22 Yellow Moon (1/2)
They arrived at King's Cross at a quarter to eleven. Mr. Weasley dashed across the road to get trolleys for their trunks and they all hurried into the station.
”Percy first,” said Mrs. Weasley, looking nervously at the clock overhead, which showed they had only five minutes to disappear casually through the barrier.
Percy strode briskly forward and vanished. Mr. Weasley went next; Fred and George followed.
”I'll take Ginny and you three come right after us,” Mrs. Weasley told them, grabbing Ginny's hand and setting off. In the blink of an eye they were gone.
Harry and Ron followed after them and crashed into the barrier and bounced backwards.
Arth narrowed his eyes.
”The barrier is closed?”
Arth checked his watch.
There were only two minutes left. Ron started to panic.
”What do we do? Why is the barrier closed? What do we do?”
Harry places his trolly in front of the wall and pushed with all his might, yet it had no effect.
Arth noticed curious gazed focusing on the three of them and sighed.
”Stop it you two, we are starting to draw attention to ourselves. Just calm down and let's wait for your parents to come out.”
Three seconds...two seconds...one second...
”It's gone,” said Ron, sounding stunned. ”The train's left. What if Mum and Dad can't get back through to us? Have you got any Muggle money?”
Harry gave a hollow laughed. ”The Dursleys haven't given me pocket money for about six years.”
Arth checked his pockets for any spare change.
”I'm out too, damn.”
Ron pressed his ear to the cold barrier.
”Can't hear a thing,” he said tensely, ”What're we going to do? I don't know how long it'll take Mum and Dad to get back to us.”
They looked around. People were still watching them, mainly because of Hedwig's continuing screeches and Corvus sitting on Arth's shoulder.
”I think we'd better go and wait by the car,” said Harry. ”We're attracting too much atten —”
”Harry!” said Ron, his eyes gleaming. ”The car!”
”What about it?”
”We can fly the car to Hogwarts!”
Harry hit the head of Ron.
”Are you an idiot?”
”Sorry, just said it as a joke, don't have the confidence to drive it anyways...”
Arth sighed.
”At least you have the room to joke around. We only have to stay here and wait... unless.”
”Unless what?”
Arth grabbed his trolley and started to push it somewhere, Harry and Ron attempted to follow. They stopped when they walked to the back of kings cross.
”What do you think you are trying to do?” Asked Harry, genuinely curious.
Arth took out his wand before replying.
”I'm going to try to Apparate.”
Ron let out a gasp.
”Are you mad? You are only twelve! You aren't allowed to Apparate until you are sixteen even if you can.”
”I think I might be able too,” said Arth with an obviously uncertain voice.
”What if you splinch yourself? What will you do?”
”I'll deal with it when I get to it.”
Harry tilted his head in confusion.
”What is Apparate, and what is splinching?”
”Apparate is when you teleport and splinching is when you leave a part of your body behind.”
Harry glance worriedly at Arth, ”can you really do it?”
”Of course I can-” Arth froze. This wasn't like him. He wasn't usually this reckless, he needed to calm down.
”Maybe... we should wait?”
Arth had noticed that he was having increasingly more moments where he acted more and more reckless. And he knew the reason why.
”God damn that Dark lord who enjoys reading the mind of a child,” he muttered under his breath.
”What?”
”Nothing,” said Arth while putting away his wand. ”I just realized how stupid I was being.”
They walked to back to the barrier feeling a bit gloomy with their trolleys. They sat in front of the barrier while sighing. Corvus was flying around snapping at any mosquitoes that dared to come near Arth.
Suddenly, Arth felt as though he was being stared at. He glanced up and pulled out his wand. There was a flash of red light as a small creature with large, bat-like ears and bulging green eyes the size of tennis balls fell to the floor with a stunned look.
Harry let out a yell.
”Dobby!”
Ron frowned.
”Are you talking about the mad elf that took away your birthday presents?”
”Yes! It was this elf.”
”He was stoping us from entering through, he must be really determined to make sure you stay away from Hogwarts this year.”
Arth nudged Dobby with his foot.
”You reckon he can take us to school? He is a house elf, and house elf's have stronger magic than wizards, in theory.”
”Doesn't hurt to try, he won't hurt any of us for sure.”
”He almost got me killed by the Dursley's...” Harry muttered, but still allowed Arthur to dispel the curse.
”Rennervate.”
There was another flash of red light.
Dobby's eyes started to flutter as he regained consciousness. When the elf saw Harry, it immediately prostrated himself.
”Harry Potter!” said the creature in a high-pitched voice, ”Dobby is happy to meet the Harry Potter here sir. However, you must not go to Hogwarts.”