Wind tore at Harry's face, whipping his hair into a frenzy as the enchanted motorbike roared beneath him, the growl of its engine almost drowned by the furious rush of air. His knuckles were white where they gripped the umbrella, Hagrid's insistence still ringing in his ears.
"Point it at 'em, lad! Point it an' think boom!"
Boom. Right. That was simple enough, wasn't it? Except that it wasn't.
The sidecar rattled violently as Hagrid swerved hard, dodging something Harry couldn't see. He twisted round, heart hammering, his breath tearing in ragged gasps against the cold air. There was nothing but darkness and fog and the blur of distant lights far, far below. And yet—
Something screamed past his ear.
He yelped and ducked, instinct taking over.
Then he saw them.
Shapes in the dark, pale and leathery, moving far too fast to belong to anything human. The flicker of moonlight caught jagged teeth and slitted eyes. Black wings spread wide, blotting out the stars.
Vampires. Bloody flying vampires.
"Three!" Harry shouted over the roar of the wind, his voice cracking despite himself. "Three of them—your back!"
"Four!" Hagrid bellowed, glancing sideways, his wild mane of hair whipping about his face. "One more on t'other side! Manageable! Yeh 'member the chant?"
"Ardere Flatus!" Harry yelled back automatically, though his throat was tight and his palms slick.
"That's the one!"
Harry swung the umbrella clumsily, the tip aimed somewhere into the chaos. He pictured Aunt Petunia's favourite vase exploding into a thousand pieces, her horrified screech ringing in his ears—boom, shatter, gone!
He shouted the words. "Ardere Flatus!"
Nothing.
The vampire lunged.
Harry panicked and swung hard, cracking the creature squarely across the face with the umbrella. It screeched and reeled back, but the hiss that followed promised it would return.
Somewhere above, Hagrid let out a wordless roar. The motorbike bucked violently as he jerked the handlebars, swiping a clinging vampire off his coat and sending it spiralling into the void below.
The others were learning.
Harry could see it in the way they moved now, darting to avoid Hagrid's fists, staying just out of reach. The smarter ones swooped for the chains connecting the sidecar to the bike, testing its strength, wings beating like the pounding of war drums.
Harry's chest burned from the cold and the panic and the endless bracing for impacts that never quite came.
"Hagrid!" he shouted, his voice nearly lost in the wind. "They're going for the joint! The screws!"
"Blast 'em, Harry!" Hagrid yelled back. "Don' think, just do!"
Harry squeezed his eyes shut and tried again. He could feel the shape of the words on his tongue, the strange, prickling weight of them in his chest.
Ardere Flatus.
Boom.
He opened his eyes, aimed at the nearest winged nightmare, and screamed it with everything in him.
"ARDERE FLATUS!"
Light burst from the umbrella's tip.
It wasn't a proper spell, not like in the books he'd read under the covers late at night. There was no elegant stream of magic, no graceful precision—just a violent eruption of raw, chaotic force.
The vampire was blasted backwards with a shriek, its wings flailing as it disappeared into the fog.
Harry stared. He did that.
Then the sidecar lurched violently as another creature slammed into it. He nearly lost the umbrella altogether, scrambling to catch it before the wind tore it away.
They weren't done yet.
---
For what felt like an eternity, it was chaos and screaming and cold air and flashes of pale skin and black wings. Harry's arms ached from swinging, his throat raw from shouting the chant again and again, sometimes to no effect, sometimes managing a wild spark of magic that flung a nightmare away for a few precious seconds.
And then—
Green fields stretched beneath them. Rolling hills, scattered cottages, winding dirt roads. The lights of the clustered towns had faded behind them.
Harry gulped in air and dared to relax, just for a moment.
"We're nearly there!" Hagrid bellowed over the roar of the bike. "Hold it, lad! Jus' a little more!"
Harry wanted to believe him.
He thought about Privet Drive, about Dudley's whining, Aunt Petunia's fussing, Uncle Vernon's constant shouting. How an ordinary day had somehow turned into this—bloodthirsty winged monsters, wild magic, death lurking in the dark.
He almost laughed.
But Hagrid didn't.
The half-giant's brows were knitted tight, his knuckles white on the handlebars. Harry caught him muttering under his breath.
"Where'd they get off to, eh? Don' like it. Not one bit."
"Isn't it… good?" Harry shouted back. "They're gone!"
Hagrid didn't answer.
The uneasy silence stretched, broken only by the engine's roar and the rush of air.
Then, just as the motorbike dipped low over a small hill, Harry spotted it—a house, tucked into the landscape, its crooked roof barely visible through the mist.
"There!" Hagrid yelled, pointing. "There we—"
He didn't finish.
The bike lurched sideways so suddenly Harry thought they'd been hit by lightning. He clutched the edges of the sidecar, the umbrella nearly slipping from his hands.
Below him, something pulled.
Harry looked down—and his blood ran cold.
They were back.
All three vampires were clinging to the underside of the sidecar, their claws sunk deep into the metal, wings snapping wildly in the wind as they hauled with inhuman strength. One hissed up at him, its pale face twisted in a grotesque grin.
"Hagrid!"
"I see 'em!"
The bike dipped lower, but the vampires didn't budge. Two more swooped in, landing where the sidecar connected to the bike, and began hammering at the screws.
The joint groaned under the strain.
Panic clawed up Harry's throat, but he shoved it down. He tightened his grip on the umbrella, breath coming in quick, shallow bursts.
"Not today," he muttered through gritted teeth.
With a burst of sheer, desperate courage, Harry swung the umbrella like a bat. One vampire screeched and fell away, its wings flailing as it plummeted into the dark.
The others hissed and came back twice as fast.
Harry braced himself.
--+--+--
Wind screamed through the night, ripping Harry's breath away as the motorbike jolted beneath him. The sidecar rattled violently with every sharp twist, each swerve threatening to fling him into the void below. He clutched the umbrella with white-knuckled desperation, swinging wildly at whatever pale shape dared get close enough.
The vampires hissed and screeched, wings beating furiously against the rush of air. They had grown bolder, darting between the slipstream and testing the chains that held the sidecar in place. One dove low, talons scraping the undercarriage, while another slammed against the joint connecting bike and car, shaking the entire contraption like a tin can in a storm.
Harry swung again and again, chanting under his breath — "Ardere Flatus, Ardere Flatus" — but his voice was ragged, his arms numb. Every time he managed a spark of magic, it was clumsy and unpredictable. Sometimes the blast was just enough to knock a creature away. Other times, the umbrella merely fizzled, leaving him defenceless but for blunt force.
And then, for the briefest moment, they broke through the worst of it.
Below, the night stretched out into rolling hills and scattered cottages, the clustered town lights long behind them. But the sky was no safer, and Hagrid knew it.
"We're nearly there!" Hagrid bellowed, his voice half-lost to the wind. "Hold on, lad! Just a bit more!"
Harry wanted to believe him. He wanted this nightmare to end.
But far below, someone else had noticed.
---
Inside the crooked house nestled into the hills, Arthur Weasley squinted out of the upstairs window, his brow furrowing. Molly joined him, clutching her dressing gown tighter around her shoulders.
"What's going on, Arthur?" she asked, her voice edged with worry.
He didn't answer immediately, leaning forward instead, eyes narrowing against the mist and shadows.
"Hold on, Molly," he murmured. "Let me focus."
When the figures finally came into view, his breath caught.
"Oh, Merlin's beard," he whispered.
Molly's hand flew to his arm. "What is it?"
Arthur turned to her, his expression grave. "That's Hagrid. That's definitely his motorbike. I had it for a while... but I gave it back to Hagrid just days ago. And those things attacking him…" He hesitated, struggling to make out details in the dark. "They're dark creatures. Vampires, I think."
Molly gasped softly.
"Don't let the children come out. Especially the twins," Arthur said firmly, already pulling his wand from his pocket. "Start the protection charms Dumbledore gave us. Now."
Molly didn't argue. They both bolted down the stairs and out into the yard, wands raised.
"Protego Totalum!" Molly cried, and with a shimmer of blue and gold, a sphere of protective magic rippled out from the Burrow, enveloping the house. The doors slammed shut with a bang, windows locking themselves tight.
Arthur pulled a small, worn badge from his robes. On the back, a single word was engraved: Auxilius. The front bore a bold letter M, crossed with the shape of a wand.
He clenched it tightly in his fist and whispered, "Aid me."
A faint warmth pulsed against his palm, and Arthur exhaled. "Help's on the way," he said, though his gaze kept flicking back to the sky. He wanted to fire a spell, to intervene, but at this distance he risked hitting Hagrid — or the small, flailing figure in the sidecar.
"Arthur…" Molly's voice was tight. "Is that a child?"
Arthur followed her gaze and felt his stomach drop. Through the chaos of wings and whirling metal, a tiny figure clung desperately to the sidecar, swinging something — an umbrella? — at the attacking creatures.
"It's a child!" Molly gasped, clutching her wand so hard her knuckles went white. "What in Merlin's name is a child doing with Hagrid?"
Arthur swallowed hard. "I don't know. I just hope it isn't who I suspect."
---
There was a sudden whoosh beside them, and a tall figure materialised in the yard.
Arthur spun on instinct, wand raised, before recognising the dark-skinned man in the grey robes.
"Kingsley Shacklebolt," he breathed in relief.
One of the Ministry's finest Aurors gave a curt nod, his piercing gaze already fixed on the aerial battle overhead.
"Rubeus Hagrid?" Kingsley asked, voice deep and calm despite the chaos.
"Yes," Arthur replied quickly. "The Gameskeeper at Hogwarts."
Kingsley's sharp eyes caught the pale flashes of movement around the motorbike, and his jaw tightened. "Do you have a broomstick?"
"In the shed," Arthur answered.
Kingsley lifted his wand and snapped, "Accio broomstick!"
A moment later, the old broom hurtled through the air and smacked neatly into his waiting hand.
"Anything else I should know before I go up there?" Kingsley asked, mounting the broom with practiced ease.
"Yes — there's a child in the sidecar, I think—"
Arthur's words were swallowed by a deafening BOOM.
The motorbike exploded in a spray of fire and smoke, the shockwave rattling the windows of the Burrow. The force flung Hagrid and the sidecar in opposite directions, spinning them wildly through the night.
"Go!" Arthur shouted.
Kingsley was already gone.
"Fire an Impediment Jinx at Hagrid!" Kingsley barked mid-flight, streaking upward like a shadow with purpose. "I'll get the boy!"
Arthur didn't hesitate. "Impedimenta! Impedimenta!"
Bolts of magic arced into the air, slowing Hagrid's descent. Beside him, Molly thrust her wand upward.
"Molliare!" she cried, and an invisible cushion softened Hagrid's fall.
The half-giant crashed into the earth with a groan, unharmed but thoroughly unconscious. Arthur sprinted toward him, but his eyes kept darting skyward.
The motorbike plummeted past the Burrow and crashed into the far field with a sound like thunder, bursting into flames.
---
High above, Kingsley Shacklebolt cut through the air, cloak snapping behind him. The heat from the explosion stung his face, but he didn't flinch.
A burned, shrieking vampire clawed wildly at the air. Kingsley flicked his wand, voice ringing clear:
"Arderio!"
A flash of fire burst from his wandtip, and the creature dissolved into ash.
He didn't slow.
The small figure — the boy — tumbled helplessly through the sky, spinning end over end. Kingsley pointed his wand and fired again.
"Impedimenta!"
The falling slowed, but gravity reclaimed him almost instantly. Kingsley cast again, faster this time.
"Carpe Retractum!"
A golden tether shot from his wand, latching around the boy's torso. With a sharp pull, he reeled the child toward him, catching him deftly with one arm.
The boy clutched an umbrella so tightly his knuckles had gone white, eyes wide and unfocused. Kingsley murmured a stabilising charm:
"Brachitenere."
The boy floated alongside him, tethered safely as Kingsley angled his broom toward the ground.
---
Arthur and Molly ran to meet him as Kingsley touched down lightly on the grass. He dismounted, shifting the limp boy carefully into his arms.
"Are you all right, Shacklebolt?" Arthur asked, chest heaving.
"I'm fine," Kingsley replied calmly, lowering the boy gently to the ground. "The blast took out most of the vampires. The rest scattered."
Arthur crouched, brushing soot from the boy's cheek — and froze.
Molly followed his gaze, her breath catching audibly as she reached out with trembling fingers, brushing aside the boy's messy fringe.
There, beneath the streak of dirt and sweat, was a lightning-shaped scar.
Her voice came out in a whisper, choked and reverent.
"Arthur… it's Harry Potter."
Arthur stared, dumbstruck.
Kingsley straightened, expression unreadable. "Then tonight's attack wasn't random," he said quietly. "Someone knew exactly where he'd be."
And above them, in the cooling night air, the last flecks of ash from the vampires drifted like falling snow.