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My first moments in the cold, black water were terrible.
Willow’s lantern light was snuffed out as though it never existed. There was no sense of up or down, no forward, no backward, only an eternal instant of hanging, or waiting, suspended, in the void.
And then, there was warmth, a narrow line of it at first, sliding along the centre of my chest. Beautiful warmth, that seemed to draw me in, rock me, guide me in a direction that must be forward.
You can swim there…
There it was. For the first time since I’d found myself in the alley, I heard it. That soundless voice that always made me think of James…
And I swam.
The feeling spread, growing warmer around me, the heat slipping silken past my paws and fanning out beyond my shoulders. Give in to it, Willow said, let it take you.
It was not like the swim that took me away from the prison of Azkaban. That had been an urgent, lonely journey, filled only with desperate anxiety for the scarce known child of my dearest friends. This one was filled with the hope of returning home to my friends, to my darling Hessia and to my beloved Godson.
There was something up ahead. A sound like a muffled echo. A splash, then another, another. Faint, but growing louder. It was the first sound of waves, the first sense of real movement I felt on the surface of this strange underground lake.
But if there were waves, then there must be something for them to beat against.
Splash, ripple, splash. Growing louder, closer!
I raised my head in the darkness and felt the fur on the tops of my ears brush softly against the roof of the cave.
You’ll reach a spot, Willow said. Where there’s nothing left for it but to pull in as full a breath as you can and dive deep. You’ll know it when you get there.
I closed my eyes on stony darkness. For one final instant, I thought about the friend standing with her lantern at the edge of the lake behind me, the one who had guided me this far. Then I looked for the images of those who would be waiting for me out beyond the walls of the cave, pulled a sharp, deep breath and dove.
The splashing was gone. Snuffed out, like Willow’s lantern, as though it had never existed. The warmth that had surrounded me was slipping away, leaving me again with no sense of up or down, no forward, no backward. There was only that eternal instant of hanging, or waiting, suspended in the void.
But having to breathe…
Had that need been there before? Didn’t know. Didn’t matter. It was there now. Growing strong. Stronger. Had to…
Breathe. Had to…
Had to fight to…
I thrust my paws ahead of me, pointed my nose and kicked as hard as I could. No cold, no dark, no despair would hold me down…
Had to breathe, had to-
I would travel. Out of the darkness.
Up into the light.
I would be free.
And I would breathe!
Deep. Deeper than this darkness. Deeper than this water, I would breathe.
I would open my mouth- And-
Clean, sweet summer air washed across my tongue. I drew a deep satisfying breath of it and felt the heat of the sun caressing my face and tickling my eyelids with its warmth.
Heat… on my eyelids…
I opened my eyes.
I was swimming across a shallow pool at the base of a hillside. Slanting rays of sun streamed across the water, painting the edges of the waves with the first copper of evening. Somewhere in the distance, was a low, steady humming
It took me a moment to realize what it was. Motors. The droning of countless motors. Almost as I did so, it was cut through by a loud, drawn-out honk. There was no doubt about it.
It was the unmistakable, blaring sound of an automobile horn.