Slowly, uncomfortably, Neville woke from a dark, dreamless sleep. He found himself lying on his back on a soft surface, and could hear voices heatedly arguing nearby. The whole situation seemed eerily familiar to Neville and it took him a few moments to ascertain where he was. He was in the hospital wing, exactly as he had been the last time he had been attacked by Dementors. A jumble of thoughts was cascading around his head, memories of the extraordinary events of the evening flooding through him, making him dizzy. He rubbed his temples and blinked several times before raising himself up to see what was going on.
The fierce argument was coming from three men standing in the centre of the room: Professor Black, Cornelius Fudge, the Minister for Magic, and Professor Snape. Snape looked particularly furious; the snarl on his face was directed straight at Black. Hermione was standing close by, listening in, as was Ron, lying on the bed opposite Neville’s. Apart from them, no one else was in the room. None of them noticed Neville waking.
“You can’t, Minister,” Black was saying, a note of pleading in his angry voice. “It violates our whole system of justice. Now if you’d just listen to me…”
“I think we’ve done enough listening to Black and his fanciful theories, Minister,” said Snape.
“They’re not fanciful, they’re true,” interrupted Hermione forcefully. “We were there.”
“I think I know a preposterous concocted lie when I hear one, Miss Granger. Are we really supposed to believe you just stumbled on Lupin on the grounds? That he just happened to have with him one of his victims, who was not dead after all, and who has now fortuitously vanished? That all this somehow proves his innocence? I was under the impression you were considered intelligent.” Snape’s naked sarcasm was harsh and biting. “Your devotion to Black is commendable, if tragically and woefully misplaced. What I want to know is,” here Snape turned to eyeball Black directly, “when are you going to arrest Black for aiding and abetting a fugitive, Minister? I should have known he was helping his old friend all along. You don’t really believe, as he claims, that this was the first time he had met Lupin since his escape, do you? Who else could have been supplying Lupin with Wolfsbane potion, using materials from my stores, I’m certain?”
Black did not reply, and Ron and Hermione exchanged glances behind his back. Clearly Black had tried to conceal his involvement with Lupin from the authorities, though, it appeared, with limited success. But where’s Lupin, and where’s Harry? thought Neville.
At that moment Hermione glanced round and noticed Neville. “Neville, you’re awake,” she exclaimed happily, and ran to give him a big hug.
“H-how long have I been out?” asked Neville groggily.
“About twenty minutes or so,” answered Hermione. “Neville, you’ve got to tell them. Tell them Lupin’s innocent. They’ve captured him. The Minister wants to send for the Dementors, to do the Kiss.”
“What?” Neville sat bolt upright in his bed.
“Contrary to Professor Black’s assertion,” said Fudge flatly, “I am well within my rights to do so, in extraordinary circumstances. Lupin is a clear danger to the public and has demonstrated that we cannot hold him. The only option left for the safety of the community is the Dementor’s Kiss.”
“But he’s still a werewolf,” Ron objected.
“All the more reason to act now before he becomes violent,” Fudge countered. “The Dementor won’t mind.” Black looked like he was restraining the urge to punch Fudge in the face.
Neville voiced the other question that was worrying him. “Where’s Harry?”
“No one knows,” said Hermione. “He’s still missing; we couldn’t find him afterwards. I hope he’s all right.”
“But that’s impossible…” Neville muttered to himself, but no one heard him.
“I should be out there looking for him,” fretted Black.
“You’re staying right where you are,” said Snape. “I’m not letting you out of my sight until Lupin is dealt with and you’re arrested.”
Black rounded on his adversary furiously, any civility abandoned. “You’re really loving this, aren’t you Snivellus? You’re quite happy to leave Harry to die out there. He could be injured; there are still Dementors out there. If he dies, what a success this day would be for you. Harry and Remus gone, and me on my way to Azkaban. Is there anything more you want? Is your need for revenge satisfied, or would you prefer to kill me here and now?”
Before Snape could reply, the doors of the hospital wing swung open and Professor Dumbledore strode in. He wore a grave expression on his face and such was the command of his presence that everyone fell silent and looked towards him. He gazed around the room with his piercing blue eyes, and then gave a gentle nod of his head as if he understood all that had been going on in the room.
“Remus Lupin is secure in the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom on the first floor,” he announced. “He has regained consciousness, but remains in his wolf form. He is clearly agitated, but apparently in control of his senses and has not been violent. His chains are more than sufficient for restraining him. Do you still intend to proceed with the Dementor’s Kiss, Minister?”
“Yes,” confirmed Fudge.
“Headmaster, can’t you stop it?” begged Black. “Surely you will believe the four of us, even if no one else will.”
“Such matters are out of my control, Sirius,” replied Dumbledore, with a sideways glance at Fudge. “The Minister will do as he sees fit.” Sirius looked stricken, and Hermione was horrified. Neville was struggling to come to terms with everything that was happening. The whole situation seemed to be spinning out of control.
“We’re wasting time,” said Fudge impatiently. “We should send Macnair for a Dementor immediately. Come on, Professor Snape, let’s go. Professor Black, you had better come with us for now.” Sullenly, Black left the hospital wing behind Fudge, a plaintive glance back at Dumbledore as he left. Snape followed behind Black, keeping a suspicious glare on his colleague in case Black tried anything.
“What was Snape doing here anyway?” Neville asked Hermione when the three of them had gone.
“He was on patrol at the entrance when the Dementors attacked, and came to help us,” explained Hermione. “He escorted us back to the castle, and it was he who found you and Lupin.” She turned back to Dumbledore, who had remained behind. “Professor, is there nothing we can do? He is innocent, we know he’s innocent. How can you stand by and do nothing? Doesn’t his side of the story at least deserve to be heard?”
Dumbledore peered shrewdly at Hermione, as if weighing something up in his mind. “Maybe it does, Miss Granger, maybe it does. However, the one thing we lack is time.” His emphasis on the last word caused Hermione to meet his gaze and give a little gasp. “You remember where Lupin is,” Dumbledore continued. “Retrieve your lost friends, and be sure not to be seen and to be back here in time. It is the only way you can hope to succeed. That is all I can offer, I’m afraid.”
He gave an enigmatic smile, and turned to leave. When he reached the door, he paused and glanced back. “Oh, three turns would be my recommendation, Miss Granger. Be seeing you.” With that, he stepped through the door and closed it behind him, leaving Neville, Hermione and Ron alone in the room.
“Is it me, or has Dumbledore completely lost it?” asked Ron.
Hermione ignored him, and looked at her watch. “Twenty-four minutes to midnight,” she said, reaching for a thin chain around her neck and pulling it over her head. “Remember that, Neville.”
“What?” said Neville, as Hermione pulled Neville off the bed to his feet and looped the long chain over his head and back over hers. Attached to the chain was an odd-looking pendant in the shape of a small hourglass.
“Sorry you can’t come with us, Ron,” said Hermione, “but you’d never get anywhere on that leg. It’ll have to be just Neville and me. Don’t be alarmed by what you see.” She lifted up the tiny hourglass and carefully turned it over three times.
The whole world began to blur in front of Neville’s eyes, as if he had been swept up in a tornado or a tidal wave, but he himself was not moving. The whole sensation was horribly dizzying and he thought he was going to faint. When it stopped, as suddenly as it began, he blinked hard several times and put his hand out to steady himself on the bed.
It was then he discovered it wasn’t there. He stumbled and Hermione had to grab him by the arm to stop him sprawling on the stone floor. He looked around in confusion. They were no longer in the hospital wing, but in a dark, empty room covered in dust. A few old desks and tables were dotted about the room. “What just happened?” he said, bemused. “Where are we?”
“In classroom one on the ground floor, just off the Entrance Hall,” answered Hermione. “Here, let me get this chain off you before you garrotte yourself.” She lifted it from around Neville’s neck. “Now listen carefully, Neville, because this is very important and we don’t have a lot of time. Do you know what this is?” She held up the hourglass on the end of the chain. Neville shook his head. “It’s called a Time-Turner, Neville. Have you heard of them?”
“No.”
“The Ministry keeps a tight rein on them. McGonagall arranged for me to have one at the beginning of the year, so I could make it to all my lessons. Neville, this device rewinds time. For each turn of the hourglass, it takes the user one hour back in time.”
“Hang on, are you seriously telling me we’ve time travelled into the past?”
“Three hours into the past to be precise. It’s now twenty-three minutes to nine this evening. Look.” She went over to the windows and threw back one of the shutters. Sunlight filtered into the abandoned classroom.
Neville was astonished. “Blimey. So that’s what Dumbledore was talking about? He wanted us to go back in time and change the past?”
“Not exactly,” replied Hermione. “Strictly speaking you can’t change the past, you can only become the past and work within it to achieve your objectives.”
“Come again?” This was beginning to go right over Neville’s head.
“It’s fairly simple. The theory is, we each have memories of the last three hours, and time will follow the path of those memories again, to preserve causality. However, we do have free rein to act in a manner that does not contradict what we already know. The problem comes if we attempt to interact with our past selves, either deliberately or accidentally, in such a way as we do not recall happening. In those cases, although time records the events as having occurred with our new participation in them, the psychological effect on us would be potentially catastrophic as our minds attempt to reconcile contradictory memories of the same time period. For that reason, it is absolutely vital that we are not seen by our past selves or by anyone else we have had contact with in the last three hours. Do you understand?”
Neville had in fact followed Hermione’s explanation only as far as the word “simple”, but for the sake of a quiet life just nodded and hoped that would be enough. “Good,” said Hermione. “Let’s go.”
“Go? Go where? What exactly is it we’re supposed to do?” asked a bewildered Neville.
“Rescue Lupin of course,” replied Hermione. “We’ll work out the details of how as we go. Come on.” She dashed out of the classroom. Neville suspected she had no more clue of what she was doing than he did, but having no other option, chased off after her. They ran into the Entrance Hall and out of the great oak front doors into the grounds. All was quiet and no one was around. Hermione ran on and Neville struggled to keep up.
She seemed to be making for the Whomping Willow and Neville wondered what her plan was. But when she reached the point where she would have to leave the path, she stopped and stared off down the hill towards the front gate. Neville caught up with her and followed her gaze. She was looking down to Hagrid’s hut, nestled against the edge of the Forbidden Forest. Chained up to a post outside the hut was Buckbeak the hippogriff, still very much alive.
“They haven’t killed him yet,” said Hermione. “We must still be inside.”
“You mean to say I’m in that hut right now with Hagrid and the rest of you?” said Neville. “This is just far too weird.”
But Hermione wasn’t listening. Her brow was furrowed; she was evidently thinking something over. Then she suddenly exclaimed, “Of course! Remember what Dumbledore said: ‘Retrieve your lost friends’. We can save Buckbeak as well. Maybe we can even use him to help Lupin escape. Come on.” Before Neville could protest, Hermione had set off again and he was forced to follow. He seemed to have spent most of this never-ending day chasing after someone or other. When would it end?
They reached the hut, but Hermione hesitated as she approached the silver-grey hippogriff. Neville didn’t blame her, the creature was huge, but Hermione seemed to be thinking of something else. After a moment, she backed off and led Neville behind a tree on the edge of the forest to hide. “What’s going on? Why don’t you get on with it?” demanded Neville.
“We can’t. When Fudge comes down here in a few minutes with the executioner, he has to see that Buckbeak’s still here. We have to see him still here as well when we leave the hut. That’s what happened last time. Once Fudge is inside and we’ve gone, we can take Buckbeak without getting Hagrid into trouble or changing the past.” Neville felt his brain twisting in knots trying to understand the logic, but he trusted Hermione knew what she was doing.
They waited a short while behind the tree until they saw Fudge, Dumbledore and the executioner with the axe approaching. It was quite a shock for Neville when he then saw himself emerging from the back door of the hut, along with Harry, Ron and another Hermione. Ron was carrying Scabbers in his hand and Neville had a momentary shiver when he realised who that was. But there was nothing he could do but remain hidden as the adults entered Hagrid’s hut and his past self followed his friends away back up the path.
Seeing the coast was clear, Hermione left her hiding place and approached Buckbeak. She bowed low to the hippogriff, and then cautiously undid the chain from the post. Neville could hear voices coming from inside the hut and urged Hermione to hurry before they finished talking and came out to perform the execution. Buckbeak was a stubborn animal however, and it took a great deal of coaxing by Hermione before the hippogriff would allow itself to be led away into the trees.
Barely had it done so when the door of Hagrid’s hut swung open and Fudge, Dumbledore, Hagrid and the executioner emerged. As Neville walked off with Hermione and Buckbeak into the forest, behind he could hear cries of bewilderment and fury as the hapless Minister tried to understand how a hippogriff he had seen moments earlier had vanished into thin air.
Hermione led Buckbeak along the edge of the forest, in the direction of the Whomping Willow, which stood a little out from the forest on a small outcrop. She found a clearing where she let Buckbeak run free. “What now?” asked Neville as he caught up with her.
“Well, we’ve all gone inside the willow out there by now,” she replied, pointing up to the lone tree, and indeed no one was there. “So there’s nothing left to do now but wait until everyone comes out.”
“Good,” said Neville, sitting down on a rock. Something had been building in him for some time, and he needed to get it off his chest. “We need to take a break for a bit,” he added. “This is going way too fast for me. I can’t go on.”
“What do you mean?” exclaimed Hermione. “You can’t give up. Don’t you want to save Lupin?”
“Of course I do,” said Neville. “But look at this. Look at all this. Werewolves and Animagi and Time-Turners and Dementors. Desperate rescues and heroic escapes. You know me, Hermione. This isn’t me. I shouldn’t be here. This isn’t me.” He buried his head in his hands. There, he’d said it. Whatever Hermione would think of him, it had to be said.
Hermione sympathetically sat down next to him. “Yes it is,” she tried to reassure him. “Come on. You’ve faced You-Know-Who. You’ve fought a basilisk.”
“Yes, but those things weren’t really me,” Neville countered. “They were some other legendary hero called the Boy-Who-Lived, who everybody is obsessed with. Don’t you see what I’m trying to say? I’m just Neville, the dumb useless kid who sits quietly in a corner. I don’t belong here. There’s this other part of me, the Marauder side I called it, the Boy-Who-Lived side. He’s the one who gets dragged into adventures, because he has the scar; he’s the one You-Know-Who wanted to kill. I’m just Neville.
“When we went after the Philosopher’s Stone, it was your idea and Harry and Ron did most of the work. Besides, I didn’t know You-Know-Who was waiting at the end. Last year, it was Harry who led the way into the Chamber, and it was Ginny who was prepared to stand up to Riddle and the basilisk. The sword of Gryffindor came to her. I’m not a true Gryffindor. I’m not brave. I just don’t run away fast enough.”
Hermione looked shocked at Neville’s outburst, but tried to conceal it. “You’re too hard on yourself, Neville. You didn’t have to go after the Stone, you chose to. It was you who actually killed the basilisk and destroyed the diary. It takes a Gryffindor to do that, surely.”
“Even so, what about all this?” replied Neville. “Why do I belong here? It was only because of Harry and Black, and Lupin’s connection to my parents, that I got mixed up in all this. Now because of you and Dumbledore, I’m out here reliving the past, on this crazy rescue mission. I didn’t choose to be involved, I just had to be because of this stupid scar. I can’t be a hero. I can’t be like Harry.”
“Harry?”
Neville nodded. “Did you see what happened down by the lake with me and Lupin and the Dementors?”
“No. We saw the Dementors leave, but we didn’t know what drove them off. We didn’t want to stop to find out.”
“It was Harry. I saw him. When the Dementors swarmed all over us, I tried to cast a Patronus, but of course I couldn’t. Then at the last moment I saw Harry down the shore. He cast a really powerful Patronus that scattered the Dementors. He’s the real hero. He must have recovered from his fall in time to save me.”
“But where did he go after that?” asked Hermione. “Nobody could find him afterwards.”
Suddenly Neville sprang to his feet as inspiration hit him. “That’s it!” he exclaimed. “That’s where he went, he went with us! I mean, will go with us. When he falls, we can go to him, make sure he’s all right, and then take him to where he can cast the Patronus. After that, he can help us free Lupin. He’ll know what to do; it’s what he’s good at. It all makes sense.”
Hermione stood up and clapped Neville on the shoulder, feeling he needed some encouragement. “Brilliant, Neville! I think you’ve got it. We’re right on hand to help him after the fight. Dumbledore did say lost friends, plural. This must have been what else he meant.”
Neville felt relieved; the weight had been lifted from his shoulders. With Harry leading the way, he knew they would succeed. The liability of his own presence would no longer be an issue. He settled down to wait out the remaining time much more relaxed.
The last rays of the sun disappeared and the stars came out as night enveloped the Hogwarts grounds. Neville and Hermione sat patiently waiting from their vantage point in the forest clearing, watching the Whomping Willow, while behind them Buckbeak trotted around searching for food. Occasionally Neville thought he caught a glimpse of the first light of the full moon glinting over the tops of the mountains, a reminder of what was to come.
Suddenly Hermione gave a stifled cry and pointed. In the gloom, Neville could just make out the thin figure of Remus Lupin, his head and torso poking out from under the Whomping Willow. Neville saw him touch the knot on the trunk, before lifting himself fully out of the hole and reaching down to help the next person out. That next person was of course Neville himself, followed quickly by the rest of the party. Neville flinched when he saw Pettigrew emerge; he knew that soon he would escape, and there was nothing Neville could do about it.
Neville watched the scene unfold, just as he had remembered it. The clouds parted, revealing the moon. Lupin cried out in pain as he began to transform. Black rushed to help him, and Pettigrew swung his punch. Black went down, and Pettigrew dived on his wand, firing off his one desperate spell. The spell struck Harry, who was standing with his back to Neville and Hermione, in the shoulder and he fell backwards down a slope into the undergrowth, almost directly towards the two of them.
Neville and Hermione didn’t wait to see the rest of the scene play out, they rushed to where Harry had come to rest. He was sprawled out face down and wasn’t moving. Hermione got to him first and rolled him on to his back check how he was. Neville hurried up behind. “Is he badly hurt?” he panted. “What spell hit him?”
“I don’t know,” replied Hermione. “It can’t be a Stunning Spell, unless it didn’t work properly, because he’s still conscious. Look.” Neville leaned over Hermione’s shoulder to see that Harry’s head was moving slightly and his eyelids were flickering. He seemed barely aware of where he was. “Harry, Harry, can you hear me?” said Hermione. “Harry, say something.” Harry groaned and mumbled and tried to shift his body, but managed little more.
A familiar cold sense of dread fell on Neville; the Dementors were coming. “Come on, there’s no time, we’ve got to get him to the lake,” he said. Taking an arm each, they lifted Harry up and supported him on their shoulders, and began carrying him as fast as they could along the edge of the forest and down towards the lake. They did not have far to go, but the going was not easy as Harry was heavy and his feet dragged along the rough ground. Harry did not appear to have any broken bones, but he was bleeding in several places and was dazed and confused. “Wha- what’s happening?” he murmured weakly as they approached the lake shore.
In the distance, Neville could make out the mass of Dementors already bearing down on their prey. By the moonlight, he could just see shapes of himself and the werewolf, trapped, unable to run. He lifted Harry’s arm off his shoulder and Harry slipped backwards, unable to stand unaided. “Harry, Harry, we need you. You have to cast a Patronus, right now,” said Neville, glancing over his shoulder. They were running out of time.
“You…what…I’d don’t…” stumbled Harry, not comprehending.
Hermione crouched and allowed Harry to sit, supporting his back. “Neville, he’s in no condition to walk, let alone do magic. Just give him a moment.”
“We don’t have a moment!” Neville exclaimed, pointing down the lake shore. “I’m dying out there! He has to do it; he did it before. I saw him. Right in front of where we we’re standing. It’s the way it happened.” But as he looked down at Harry, he knew something was not right. He glanced behind and saw a brief flash of light: his own weak, desperate attempt at a Patronus that had failed.
Hermione made one last attempt to rouse Harry quickly. “Harry, come on, try to get up,” she urged, but to no avail. Then she looked up, because she thought Neville had said something. “What did you say, Neville?”
“I’m wrong,” repeated Neville quietly, seemingly to himself. “I was wrong. I’m always wrong; I should have known.” Suddenly, and before Hermione could react or say anything, he turned and rushed to the very edge of the lake, his wand drawn, pointed at the Dementors.
Neville thought of the boy he’d seen on this very spot. He thought of the Patronus the boy had cast, the animal-shaped light that he was certain now had not been a stag. He thought of the outline of the boy against that light: shorter and stockier than Harry. And he thought with joy that what he had seen was the impossible, that he had seen himself perform powerful magic far beyond his expectations. Happiness filled his heart at the realisation. For once he was not a failure, for once he would achieve something that was all his own. He would save himself, and Lupin.
“EXPECTO PATRONUM!”
Light poured from his wand in a wave, so fast and so strong that he was almost thrown backwards by the force. Quickly the light coalesced into an animal form, which Neville drove forwards across the lake towards the Dementors. The animal was a lion.
A Patronus is a symbol, unique to its caster. It represents that in which the caster places most trust, the one thing that the wizard feels most protects and guards them. More than any other magic, it shows that person, place or thing with which the wizard has the deepest connection. The silvery form of the lion of Gryffindor charged headlong into the Dementors, and they scattered and fled before it.
* * *
Neville bounced happily around the clearing as Hermione and Harry sought to bring Buckbeak under control once more. He paused every so often to flourish his wand and yell “Expecto Patronum!” once more. Each time he did so, it produced little more than a brief flash of light, no better than his previous attempts, but this did not seem to discourage Neville, or dampen his exuberance.
“You’re not going to get it to work again, Neville,” said Hermione. “You could only do it that one time because you already knew it was going to happen and could use that memory. It’s a classic predestination paradox.”
Neville wasn’t listening, though. He neither understood nor cared that his feat of magic was purely the result of a bizarre and convoluted quirk of time and causality. All he cared about was that he had done it. For one brief moment he had not been a weak, timid, poor excuse for a wizard. He was capable of better things. And if it had happened once, why not again?
It was now over a quarter of an hour since he had cast the Patronus. Harry had now largely recovered and Hermione had stopped his bleeding. He was able to stand, though he was still rather groggy, and a nasty bruise had sprouted on the top of his head which Hermione hadn’t noticed before. He had taken Hermione’s hasty explanation of what was going on remarkably easily in his stride.
Together they had returned to the clearing in the forest and had watched Snape come down from the castle to meet up with Black, Ron and Hermione and discover Lupin and Neville. Ron, Neville and the werewolf were placed on conjured stretchers; Snape insisting on binding Lupin to his. Then the group had all made their way back up to the castle, where no doubt they would be meeting up with Fudge and Dumbledore.
Now all Neville, Hermione and Harry had to do was rescue Lupin. Hermione rather baulked at Harry’s suggestion that they fly Buckbeak to the window of the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, where Lupin would be held, to free him. Hermione did not like flying. Normally Neville would have objected as well, but at the moment he simply didn’t care; he was ready to do anything.
Buckbeak was remarkably compliant with Harry in charge and allowed the three teenagers to climb up onto his back. Hermione shifted uncomfortably and grabbed hold of Harry tightly, with Neville behind them. Remarkably, the hippogriff seemed to hardly feel or notice the heavy weight on his back and soared easily into the sky. As they rose above the forest, Neville’s head felt in the clouds already and for the first time in his life, he was just able to enjoy the pure sensation of flight.
Timing was of the essence at this point, and they hovered above the castle, waiting for the right moment, as the key players were gathering in the hospital wing, and Neville himself was awaking there. At that time Harry guided the hippogriff down in a gentle arc to the windows on the eastern side of Hogwarts. The Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom was only one floor above ground level, but they were still several feet above the ground as they located the correct window.
Trying desperately not to look down, Hermione drew her wand and said, “Alohomora.” The latch on the window sprang open and Harry precariously clambered in. Neville waited nervously to see what would happen. He heard what sounded like the snapping of chains and for a terrible moment Neville wondered what would happen if the Wolfsbane potion had worn off. He needn’t have worried however, for a moment later Harry appeared at the window with the werewolf.
There was brief confusion while they wondered how to get Lupin onto Buckbeak, but then to the surprise of them all the werewolf leapt out of the window and scrabbled vertically down the stone wall of the castle, showing amazing surefootedness and grip. Eventually he slipped and fell a fair distance to the ground, but though he landed on his side, he rolled over and stood up immediately, unharmed.
Hermione helped Harry back onto Buckbeak and they floated down to the ground. In a dark corner under the east wall they landed and dismounted from the hippogriff. Buckbeak was a little alarmed at the sight of the werewolf, but Harry soothed him. Neville and Hermione ran to Lupin; Hermione patted him on the back and ruffled his fur. The werewolf could not speak of course, but fixed Neville with a very human stare, a look of wonder and gratitude. “Goodbye, Mr Lupin,” said Neville. “Good luck.”
“Can you make it safely to the Forest from here?” asked Hermione. “Hide under the trees. We’ll get Professor Black to come find you in the morning.” The werewolf nodded, and then approached Buckbeak. The hippogriff proudly stood his ground, but the werewolf sunk onto his knees in front of him, its head bowed. Buckbeak acknowledged Lupin’s bow.
“I think they’ll go with each other,” said Harry. “Bye, Buckbeak. Look after him.” He let Buckbeak go and the hippogriff spread his wings and galloped off in the direction of the Forest, eventually taking to the air, a few feet off the ground. Below him scampered the werewolf, keeping pace with him at an impressive speed. The three friends watched them go, fading into the darkness. “I reckon they’ll be all right,” opined Harry.
Hermione looked at her watch. “Twenty-nine minutes past eleven,” she said. “Come on Neville, we’ve got to go. We’ve only got seven minutes left. We need to get back to the hospital wing. Harry, you’d best wait twenty minutes or so, then stagger in through the front door. Hopefully your injuries will be enough to convince everyone you’ve been knocked out all this time. See you later.”
Without waiting for a reply, she dragged Neville away and ran off around the castle towards the main doors. Neville gave Harry a quick wave goodbye and then dashed off in pursuit of Hermione. Hermione reached the great wooden doors first and paused to allow Neville to catch up. After checking the coast was clear, they slipped back inside and ran across the Entrance Hall to the main staircase. Leaping up the stairs two at a time, they ascended to the first floor.
Just as they were turning into the corridor to head for the hospital wing, they heard voices up ahead. Hermione dragged Neville into an empty classroom. Peering out from a crack in the door, they saw Fudge, Black and Snape pass, no doubt on their way from the hospital wing to the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, to seal (or so they thought) Lupin’s fate. Neville and Hermione waited for them to pass, before leaving the classroom and rushing on towards the hospital wing.
As they turned the last corner, they heard Dumbledore ahead, saying, “Be seeing you.” As they rushed up, Dumbledore emerged through the hospital wing doors, and closed them behind him. He turned to greet Neville and Hermione. “And here you are,” he said, without a hint of surprise.
“We did it. He’s free,” exclaimed Hermione breathlessly.
“I would expect nothing less,” replied Dumbledore with a smile. “I advise rest. Time is on your side now. Goodnight.” He patted them both on the shoulder and calmly walked off down the corridor.
Neville and Hermione pushed open the door of the hospital wing and stepped inside. Ron looked up from his bed with a wide stare, his head twisting back and forth between them and a point just in front of him, like a spectator at a tennis match. “That was bloody weird,” he said.
Neville Longbottom and the Prisoner of Azkaban by Sonorus
Chapter Notes: In which Neville and Hermione live through the events of the evening once more.