#hlpride2026

⭒˚.⋆⭒˚.⋆⭒🪐 ⋆⭒˚.⋆⭒˚.⋆

Five minutes of forcing their way through dense undergrowth later, the girls slipped behind the wide trunk of an ancient tree and peered carefully around it. Below them lay a broad clearing, lit by pale moonlight and torches driven straight into the earth. A dozen tents were pitched around a dying fire. Imelda spotted a patrol of two men dressed in leather and fur; their cloaks were dark, and daggers hung at their belts. She felt her stomach drop.

“Shall we?” Poppy looked at her, hope in her eyes. How could Imelda let her go in there alone? Small, slight, and brimming over with courage to rescue every innocent soul she could find.

“Yes,” the Slytherin agreed and the girls cast Disillusionment Charms and moved quietly along the perimeter of the poachers’ camp.

They stepped softly on the wet earth, watching the patrol. The men scanned their surroundings with the lazy inattention of people who didn’t really believe anyone was coming. They seemed entirely unconvinced the patrol was even necessary—who was going to find them in the Forbidden Forest? Hogwarts students? Hardly.

“Look,” Poppy whispered, and Imelda nearly walked into her back. “There they are.”

Imelda looked down and saw dozens of cages holding all manner of creatures: tiny Nifflers, a Hippogriff foal, Puffskeins, and many others—all crying quietly in the dark, locked away. Something clenched in her chest.

“Go!” Poppy commanded and jumped down from their hiding place.

“Poppy! Wait!” Imelda hissed.

They had no plan. No assigned roles, no signals. Only enthusiasm and a sincere desire to free every last one of them. Imelda exhaled, drew her wand, and jumped down after her.

“Alohomora,” Poppy whispered, opening cage after cage.

“Alohomora,” Imelda whispered alongside her, to speed things along.

The creatures seemed to understand that silence was required, and one by one they disappeared into the forest without a sound. Imelda sharpened every instinct she had, listening to the darkness around them, trying to pick out human footsteps from the sounds of the night.

When the last cage had been opened, a satisfied Poppy threw her arms around Imelda and whispered in her ear, “It worked!”

“Yes, yes,” Imelda whispered back, “now let’s get out of here.”

She was pulling her broom from her magically enlarged pocket when a rough male voice sounded behind them. “And where do you think you’re off to, little girls?”

Imelda’s heart lurched. She reacted before the poacher could raise his wand — Slytherin discipline and hundreds of hours of Quidditch training had honed her reflexes to something close to instinct.

“Protego!” she shouted, throwing up a silver shield that caught the red curse from a second poacher who had just come running from behind a tent with a sharp crack.

“You little brats!” the first one bellowed—the stockier of the two—and a dense stream of violet fire erupted from his wand.

“Poppy, fly!” Imelda called but Poppy had no intention of running. Her eyes were burning with a dangerous light. The poachers had made a very serious mistake in angering her.

“Depulso!” Poppy shouted, sending a powerful shockwave into the tents. The spell took out the poles, and heavy canvas collapsed in a heap along with cauldrons and weapons, burying the patrol for a moment and leaving them disoriented.

The camp woke up instantly. Men and women came pouring from the other tents, drawing their wands as they ran. The situation was becoming desperate: two teenagers against an armed gang in the middle of a dark forest.

“We need to go!” Imelda gripped her wand and stepped forward. “Incendio!”

A bright burst of flame sent several of the poachers stumbling back, but one of them—a tall, masked wizard—had his shield up in time, and was already turning his wand, preparing something dark.

“Don’t even think about it. Levioso!” Poppy reacted like a flash of lightning, lifting the man into the air, and Imelda added immediately, “Diffindo!”—a magical blade cutting through the air and sweeping the poacher off his feet, sending him crashing to the ground.

Imelda grabbed Poppy’s hand, feeling adrenaline pulsing through her veins. Curses lit up the air around them in every colour, shearing branches from trees and scorching wet leaves underfoot. The poachers were firing to wound, with no concern for the youth of their targets.

“Glacius!” Imelda froze the earth under two attackers trying to move in from the flank. The men went down hard, crashing into the roots of an ancient oak.

But the space around them was closing in. The leader of the group—a stocky man with a large scar across his neck—drew a complex pattern in the air with his wand. The air around the girls grew heavy, and the ground beneath their feet began to shift and pull, turning into sucking bog.

“Poppy, broom now!” Imelda commanded.

She threw her broom to the ground and it leapt obediently into her hand. She swung onto the handle and reached back for Poppy. Breathing hard, Poppy grabbed her shoulder and jumped on, wrapping both arms tightly around Imelda’s waist.

“Expelliarmus!” Poppy shouted over Imelda’s shoulder, disarming the poacher who had nearly grabbed the broom’s tail.

“Hold on!” Imelda shouted and wrenched the handle upward.

The broom shot into the air almost vertically, tearing free of the trap. The poachers fired after them, but the thick fog and the sweeping branches of the Forbidden Forest made a reliable shield. Green and red sparks flashed past, lighting up the tree canopy from below, but with every second the sounds of the camp grew fainter.

They flew through the cool of the night, leaving the danger behind. Imelda wove confidently between the ancient trunks, and Poppy, behind her, finally loosened her grip and began to laugh quietly, from relief and adrenaline and the sheer aliveness of it all. Every creature was free, and they were whole.

“Your heart is about to beat out of your chest,” Poppy said, pressing in closer.

“Isn’t yours?” Imelda asked, glancing back at her.

“No,” she answered softly, tightening her arms around Imelda’s waist. “Shall we go to the lake?”

“Are you sure?”

Poppy didn’t answer—only pressed her lips lightly to the side of Imelda’s neck. Imelda’s skin came alive with goosebumps; a flock of Hippogriffs took flight in her stomach; and her heart stilled and then began beating in an entirely different rhythm.

A few minutes later they landed on the bank of the lake. The castle rose above the still water like a great stone cliff, torchlight and candlelight flickering faintly in the windows.

They made their way to the stone ruins where they often sat for hours talking about everything, or saying nothing, each lost in her own thoughts. Imelda helped Poppy up—she was a head and a half shorter than the Slytherin—and leant in against her. Poppy drew her closer, legs wrapping around her waist, hands settling softly around her neck.

“Thank you for helping me. Again,” Poppy said, smiling into Imelda’s eyes.

“Warn me next time, would you?”

“You know I won’t.”

“Sweeting, you’re going to be the death of me one day.”

“But you’re not cross with me, are you?” Poppy asked, with that particular slyness in her expression.

Instead of answering, Imelda kissed her—softly, her arms pulling her close. Somewhere in the forest a bird began to sing, and the sky above them was full of stars that lay reflected in the dark water of the lake below.

“You’ll come to love being outside,” Poppy murmured.