The Girl Who Saw Tomorrow » Harry Potter

1.49 | The Day of Tomorrow Pt. 1

Dumbledore's Army was back in formation – or at least, a part of it. Harry, Hermione, Ron, Ginny and Luna were huddled together at the end of Umbridge's corridor.

"Don't you think we should find Margaret?" asks Ron, choosing his words carefully – Neville and Luna did not know where Margaret was from. "She can tell us, can't she?"

"Luna and I tried while Harry was getting the Invisibility Cloak," says Ginny, frowning. "No one's seen her after your exam this morning..."

"After what happened last night, however," says Hermione, biting her lip nervously. "Maybe we should find her later..."

"We don't have time," says Harry, frowning. "Keep an eye out for her, if you can find her while I'm gone..."

But they would not be finding Margaret any time soon, for she was hiding on the boundaries of the Forbidden Forest.

During the History of Magic exam, nearly the entire paper of which she had left, Margaret had watched as Harry fell off of his desk, clutching his head and yelling in pain. Old Professor Tofty had taken him out of the Great Hall whilst the other students watched, and had returned without him.

Little did their classmates know, Harry had just seen a fake, but seemingly very real vision of his godfather being tortured by the Darkest Wizard of all time...

As soon as the exam was over, Margaret dashed from the Great Hall, found an empty corner and teleported to her room where she changed into more comfortable clothes, secured her wand and took a quick bite of the remaining macrons to calm her nerves. When she was as prepared as she could be, she teleported outside.

The sun was setting quickly above. It was strange to think it was only that morning when she was in Paris. It felt like it had been days since then.

In Margaret's opinion, waiting was the hardest part. Every single minute passed excruciatingly slowly as anxiety clutched her heart tighter in its unforgiving grip. The worst part was that she almost wanted the time to freeze. She did not want to go to the Department of Mysteries, she did not want to leave the safe confines of Hogwarts; she wanted to tell Harry that Sirius was perfectly all right at Grimmauld Place and that Kreacher was currently lying to him under Bellatrix Lestrange's orders...

But she could not mess with time like that, else Voldemort's return would never be proven, Fudge would continue to rule, Umbridge would remain at Hogwarts, Dumbledore would not be able to return, and Sirius...

Margaret buried her face in her hands, biting her tongue so hard that she tasted the metallic tinge of blood; but she forced down her sobs. This was no time to cry. She was not weak.

Before long, the sounds of grass under shuffling feet and muffled talking filled the air and Margaret peeked out from behind the tall tree.

A little ways away, Hermione and Harry were leading the striking pink and plump figure of Umbridge toward the forest. The three disappeared amongst the first shade of trees and Margaret, drawing her wand, broke into a sprint in the same direction. Midway through, she paused, her heightened senses alert for the littlest of sounds as she looked around – they were well off the forest path now.

"It's a bit further in!" Hermione's voice sounds loudly from her right, and quickly Margaret follows it, knowing she wanted to be heard. "It had to be somewhere students wouldn't find it accidentally!"

The canopy of trees above was so thick that it seemed to be well past dusk inside the forest. Margaret took advantage of that, ducking behind trees and watched from the darkness as Harry and Hermione came to a stop in the large clearing where Hagrid had kept Grawp. However, the ten-foot giant was nowhere to be seen; the ropes which bound him to nearby trees stumps were lying torn on the ground.