THE FORBIDDEN FOREST
“You don’t think they’ve been hurt, do you?” whispered
Hermione.
“I don’t care if Malfoy has, but if something’s got Neville . . . it’s
our fault he’s here in the first place.”
The minutes dragged by. Their ears seemed sharper than usual.
Harry’s seemed to be picking up every sigh of the wind, every
cracking twig. What was going on? Where were the others?
At last, a great crunching noise announced Hagrid’s return. Mal-
foy, Neville, and Fang were with him. Hagrid was fuming. Malfoy,
it seemed, had sneaked up behind Neville and grabbed him as a
joke. Neville had panicked and sent up the sparks.
“We’ll be lucky ter catch anythin’ now, with the racket you two
were makin’. Right, we’re changin’ groups — Neville, you stay
with me an’ Hermione, Harry, you go with Fang an’ this idiot. I’m
sorry,” Hagrid added in a whisper to Harry, “but he’ll have a harder
time frightenin’ you, an’ we’ve gotta get this done.”
So Harry set off into the heart of the forest with Malfoy and
Fang. They walked for nearly half an hour, deeper and deeper into
the forest, until the path became almost impossible to follow be-
cause the trees were so thick. Harry thought the blood seemed to
be getting thicker. There were splashes on the roots of a tree, as
though the poor creature had been thrashing around in pain close
by. Harry could see a clearing ahead, through the tangled branches
of an ancient oak.
“Look —” he murmured, holding out his arm to stop Malfoy.
Something bright white was gleaming on the ground. They
inched closer.
It was the unicorn all right, and it was dead. Harry had never
seen anything so beautiful and sad. Its long, slender legs were stuck
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