Devil's Snare

At half past three on Friday afternoon, William and the other Ravenclaw students hurried down the steps to the grounds in front of the castle, ready for their first Flying Class.

It was a clear, breezy day, and the grass rippled beneath their feet as they hurried down the sloping lawn toward a flat patch of grass across the grounds.

The Hufflepuff students were already there, along with dozens of flying broomsticks laid out neatly on the ground.

William had heard Fred and George complain about the school's flying broomsticks, and now he saw they had been right.

Every one of them was battered and broken, like an antique that had been used for decades. Leaving safety aside, they looked and felt terrible.

Was Hogwarts short of money?

Definitely not.

William strongly suspected someone had taken a kickback!

Madam Hooch strode over. She had short gray hair and yellow eyes like a hawk's.

"Well, what are you all waiting for?" she barked. "Everyone stand next to a broomstick.

Quickly, quickly, get a move on!"

William found a broomstick that looked less battered than the others and tried to communicate with it through his eyes.

William had never handled anything like this before and could only hope it would give him some face.

"Stick out your right hand over the handle of your broom," Madam Hooch called from the front, "and say, 'Up!'"

"Up!" everyone shouted.

William's broom rose shakily, as though struggling up a mountain.

William raised his voice, and the broom picked up only a little speed.

Cho's broom leaped straight into her hand. She raised an eyebrow and gave William a smug glance.

This was the first time she had surpassed William in a class.

Once everyone's broom was in hand, Madam Hooch showed them how to mount without sliding off the front.

Sitting on a flying broomstick wasn't as uncomfortable as William had imagined. Some invisible support seemed to cushion his backside.

Madam Hooch walked up and down the rows, correcting their grips.

"Now, when I blow my whistle, kick off from the ground, hard," Madam Hooch said.

"Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet, then lean forward slightly and drop straight back down to the ground.

On my whistle-three-two-"

But Summerby of Hufflepuff House seemed too nervous. Before the whistle even touched Madam Hooch's lips, he kicked off hard and shot upward.

"Come back, boy!" Madam Hooch shouted, but Summerby shot off into the distance like a rocket.

Fred and George had said these brooms were slow, but William thought that was pretty fast. In no time at all, Summerby had vanished from sight.

Even a Nimbus 1700 couldn't be that fast, could it?

Everyone found Summerby a short distance beyond the greenhouses.

He was lucky.

Not far away was the special fertilizer used to irrigate all kinds of herbs and plants.

-Magical Creatures' excrement.

Although the cesspit was protected by a layer of magic, at the speed he'd been going, Summerby might well have broken through the defenses and plunged straight in.

He was also unlucky.

Summerby had fallen from high in the air, and the only reason he wasn't hurt was that he had landed in a mass of vines.

The flying broomstick was still thrashing violently, awakening the plant. A mass of tentacle-monster-like branches surged out of the ground, and one snapped the battered broom in two with a lash.

Summerby sprang up and struggled toward a damp wall, but the plant extended snakelike tendrils, wrapped them around his ankles, and hoisted him into the air.

He frantically pulled at the vines, but the more he struggled, the faster and tighter they wrapped around him.

By the time William and the others arrived, Summerby had been wrapped up like a zongzi and hung from the eaves like one of the Calabash Brothers.

"Help!!" Summerby trembled, swaying back and forth. From a distance, he looked like a green caterpillar.

But no one dared approach. Tentacles over ten meters long waved through the air and slammed into the ground, leaving a huge crater.

The effect was like ten Illaois using their ultimates at once!

Everyone looked at Madam Hooch.

Madam Hooch's expression changed slightly as well. She recognized the plant before her-Devil's Snare!

She could recognize it at a glance, not because she was exceptionally learned or had made any particular achievements in Herbology... but because only a few months ago, Robert, the Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor, had died because of this very plant!

Robert really had suffered a miserable fate. He had gotten drunk during the day, been gravely injured by a wild boar, and then happened to fall into a Devil's Snare and get tangled up. Unable to get treatment, he had bled to death.

Madam Hooch knew, of course, that Professor Sprout had transplanted the Devil's Snare, but she hadn't expected it to be moved near the cesspit.

Of all the places that broomstick could have flown, why did it have to come here?

Well, the other places were pretty dangerous too. There were tall walls to the west and north, the Black Lake to the south, the Forbidden Forest farther east, and an even more dangerous Whomping Willow not far away...

Hogwarts really was a dangerous place.

As for Madam Hooch, the Quidditch teacher...

Although she was an adult witch and a teacher, she wasn't familiar with Devil's Snare!

You couldn't expect a physical education teacher to answer calculus questions or calculate the probability of someone being a red-green color blindness carrier, could you?

Still less could you expect a Quidditch teacher to remember Devil's Snare's weakness.

Even if she'd once known it, she would have given it all back to her professor long ago.

"All of you wait here. I'll go get Pomona..."

Madam Hooch panicked and prepared to fetch help, but before she had finished speaking, the Devil's Snare used its ultimate again.

Disturbed by so many people, the Devil's Snare was in a foul mood. A mass of vines rose from the ground, wreaking havoc all around.

Everyone retreated. Summerby was flung high into the air, and the vine carrying him swung toward the cesspit.

The young wizards all cried out in alarm. It looked as though the next moment they would see Summerby swimming freestyle in it.

Cho grabbed a broom, seemingly intending to ride it up and rescue Summerby.

"Are you crazy?" William said. "The Devil's Snare will catch you before you even get close."

"Then what do we do?" Cho shouted, clutching the broomstick.

"I heard Hagrid say that Devil's Snare likes dark, damp places-"

"But we don't have any fire!" Cho shouted, wringing her hands anxiously.

William said in surprise, "Are you a witch or not?"

He pulled out his wand and waved it, chanting an incantation. A flame as blue as a bluebell shot from its tip.

He passed through the crowd and walked slowly toward the Devil's Snare, the flame hovering over his wand like a blue lantern.

Everyone watched William, and many of the young wizards covered their eyes.

But although countless vines lashed about menacingly, none dared go near William. They all retreated toward the dark corners.

Within seconds, Summerby felt the vines loosen their grip on him.

The plant twisted and twitched, releasing the tendrils wrapped around him of its own accord. At last, he broke free completely.

Summerby breathed a sigh of relief.

Then he fell from midair.

"Aah! Help!!"

(The third update is complete.)