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But this wasn't over yet.
Hermione raised her wand, closed one eye, and took aim at a Slytherin player, the tip tracking him as he moved.
Marcus Flint's eyes went wide.
What are you doing?!
He couldn't hold it in any longer. He flew straight to the referee, Madam Hooch.
"Referee!"
Marcus jabbed a finger at Hermione. "Isn't that against the rules?!"
"Look at her waving that wand around — hey, hey, hey, the tip is glowing green!"
Marcus was genuinely terrified. He edged behind Madam Hooch.
Madam Hooch glanced over at Hermione and said impatiently, "What's it to you if someone's holding a wand in the stands? She hasn't cast anything."
"But she could Avada Kedavra me!"
"If she does, we'll deal with it then. The Ministry of Magic will handle her," Madam Hooch said, eyes glazed. "Now get back in the match, would you? Stop whispering with the referee , people are going to think I'm calling this crooked."
You ARE calling this crooked!
Marcus screamed inwardly, on the verge of tears.
After that, Hermione kept herself busy. A hammer here, a knife there. Every time a Slytherin was about to get their hands on the Quaffle, they'd feel something cold whistle past their head.
Gryffindor scored. And scored again. And again.
Eventually Hermione's pockets ran dry. She started rummaging through her bag, head down, muttering to herself.
"Hm. Is there anything left to throw..."
She peered into its seemingly bottomless depths.
"Nothing left to throw..."
Three exhausted voices answered in unison.
Hermione turned. Ron, Neville, and Seamus were standing right beside her, their heads and shoulders buried under an avalanche of tools that had apparently been landing on them for some time. Their expressions said they had given up on life.
"Hey, what's wrong with you three?"
Hermione blinked, genuinely puzzled.
The three of them looked at each other. Then they looked at Hermione like she was something that had crawled out of a nightmare.
On the other side of the pitch, Harry was chasing the Golden Snitch into the clouds.
Malfoy was right on his tail.
Harry stretched out his hand. The Snitch was inches away, close enough to feel the air move around it.
Then the cold hit.
Bone-deep and instant. Harry looked down. Ice was spreading across his broomstick, thickening fast.
"This is..."
He recognized the feeling. His chest dropped.
The next second, dark shapes poured in from every direction, moving like smoke given form.
Dementors.
Harry yanked his broom hard, trying to dodge, but there were too many. He couldn't avoid them all. One came at him face-first, and there was nothing he could do.
The cold seized him all at once. His blood seemed to stop moving. He felt something pulling at his soul, and his thoughts began to dissolve.
Then everything went dark. Harry slipped from his broom and fell.
Malfoy didn't know what had happened to Potter, only that he was suddenly gone , and the Golden Snitch was right there. He snatched it out of the air.
Then he saw Potter falling.
"Potter!"
Damn it.
Malfoy's face went tight. One second of hesitation , then he swung his broom around and dove.
He wasn't fast enough.
He caught Harry's arm, barely, but by then the ground was right there. The momentum dragged him off his broom along with Potter.
It's over.
Everything went black.
He could hear the screams from the stands.
"Arresto Momentum!"
A clear voice cut across the entire Quidditch pitch.
An invisible force closed around both of them. Their fall slowed abruptly, smoothly, and they touched down without a sound.
Everyone turned at once.
Hermione was standing in the stands, wand still raised in the casting position.
Madam Hooch, who had apparently been operating on autopilot for most of the match, finally snapped back to reality and rushed over to check on them.
Neither was badly hurt. Harry was unconscious from the Dementors' influence, and Malfoy was shaky and pale from the shock, but both were in one piece.
Hermione leaped down from the stands, flipped mid-air, landed on her broom, and flew toward them.
Dumbledore and the other professors arrived moments later, gathering around.
Dumbledore looked at Hermione. He'd sensed the anomaly too, had been about to act , but she'd moved first.
Hermione looked at Malfoy. "What happened?"
Malfoy was still ashen. "Potter was about to catch the Snitch, and then — out of nowhere — Dementors. A whole swarm of them. They went straight for him."
He reached into his pocket and held up the Golden Snitch.
Hermione stared at it.
Her expression went very dark.
All that work. For nothing.
She spun around sharply, wand pointed straight at the sky.
"Expecto Patronum!"
A blinding white light erupted from the tip of her wand. It expanded into the air and took shape , dozens of shapes, solid and luminous and unmistakable.
Dragons. Phoenixes. Tigers. Lions. Bears. Serpents.
An entire host of them, vivid as living creatures, each one radiating power. They roared as they spread out in every direction, encircling Hogwarts in a ring of blazing silver.
The crowd had gone absolutely silent.
Hermione raised her wand toward the horizon. Her voice was quiet and completely without mercy.
"Hunt down every Dementor inside and outside of Hogwarts. Every single one. Leave nothing standing."
The Patronuses obeyed. They scattered with a sound like thunder, sweeping over the castle and the grounds, searching.
For a moment, a cold and killing stillness settled over all of Hogwarts.
"That's... that's the Patronus Charm?"
A student stammered it out, shattering the silence.
Did she just bring an entire zoo?!
Everyone stared at Hermione with wide eyes.
The Patronus Charm wasn't exactly a mystery to Hogwarts students , but it was extraordinarily difficult. Most adult wizards couldn't cast it reliably, let alone produce a corporeal form.
That Hermione could do it? Nobody was surprised.
But this many? All at once?
Never seen anything like this in my life.jpg
Wasn't a Patronus supposed to have exactly one form?
Even for the Witch of Gryffindor, this was frankly unsettling.
Dumbledore's expression shifted, just slightly.
Snape and the other professors looked shaken to their cores.
"Hermione," Lupin said, unable to stop himself. "Wasn't your Patronus an otter?"
He remembered it clearly. On the Hogwarts Express, she'd conjured a silver otter.
But this...
What in the world were all these creatures?
Hermione noticed the stares. She spread her hands. "Patronuses change with the wizard's emotional state. I'm feeling a lot of things right now, so mine cycling through ten forms a second is perfectly reasonable."
Then, under her breath, sharp and bitter: "Damn it. Those 150 points should have gone to Gryffindor."
Everyone stared at her.
...
So the whole scene was because of that?!
➤ Next: Azkaban ×, Mental Hospital √
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