"Make way, make way!"
Ron, Neville, and Hermione rushed forward through the train, carrying Harry between them, while Percy ran ahead to clear a path.
When they reached the middle of the train, a small group suddenly blocked their way.
"What's wrong with him?"
There were three of them in this little clique—two chubby boys with stupid expressions, and at the front, a pale boy with a pointed face and slicked-back blond hair.
"None of your business! Who are you?"
Percy was furious that a first-year was ignoring his orders and blocking the path. He glared down at the boy.
"Malfoy."
The blond boy lifted his pointed chin. He glanced at Percy and the red hair of Ron behind him, his gray eyes flashing with contempt.
"Draco Malfoy."
Having answered the question, Malfoy turned his head to the side, looking with great interest at the sweating, semi-conscious Harry.
"So that scream just now came from him?"
Turning his head back, Malfoy snickered incessantly, saying to the two followers behind him:
"Tsk, tsk—what did I just tell you, Crabbe, Goyle? Making friends with the wrong sort will bring bad luck sooner or later... Karma came faster than I expected, didn't it? I thought he'd at least wait until we got to Hogwarts."
The two chubby boys, Crabbe and Goyle, looked at Malfoy with admiration, their fat jiggling as they laughed.
"You heard me, Malfoy," Percy glared at the three of them even more fiercely. "Don't block the way!"
"Oh, how funny. Why should I listen to your orders?" Malfoy turned back, sizing Percy up with a scornful look.
"You don't want to listen to my orders, do you?"
Percy was fuming. He jabbed a finger at the badge on his chest.
"Well, that's unfortunate, because I happen to be a prefect. Little Malfoy, I assume you at least understand what a prefect is, and what kind of authority a prefect has?"
Prefect?
Malfoy "reluctantly" lowered his gaze to Percy's chest, where a shiny gold prefect badge was indeed pinned.
At Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, for a new student who hadn't even stepped through the school gates yet, a prefect badge carried considerable weight.
Malfoy stared at the badge for about ten seconds, his face gradually darkening. After a cold harrumph, he led Crabbe and Goyle back into their own compartment.
"This is the prefects' carriage. Lift him up... Oh, be careful, Ron, don't break anything!"
Arriving at the frontmost carriage adjacent to the engine, Percy guided the three of them to carry Harry inside.
The prefects' carriage did look more luxurious—the tables were gold-plated, every red upholstered seat could be reclined into a temporary bed, and the cushions were thicker and "firmer" than those in the ordinary student compartments.
Ron, Hermione, and Neville placed Harry on the nearest reclined seat, and the original occupants of the compartment immediately gathered around.
"Is this the boy, Percy?"
A girl with pretty features and beautiful curly brown hair leaned in next to Percy, looking at Harry curiously.
"That's right, it's him... This is Penelope Clearwater, a Ravenclaw prefect," Percy lifted his chin slightly, introducing her to the three first-years.
Harry's chest was heaving violently, but he had stopped screaming. The soul-tearing pain from earlier was fading rapidly like a passing dream.
As the pain receded, Harry's senses quickly returned. through his blurred vision, he could make out several figures moving around him. Someone supported his back to help him sit up halfway and brought a cup to his lips.
"Drink some water, you poor little thing," a girl's voice said.
"Thanks," Harry mumbled, doing as he was told.
After drinking some water and resting for another two minutes, Harry finally felt like he was back to normal. He took off his glasses, rubbed his eyes which were blurred with sweat and tears, and put them back on. His vision cleared.
Harry found himself in a new compartment, surrounded by a group of older students, while Ron, Hermione, and Neville were squeezed to the side.
Perhaps because they were in a compartment full of older students, or perhaps because the sudden incident had frightened them, Harry noticed that Ron, Hermione, and Neville were staring at him with looks full of nervousness and helplessness.
"What on earth happened to you?"
The tall boy closest to him looked at him suspiciously. Harry knew this was Percy Weasley, Ron's brother... He had seen this boy once when crossing Platform 9¾, though Percy hadn't noticed him at the time.
"Scar hurt," Harry said, gently rubbing his scar, his speech still slurred.
"Do you—er, does this happen often?" Ron sucked in a cold breath, his face full of horror.
"Oh, not often..."
Harry glanced at Ron. He didn't want to be treated like a freak in the wizarding world too, so he quickly added an explanation.
"Actually, that was the first time it ever happened to me."
Silence followed.
The older students in the compartment, as well as Neville and Ron, exchanged glances, none of them knowing how to handle the situation or offer comfort.
"Anyway," Percy frowned, "you just rest here for a while. I'll write a letter to inform Professor McGonagall about your condition—oh, she's the Transfiguration professor at the school and also the Head of Gryffindor House... Oh, and the professor in the back compartment said he would come to see you later."
"The professor in the back compartment?"
Harry, having largely recovered his senses, immediately caught the key point. He opened his mouth in surprise, blinking at Percy, and then looked towards Hermione Granger, who was pressed against the glass window. This girl, who had grown up in the Muggle world like him but had a bit of a temper...
"That man? But didn't you say he was a scammer?"
"I didn't—I mean... I did meet—meet—"
Hermione Granger's cheeks were glowing red.
"A scammer... who looks very much like that professor."
"That's not what you said just now, Hermione," the chubby round-faced boy—Neville Longbottom—mumbled, also blushing as he kindly reminded her in a whisper.
"You just said... 'You are the scammer who sold me fake medicine'—your exact words, Hermione."
Hermione glared at Neville angrily but didn't know how to defend herself.
"My suggestion is," Percy lifted his chin, fiddling with his prefect badge. He looked at Hermione Granger and spoke in a lecturing tone, "when the professor comes over, you should apologize to him publicly and tell him you just mistook him for someone else."
That really is embarrassing.
Harry looked at Hermione, whose shoulders were hunched and whose brown eyes were welling up with tears, empathizing with her situation.
Licking his lips and hesitating for a moment, Harry decided to offer Hermione Granger a few words of comfort. After all, they had just been sitting in the same compartment.
"If he is a professor at a magic school, Hermione, then I don't think he would..."
Harry barely started his sentence before he was interrupted by a strange phenomenon.
A stream of light—faint, like starlight seen above the smoggy London sky in autumn, but impossible to ignore—appeared out of nowhere!
It flashed across the four walls of the compartment, the floor beneath their feet, the table, the reclined seat under Harry... flowing over the surface of every object in the carriage before vanishing in an instant.
"What the hell was that?!" Ron shouted immediately, jumping up and looking around in panic.
Startled, Harry also scrambled up from the recliner, his eyes wide with surprise as he scanned the room.
The noise drifting in through the compartment door soon made the group realize that the stream of light hadn't just appeared in their compartment—it had swept through the entire steam train!