Chapter 208
Chapter 208
Hunger woke Suer. He had missed both breakfast and lunch, and after spending the night in terror inside the Forbidden Forest, he was exhausted in mind and body alike.
The urgent demand for food from both stomach and brain forced him out of bed to forage in the kitchens. Hogwarts boasted the most relentlessly industrious kitchen in the profession: someone was on duty twenty-four hours a day, and no matter who arrived or when, hot, freshly prepared food would be waiting.
Apart from Dumbledore, who could summon food with a snap of his fingers, young Hufflepuffs benefited most. The kitchens lay only one corridor away, and they did not need to creep down from some distant tower.
Only those who had lived in the Hufflepuff common room knew how wonderful it was.
Full and content, Suer picked happily at his teeth as he ambled back to the dormitory. Youth was marvellous. He had been exhausted the night before, but after a good meal, satisfaction had already replaced the aching in his muscles.
The young wizards in the dormitory were still discussing the Hogsmeade weekend at the end of the month. One could easily imagine it remaining the most popular subject in Hogwarts after Quidditch until the day finally arrived.
Suer found Justin and Morn tucked into a corner. At some point, they had set up a wizard-chess board and launched into a heated match.
Thinking back, whenever Suer found these two dormmates, they were either playing chess or on their way to play chess.
Was this what happened when two hopeless chess players discovered kindred spirits?
Why had that famous scene from Stephen Chow’s Flirting Scholar suddenly appeared in his mind–two men kissing? Horrible. He could not bear it.
Suer did not disturb them and quietly slipped out of the common room.
Better to find Hermione in the library. How could two disreputable men blazing with mutual passion compare with a sweet-smelling young girl?
The library was on the second floor. Suer easily found Hermione sitting alone at a long table between several bookcases, a thick pile of books heaped beside her.
“Do twelve subjects really give you this much homework? Can you manage it all?”
Hermione made no sound. She waved, then pointed towards her tightly closed lips.
Between classes, homework and the Mandrake leaf, the young girl had probably eaten very little for quite some time. She had grown visibly thinner, though her spirits remained good.
Suer’s heart ached. He preferred Hermione a little plumper; her small hands felt much nicer to squeeze that way.
“I don’t think you can go on like this. Drop a few classes you don’t need. Otherwise, when we go home for the holidays, Mrs Granger will certainly blame me for not taking care of you.”
Hermione looked up at Suer for a long while. She saw all the concern in his eyes and gave him a soft smile.
She took a sheet of papyrus from one side, scratched out a message with her quill and passed it over.
“It’s all right. I think I’m managing well at the moment, but I’ll consider your suggestion. If it becomes too much, I’ll ask Professor McGonagall to let me drop a few classes…”
“All right.” Suer nodded. “Next week will be the full moon, exactly one month after you started.”
“Wonderful. I’m going to eat a proper feast that day,” Hermione wrote rapidly.
“That’s what I did too. I’ll take you to the kitchens that evening. You haven’t been there before, have you?” Suer stroked Hermione’s head sympathetically.
Hermione glared and slapped his hand away. She opened her mouth, then suddenly remembered the Mandrake leaf inside.
“Don’t pat my head! I’m not Angel!!!” Hermione pressed several exclamation marks into the papyrus. Her knuckles bore down so hard that the ink bled across the page.
“All right, all right. You’re not Angel. You’re my little childhood sweetheart,” Suer said with a shrug and a smile.
Hermione’s face instantly flushed. She glared at him in embarrassed annoyance, then shoved him away and lowered her head. Her long hair swept across her slender white neck, revealing crimson earlobes.
Suer chuckled, rose and walked to the bookcase behind them.
He soon returned with a book and sat close beside Hermione. Large gold letters on the cover read Dangerous Magical Creatures.
He wanted to discover exactly what sort of monster he had encountered in the Forbidden Forest the night before.
Silence settled over the library. Suer became absorbed in the book. Hermione wrote for a while, then secretly glanced up at him, a faint curve at the corner of her mouth.
“The Chimaera, native to south-eastern Greece, is an extraordinarily bloodthirsty monster. No one knows how it first came into existence. It appears to be a fusion of several magical creatures, possessing a lion’s head, a goat’s body and a dragon’s tail. Evil by nature, it was classified XXXXX, Extremely Dangerous, by the Association of Magical Creatures under the International Confederation of Wizards in 1893.”
An animated illustration showed a Chimaera standing atop a cliff and roaring at the sky.
Beneath the picture was a note in small print: “Any wizard who encounters a Chimaera must leave immediately. Do not linger. This species can fight a dragon and is extraordinarily dangerous!”
Suer shuddered at what he read. Such a dangerous creature lived in the Forbidden Forest. Did Dumbledore truly know? What if it went mad and left the woods…
Er… If that day ever came, the Chimaera would probably be met by dozens of Avada Kedavra curses the moment it showed its head.
No one would believe that the castle’s professors knew no Dark magic whatsoever.
Dumbledore was a man known as the white Dark Lord. The fact that his title still contained the words “Dark Lord” said plenty…
Even so, Suer remained shaken and felt still more grateful to the Bowtruckle.
His animal form did not make him as familiar with the Forbidden Forest as the Chimaera. He might be a little faster thanks to his body’s advantages, but in the end he would almost certainly have landed in the beast’s jaws.
Besides, if the Forbidden Forest contained a Chimaera, what about other dangerous creatures? There could hardly be none.
Turn a corner and meet another XXXXX-class beast. Surprised? Delighted?
In his wandering search for the Acromantulas, Suer had somehow run into the depths of the Forbidden Forest the night before…
It had been far too reckless. Suer silently condemned his own rash behaviour, then continued reading.
“Like a dragon, the Chimaera can breathe fire. Its dragon tail is also a formidable weapon. Chimaera eggs can be used to prepare numerous advanced potions. They are exceptionally rare and are uniformly classified by Ministries of Magic as Grade-A prohibited trade goods.”
“A wizard once attempted to steal a Chimaera’s egg and was forced to fight the creature when the attempt failed. He ultimately succeeded in killing it, only to fall from his broom on the journey home because his magic was exhausted.”
“What rotten luck. Greed does drive people mad…” Suer could not help sighing. He was entirely different, of course. This little badger only wanted a bite of meat.
“What did you say?” Hermione passed him a sheet of paper bearing one enormous word: “WHAT?”
“Look at this…” Suer handed her the book.