the Gambler

From time to time there was a sound of playfulness in the rickety hut of the Burrow. In the open space ahead, a few ugly-looking goblins came out through the grass blades, and were bounced back by Tom casually.He lazily turned a page of the newspaper. All the recent reports in the Daily Prophet had focused on frequent Death Eater attacks under Voldemort's leadership.In the photo, the huge Dark Mark was shining with green light, and directly below the mark, a tragic family of wizards was suspended in mid-air, and an iron pillar covered with spikes pierced through their abdomen, like a skewer of human flesh.

Tom frowned in disgust, even though he knew it wasn't his masterpiece, he was still disgusted by this behavior.Although it is inevitable to frighten the enemy in war, he is not the type who likes to treat corpses roughly.He prefers to torture the living, thank you.

Harry made a beautiful dive, and when he was about to approach the ground, he jerked up the front of the broom, and between his clenched fingers, a pair of transparent, constantly vibrating wings came out.Harry opened his palms, and the Snitch's figure glistened in the sunlight.Ron and Hermione also quickly returned to the ground, and they hugged Harry and laughed.In an atmosphere of extreme tension, this rare joy can resonate even in the slightest.

Because of Bellatrix, Dumbledore ordered the closure of the Floo network of the Black family, and Harry and Tom needed to join the Weasley family and go to platform nine and three-quarters together.Hermione lived in the Burrow the day before Harry's arrival, and her relationship with Ron quickly warmed up. Anyone with a discerning eye could see how much Mrs. Weasley liked Hermione. She seemed eager to marry the two immediately. couple.

This may also have something to do with Mrs. Weasley's desire to divert attention. The wedding date of Bill and Fleur is slowly approaching, and they will stick together to plan the wedding when they have time. Fleur's performance is particularly sweet, and she almost arranged Bill's wedding. Everything, including blatant feeding and kissing.This greatly irritated the other three witches in the room, yes, Jasmine, Hermione, and Ginny. They even wanted to curse Veela many times and couldn't leave Bill's fingers for a moment.

Harry raised an eyebrow. In fact, Bill seemed to be more attached to Fleur, and they looked very happy.Ron probably thought so too.But their opinions have never been recognized by the witches. 'You just like phlegm calling you Ali!Ron desperately wanted to stick his cheeks up! Ginny's complaint drew an approving nod from Hermione, who ignored Ron for most of the afternoon.Since then, Harry and Ron have kept their mouths shut.

"Are you all ready?" Mrs. Weasley clapped her hands to attract everyone's attention. After scanning everyone's luggage, she cast a dissatisfied look at Ron. The two wool socks exposed by the boy's ankle were obviously colored different.

"Ronald Weasley," said the witch angrily, "I told you last night to prepare your clothes for this morning."

"But Mom, I'm ready! But it's like this in the morning!" Ron retorted, flushing so that the freckles on his face were not clear.

"Perhaps that ghoul in the attic finally slipped down to change your socks, little Ronnie!" Fred, with his nightcap still askew on his head, leaned against the banister of the stairs next to him, stealing. laugh.

"It must be the two of you!" Ron condemned angrily.

"It breaks my heart," Fred exclaimed, exaggeratingly wiping non-existent tears. "Mum knows how busy we are, and it was almost wee hours when we got back last night! Don't you, George?"

"Little Ronnie doubts us, I'm on the verge of tears, Fred!"

The twins clung to each other and wept bitterly, entertaining a roomful of people with their performance.

"I like them, dear Bill." Fleur giggled and snuggled into Bill's arms. The latter gently combed his fiancée's moonlight silver hair, and murmured a response from his throat.

"Do you want to consider closing the joke shop?" Mrs. Weasley's face was not very good. "The activities of Death Eaters have become more and more rampant these days, and many stores in Diagon Alley have closed down. Moreover, the number of customers is not as good as Once upon a time—”

"No, Mom!" Fred said seriously. "Weasley's Joke Shop should bring joy to others, especially at this time, everyone should smile more!"

"Fred is right. The darker the time, the more we need to be happy. We have discussed it carefully, and we will not change our decision, Mom!" George also put on the same serious expression.

Mrs. Weasley glanced up at the weird clock. All the spoons with the Weasley family heads were stuck in places marked with danger. She waved her wand tremblingly, and the round dial was hidden by the napkin.Harry noticed that tears were shining in the witch's eyes, her brows were frowned, and she said in a tone that she didn't know whether to comfort herself or others: "What you said makes sense, maybe this thing has already been released. question."

The witch turned around and smiled reluctantly at everyone: "Shout out the name of Diagon Alley in line, and don't mispronounce it again. Someone from the Ministry of Magic will escort you to Platform Nine and Three Quarters." She looked deeply into Harry's In the eyes, the nose twitched hard, "Be careful, Harry, and take care of yourself."

"I've always been good at taking care of myself, Mrs. Weasley." Harry took the initiative to hug the witch, "I and the others will gather together to take care of each other, don't worry."

"You've grown up a lot, Harry," said Mrs. Weasley with feigned ease, and Harry saw her turn her head and quietly wipe away tears. "Okay, Ron, you're first."

Mr. Weasley was waiting at the door of Tom's bar very early, and beside him was a strange wizard sitting in the driver's seat.It was a Ford sedan whose space had been expanded by magic, and he hurriedly called everyone to get in. Mr. Weasley carefully closed the door like he was treating a baby, and urged his colleagues who were staring at Harry's forehead to leave quickly.

"Just the two of you?" Hermione asked quietly.

"Of course not. Moody and the others are following behind. You should not have noticed. They must be good at stealth, right? By the way, there is also a small team of Aurors guarding the platform. It has been very uneventful recently. Many people think that mysterious people No attack on the Hogwarts train, who knows?" muttered Mr Weasley, "Albus got us fully prepared. Oh, Harry—"

"what?"

"Padfoot will accompany you back to school. After all, it will be safer to bring a ferocious animal with you." He looked at the dazed boy from the rearview mirror, and his tone was a little nervous, "It seems that it can't do without you, no matter whether it is How can I persuade you. But Padfoot can’t stay by your side all day, you know, it likes to go hunting in the wild.”

"I see, thank you."

So Sirius would disappear from time to time to perform the tasks of the Order of the Phoenix, but he himself asked to be Harry's bodyguard.This warmed the boy's heart.

The Ministry of Magic officials drove smoothly and quickly, and it didn't take them long to reach the front of London Railway Station.People around were amazed at how many people climbed out of a small car, but fortunately no one came to ask.Harry was glad there weren't any police around, otherwise he didn't know how to explain the overload.Harry and their luggage had been placed back in the castle lounge in advance. After passing through the wall one by one, the bright red body of the Hogwarts Express was looming in the smoke.

Harry couldn't help noticing that the place was far less lively than it used to be, and there were a lot fewer people on the platform, and everyone spoke very softly, and the parents seemed to be hesitant to let their children go.

"But Hogwarts is the safest place in Scotland, Mom!" A young girl complained dissatisfiedly. Her mother had been holding her by force for more than ten minutes. The girl couldn't wait to find her friends on the train. .Harry noticed that it was a Muggleborn, and the clothes the family wore were decidedly not wizardly.

"We can stay at home, there won't be dark wizards there!"

"Mom, I told you that those inexplicably collapsed bridges and houses were not accidents." The girl said softly, "The war in the wizarding world will also affect the Muggle world. Remember the arrest warrant issued by the Prime Minister last year The murderous criminal Sirius Black?"

The girl's mother turned pale, and her voice trembled: "Oh my God, that's really terrible."

"In fact he was wronged," the girl struggled for a moment as her feet slipped back and forth on the ground, and she looked up at her mother again. "He's a wizard, Mom. Although I don't know how the Muggle Prime Minister knows about him."

"My daughter is right, my dear." The girl's father finally spoke. "Obviously the two worlds influence each other. If Hogwarts is the safest place, I would prefer her to stay there." He stretched out his hands and rubbed the mess scratched the girl's hair, "promise that I will protect myself, child. Me and your mother will also pay attention to safety."

"Thank you dad," the girl put her arms around her parents, "I love you!"

A huge black dog jumped into Harry's arms through the crowd, and many people around were startled by its size.Padfoot flicked his tail cheerfully around the boy, and Harry couldn't help laughing out loud as he stroked handfuls of the soft fur of the dog's head, which licked his palms wet.Tom looked away in disgust.

"Padfoot, we can get on the train." Harry pointed to the red leather train that was blowing its whistle. More and more people noticed the weird combination here. He crossed the crowd and greeted several DA members. wave.

Harry and the others picked the box closest to the end of the train. Compared with the original crowded situation, all the boxes now seem much empty, and some even have no passengers.Hermione and Ron went to make routine inspections, and Harry leaned on the table by the window and looked out intermittently, unable to settle down for some inexplicable reason.The tension also infected Tom, whose brows knit together.

"what happened?"

"I'm a little uneasy." Harry admitted generously. Padfoot shook his body a few times and slowly returned to his human form. He quickly closed the curtain of the cubicle, cast a dozen anti-tapping and detection spells, and sat next to his godson. Down.

"Don't worry, Moody and the others will contact me every five minutes."

"Do you think Voldemort will really attack the Hogwarts Express?"

Tom closed the book heavily, and Harry watched as the boy drew out his wand and waved it complicatedly a few times, the golden light slowly enveloped the entire box.Harry reached out to touch where the barrier had vanished, leaving nothing but air.

"Protection spell?" Harry asked.

"Improved Ignore Charm." Tom replied calmly. "Protection Charm is too much waste of magic power."

"That's a nice idea, though I don't think it's necessary—hell!" Sirius stared out the window in shock.

Ginny screamed and quickly covered her mouth. She widened her eyes and watched in disbelief as wave after wave of Death Eaters in black floor-length robes and white masks appeared outside the car window.There was the sound of a dull heavy object landing above her head, and she raised her head, the sound of small footsteps mixed with crazy female laughter.Outside the box were all the students fleeing in all directions, and everyone had expressions of horror.The glass door of the compartment was opened roughly, and Harry appeared outside the door with the smell of gunpowder smoke. Without giving Ginny a chance to speak, he put the invisibility cloak over the girl's head, and pulled her through the crowd to the nearest the rear of the car.

Only then did Ginny calm down and look around carefully. There were five or six breathing sounds besides them in the dark box.

"Report your name!" said a fairly familiar voice, slightly louder but not to the extent that the enemy would detect it.

"Harry Potter and Ginny Weasley," Harry said eagerly, shoving Ginny into the box, "keep them safe, Ernie and Zacharias."

"What about you?" Ernie asked softly.

"I need to find more people. Pay attention to your gold coins. If it gets hot, it means that you need to quickly disconnect the iron buckle of the box."

"I'll go with you!" Ernie suggested.

"No, you need to ensure their safety. The other DA members and I will try our best to delay the Death Eaters coming here." Harry's firm tone made both of them submit, "This is equally important."