er seen. The class looked dispiritedly at the
enormous boxes Hagrid had brought out, all lined with pillows and fluffy blankets.
"We'll jus' lead 'em in here," Hagrid said, "an' put the lids on, and we'll see what
happens."
But the skrewts, it transpired, did not hibernate, and did not appreciate being
forced into pillow-lined boxes and nailed in. Hagrid was soon yelling, "Don panic,
now, don' panic!" while the skrewts rampaged around the pumpkin patch, now
strewn with the smoldering wreckage of the boxes. Most of the class - Malfoy,
Crabbe, and Goyle in the lead - had fled into Hagrid's cabin through the back door
and barricaded themselves in; Harry, Ron, and Hermione, however, were among
those who remained outside trying to help Hagrid. Together they managed to
restrain and tie up nine of the skrewts, though at the cost of numerous burns and
cuts; finally, only one skrewt was left.
"Don' frighten him, now!" Hagrid shouted as Ron and Harry used their wands to
shoot jets of fiery sparks at the skrewt, which was advancing menacingly on them,
its sting arched, quivering, over its back. "Jus' try an slip the rope 'round his sting,
so he won hurt any o' the others!"
"Yeah, we wouldn't want that!" Ron shouted angrily as he and Harry backed into
the wall of Hagrid's cabin, still holding the skrewt off with their sparks.
"Well, well, well. . . this does look like fun."
Rita Skeeter was leaning on Hagrid's garden fence, looking in at the mayhem. She
was wearing a thick magenta cloak with a furry purple collar today, and her
crocodile-skin handbag was over her arm.
Hagrid launched himself forward on top of the skrewt that was cornering Harry
and Ron and flattened it; a blast of fire shot out of its end, withering the pumpkin
plants nearby.
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"Who're you?" Hagrid asked Rita Skeeter as he slipped a loop of rope around the
skrewt's sting and tightened it.
"Rita Skeeter, Daily Prophet reporter," Rita replied, beaming at him. Her gold
teeth glinted.
"Thought Dumbledore said you weren' allowed inside the school anymore," said
Hagrid, frowning slightly as he got off the slightly squashed skrewt and started
tugging it over to its fellows.
Rita acted as though she hadn't heard what Hagrid had said.
"What are these fascinating creatures called?" she asked, beaming still more
widely.
"Blast-Ended Skrewts," grunted Hagrid.
"Really?" said Rita, apparently full of lively interest. "I've never heard of them
before...where do they come from?"
Harry noticed a dull red flush rising up out of Hagrid's wild black beard, and his
heart sank. Where had Hagrid got the skrewts from? Hermione, who seemed to be
thinking along these lines, said quickly, "They're very interesting, aren't they?
Aren't they. Harry?"
"What? Oh yeah . . . ouch . . . interesting," said Harry as she stepped on his foot.
"Ah, you're here. Harry!" said Rita Skeeter as she looked around. "So you like
Care of Magical Creatures, do you? One of your favorite lessons?"
"Yes," said Harry stoutly. Hagrid beamed at him.
"Lovely," said Rita. "Really lovely. Been teaching long?" she added to Hagrid.
Harry noticed her eyes travel over Dean (who had a nasty cut across one cheek).
Lavender (whose robes were badly singed), Seamus (who was nursing several
burnt fingers), and then to the cabin windows, where most of the class stood, their
noses pressed against the glass waiting to see if the coast was clear.
"This is o'ny me second year," said Hagrid.
"Lovely... I don't suppose you'd like to give an interview, would you? Share some
of your experience of magical creatures? The Prophet does a zoological column
every Wednesday, as I'm sure you know. We could feature these - er - Bang-
Ended Scoots."
"Blast-Ended Skrewts," Hagrid said eagerly. "Er - yeah, why not?"
Harry had a very bad feeling about this, but there was no way of communicating it
to Hagrid without Rita Skeeter seeing, so he had to stand and watch in silence as
Hagrid and Rita Skeeter made arrangements to meet in the Three Broomsticks for
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a good long interview later that week. Then the bell rang up at the castle, signaling
the end of the lesson.
"Well, good-bye, Harry!" Rita Skeeter called merrily to him as he set off with Ron
and Hermione. "Until Friday night, then, Hagrid!"
"She'll twist everything he says," Harry said under his breath.
"Just as long as he didn't import those skrewts illegally or anything," said
Hermione desperately. They looked at one another - it was exactly the sort of thing
Hagrid might do.
"Hagrids been in loads of trouble before, and Dumbledores never sacked him,"
said Ron consolingly. "Worst that can happen is Hagrid'll have to get rid of the
skrewts. Sorry . . . did I say worst? I meant best."
Harry and Hermione laughed, and, feeling slightly more cheerful, went off to
lunch.
Harry thoroughly enjoyed double Divination that afternoon; they were still doing
star charts and predictions, but now that he and Ron were friends once more, the
whole thing seemed very funny again. Professor Trelawney, who had been so
pleased with the pair of them when they had been predicting their own horrific
deaths, quickly became irritated as they sniggered through her explanation of the
various ways in which Pluto could disrupt everyday life.
"I would think," she said, in a mystical whisper that did not conceal her obvious
annoyance, "that some of us" - she stared very meaningfully at Harry- "might be a
little less frivolous had they seen what I have seen during my crystal gazing last
night. As I sat here, absorbed in my needlework, the urge to consult the orb
overpowered me. I arose, I settled myself before it, and I gazed into its crystalline
depths . . . and what do you think I saw gazing back at me?"
"An ugly old bat in outsize specs?" Ron muttered under his breath.
Harry fought hard to keep his face straight.
"Death, my dears."
Parvati and Lavender both put their hands over their mouths, looking horrified.
"Yes," said Professor Trelawney, nodding impressively, "it comes, ever closer, it
circles overhead like a vulture, ever lower. . . ever lower over the castle. . . ."
She stared pointedly at Harry, who yawned very widely and obviously.
"It'd be a bit more impressive if she hadn't done it about eighty times before,"
Harry said as they finally regained the fresh air of the staircase beneath Professor
Trelawney's room. "But if I'd dropped dead every time she's told me I'm going to,
I'd be a medical miracle."
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"You'd be a sort of extra-concentrated ghost," said Ron, chortling, as they passed
the Bloody Baron going in the opposite direction, his wide eyes staring sinisterly.
"At least we didn't get homework. I hope Hermione got loads off Professor Vector,
I love not working when she is. . . ."
But Hermione wasn't at dinner, nor was she in the library when they went to look
for her afterward. The only person in there was Viktor Krum. Ron hovered behind
the bookshelves for a while, watching Krum, debating in whispers with Harry
whether he should ask for an autograph - but then Ron realized that six or seven
girls were lurking in the next row of books, debating exactly the same thing, and
he lost his enthusiasm for the idea.
"Wonder where she's got to?" Ron said as he and Harry went back to Gryffindor
Tower.
"Dunno . . . balderdash."
But the Fat Lady had barely begun to swing forward when the sound of racing feet
behind them announced Hermione's arrival.
"Harry!" she panted, skidding to a halt beside him (the Fat Lady stared down at
her, eyebrows raised). "Harry, you've got to come - you've got to come, the most
amazing thing's happened- please -"
She seized Harry's arm and started to try to drag him back along the corridor.
"What's the matter?" Harry said.
"I'll show you when we get there - oh come on, quick -"
Harry looked around at Ron; he looked back at Harry, intrigued.
"Okay," Harry said, starting off back down the corridor with Hermione, Ron
hurrying to keep up.
"Oh don't mind me!" the Fat Lady called irritably after them. "Don't apologize for
bothering me! I'll just hang here, wide open, until you get back, shall I?"
"Yeah, thanks!" Ron shouted over his shoulder.
"Hermione, where are we going?" Harry asked, after she had led
them down through six floors, and started down the marble staircase into the
entrance hall.
"You'll see, you'll see in a minute!" said Hermione excitedly.
She turned left at the bottom of the staircase and hurried toward the door through
which Cedric Diggory had gone the night after the Goblet of Fire had regurgitated
his and Harry's names. Harry had never been through here before. He and Ron
followed Hermione down a flight of stone steps, but instead of ending up in a
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gloomy underground passage like the one that led to Snape's dungeon, they found
themselves in a broad stone corridor, brightly lit with torches, and decorated with
cheerful paintings that were mainly of food.
"Oh hang on . . ." said Harry slowly, halfway down the corridor. "Wait a minute,
Hermione. . . ."
"What?" She turned around to look at him, anticipation all over her face.
"I know what this is about," said Harry.
He nudged Ron and pointed to the painting just behind Hermione. It showed a
gigantic silver fruit bowl.
"Hermione!" said Ron, cottoning on. "You're trying to rope us into that spew stuff
again!"
"No, no, I'm not!" she said hastily. "And it's not spew, Ron -"
"Changed the name, have you?" said Ron, frowning at her. "What are we now,
then, the House-Elf Liberation Front? I'm not barging into that kitchen and trying
to make them stop work, I'm not doing it -"
"I'm not asking you to!" Hermione said impatiently. "I came down here just now,
to talk to them all, and I found - oh come on, Harry, I want to show you!"
She seized his arm again, pulled him in front of the picture of the giant fruit bowl,
stretched out her forefinger, and tickled the huge green pea