So, here's another scene I couldn't wait to write...

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The giant metal birds are only the first of many surprises that morning.

Stephanie hears them first, jumping to her feet a second before everyone else. Barbara is on her feet immediately after, followed by the others, wands at the ready in seconds. At first, she's not sure what she's looking at, the birds only a burry blob in her still sleepy state. She's almost positive she's still dreaming. Bronze feathers, ear piercing shrieks. Larger than anything she has ever seen before. None of the classes she'd taken at either Ilvormorny or Hogwarts have prepared her to face something like this.

"What are those things?!" Stephanie hisses.

"Deadly," Barbara guesses.

As if to test that statement, the birds hunch their backsides, and with a striking, "caw!" they send a volley of arrows at them. The group scatters. The arrows wedge themselves into the ground with a bland slunk!

"No shit!" Stephanie yelps as they duck behind a rock. "What kind of bird uses its own feathers as projectiles?!"

Barbara takes another look. She's right. It's not arrows as she had initially thought. They're feathers. Gleaming, bronze, metal feathers sticking up from the ground where they hit moments before. They're unbelievably sharp. What the hell?

The birds circle over head. Swoop down once. Hermione blasts them with a stunning spell, but all this seems to do is anger them. The others join in, each trying different methods, Stephanie even uses her new gun. Nothing comes of it. The birds it seems, are impervious to magic and unaffected by no-maj weapons. The feathers are raining down on them now. Cuts and gashes are inevitable.

"We've got to find cover!" Hermione shouts. Her hand is bleeding. Harry's got a nasty cut on his arm. Ron doesn't have any injuries that Barbara can see, but he's worse for wear. Draco and Stephanie aren't in her line of sight.

"Where are we supposed to find a place to hide?!" Ron shouts. "These bloody things burn through everything!"

The birds swerve, let out an ear piercing cry, and dive. They're heading for Draco and Stephanie on the other side of the clearing. They throw themselves into the shrubs as another volley of feathers are sent their way.

"Hey!" Barbara yells. She throws a rock at one of the birds. They don't take notice, as if they're suddenly bored with the other four. "Get away from them!" She throws another rock. Useless. She turns to Hermione. Her heart sinks when she sees the wide eyes. She doesn't have a plan. She doesn't know what these things are. The one thing she doesn't know... "Stephanie! Draco!"

They don't respond. It's, in part, due to the obnoxious noise that follows -- a sharp whistle, at first, as if someone who doesn't know how to play the flute is blowing too much air into it. Then, it breaks into a melody, some classical thing or another, nothing Barbara has ever heard before. Beautiful but beyond loud. Barbara covers her ears, but it's not enough to tune it out. The birds seem to share her sentiments. They startle, soar into the trees, fleeing -- only they don't get far. As they rise higher, arrows -- actual arrows this time --  fly into the air. They hit their mark easy. One by one, the birds' undersides are hit, right in the middle, with an arrow. They burst into a cloud of yellow dust, sprinkling down upon the group.

"...what was that?" Harry blinks.

No one has an answer for him. Barbara's running for Draco and Stephanie. "Are you guys okay?" She checks them over for any injuries when she reaches them. There's a few cuts and bruises, but they don't look too awful.

Stephanie gives a shrug, speechless for the first time since Barbara has known her. Draco flat out ignores her question. Instead, he's got his head turned up, grey eyes searching the trees as if he's looking for someone. "Where'd she go?"

"Who?" Harry asks. He glances up at the trees too, but of course there isn't anyone there.

"The girl!"

"What?"

"Oh, great now he's going mad," Ron mutters with a roll of his eyes.

"No, he isn't. Look!" Hermione points to one of the trees. Sure enough, there is, in fact, a girl in the trees. She's too far away for Barbara to see her face, but she's got a bow and a quiver of arrows strapped over her back. A silver cloak is drawn over her head, the tail flapping in the wind. She dashes off when she realizes she's been spotted, jumping from branch to branch. Then, before anyone can say or do anything, Draco's running after her.

"Where are you going?" Stephanie yells after him.

He doesn't respond. Ron shakes his head. "Completely mental."

"Come on," Barbara says. She runs after Draco, not looking back to see if the others are following -- if their heavy footfalls aren't enough to give that away, then Ron's complaining is. "If he wants to run off after some random mystery person, I say we let him!" "We're better off without him, anyway!" "Is he even worth the trouble?" But Barbara won't leave anyone behind.

They're not running long before they happen upon a ravine, twelve feet across and sloshing around wildly. The girl with the silver cloak, who's still up in the trees, swings herself from one branch to the next, moving through the trees like a professional acrobat. Within minutes she's landing on her feet on the other side of the river. She turns to look back at them. Barbara still can't see her face with the hood of her cloak pulled over her head, but something about the girl's stature gives the impression of arrogance -- she thinks she's lost them.

But it doesn't seem as if Draco is willing to so easily admit defeat -- perhaps it's that Slytherin ambition. Or maybe he's spending too much time with the Gryfinndors, it's making him all too impulsive, just like them.

He sets his sights on the girl on the other side of the ravine, eyes flickering to the large rock at the center of the rushing water -- it's sleek and awful slippery looking, and in an instant it's clear what he's planning.

The girl on the other side shakes her head. "No, don't!" she calls. "You won't make it!" Draco doesn't listen to her. And he falls in. In seconds, he's carried off down the ravine, Barbara's heart leaping as she takes off down the river bank, shouting Draco's name. The girl on the other side let's out a loud curse -- at least, Barbara thinks it's a curse. It's in another language, but it's hostile all the same.

She and Barbara mirror each other on either side of the bank; the girl latches onto a fallen branch, thrusting it out to Draco thrashing around in the water, fighting against the waves. He takes hold, but it slips through his fingers.

"Grab it!" the girl yells.

Draco looks like he has a sarcastic remark in return, but he can't speak lest he wants a mouthful of water. He makes another grab at the stick. This time he grasps it firmly, and the girl pulls him out. Just in time too, it seems, Barbara can see a waterfall coming up a few feet ahead of them.

Draco and the girl fall to the ground on the other side of the river just as the others catch up. Everyone's out of breath. Barbara's sank to the ground, heart pounding. "Are you okay?" she calls to Draco, but he ignores her. Instead, he's already turning his attention back the the cloaked girl -- at least he tries too. She's already making another run for it, her cloak flapping like a cape behind her. The girl fast, already half a mile ahead. Anyone else might have cut their losses and given up, but Draco is determined to catch this girl for whatever reason. He runs after her.

"Oh for Pete's sake!" Hermione exclaims. She preforms a quick spell, allowing for all of them to levitate over the river in a much more civilized manner than Draco had attempted -- perhaps she would have performed the spell on him too had he slowed down long enough to ask. But he seems positively taken with this mystery girl, not thinking straight at all.

He doesn't seem phased by his unplanned swim at all. In fact, he's already made great time, gaining on the girl fairly quickly. Maybe it's all the time he's spent as the Seeker on the Slytherin's Quidditch team that allows him to catch up to her so fast. This theory is further tested when Harry surpasses the others, quickly coming to a sprint next to Draco. The pair of them are on the girl in seconds; Draco reaches out, fingers closing around the hood of the girl's cloak. He yanks it off as hard as he can, pulling the girl to the ground in the process. She lets out a startled yelp as she falls on her hind end.

"I knew it!" Draco shouts, stopping with such abruptness Harry actually runs past them and has to circle back. The others catch up, hunching over to catch their breaths. Draco's glaring down at the girl on the ground; she sneering right back up at him. "Is this where you've been all this time? Frolicking around in the woods like some sort of woodland pixie or something?!"

"I'm not frolicking," the girl grumbles, not really meeting his eyes. She's incredibly young, twelve or thirteen by the looks of things, and her response is even more childish. "You're frolicking."

This only seems to agitate Draco more, but before he can say any more Stephanie forms a T with her hands for a time out. She's still trying to catch her breath. "Hold up. You know this kid?"

"I'm not a kid," the girl snaps. "I'm fifteen, I just look younger." She hauls herself to her feet, her harsh gaze never leaving Draco's.

"Kay. Fair enough. But...who are you?"  Stephanie asks again.

"She's my sister," Draco says. His voice is a bit colder than usual. Barbara's heard him sound bitter before, but she's never heard him this way before.

The girl lets out a short, sharp laugh, nearly at icy as the look in Draco's eyes. "Oh, so you're claiming me now?"

"You're the one who stopped claiming us, Carina!" Draco snaps.

"Really? Because that's not the way I remember --"

"Since when do you have a sister?" Harry interrupts. He's looking between the two, as if his brain is only just processing that bit of information. Barbara has to admit, she's thrown for a loop too. Draco has never once mentioned having a sister, but now that it's been pointed out it's difficult to ignore. The family resemblance is uncanny. In fact, if the girl hadn't been so small the two might have been twins. They have the same thin frame, identical platinum hair (hers is short too, if not just the slightest bit longer, uneven bangs swooping from the left to the right of her head). Their eyes are the same shade of gray, too, only hers are much more hardened, as if she's seen things that would make grown men pee themselves.

The girl, Carina, smiles, but it lacks any sincerity. "I'm not talked about."

"Yeah, maybe that's because -- oh I don't know -- you ran away!" Draco rolls his eyes.

"I'm an embarrassment!" Carina corrects. Draco scoffs, but he doesn't argue as Carina goes on. "A disgrace, really. A pure-blood family producing something like me. It's unspeakable!"

"That is not what he said!" Draco says with even more bite than before. Barbara can only assume he's referring to his father, a man whom he's hero worshiped since childhood.

"Yeah, well, close enough," Carina says carelessly. She snatches her cloak back from Draco, draping it around her shoulders again.  Stephanie is frowning, looking back and forth between the two Malfoy siblings. She nods. "Uh, huh... Well, I'm totally confused."

"I'm a squib," Carina spat, still glaring at Draco as if it's his fault.

"...gesundheit?"

"Squibs are essentially the opposite of muggle-born witches and wizards," Hermione explains quietly. "Non-magical individuals born into magical families." It's clear, then, why the Malfoys had seemingly kept Carina from the world, why Draco had never mentioned her before. A pure-blood family like them, one so uppety and in league with the Dark Lord no less... It would be killer on their reputation if anyone found out they had a squib for a daughter. Barbara's heart clenches for the girl.

"Yeah," Carina spits. "That."

"You left without saying anything!" Draco yells.

"Like you'd have noticed if I'd said anything anyway."

"I noticed when I returned home from school and my sister was missing. Mother wouldn't stop her sobbing for months. And father organized a search party. Not that you'd care about any of that, would you?"

"Come off it. They were just upset because I left before they got the satisfaction of kicking me to the curb!"

"Oh, please. They weren't throwing you out, Carina!"

"How the hell would you know? You were never even there! You were just as bad as they were --" Carina stops abruptly, holding up one finger, shaking her head. "No. No, you know what. We're not doing this."

She turns on her heels and starts off without another word, the others watching in awkward silence. Not even Ron has anything to say. It feels all too much like they're invading a private moment.

Draco storms after her, eyes flashing. He looks extra demented thanks to the water from the river and the sweat from the run dripping from the tips of his hair. "What? So that's it then? You're just leaving? Again?"

Carina doesn't stop, and she doesn't look back. "I know when I'm not wanted."

For a moment, another unfamiliar emotion flickered in Draco's eyes. "You were never unwanted."

She scoffs, but still doesn't turn around. "Could've fooled me."

Draco glares at her back. "Why'd you even come here then!?"

"Saved your stupid arse," Carina calls over her shoulder. "You're welcome by the way."

"No one asked you to do that!"

"Never mind, Draco. Goodbye."

"No." He hurries forward and pulls her back by the arm. "You're not just running away again!"

Carina pauses. She glances down at his hand on her arm as if its a minor inconvenience. "I know seventeen different ways to sever your arm off, brother," she spits the word as if its the worst insult she can think of, "so if you'd like it to stay attached I suggest you unhand me right now."

"I'm not doing that," Draco argues. "You're not running away again."

"Like you could stop me."

"Then, I'll just follow you."

"You wouldn't be able to keep up."

"I caught you just now. I think I'd manage."

Carina huffs, yanking her arm from Draco's grasp as she whirls around. There's a fire in her eyes -- the heat sucks the air from Barbara's lungs. "Fine! You wanna know what I've been up to, do you? You want to know where I've been all this time? I couldn't do your magic, so I set off to find my own. A different kind of magic."

"What are you talking about?" Draco eyes her up and down. From the look in his eyes he thinks she's making it up, and while Barbara would never accuse another of lying she's also never heard of any other types of magic. What's she on about?

Carina rolls her eyes as if to say you are such an idiot and I'm ashamed to be related to you. "I knew you wouldn't get it." She starts off again.

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

"Never mind."

Draco is about to put his foot in his mouth again, Barbara can tell, so she jumps in. "Look, it's getting late. Clearly you guys have some issues to work out, and obviously you know your way around these woods so why don't we all set up camp together. Have a nice long conversation to work things out, maybe. Everything will be better in the morning."

Barbara gives her best, friendliest smile, but Carina only regards her as if she's a bug she's about to step on. "Well. I guess we know what house you're in." It's the same snide tone a lot of the Slytherin's use, the same one Draco used himself not so very long ago, the one that suggests she's just the slightest bit superior. Barbara isn't sure if she should be offended by the comment or not.

Carina glances up at the sky, tilting her head to one side in contemplation. "We usually travel at night, when the moon is high." She pauses. "Still. I suppose I shouldn't leave you lot just yet. You'll wind up getting yourselves killed." No one comments on the implication that she's not traveling alone. They're scared to ask what her travel partner is like.

"We've been managing just fine without your help, thanks," Draco snaps.

"Sure you have," Carina says. "Just like you handled the Stymphalian birds." He glares back at her, but she doesn't give him the chance to respond again, setting off once more. "You can stay with us -- one night only!"

---

Okay so that was a bit long. I got carried away 😅 So as you can see Carina is a new HP oc. Draco's sister. Squib. Disowned. Runaway. Very bad ass. Personally I love her.

She's also high key a set up for a Percy Jackson crossover sometime in the future so yeah. There will be some teasing for that in the Deathly Hallows stuff (really Deathly Hallows might just be all au stuff at this point but it's fanfic so I can do whatever I want).

I'm gonna write it so that you can enjoy it even if you don't like PJ too. You can just ignore the crossover stuff. But I love both and I'm a sucker for crossovers and the crossovers between these two universes will always be near and dear to my heart because that's like the first thing I ever wrote so... Yeah, hopefully those of you that also enjoy both fandoms will enjoy the hints dropped!

That said it's still a very long way away because we're still in year four in this HP fic, I just get ahead of myself and so...yeah. Spoilers... Yay... Hopefully you enjoyed this little...thing. It's not edited and just a draft so it might be changed later but...yup. There we go.

Okay. I'm rambling. It's 2:30 am. I have work ina. Few hours, my grammar is slipping..I'm tired night 😘😘😘