Chapter 162: Spider Animagus, Assassination
At the foot of the mountain.
Leo, Newt, and Stanley sat around a campfire.
"The egg‑laying went smoothly," Newt said. "Now we just wait for them to hatch.
"Stanley, this is when the Thunderbirds are weakest. The female will be in poor shape, and the male will stay glued to the nest. The poachers will strike if they can. Please work with the Sanctuary warden and tighten security again."
Stanley nodded solemnly. "I understand. We do it every year."
He glanced at Leo, open admiration in his eyes. "And this time we solved the laying problem quickly, thanks to Leonardo.
"Your ability to communicate with magical creatures is like nothing I have ever seen. Without you calming and talking to the female Thunderbird, we would not have managed it so smoothly."
Leo flicked his wand, feeding the flames so they burned brighter.
"Thank you," he said. "I am just glad I could help."
"And your potions are impressive too," Stanley added. "You cut out half the steps for us. Tell me, is Severus Snape still your Potions professor at Hogwarts?"
"Yes. Professor Snape is our Potions master."
"No wonder. I have met him a few times. Youngest Potions Master of his generation. Very strict. Very knowledgeable. With a teacher like that, I imagine he drives you all quite hard?"
Leo thought of Snape stalking between the cauldrons, of that poisonous tongue reducing first‑years to tears.
"Professor Snape is very dedicated to our instruction," he said politely. "He insists on precision in every step."
The standards were high. But Leo had to admit, Snape taught real substance.
That made him a good teacher.
He wondered, not for the first time, how exactly Professor Jones here ran his classes and how he corrected students' mistakes.
Ilvermorny did sound interesting. If he ever got the chance, a visit would be nice.
Rustle.
Grass shook and whispered.
A small black‑and‑white bird shot out of the undergrowth, legs pumping as it sprinted straight for the base of a boulder.
"Hoo‑hoo?"
It pecked fiercely at something under the rock, then let out a frustrated little cry when nothing came out.
Only then did it seem to notice the people nearby. It turned toward the fire, fixed its gaze on Leo, and cocked its head.
"Hoo?"
The bird hopped closer, bouncing its way to Leo's feet and chirping softly up at him.
"No luck catching dinner today?" Leo asked.
He had understood the complaint in its call. Smiling, he took a small pouch of dried insects from his pocket—feed he kept for creatures like Quietfinches and Puffball birds.
He held one out between his fingers. The bird did not hesitate, snapping it up at once.
"Ha. Leonardo, your affinity with animals is outrageous," Stanley said, amused. "That is a North American roadrunner, a bird built for running, not flying. It eats spiders, frogs, and mice. It does not normally go anywhere near people.
"I imagine it was hunting just now. Lucky thing you were here to save it from going hungry."
Leo listened with interest. Trivia like this was just as enjoyable as any formal lesson.
As he fed the roadrunner, he let his gaze drift to the big rock. The black vortices in his eyes turned slowly.
Spider.
…
Behind the boulder.
A black widow spider, the one with the strange red lip‑shaped marking on its abdomen, squeezed out of a crack.
It rubbed its forelegs together. In an instant, its body twisted and swelled.
Silent as smoke, the spider stretched into the form of a dark‑haired, red‑lipped woman.
Sherry patted her chest, silently cursing that stupid bird.
She had been perfectly concealed. Then some feathered idiot had leapt out of nowhere and nearly pecked her to death.
If she had actually ended up inside a bird's stomach, she might have gone down as the most ridiculous dead Animagus in history.
She ran through the plan in her mind again.
They had brought the whole crew for this job. Nearly forty wizards. That was not a force to take lightly.
These were not the days of fifty years ago. The wars had chewed through the wizarding population. Pulling together thirty or forty adult wizards meant real power now.
And poachers lived on the edge. They were far more vicious in a fight than most law‑abiding witches and wizards.
Even so, there might not be much of a pitched battle this time. The most important piece of the plan was Sherry herself.
As an unregistered Animagus with a small, unobtrusive spider form, she was born for assassination.
Half their successful jobs had relied on her slipping close to the target, then striking from the shadows—one blow, one corpse.
Newt Scamander was strong and troublesome. That case of his was full of dangerous beasts. If he opened it, the gang might well come away with nothing but scars.
But he had to open it first.
Sherry was confident. Her casting was fast. If she got a clear shot, she would kill him.
Even in the worst case, she could maim him badly and stop him from reaching his case. The others would move at the same time.
If they pulled this off, she could retire.
A beach in Hawaii. A drink in one hand, Alistair in the other. That would be the life.
She shook the fantasy away and focused.
Her little reverie had taken a second or two at most.
She drew her wand and took a slow breath.
Fixing Newt's position in her mind, she gathered her magic, sharpening her focus to a knife's edge.
She twisted her waist, stepped out from behind the boulder, and drove her wand forward.
"Avada Kedavra!"
The familiar green light burst from the tip, streaking straight for Newt Scamander's back.
If it hit, half their plan was complete.
But before Sherry's red lips had even closed on the last syllable, the Killing Curse had flown no more than half a metre when a red beam slammed into it side‑on.
Raw magic flared where they met, crimson and green grinding against each other. Sparks spat and hissed.
"What—"
Sherry instinctively poured in more power, fighting to push the green light through.
She never finished the word.
The red spell coiled like a serpent and swallowed the Killing Curse whole, then punched straight into her chest.
An irresistible force smashed into her. Her wand flew from her fingers.
Before she could even register the disarming, a bolt of blue lightning followed, slamming through her body.
Pain and numbness hit together like twin hammers.
Her consciousness went out like a snuffed candle.
At the same moment, the air filled with the cracks of Apparition. Dozens of figures appeared around the clearing.
"Sherry!" a shocked voice bellowed.
…
In the instant the poachers arrived, a dozen of them reversed their wands and drove the tips into the ground.
"Protego Horribilis!" they roared, driving their wands into the ground.
Leo moved first. The arcs of blue still dancing on his wand had not even faded before he drew fresh magic up.
He said nothing. His wand carved tight, vicious arcs through the air, hurling Diffindo in rapid succession.
Each nonverbal slice hardened into a spear of white light, lancing out in every direction.
The poachers had not expected their enemies to answer so aggressively. Even so, these were hardened criminals. Their reactions were honed by years of danger.
Shields flared in quick succession. One or two were good enough to cover their comrades as well.
A few unluckier men took hits when they failed to dodge, but most twisted aside just in time, letting the spears gouge flesh without striking anything vital. They could still fight.
Newt was not far behind. He had felt something wrong the moment Leo had fired, and his hand had already gone to the latches on his case.
Now, seeing the ring of hard‑faced wizards, there was no more room for doubt. Poachers.
He flipped the lid open without a second thought.
Several magical creatures sprang out, though they had not yet fully formed a protective ring.
The poachers' combined spellwork took hold first.
Cracks ripped across the ground, neatly slicing the terrain to separate Leo, Newt, and Stanley.
In the next heartbeat, dark barriers rose from the fractures, sealing them off from one another.
Newt frowned deeply at the black wall cutting him off from Leo.
"A ward," he muttered.
He swept his gaze over the ring of wizards. For once, the gentle expression in his eyes hardened.
He flicked his wand. A string of runes shot into the case.
Five Kneazles leapt out, followed by a Chimera, an Erumpent…
He did not waste another glance on the poachers. He levelled his wand at the barrier and began to unpick it.
The "little ones" could handle the attackers. What mattered to him now was Leonardo.
Leo was just a first‑year. Talented, certainly, but up against this pack of killers, his practical experience would be thin.
Newt prayed the creatures who had burst out first would be enough to shield the boy until he could break through.
…
On the other side.
Leo stood within a living wall of coiled silver and teal.
The Occamy, first out of Newt's case, had grown as thick as a tree trunk. It loomed protectively over Leo, hissing at the circle of wands around them.
Leo patted the scaled flank. The Occamy gave a soft trill.
He understood clearly.
"Do not be afraid."
Leo smiled.
"Do me a favour and give me some room," he said. "I do not want to hurt you by accident."
He did not know why, but the Occamy obeyed at once. It arched its body and drew back, leaving him a clear path out of its coils.
In those few seconds, Leo saw that a brown‑haired man had appeared beside the boulder.
The man was pouring healing magic into the blackened woman on the ground.
Blackened was the only word. Her skin was as dark as her hair now.
Earlier, when Leo had used the Peeking Fiend's Eye, he had caught a flicker of magical pathways inside the spider behind the rock.
The roadrunner must have startled it. That surge of magic had betrayed its true nature.
He silently thanked Scabbers for his contribution. After all the time spent studying that rat's Animagus pattern, he could recognise the signs in an instant.
Sure enough, the spider had reverted to a human witch.
Leo had only needed a glance in that direction. He had pointed his wand at the stone and trees nearby and triggered Transfiguration.
Light had flared along bark and rock.
Seeing it, Aidan—standing among the poachers—felt his heart drop.
He had had a bad feeling before they ever moved out.
Watching Sherry fail and get hammered like that, the feeling only grew.
He was not the strongest fighter. But his sense for danger had always been sharp, and that was what had kept him alive and useful all these years.
He would have liked to retreat with his conscience intact. Seeing Sherry lying there, though, he knew that was no longer an option.
Not only had they drawn the bow; the arrow was already in flight.
And there was another reason…
Aidan's gaze slid to Alistair, complicated.
Their leader was an idiot in love.
"Brat!" Alistair roared, surging to his feet and rounding on Leo.
A breath later, the cold rushed back in.
More than a dozen blood‑red blades were screaming toward his chest, gut, and face. He snapped his wand up on instinct. "Protego!"
The Shield Charm flared into life.
Ting‑ting‑ting.
The ringing of metal on glass rippled across the clearing. The sound dug ice fingers into Alistair's spine.
For all that the boy looked young, his strikes were merciless.
The other poachers dropped their smirks. Every eye fixed on Leo.
The blood‑red blades that had slashed at Alistair were not the only ones. Others had curved toward them as well—testing defences, probing for weak points.
"Take him alive!" Alistair snapped. "He has to be Scamander's grandson. With him in our hands, Newt will not dare make a move."
It was, outwardly at least, the right call.
Any child trusted enough to travel with Newt Scamander was clearly not ordinary. Catching him would give them leverage.
Wands swung as one. Disarming Charms, Binding Spells, Slowing Curses, and every other non‑lethal jinx they knew lanced toward Leo.
Magic lit the clearing in every colour, throwing up waves of dust and smoke.
Bang.
A gunshot cracked through the chaos. For a moment, none of the poachers quite processed the sound.
This was America. Some wizards had a fondness for firearms. Especially outlaws. A pistol or two on the hip was not unusual.
"Who fired that? I said alive!" Alistair snarled.
A dragon's roar answered him, heavy with pressure.
Blazing dragonfire swept the dust aside and revealed Leo, still standing.
A dragon, a Graphorn, a Wampus cat, and an Acromantula ringed him now.
The sight made every poacher's danger sense scream.
These were not harmless oddities. Each was a creature with real blood on its claws.
They had no idea where they had come from. They only knew it made "taking the boy alive" a great deal harder.
One or two of the sharper ones noticed the object in Leo's left hand as well.
A revolver.
Was he the one who fired?
"James!" Aidan shouted.
One of the nearer poachers lay in a pool of blood. Both his legs had been blown clean through. He had not even cried out. The pain had knocked him out cold.
Leo regarded the creatures bristling at his side.
Good. The magical‑creature Transfiguration was smoother now. Faster. And he could maintain more forms at once.
A thought struck him. He drew a black‑and‑gold Flask from his robes and twisted the lid open.
"Norbert," he said. "Come out and stretch your wings."