CHAPTER TWENTY
THE DEMENTOR'S
KISS
Harry had never been part of a stranger group. Crookshanks led
the way down the stairs; 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, held up by his own wand,
which was being pointed at him by Sirius. Harry and Hermione brought up the
rear.
Getting back into the tunnel was difficult. Lupin, Pettigrew, and Ron
had to turn sideways to manage it; Lupin still had Pettigrew covered with his
wand. Harry could see them edging awkwardly along the tunnel in single file.
Crookshanks was 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. Harry had the impression Black was making no effort to prevent
this.
“You know what this means?” Black said abruptly to Harry as they made
their slow progress along the tunnel. “Turning Pettigrew in?”
“You' re free,”
said Harry.
“Yes...,” said Black. “But I'm also—I don't know if anyone ever
told you—I'm your godfather.”
“Yeah, I knew that,” said Harry.
“Well...
your parents appointed me your guardian,” said Black stiffly. “If anything
happened to them...”
Harry waited. Did Black mean what he thought he
meant?
“I'll understand, of course, if you want to stay with your aunt and
uncle,” said Black. “But... well... think about it. Once my name's cleared... if
you wanted a... a different home...”
Some sort of explosion took place in the
pit of Harry's stomach.
“What—live with you?” he 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,” said Black quickly.
“I understand, I just thought I'd —”
“Are you insane?” said Harry, 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!” said
Harry.
Black's gaunt face broke into the first true smile Harry had seen upon
it. The difference it made was startling, as though a person ten years younger
were shining through the starved mask; for a moment, he was recognizable as the
man who had laughed at Harry's parents' wedding.
They did not speak again
until they had reached the end of the tunnel. Crookshanks darted up first; he
had evidently pressed his 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 and
Hermione to pass. 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. Harry's
mind was buzzing. He was going to leave the Dursleys. He was going to live with
Sirius Black, his parents' best friend... He felt dazed... What would happen
when he told the Dursleys he was going to live with the convict they'd seen on
television...!
“One wrong move, Peter,” said Lupin threateningly ahead. His
wand was 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 on his chest. And then —
A
cloud shifted. There were suddenly dim shadows on the ground. 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 Harry and Hermione
stop.
Harry could see Lupin's silhouette. He had gone rigid. Then his limbs
began to shake.
“Oh, my —” Hermione gasped. “He didn't take his potion
tonight! He's not safe!”
“Run,” Black whispered. “Run. Now.”
But Harry
couldn't run. Ron was chained to Pettigrew and Lupin. He leapt forward but Black
caught him around the chest and threw him back.
“Leave it to
me—RUN!”
There was a terrible snarling noise. 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; he was backing away —
As the werewolf reared, snapping its long
jaws, Sirius disappeared from Harry's side. He had transformed. The enormous,
bearlike dog bounded forward. As the werewolf wrenched itself free of the
manacle binding it, the dog seized it about the neck and pulled it backward,
away from Ron and Pettigrew. They were locked, jaw to jaw, claws ripping at each
other.
Harry stood, transfixed by the sight, too intent upon the battle to
notice anything else. It was Hermione's scream that alerted him —
Pettigrew
had dived for Lupin's dropped wand. Ron, unsteady on his bandaged leg, fell.
There was a bang, a burst of light—and Ron lay motionless on the ground. Another
bang—Crookshanks flew into the air and back to the earth in a
heap.
“Expelliarmus.” Harry yelled, pointing his own wand at Pettigrew;
Lupin's wand flew high into the air and out of sight. “Stay where you are!”
Harry shouted, running forward.
Too late. Pettigrew had transformed. Harry
saw his bald tail whip through the manacle on Ron's outstretched arm and heard a
scurrying through the grass.
There was a howl and a rumbling growl; Harry
turned to see the werewolf taking flight; it was galloping into the forest
—
“Sirius, he's gone, Pettigrew transformed!” Harry yelled.
Black was
bleeding; there were gashes across his muzzle and 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.
Harry and Hermione dashed over to
Ron.
“What did he do to him?” Hermione whispered. Ron's eyes were only
half-closed, his mouth hung open; he was definitely alive, they could hear him
breathing, but he didn't seem to recognize them.
“I don't know...”
Harry
looked desperately around. Black and Lupin both gone... they had no one but
Snape for company, still hanging, unconscious, in midair.
“We'd better get
them up to the castle and tell someone,” said Harry, pushing his hair out of his
eyes, trying to think straight. “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.
He had a moment's indecision, but
there was nothing they could do for Ron at the moment, and by the sound of it,
Black was in trouble —
Harry set off at a run, Hermione right behind him. The
yelping seemed to be coming from the ground near the edge of the lake. They
pelted toward it, and Harry, running flat out, felt the cold without realizing
what it must mean —
The yelping stopped abruptly. As they reached the
lakeshore, 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 Harry saw them. Dementors, at least a hundred of them,
gliding in a black mass around the lake toward them. He spun around, the
familiar, icy cold penetrating his insides, fog starting to obscure his vision;
more were appearing out of the darkness on every side; they were encircling
them...
“Herrnione, think of something happy!” Harry yelled, raising his
wand, blinking furiously to try and clear his vision, shaking his head to rid it
of the faint screaming that had started inside it —
I'm going to live with my
godfather. I'm leaving the Dursleys.
He forced himself to think of Black, and
only Black, and began to chant: “Expecto patronum! Expecto patronum!”
Black
gave a shudder, rolled over, and lay motionless on the ground, pale as
death.
He'll be all right. I'm going to go and live with him.
“Expecto
patronum! Hermione, help me! Expecto patronum!”
“Expecto —” Hermione
whispered, “expecto—expecto —”
But she couldn't do it. The dementors were
closing in, barely ten feet from them. They formed a solid wall around Harry and
Hermione, and were getting closer...
“EXPECTO PATRONUM!” Harry yelled, trying
to blot the screaming from his ears. “EXPECTO PATRONUM!”
A thin wisp of
silver escaped his wand and hovered like mist before him. At the same moment,
Harry felt Hermione collapse next to him. He was alone... completely
alone...
“Expecto—expecto patronum —”
Harry felt his knees hit the cold
grass. Fog was clouding his eyes. With a huge effort, he fought to
remember—Sirius was innocent—innocent—We'll be okay—I' mgoing to live with him
—
“Ex ecto patronum!” he gasped.
By the feeble light of his formless
Patronus, He saw a dementor halt, very close to him. It 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 gasped. “He's innocent... expecto expecto patronum
—”
He could feet them watching him, hear their rattling breath like an evil
wind around him. The nearest dementor seemed to be considering him. Then it
raised both its rotting hands—and lowered its hood.
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.
A paralyzing terror filled Harry so that he
couldn't move or speak. His Patronus flickered and died.
White fog was
blinding him. He had to fight... expecto patronum ...he couldn't see... and in
the distance, he heard the familiar screaming... expecto patronum... he groped
in the mist for Sirius, and found his arm... they weren't going to take
him...
But a pair of strong, clammy hands suddenly attached themselves around
Harry's neck. They were forcing his face upward... He could feel its breath...
It was going to get rid of him first... He could feel its putrid breath... His
mother was screaming in his ears... She was going to be the last thing he ever
heard —
And then, through the fog that was drowning him, he thought he saw a
silvery light growing brighter and brighter... He felt himself fall forward onto
the grass... Facedown, too weak to move, sick and shaking, Harry opened his
eyes. The dementor must have released him. The blinding light was illuminating
the grass around him... The screaming had stopped, the cold was ebbing
away...
Something was driving the dementors back... It was circling around
him and Black and Hermione... They were leaving...
The air was warm
again...
With every ounce of strength he could muster, Harry raised his head
a few inches and saw an animal amid the light, galloping away across the lake...
Eyes blurred with sweat, Harry tried to make out what it was... It was as bright
as a unicorn... Fighting to stay conscious, Harry watched it canter to a halt as
it reached the opposite shore. For a moment, Harry saw, by its brightness,
somebody welcoming it back... raising his hand to pat it... someone who looked
strangely familiar ...but it couldn't be...
Harry didn't understand. He
couldn't think anymore. He felt the last of his strength leave him, and his head
hit the ground as he fainted.
© Гарри Поттер фан сайт
А когда вырастешь Армия России сделает из тебя мужчину.