Can A Phoenix Love A Lion? (Hermione Granger x Male Reader)

19. Follow the Spiders

The door banged shut and Ron pulled off the Invisibility Cloak.

"We're in trouble now," he said hoarsely. "No Dumbledore. They might as well close the school tonight. There'll be an attack a day with him gone."

"Look," Y/N said, his voice low.

A line of spiders was going out of the hut by a window.

"Come on," he said. He caught a lantern and opened the door. "C'mon, Fang, we're going for a walk."

"What're you doing?" Ron said.

"I want to know where they're going," Y/N said resolutely. "Not you?"

"All right," Harry said.

Once outside, they saw the spiders going toward the Forbidden Forest.

"Come on," Harry said.

"What?" Ron hoarsely.

"You heard what Hagrid said," Harry told him. "Follow the spiders."

"They're heading to the Dark Forrest!"

Y/N rolled his eyes. And he's the Gryffindor. He sighed and began to walk by the spiders, Harry following him.

"Why the spiders?" Ron wailed. "Why couldn't it be 'follow the butterflies'?"

So, with Fang scampering around them, sniffing tree roots and leaves, they entered the forest. By the glow of the lantern and their wands, they followed the steady trickle of spiders along the path. They walked behind them for about twenty minutes, not speaking, listening hard for noises other than breaking twigs and rustling leaves. Then, when the trees had become thicker than ever, so that the stars overhead were no longer visible, and the lantern and their wands shone alone in the sea of dark, they saw their spider guides leaving the path.

They followed anyway. They couldn't move very quickly now; there were tree roots and stumps in their way, barely visible in the near blackness. Y/N could feel his hands moist against the wood of his wand and the metal of the lantern. More than once, they had to stop, so that they could crouch down and find the spiders in the light.

They walked for what seemed like at least half an hour, their robes snagging on low-slung branches and brambles. After a while, they noticed that the ground seemed to be sloping downward, though the trees were as thick as ever.

Finally, they came by a sort of tunnel, its ceiling made of trees fallen on the ground.

Ron breathed heavily. "Guys, I don't like this," he mumbled, the light of his wand shaking. "Guys, I don't like this at all."

"Shush!" Harry retorted.

Y/N looked once again at the spiders on the ground. They were all heading straight inside the tunnel. No choice, then.

"Can we go back, now?" Ron moaned.

"Follow us," Y/N told him. He had hoped his voice would be reassuring, yet it was trembling.

They went inside the tunnel, surrounded by spiders everywhere. Their whinings came from everywhere, and their webs hung from the tree ceiling. Y/N felt some of them falling on his shoulders. It was hard not to weep like Ron. But these spiders weren't dangerous it seemed, so he found a little strength to avoid moaning.

They emerged in a hollow. On the other side was a large hole, like some gigantic animal's lair.

Suddenly, a crash of branches came from it, as if a tree had fallen down.

"Who is it?"

The voice was deep, so deep Y/N thought he could feel the earth shaking under his feet. If not the earth, he was shaking.