wait, was she carrying a wand as well?
"Are you hurt?" She asked in a clipped tone as she helped Harry up.
"No," Harry reached out a hand for Hazel, "Who ar-"
"You're bloody fools, the pair of you!" She snapped and Harry and Hazel jumped, "Do you have any sense at all?"
"What?" Harry said stupidly.
"What in the blazes were you thinking, walking around on your own at night?"
Harry frowned, "We can look after ourselves."
The woman snorted derisively. Her eyes were lingering on Harry's scar, like most magical people.
"Who are you?" Harry asked, but the woman ignored him.
"What were you looking at?" she pointed her wand towards the alleyway. It was empty.
"Nothing," Harry picked up his wand.
"You don't jump at 'nothing'. What did you see?"
"I said it was nothing."
Her eyes were a very intense blue and they would have been pretty if she just stopped scowling. The long, searching look was very comfortable and Hazel looked down at her slippers.
"Was there anything there?" The woman asked.
"No," Hazel said at once.
The woman raised her wand into the air.
Bang!
Hazel squealed instinctively. A triple-decked lopsided purple bus had appeared on the street in a puff of smoke.
A tall, spotty and skinny boy stepped off the back, "Welcome to the Knight Bus, emergency transport for the stranded witch or wizard. My name is Stan Shunpike and I-"
"Very good," The woman pushed Harry and Hazel towards him, "The Leaky Cauldron. Now."
"'ere," Stan frowned, "You can't just pick the destination, love. We're on a schedule, ain't we?"
The woman opened the lapel of her jacket and showed something to Stan. Whatever it was, his pimpled face went very pale.
"Blimey. 'ere Ernie. the Leaky Cauldron, and step on it."
The three of them stepped onto the bus. It wasn't at all like the ones that Hazel had taken into town before. Instead of chairs there were a series of four-poster beds scattered haphazardly across the floor.
The woman handed over a galleon and sixteen sickles to Stan.
"Three beds it is," he said as he walked up to the front, where there sat a heavily spectacled man.
Harry sat on one of the beds and Hazel sat beside him. There was something about the scowling woman she didn't like, especially how she kept glancing at the two of them out of the corner of her eye. She didn't sit but held on to one of the railings hanging from the room.
"Next stop, the Leaky Cauldron!" Stan announced.
Bang!
The whole bus lurched sickeningly. Hazel screamed as she was thrown back onto the bed which itself flew across the floor. Only Ernie, Stan and the woman stayed in place.
They weren't in Little Whinging anymore. They were driving down a narrow road in the countryside. Every time Ernie yanked the steering wheel, the whole bus nearly toppled over, dangling alarmingly on two wheels. So many times, they aimed right at walls, or trees, or buildings and time and again they seemed to miss them at the last second. Except the bus wasn't steering around them, it was like they were dodging out of the way.
Probably smart, with the way Ernie was driving.
After just a few minutes, Hazel was soaked in a cold sweat and her mouth was bone dry. All these near misses weren't doing great things for her heart, or her nerves. This was probably how the 'young hoodlums' that Uncle Vernon constantly talked about drove.
Hazel caught her brother's eye. Where were they going? Who was this woman and why was Stan scared of her? He gave the slightest nod, which she returned. They were going to the Leaky Cauldron, which was a better plan than they'd had. If they wanted to avoid the Ministry though and keep Harry out of trouble then they needed to escape before they got through the door.
"'ere," Stan said as they drove right through a forest, the trees diving out the way, "Wot's the story on Sirius Black?"
The woman grunted.
"Sirius Black?" Harry was looking quite pale, "The muggle who escaped from prison? How do you know about him?"
"Muggle?" Stan laughed, "He ain't no muggle! Wot's yer name?"
"Harry," Harry said while keeping his head down, "And this is Hazel."
"Wot?" Stan peered at him, searching his head for… "Blimey! Ern! We got 'arry Potter on the bus!"
"Keep your mouth shut!" The woman said furiously, and Stan went quiet at once.
"So how do you know about Sirius Black?" It was very brave of Harry to keep talking. Hazel didn't wasn't sure she could open her mouth.
"Well, 'e was only You-Know-Who's greatest follower, wasn't he? His right 'and man. Say he cracked when 'e was defeated. 'ow'd you do it anyway?"
"Dunno. So, what did Sirius Black do?"
"Blew up a street of muggles, in broad daylight. Laughed about it 'n all as they took 'im away. Been in Azkaban all this time. And now 'e's escaped, ain't he? Been on the run for weeks. Even 'ad to tell the muggles about 'im."
Bang! The bus was weaving down a narrow, cobbled street.
Oh, please be there soon…She would take floo powder over this any day.
"How did he escape?"
"Nobody knows," Stan said theatrically, "Musta been some pretty 'eavy magic to get past the dementors. I wouldn' wanna tangle with 'em."
"Dementors?"
"Blimey 'arry, do you know nothing? They guard Azkaban, don't they? 'orrible things, they say. Once you been with the dementors a while, you ain't never the same."
Hazel felt a horrible jolt that had nothing to do with the bus. How long had Hagrid spent in Azkaban? Had he met these dementors? The thought of them doing anything horrible to him broke her heart.
"That's enough," said the woman.
"But-" Harry tried.
"I said, that's enough!"
Harry frowned and settled down, but she could tell he was thinking. He sounded so horrible, this Sirius Black. The sooner he was caught, the better.
Bang!
"The Leaky Cauldron!" Stan announced without looking up, "See you again, 'arry! See you 'azel!"
"Let's go," the woman steered them off the bus. Harry gave her another look and Hazel sighed. Her legs were like jelly but there was nothing else for it. Harry wasn't going to get into trouble.
Hazel tensed. Any minute now.
A firm hand grabbed the back of her t-shirt.
"Don't even think about it," The woman growled, "In. Now."
And the Potters were thrown through the doors.
Most of the pub was in the dark, the chairs up on the tables. A fire was roaring, tall and bright in the hearth. There were two outlines just visible in the brightness of the flame. One was definitely Tom, the tall and broad barman. The other, she didn't recognise as it climbed out of a chair.
"Ah! At last!" She recognised that voice and her blood ran cold.
It was Cornelius Fudge, the Minister of Magic himself.
"Thank goodness," He was a rotund man, wearing a pair of pinstripe robes with a green bowler hat in his hands. He tossed the hat to one side and shook Harry's hand vigorously, "Thank goodness! We were getting very worried about you both! We had feared…well, that doesn't matter! You're both here now, safe and sound!"
He sat back down in his chair, hand on his heart and a broad smile on his plump face. He gestured for Harry and Hazel to sit on the second chair in front of the fire. The strange woman stood off to the side, the flickering light making her look a little like a ghost.
"Tea? Crumpets? You must be starving. It's been hours since your dinner."
Hazel's stomach grumbled longingly but she ignored it. She frowned at the grinning Minister. She was starting to worry again.
"How do you know about dinner, Minister?" How much did he know?
"Oh, the Ministry has ways of knowing such things," Fudge waved his hand dismissively, "It's not important. What's important is that we've found you."
"I don't understand," Harry's looked as confused as she felt, "What's going on? Why am I not being punished?"
"Punished?" Fudge looked aghast, "Whatever for, my boy?"
"I blew up my aunt."
"Oh," Fudge chuckled, "The Ministry doesn't punish people for little accidents like that."
"But last year," Harry pressed, "I got an official warning. It said I would be expelled if I ever did magic in front of muggles again?"
She kicked him on the shin. He wasn't helping himself here!
"Yes, well…" Fudge started playing with the rather rumpled rim of his bowler hat, "Certain…circumstances have changed since last year. We need to be…flexible…about certain things. Anyway, don't you want to return to Hogwarts?"
Hazel nodded vigorously. In case Harry decided to keep being an idiot.
"Of course I do," He said, "But-"
"Then there's nothing left we need to discuss," Fudge stood up and clapped his hands, "Now, I should be reporting back to the Ministry. Tom has a nice room upstairs for both of you and we've had your things brought from home."
She could imagine how that conversation went.
"And Aunt Marge?" Hazel asked hesitantly.
"Oh, she's right as rain. A couple of wizards from the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad popped over just after you left and deflated her. They've also applied a hefty memory charm, so she'll remember none of it."
"Good," Aunt Marge may have been the most horrible person on the planet, but thoughts of her floating over the English Channel still weren't very pleasant.
"Your aunt and uncle were, quite distressed," said Fudge in the understatement of the century, "But once we calmed them down, they agreed to let you return next summer."
"Next summer?" Harry asked.
"You can stay here for the rest of your holidays, then take the train to Hogwarts as normal."
"You mean," the excitement was building in his voice, "We don't have to go back to Privet Drive?"
"Not this summer, anyway, although I would ask that you stay in Diagon Alley for the time being. No exploring the muggle world now. Wouldn't want to lose you again!" Fudge picked up a briefcase and chuckled again.
He stopped suddenly at the door, "Oh, and Miss Hawthorne shall be staying here too. To keep an eye on things for me."
Hawthorne? Oh, the woman standing in the corner. She didn't look any happier to be in the Leaky Cauldron than she had been on the Knight Bus, or in Little Whinging, or at any point since they'd met.
"She's…ah, not the chattiest," Fudge put his bowler hat on, "But she's an excellent auror. She'll make sure that…well, she'll make sure that everything's relaxing for your stay. Enjoy!"
"But Minister-" Harry tried to ask but Fudge had already stepped out humming onto the muggle street.
They sat in silence then but for the crackling fire.
"Come along then, Mr Potter, Miss Potter," Tom hurried over from behind the bar, "You've had quite the night, and I imagine a good rest is in order."
Very subtly, so subtle she barely noticed, he glanced at Hawthorne who nodded.
"Your room is just at the stop of the stairs, at the end of the corridor. You get a lovely view of the muggle London as well as Diagon Alley."
They followed Tom up the rickey stairs. Hawthorne followed them.
The room was lovely, bigger than in Privet Drive. Their trunks sat at the feet of two large beds. Hazel hurried over and opened hers. She had to check, just in case.
Good, her presents were still safely wrapped up where she'd left them.
"Have a good night, young Potters," Tom bowed his head as he closed the door. It was only one set of footsteps that went down the stairs though.
"What," Harry sat on his bed with a deep sigh, "Is going on?"
"No idea," So much had happened, how did she even start?
"Who is that woman? Hawthorne?" Harry whispered as he glanced suspiciously at the door, "What's an auror? How did she know to find us?"
"Why didn't you tell her about the alleyway?"
He shrugged, "I'm not even sure I saw anything. And she looked in a bad enough mood already."
"Do you think she's always like that?"
"I hope not, or this is going to be like living with Uncle Vernon for another fortnight."
"I am glad Aunt Marge is okay though, and that you've not been expelled."
"Something isn't adding up," Harry frowned, "You read the letter last year. One more misstep and I was gone. Why have they changed their minds now?"
"Honestly, Harry. It's like you want expelled."
"I want to know what's happening. I want to know why Fudge has suddenly changed his mind. I want to know why there's a woman standing guard outside our door."
"Maybe she'll be in a better mood tomorrow," It seemed very unlikely, "You can ask her then."
"Maybe."
Hazel settled into bed with every intention of carrying on their conversation but as soon as her head hit the pillow, she was fast asleep.