Hogwarts: From Squibs to Greatness

Chapter 145 Honey Duke and the Eve of the Plan

The passage twists and turns, more like a giant rabbit hole.

Harry hurried on, wand held out in front of him, stumbling now and then over the uneven ground.

Soon after stumbling along the way, Harry came to the bottom of a dilapidated stone staircase, which extended to an invisible place above.

Harry began to climb, careful not to make any noise.

He didn't know how long it had passed, how many stairs he had climbed, and finally when Harry was concentrating on looking at his feet, he unexpectedly hit his head against a hard object, causing him to let out a slight cry of pain.

While rubbing the place where he just hit, he stretched out his hand upwards, and soon the touch from his palm was like wood. When he looked up, it turned out that what he just hit was a trapdoor.

He pricked up his ears and listened carefully to the sound behind the trapdoor. He didn't know if the sound insulation here was too strong, or it was just so quiet on the other side of the trapdoor.

Harry didn't hear any sound, so he hesitated a little, Harry decided to push open the trap door first, and escape immediately if there was a situation.

Slowly he pushed open the trapdoor and peered over its edge.

It was a cellar, full of crates and other wooden boxes, and Harry was relieved that no one was there.

So he climbed out of the trapdoor and closed it carefully.

It was only then that Harry realized that the closed trapdoor blended seamlessly with the gray floor around it, and it was impossible to tell without looking carefully.

Harry slowly climbed up the wooden stairs leading to the upper floor.Now he could clearly hear voices, not to mention the tinkling of bells and the opening and closing of doors.

When he was thinking about what to do, he suddenly heard a door nearer opened, and someone was coming downstairs.

"Get another box of jelly slugs, honey, they've bought us all out!" said a woman's voice.

A pair of feet came down the stairs, and Harry jumped behind a large crate, waiting for the footsteps to pass.He heard the man moving boxes against the opposite wall.Maybe there will never be another chance——

Harry dodged stealthily and swiftly from cover, and climbed the stairs; glancing back, he saw only a bulky back and a shiny bald head, bound in a box.

Harry climbed to the doorway at the top of the stairs, slipped in and found himself standing behind the counter at Honeydukes.

He stooped down, tiptoed to the side, and then straightened up.

Honeydukes was packed with Hogwarts students, and no one gave Harry a second glance.

He walked sideways among the crowd, scanning his surroundings.

This was Harry's first visit to Honeydukes Candy Shop in Hogsmeade, and everything here made Harry feel extremely fresh.

Rows of shelves are filled with the tastiest and juiciest sweets.

Large chunks of buttery-yellow nougat, shiny pink coconut sorbet, honey-colored toffee, hundreds of neatly arranged chocolates, and a big bucket of Bibi’s multi-flavored beans.

There was also a big vat of sizzling bees, those custard balls that Ron had mentioned, the kind that make you float into the air.

Against the other wall are "special effect" candies, such as Blowing Super Bubblegum, which fills a room with bluebell-colored bubbles that last for days.

There are also the strange and crunchy maomaoya mints; the small and black pepper urchin, which will breathe fire in the mouth after eating; effect candy.

Harry stared at everything in front of him dazedly, and tried his best to squeeze through a group of sixth graders.

Then Harry saw a sign hanging in the far corner of the shop, and Ron and Hermione were standing under it. According to the sign, it seemed that they were studying the plate of blood-smelling lollipops.

Harry moved quietly behind the two of them.

"Er, no, I guess Harry wouldn't want such things, they're for vampires," said Hermione.

"How about these?" said Ron, pushing a jar of cockroach candy under Hermione's nose.

"Absolutely not," said Harry.

Ron almost threw the jar away.

"Harry!" screamed Hermione. "What are you doing here? How... how...?"

It seemed that Hermione was too shocked by Harry's appearance here, and she didn't say the whole thing for a long time.

"Wow!" Ron showed admiration on his face, "You have learned to apparate!
"Of course not," said Harry.

Lowering his voice so that the sixth graders would not hear him, he told them both about the Marauder's Map.

"Why did Fred and George never give it to me!" Ron was annoyed. "I'm their real brother!"

"But Harry won't keep it!" said Hermione, as if the idea was ridiculous. "He's going to give it to Professor McGonagall, isn't he, Harry?"

"I won't hand it in!" said Harry.

"Are you crazy?" Ron glared at Hermione. "Hand over such a good thing?"

"If I hand it over, I'll have to tell where I got it! Filch will know Fred and George stole it!"

"But what about Sirius Black?" Hermione said through clenched teeth. "He will use one of the secret passages on the map to sneak into the castle! The teachers must know!"

"He couldn't have come in through the secret passages," said Harry quickly. "There are seven secret passages in the picture, right? Fred and George reckon Filch already knows four of them, and the other three."

"One has collapsed and no one can pass through it. The entrance of the other is planted with Whomping Willow. There is no way to avoid it. The exit of the one I just used is in the cellar of Honeydukes. If you don't know it, it's hard to find. The trapdoor."

It's a pity that Harry never imagined that the Padfoot of one of the creators of the Marauder's Map in his hand was the "wanted criminal" Sirius who worried him all the time.

What made Harry even more unexpected was that John was quietly reading a book in the Shrieking Shack in the remote part of Hogsmeade at the moment, while Sirius and Lupine were watching Harry's movements through the surveillance screen.

And in the cage on the table, the sober Scabbers, Peter Pettigrew, was looking at the people in front of him in horror, as well as Crookshanks who was guarding the cage.

For Pettigrew, whose head was about to degenerate and was as big as a mouse, he really couldn't understand the scene where the few people he feared most gathered together and appeared in front of him when he woke up.

What made Pettigrew even more chilling was that everyone present except Crookshanks, the cat, knew his true identity.

Can you imagine the horror of waking up to someone who clearly wants to kill himself calling out his name?

At the same time, what made him even more desperate was the cage that locked him. This cage seemed to be an alchemy tool, which completely restricted him in the Animagus form, and no matter how hard he tried, he could not return to his human form.

So he had no choice but to resign himself to his fate, laying down in the cage and focusing on the few people in the room.

Sirius and the others naturally didn't know about Pettigrew's psychological changes. After watching Harry for a while, Sirius saw that he was reading a notice posted by the Ministry of Magic.

He still couldn't hold back, looked back at John and said, "Are you really going to do this? Wouldn't this be too cruel to Harry?"

John put down the book in his hand, looked at the worried Sirius and said directly: "Sirius, you have to know that Harry will always go on in the future, you can't hide everything from him, especially Something about his parents."

"Harry needs to know the truth, no matter how cruel the truth is, this is something he must experience, only in this way can Harry achieve real growth."

Sirius opened his mouth to refute, but Lupine beside him put his hand on Sirius and shook his head slowly.

Sirius didn't know, but Lupine knew very well that although John looked very young, the other party was very methodical and had an uncompromising personality.

And like John said, Harry has a right to know about his parents, even if the truth of the matter would be pretty hurtful.

Sirius finally gave up his thoughts, and looked helplessly at Harry, who was talking to Ron and Hermione with a smile on the screen.

At this time, in the picture, Ron dragged Harry to the big bucket containing Zizibee candy, and said excitedly: "Look, this is Zizibee candy, there are jelly slugs, and sour popping candy, I seven Fred gave me one when I was [-] and burned a hole in my tongue. I remember Mum beating him up with a broomstick."

Ron looked thoughtfully into the box of Sour Pops: "If I told him it was peanuts, would Fred try some cockroach skewers?"

After Ron and Hermione paid for a load of candy, the three left Honeydukes and walked into the blizzard.

Hogsmeade looked like a Christmas card, with thatched cottages and shops covered in fresh snow, holly wreaths hanging from the doors, and enchanted strings of candles adorning the trees.

Harry shivered; unlike the two of them, he wasn't wearing a cloak.The three of them walked forward on the street with their heads bowed against the wind, and Ron and Hermione introduced Harry to the shops on the street of Hogsmeade in their scarves.

"That's the post office."

"Zoko's Joke Shop is just ahead."

"We can go to the Shrieking Shack."

"I say," said Ron, chattering his teeth, "how about we go to the Three Broomsticks for a butterbeer?"

Harry was exactly what he wanted.The wind was so cold that his hands were numb.

So the three of them crossed the road and got into the small bar a few minutes later.

It was extremely crowded, noisy, hot, and smoky.A good-looking, curvaceous woman greeted a rowdy group of wizards at the bar.

"That's Ms. Rosmerta," said Ron. "I'll get a drink, okay?" he added, blushing a little.

Harry and Hermione squeezed to the back of the bar, where there was a small empty table between the windows and a pretty Christmas tree, next to the fireplace.

Ron came five minutes later with three big mugs of hot, frothy butterbeer.

"Merry Christmas!" he said cheerfully, raising his glass.

Harry took a swig of the most delicious thing he'd ever tasted, and it seemed to warm every inch of him.

(End of this chapter)