A Memorable Tale

20 | Care of Magical Creatures

Neville struggled with his chomping textbook beside me and I took it from him, stroking its spine to calm it down. "Whoa... how'd you know to do that?"

"I just started petting different parts of it." I handed it back to him. "Every creature's got a part of them that they want petted."

We continued into the forest as the crowd travelling grew bigger with every student approaching.

"Careful how excited you look," Ron warned as he approached behind me. "You don't want the Slytherins to ruin your fun 'cos you look too happy."

"How could they ruin fun with animals?" A silly question, really. A troublemaker could ruin everyone's fun if they put their mind to it.

"How did you get your textbook to calm down?" asked Draco as he struggled with his, despite the belt that was tightly wrapped around it. I glanced behind me, seeing many people with their textbooks forced shut with ropes and belts.

I sighed and took it from him, stroking its spine. Its excited vibrating stopped and it became as calm as a canary. "There you go."

Others followed suite and Hagrid clapped his hands. "Good job on that one, Y/N!" he said. "All animals have a weak spot that they like being pet. I'm sure you'd know that, hm?"

I nodded, my eyes not quite on Hagrid as he approached the paddock, a beautiful creature of feathers and horse's hooves: a hippogriff.

"Ta-da!" Hagrid sang as he opened his arms, the beautiful creature stepping forward. "This is Buckbeak."

I bounced on my heels, my hands trying to cover my childish grin. "He's beautiful," I whispered, earning an odd look from Ron. "You see that beak? He could destroy you with that!"

"Oh, don't be silly," I said dismissively. "That's only if you anger him."

"That's right!" Hagrid exclaimed. "That is a hippogriff. The first thing you wanna know about hippogriff's is that they're very proud creatures. Very easily offended. You do not want to insult a hippogriff - it might be the last thing you ever do."

He clapped his hands together, the seriousness in his face vanishing. "Now, who'd like to say hello?"

My hand shot into the air as people backed away, out of my peripheral vision.

"Alright, you first, Y/N." He waved me over and I took care to bow, my eyes never leaving the hippogriff's. Soon enough, Buckbeak bowed as well and I grinned, rushing over and holding out my hand for him to press his forehead against.

"He's beautiful," I whispered again, and he chirped with pride. "Yes, you're very beautiful. Very smart, too, look how gentle you are."

"She's the one that own three hippogriffs," Draco called from the crowd.

"No wonder! You didn't even need me to tell you what to do!" Hagrid rubbed my head. "Would anyone else like to try? Someone without any experience?"

Most moved even further back, with Hermione, Ron, and Harry sort of lingering out of respect for Hagrid.

"Oh, for goodness sake," I said. I walked over to the trio, which scared away Ron and made Hermione take a step back and I took Harry's hands, slowly pulling him towards Buckbeak.

He hesitated, then slowly bent down, his wide eyes fixated on Buckbeak. After a while, Buckbeak bowed in returned.

"Well done, Harry!" Hagrid complimented. "Now you can touch him, like Y/N did!"

Harry outstretched a trembling hand and Buckbeak pressed his beak against it, making a grin spread across his cheeks.

"I reckon he might let you ride him," Hagrid then suggested, making the grin quickly drop from Harry's face.