Chapter 359: Honeydukes Cellar (Edited)

Talking all the way to Hogsmeade, this time the boys didn't detour at the Three Broomsticks, but headed for Honeydukes.

"Grandpa Ambrosius! Grandma Flume! Hello".

(?ΦωΦ?)?

As soon as he entered, Fish greeted the Flume's in a loud voice.

"Oh, it's little Fish, come and let Grandma see you."

Mrs. Flume, plump-faced and kind, stopped her busy work and greeted him quickly, hugging him and kissing him on the cheek.

"It's a pity Grandma wasn't here the last time you came! Have you eaten enough sweets while you were at school? If not, I'll send you some now and then..."

Mrs. Flume patted Fish's head, then took him by the hand, rambled on and on, and pulled him towards the back of the store.

Hermione and the others looked at each other, then shrugged and chose their own treats.

"What does Fish want to eat? Grandma will bring it to you."

At the back of the store, Mrs. Flume let go of Fish's hand and asked with a smile.

(`ω′′≡`ω′)

The kitten shook his head, took out a handful of coins from his pocket, handed them to Mrs. Flume and said seriously, "Fish came here today to buy nya candy, Fish is going to buy Christmas gifts for his friends, more than four hundred nya!".

(?ΦωΦ?)?

"Grandma, can you help Fish see how he can buy 437 candies with this money?".

"Four hundred and thirty-seven..."

Mrs. Flume twisted the corners of her mouth, with such an exaggerated amount, no matter how much she adored Fish, she really couldn't give it all to him.

So she took the pile of coins from Fish's hand and counted them carefully.

"How much candy are you going to give everyone?"

Honeydukes had special Christmas gift boxes of three kinds: large, medium, and small.

Of course, whichever one it was, the money Fish had wouldn't be enough, and if it was just the small box, Mrs. Flume could sell it to Fish by the skin of her teeth, but if Fish wanted a medium or large box, she couldn't do anything.

But Mrs. Flume wasn't going to refuse Fish's order, she was going to collect the final payment from Professor McGonagall later....

That's what everyone used to do when Fish got in trouble in town.

Anyway, they didn't want to blame Fish, and it would be better to let Professor McGonagall educate the cat.

Although Fish had no idea about money, he had learned arithmetic well enough to know that he couldn't afford any of the gift boxes with the money he had, so he said, "Buy all you can nya, Hermione said it's the thought that counts, and Fish earned all this money all by himself nya. Don't give Fish any extra candy nya, it's too hard to earn money..."

(??ˇ?ˇ??)

Said the little cat with a look of excitement.

"Fish, you're so sensible!" Mrs. Flume surprised Fish with a hug and a kiss, "Grandma will give you the best price, don't worry, we won't lose any money."

Of course, she wasn't going to make any money and gave Fish a cost price.

Mrs. Flume let go of Fish and called out to Mr. Flume, who was standing in front of her, "Come here, dear! Fish has a lot of things to buy! Let's put everything else on hold."

"Here we go! Children, please do it yourselves, just put the money on the counter, I have to go to the back first."

The burly Mr. Flume immediately left his business and ran to the back.

This sort of thing was common when they all returned to Hogsmeade last time, so the other students who were shopping didn't complain, but did as Mr. Flume told them , figured out the prices of the items they wanted to buy and put the money directly on the counter.

Mr. and Mrs. Flume took Fish to the basement,

From the boxes they kept here, they took out all kinds of candy, unpacked them, and then reassembled and rewrapped them in little boxes of colored paper.

Fish watched for a while as they assembled them and then joined them in packing them.

As the three worked, Fish's cat ears suddenly turned to his side and back, followed by Fish's head.

"Nya?!"

?(?ΦωΦ?)?

Fish stared at the shadows behind him, ears perked up and pointed in the same direction.

"What is it, Fish?" asked Mrs. Flume.

"Under that direction, the sound of someone walking nya...and getting closer and closer to here..."

Fish replied, pointing to the dark corner of the basement.

Naturally, the two did not doubt Fish's assertion, and....

Mr. Flume, who often transported goods in the cellar, had discovered the secret passage hidden in the cellar many years ago, but all the time he thought that only he and Mrs. Flume, whom she had told, knew about it.

Only they didn't use it at all, so they had forgotten about it for a long time, and now that Fish had reminded them of it, the couple quickly remembered.

"That place..." said Mr. Flume, rubbing his bald head, "It has a secret passageway that leads directly to the statue of the one-eyed hunchbacked witch on the second floor of Hogwarts..."

The secret passageway was unknown to Fish, because to enter it from Hogwarts you had to tap your wand on the statue of the one-eyed, hunchbacked witch and say the incantation "separate left and right."

After explaining the secret passage to Fish, Mr. Flume's expression suddenly became suddenly serious, for a possibility had just occurred to him...

"My dear, you must take Fish and go, it's probably Sirius Black!"

He quickly pulled his wand out of his pocket and shouted to Mrs. Flume.

Mr. Flume had heard about Black sneaking into Hogwarts and destroying the portraits in the Gryffindor dormitories to students who came to the store, and since Dementors had been prowling around town lately, trying to hunt Black down, it was only natural that he would think of him....

There was no need for normal students and teachers to come to Hogsmeade using the secret passage, although it could have been a first or second year student, but the odds of them knowing about the secret passage were too low.

Come to think of it, Sirius Black was the only one who could have known about it.

The passageway under the basement had been used by Mr. Flume, and it was long enough to hide hundreds of people, let alone one, and it led directly to his own basement, so he could easily solve the food problem.

It was fear of some lucky pupil that prevented Mr. Flume from immediately informing the pesky Dementors.

"Fish is staying to help nya! Fish wants to get the reward."

?(?ΦДΦ?)?

The kitten could not pass up this opportunity, and did not hesitate to refuse Mr. Flume's offer.

Mrs. Flume pulled out her wand and said with a smile, "Don't underestimate Fish, he's a little troublemaker who would give both Minerva and Professor Dumbledore a headache, and... when you were at school, you weren't as good at dueling as I was."

Mr. Flume smiled awkwardly and did not press the matter further, but merely clenched his wand tighter in silence.

There was a large group of students about the basement anyway, and as soon as something went wrong, he would cast a megaphone spell and shout at them to inform the other teachers and the Dementors.

"He'll be out soon nya," Fish whispered to the Flume, "Let's find a place to ambush him."

He gestured to the pair and then quickly transformed into his clouded leopard form, hopping lightly onto a bookshelf, crouching down and staring at the flimsy door Mr. Flume had pointed out as almost indistinguishable from an ordinary tile.

Mr. and Mrs. Flume were also behind separate bookshelves, wands nervously wielded, ready to strike at a moment's notice.

Wearing the invisibility cloak his father had left him, Harry walked for a long time, long enough to start panting, down the winding, wobbly passageways before he reached the foot of a worn stone staircase that ascended out of sight.

After calming his breathing a bit, Harry gathered his strength and began to climb again, taking care not to make any noise.

After climbing hundreds of steps, Harry, already a bit dazed, collided with a thud against a swinging door.

Rubbing his head, he pressed his ear to the lid and listened intently.

After making sure nothing could be heard from above, he slowly pushed the door open and peered over the edge.

It was a basement, full of crates and other wooden boxes, with piles of snacks and boxes of colored paper scattered on the floor at the far end, the sweet smell of which wafted into the passageway through the crack Harry had opened, causing him to retch.

Without further hesitation, Harry quickly climbed down the mountain and turned to close the trapdoor again....

At that moment, however, a dark figure came down from a nearby shelf and pounced on Harry.

"Roarr~!"

?(=`Д′=)?