The refuse truck was rearing onto its front wheels, bulging and creaking, tilting its gaping compactor toward the sky. With a convulsive lunge, a ball of orange flame erupted from its metal guts. James realized that Norberta the refuse truck was quickly transforming back into Norberta the dragon. The rubber tyres stretched and burst into sinewy legs. The mouth of the compactor gnashed, grew long fangs and elongated onto an accordion neck, rising up between the buildings. The rumble of the engine grew to a sustained roar, and fire once again burst into the sky, streaming from the dragon’s unhinged jaws.
Another elf was riding on the back of Norberta’s neck, clinging tight with long, agile fingers, its mouth moving quickly as it spoke to the dragon, provoking it.
It was Heddlebun.
A lance of red light struck Norberta’s flank, exploding into sparks. Dimly, James realized that his father was firing at her, trying to Stun her. He fumbled his own wand out and aimed wildly, but before he could utter a single spell, Norberta reared, unfurled her wings, and clapped them down again, sending a wave of gritty wind washing over the street, rocking the parked cars on their springs. The dragon leapt upwards, scratched and clawed her way up a nearby parking structure, tearing loose great chunks of concrete as she went, and clambered onto its roof with a flick of her long tail.
“Wingardium Leviosa!” James’ father called, stabbing out his wand again and arresting a huge chunk of concrete an instant before it could bash itself to bits on the street below. Hunched in the hovering concrete’s shadow, Millie lifted her head from beneath her clasped arms.
Eyes bulging, she looked up at the slowly revolving hunk of building, and then scrambled sideways, out of its range.
With a grunt of released effort, James’ dad lowered his wand.
The concrete completed its fall, shattering liked a dropped plate.
James looked up at his dad, shocked and speechless, but his father was already turning back to the alley, dropping his eyes to the small figure of Piggen.
But Piggen wasn’t there.
Footsteps rang from the depths of the alley, not retreating but approaching. Merlin reappeared, his staff held before him, its runes glowing with fierce red light.
Breathing hard, the sorcerer looked from James to Harry.
“Which way did she go?”
Harry nodded to the scarred fa?ade of the parking structure.
“Diagon Alley. Has to be.”
“Then let us not spare a moment!” Merlin commanded, already moving forward. He broke into a run, reached to grasp Millie’s hand where she stood dumbfounded in the street, and then vanished with her in tow, leaving the crack of their disapparation echoing down the canyon of the street.
“Well, James,” his father announced, reaching out with his left hand, raising his wand in his right. “You said you wanted to be a Junior Auror-in-training, yes? Here’s your chance.”
With a gulp, James raised his own wand and grasped his father’s hand.
The world whip-cracked away, spinning into a blur of oblivion.
An instant later, it sprang back into place, leaping up to smack James’ heels as he landed next to his father. He looked around, pointing his wand frantically. They were in another street now, this one wider but even less illuminated. Before him was an old pub with mullioned windows and a heavy wooden door beneath a swinging sign: The Leaky Cauldron.
Harry stepped swiftly into the dark street and raised his eyes, looking out over the nearby rooftops.
Merlin burst through the front door of the Leaky Cauldron, his staff leading, still pulsing with red light.
“There!” he announced, pointing to James’ right.
James spun to look, even as he heard the grating roar of the dragon’s approach.
A decrepit apartment building, four floors high, stood on a wedge of footpath between two angled streets. James craned to look up at its roofline. There, an old wooden water tower stood on posts.
Startlingly, the water tower exploded, disintegrating into flying planks, flinging metal braces, and a torrent of unleashed water. Norberta’s head plunged through the water and bashed aside the remains of the tower.
Her wings pumped and she leapt from the building’s roof, sailed over empty space, kicked off a lamp-post, and grappled up the face of a soot-stained factory, shattering rows of windows as she went.
A blare of horns sounded from the connecting streets. Voices began to shout in alarm.
“Damn and drat!” Harry breathed urgently, lifting his wand to fire Stunning bolts at the scrabbling dragon. It was no use.
Merlin called magical spells in his guttural tongue, and lances of vivid purple light spat over the street. Even these merely bounced off Norberta’s scaly skin. Using her wings for leverage, she clawed and tore her way to the roof of the factory, and then loped along its top. James watched, horrified, as the great dragon lowered her head and plowed between a pair of brick smokestacks, pulverizing their bases.
Ponderously, the smokestacks leaned toward each other, kissed their surfaces with a sustained crunch, and then began to collapse, disintegrating into themselves.
“Damn and drat!” Harry said again, this time in a half-shout.
He raised his wand nearly straight up, waiting for Norberta to appear between the factory and the block above the Leaky Cauldron.
A bell clattered nearby and the door of the pub swung open.
James glanced aside to see a grizzled old wizard with a nose the size and color of a blood orange peer out at them.
“Whassall this, then?” he said, his black eyes glimmering in the dark. “Whassall the noise?”
Harry fired several shots in quick succession, even as Merlin leapt backwards into the street, pointing his staff at the roof above, unleashing a torrent of crackling energy.
The building shook. Grit and chunks of masonry broke from above, raining down and clattering to the street all around.
The grizzled wizard jerked his head back into the door, which slammed shut.
“She’s beyond the roof!” Harry called, lowering his wand and lunging toward the door of the pub.
It was locked tight, rattling with bolts and chains. Without so much as a backward glance, Harry simply stepped aside and gestured briefly with his wand. After you, the motion seemed to say.
Merlin dipped his staff. Its runes flashed green and the door of the Leaky Cauldron blew open, taking the remains of an iron deadbolt and chains with it. The bell overhead gave an alarmed clatter and broke loose. Harry led the way with Merlin immediately behind. James scrambled to follow, passing the grizzled wizard with the blood orange nose who stood huddled in the corner, fuming speechlessly at his demolished door.
James had been inside the Leaky Cauldron on many occasions and assumed that it never technically closed. Indeed, even at this late hour, the pub was crowded with patrons of all shapes and sizes, most gathered around a long bar cluttered with glasses, steins, and bottles.
Eyes turned to follow Merlin, Harry, and James as they rushed past, pounding toward the rear exit, wands and staff raised. Millie stood away from the bar, her eyes wide and terrified. She moved to follow James, hunching her shoulders and ducking low in his wake.