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CHAPTER TEN

TURNING MYback on the alligators, I scraht have ue, this ti h power to pull me all the way to the asping for breath, I spotted the first of the onrushing alligators and knew I’d never round, I prepared to e My aim was to clamp its jaws shut and keep thee with its tiny front claws But even assu with the rest of the pack, which were coli toover by the tilinting cruelly, snout lifting as it bared its fangs - so ! so sharp! - to crush ether ?

? when, on the bank to ible while waving its arht flash in the sky overhead I instinctively covered my eyes with my hands When I reator had ators were all in ainto one another On thedeeply, paying no attention to ators to Harkat - he’d stopped in confusion - then at the figure on the bank As it lowered its arms, I saw that it was a person - a woman! And as she stepped forward, out of the shadows of the trees, revealing her long straggly hair and body-wrapping ropes, I recognized her

"Evanna?" I roared in disbelief

"That was pretty finely ti to a halt at the edge of the moat

"Evanna?" Harkat cried

"Is there an echo?" the witch sniffed, then glanced around at the alligators and toad "I’ve cast a te spell on the creatures, but it won’t last long If you value your lives, get out of there, and quick!"

"But hohat - where ?" I stuttered

"Let’s talk about it on - dry land," Harkat said, crossing over to join et the globes?"

"Yes," I said, pulling one out from within my shirt "But how did she?"

"Later!" Harkat snapped, pushingmy questions, I stumbled to the bank and crawled out of the ht rabbed Harkat’s robes and pulled hi "We’d best not be here when their sight clears That toad has a nasty teht bound after us"

Harkat and I paused to consider ould happen if a toad that size leapt upon us Then we hurried after the departing witch as fast as our weary legs could carry us

Evanna had established her carassy isle a few hundrede crawled out of the swa in a pot above it Replace for us, blue robes for Harkat, dark brown trousers and a shirt for et dressed," Evanna ordered, going to check on the stew