ASHLYNN WAS SURE that there had never been a stranger group of people in the history of anything recorded. Crookshanks and Gaia led the way down the stairs and into the tunnel; Lupin, Pettigrew, and Ron went next, looking like entrants in a six-legged race. Next came Professor Snape, drifting creepily along, his toes hitting each stair as they descended, help up by his own wand, which was being pointed at him by Sirius. Harry and Hermione followed after him and Ashlynn brought up the rear.

"You know, it might actually be a good idea to obiliviate Snape." Ashlynn whispered to Hermione, but she merely shook her head. "Well, what do you plan on telling Professor Dumbledore? We attacked him, Hermione. We are going to be in a world of trouble."

"He may not remember that it was you who did the attacking." Professor Lupin called back as they made thier way down the stairs.

"Yeah, maybe we can convince him that he tripped and hit his head." Ron laughed.

"Because that sounds like it will work." Ashlynn scoffed before a thought stuck her with enough force to make her whole body jerk. "You know, I just thought of something, Black."

Black looked over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow. "Yes."

"Well, Harry said that he's seen Crookshanks and Gaia with you before. And then you said that they both knew what Pettigrew really was . . ." Ashlynn trailed off, her eyebrows drawn together in concentration. " . . . but Gaia has been around Pettigrew for years now, and she never acted like Crookshanks did."

"Yes, well, as far as I can tell, your Gaia grew up with Pettigrew around. She merely assumed that he was like any other rat, because she hadn't been exposed to any others."

"Oh . . ." Ashlynn thought for a moment before she spoke again. "How do you do that? Talk to them?"

Sirius shrugged his narrow shoulders. "It is a skill you learn. You're young, I'm sure you will pick it up within the next few years."

Getting back through the tunnel turned out to be difficult. Lupin, Pettigrew, and Ron had to turn sideways to manage it; Lupin still had Pettigrew covered with his wand. Ashlynn could see them edging awkwardly along the tunnel in a single file. Crookshanks and Gaia were still in the lead. Harry went right after Black, who was still making Snape drift along ahead of them; he kept bumping his lolling head on the low ceiling. Ashlynn snorted as she realized that Black was doing nothing to prevent this.

"You know what this means?" Black said abruptly to Harry as they made thier slowly progress along the tunnel. "Turning Pettigrew in?"

"You're free." Harry answered.

"Yes . . ." Black nodded his head. "But I'm also - I don't know if anyone ever told you - I'm your godfather."

"Yeah, I knew that." Harry said.

"Well . . . your parents appointed me your guardian." Black said stiffly. "If anything happened to them . . . I'll understand, of course, if you want to stay with your aunt and uncle." He continued. "But . . . well . . . think about it. Once my name's cleared . . . if you wanted a . . . a different home . . ."

"What - live with you?" Harry said, accidentally cracking his head on a bit of rock protruding from the ceiling. "Leave the Dursleys?"

"Of course, I thought you wouldn't want to." Black said quickly. "I understand, I just thought I'd -"

"Are you insane?" Harry said, his voice easily as croaky as Black's. "Of course I want to leave the Dursleys! Have you got a house? When can I move in?"

Black turned right around to look at him; Snape's head was scraping the ceiling but Black didn't seem to care.

"You want to?" He said. "You mean it?"

"Yeah, I mean it!"

Black's gaunt face broke into a true smile and Ashlynn stared. The difference it made was startling, as though a person ten years younger were shining through the strained mask.

"Hey, just so you know." Ashlynn said, a wide grin spreading across her face. "Me and the Weasley's tend to show up occasionally to kidnap Harry."

Black turned and stared at her over his shoulder, causing Snape to bash his head into the ceiling several times in a row.

"You know, to keep things interesting. We did it last year, anyhow." Ashlynn giggled. "And I demand custody over the Christmas Holiday's. Harry's family now, which, I supposed, extends to you, too. Oh, by the way, did you know my dad? Richard Peirce?"

Black appeared positively awed by her easy going manner and, after a moment, seemed to remember that she had asked a question.

"The boy who married the Squib." Sirius nodded his head. "James and Lupin were more his friend than I was, but we had several classes together. He was a good man. We kept in touch after school."

"The Squib," Ashlynn said savagely, "was my mother. And I don't like for anyone to talk about her like that."

"My apologies." Sirius did, indeed, look contrite. "I do not mean it insultingly. I only remember her in passing and all you're father really said about her was that she was one of the smartest kids in her classes with the Muggles. Had top grades in all her classes, and left her school with scholarships to all the - what are the called? Collage?."

"College." Ashlynn corrected. "And, yeah, she was crazy smart. Maybe after everthing's settled down you could come to the family orchard. I'm sure that dad would like to see you. And Aunt Lilan!"

Black smiled softly. "I believe that I would like that very much. I have not thought of your Aunt Lilan in a very long time."

They did not speak again until they had reached the end of the tunnel. Crookshanks and Gaia darted up first; one of them had evidently pressed their paw to the knot on the trunk, because Lupin, Pettigrew, and Ron clambered upward without any sound of savaging branches.

Black saw Snape up through the hole, then stood back for Harry, Hermione and finally Ashlynn. At last, all of them were out.

The grounds were very dark now; the only light came from the distant windows of the castle. Without a word, they set off. Pettigrew was still wheezing and occasionally whimpering.

"One wrong move, Peter," Professor Lupin said threateningly, his wand still pointed sideways at Pettigrew's chest.

Silently they tramped through the grounds, the castle lights growing slowly larger. Snape was still drifting weirdly ahead of Black, his chin bumping his chest. And then -

A cloud shifted. There was suddenly dim shadows on the ground shifting across the lawn and each of thier faces. Their party was bathed in moonlight.

Snape collided with Lupin, Pettigrew and Ron, who had stopped abruptly. Black froze. He flung out one arm to make Ashlynn, Harry and Hermione stop as well.

Ashlynn could see Professor Lupin's silhouette. He had gone rigid. Then his limbs began to shake.

"Oh my god." Hermione gasped. "He didn't take his potion tonight! He's not safe!"

"Run." Black whispered. "Run. Now."

But Ashlynn was frozen. Ron was chained to Pettigrew and Lupin. Harry leapt forward but Black caught him around the chest and threw him back.

"Leave it to me - RUN!"

There was a terrible snarling noise. Professor Lupin's head was lengthening. So was his body. His shoulders were hunching. Hair was sprouting visibly on his face and hands, which were curling into clawed paws. Crookshanks's hair was on end again; Gaia was backing away -

As the werewolf reared, snapping its long jaws, Sirius and Ashlynn both disappeared. They had transformed, nearly in the same second, and the enormous, bearlike dog was joined by a sleek brown wolf as it bounded forward. The werewolf wrenched itself free of the manacle binding it, and the dog seized it about the neck and pulled it backward, away from Ron and Pettigrew at the same time the wolf collided with the werewolf's abdomen, forcing it farther back. They were a bundle of teeth and fur and claws ripping at each other.

Ashlynn howled as the werewolf's claw skidded across Sirius's muzzle and onto her cheek, nearly taking her eye out in the process, and without thinking, she ducked low enough to avoid the snapping jaws of the beast as it attempted to throw both her and Sirius off.

Behind her she heard Hermione scream, and then there was a bang, a burst of light that seemed to daze the werewolf, another bang, and then Harry yelling "Expelliarmus!".

He shouted something more but Ashlynn was too busy trying to avoid the werewolf's snapping jaw to understand what it was. Clamping down on the werewolf's back leg, Ashlynn pulled and tugged and used what little leverage she had to spin the great beast around and toward the forest.

The werewolf howled, rumbling a low growl in her direction, but it did not attack again; instead, it galloped into the forest, howling madly.

"Sirius, Ashlynn, he's gone! Pettigrew transformed!" Harry yelled.

Sirius was bleeding from the gash across his muzzle and another on his back, but at Harry's words he scrambled up again, and in an instant, the sound of his paws faded to silence as he pounded away across the grounds.

Ashlynn shifted and joined Harry and Hermione as they dashed over to Ron.

"What did he do to him?" Hermione whispered. Ron's eyes were only half-closed, his mouth hanging open; he was definitely alive, Ashlynn could hear him breathing, but he didn't seem to recognize them.

"I don't know . . ."

Ashlynn turned and gazed over the scene around them. Both Sirius and Lupin were gone and the only adult left in thier company was Snape, who was still hanging, unconscious, in midair. Off to the side, Crookshanks and Gaia were lying in a very similar manner as Ron, breathing shallowly.

"We'd better get them up to the castle and tell someone." Harry said, pushing his hair out of his eyes. "Come -"

But then, from beyond the range of their vision, they heard a yelping, a whining: a dog in pain . . .

"Sirius." Harry muttered, staring into the darkness.

"Harry's, it's the Dementors. I can smell them." Ashlynn hissed, shaking madly. The air smelled like something decaying, wet and feral and chilling to the bone.

Harry set off at a run, Ashlynn and Hermione right behind him. The yelping seemed to be coming from the grounds near the edge of the lake. They pelted toward it, Ashlynn, for once, forgetting to shift as they rushed into danger, her entire body shaking violently as the temperature seemed to drop several degrees.

The yelping stopped abruptly. As they reached the lake shore, they saw why - Sirius had turned back into a man. He was crouched on all fours, his hands over his head.

"Nooo," He moaned. "Nooo . . . please . . ."

And then Ashlynn saw them.

Dementors, at least a hundred of them, gliding in a black mass across the lake toward them. Across and around and over. Ashlynn spun on her heels and found more appearing out of the darkness on every side, they were encircling them . . .

"Hermione, Ash, think of something happy!" Harry yelled, raising his wand, blinking furiously, shaking his head, and then he began to chant, "Expecto Patronum! Expecto Patronum!"

Black gave a shudder, rolled over, and lay motionless on the ground, pale as death.

"Expecto Patronum! Hermione, Ash, help me!" Harry pleaded, shaking violently. "Expecto Patronum!"

Ashlynn pointed her wand toward the nearest Dementor and forced herself to think of something happy.

Mum painting . . . Mum sitting in the living room, she right in front of the big bay windows, and she's painting . . .

"Expecto Patronum!" Ashlynn said, but her voice wavered and there wasn't even the little silver whips coming from the tip of her wand like Harry had.

Winning the Quidditch Cup. Ashlynn thought fiercely, and then she corrected herself. Fred kissing me after we won the Quidditch Cup.

"Expecto Patronum! Expecto Patronum! Expecto . . . Expecto . . ." But Ashlynn couldn't do it. At her side she could hear Hermione whispering the spell, but she could see the whites of her eyes, and her pupils seemed to be nothing more than little pinpoints surrounded by a ever growing expansion of brown.

The Dementors were closing in, barely ten feet from them. They were forming a solid wall around them all, pressing in closer, closer . . .

"EXPECTO PATRONUM!" Harry bellowed. "EXPECTO PATRONUM!"

The same thin wisp of silver escaped his wand and hovered like a mist before them. At the same moment, Ashlynn felt Hermione collapse between them.

Ashlynn could feel the cold seeping into her blood, chasing away the warmth of the night. There was a ringing in her ears and, quiet suddenly, her knees would no longer support her weight. To her left, she could see Harry falling to his knees as well, but it seemed as if there was a fog clouding her vision and Ashlynn couldn't see Harry any longer. She couldn't see anything. There were tears in her eyes, blurring the world around her.

"Expecto - expecto patronum - Expecto Patronum!" Harry gasped.

Blinking furiously, Ashlynn tried to focus on her surroundings and found that, by the feeble light of Harry's Patronus, she could see the Dementors halt, hovering very close to them all. They couldn't walk through the cloud of silver mist Harry had conjured. A dead, slimy hand slid out from under the cloak. It made a gesture as though to sweep the Patronus aside.

"No - no -" Harry was gasping. "He's innocent . . . expecto - expecto patronum -"

Ashlynn could feel them watching Harry, herself, Hermione and Sirius, could hear their rattling breath like an evil wind around them. The nearest Dementor seemed to be considering Harry thoughtfully. Then it raised both it's rotting hands - and lowered its hood - and -

If Ashlynn had the strength left to scream, she would have. As it was a thin, panicked whine whistled from her nose, like the call of a distressed wolf.

Where there should have been eyes, there was only thin, gray scabbed skin, stretched blankly over empty sockets. But there was a mouth . . . a gaping, shapeless, hole, sucking the air with the sound of a death rattle.

Harry went stiff and a moment later his Patronus flickered and died.

Ashlynn was no longer on her knees, but lying flat on her back, her head tilting toward Harry and the others, her fingers clawing weakly at the grass beneath her.

A pair of strong, clammy hands suddenly placed themselves on Ashlynn's cheeks . . . turning her face away from Harry and the others . . . tilting her chin upward . . . she could feel it's breath wafting across her, smelling like rotten meat . .

She could hear Harry sobbing next to her and, with a start, realized that he was not the only one. Tears were streaming down her face steadily, and in her minds eye, she could see her mother, lying in the hospital bed, wasted away. Cursing, Ashlynn lashed out, her hand coming up to strike out blindly at the Dementor above her. With a brilliant spark, the tip of her wand connected with the Dementor's temple, and the creature hissed.

But the spark didn't fade. Instead, it grew brighter and brighter . . . Harry was falling forward onto the grass, face down, sick and shaking . . . The blinding light was illuminating the grass around them all . . . Something was driving the Dementors back . . . the cold was ebbing away . . . it was circling around her and Harry and Sirius and Hermione . . . The Dementors were leaving . . . they were being driven away . . . The air was warm again . . .

And then everything went black.