CHAPTER 1:- On Board the Hogwarts Express.
"Hi, I'm Albus Severus Potter; this is my first time to Hogwarts. Are you a first–year too?" Albus was always a nervous little boy but he was much calmer after the little conversation he had had with his father on the platform.
Albus Severus Potter was the son of Harry and Ginny Potter and a very famous wizard. He was currently on his way to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Sitting opposite Rose Weasley, his cousin, in the Hogwarts Express, he was feeling excited, for the first time since receiving the letter, about going to Hogwarts.
"Well, Al, you can stay here and chitchat all that you want with the lovely ladies here and I will go and do my own poking about. Say Hugo, how would you like to come with me to see Scorpius? You don't want to stay here with your sister do you? Come along." and James dragged Hugo out of the compartment, nearly colliding with the food trolley in the process.
"Anything off the trolley?" called out the fat lady pushing the trolley. All the occupants of the compartment, including Rose, rushed to the gateway. The moment everyone got there however, they all backed away screaming: "looting on the Hogwarts Express!"
Albus smiled to himself and shouted out something which could either make him very popular or much hated. "It's my treat!"
Everyone looked back at him in mixed awe and shock, then they chanted Albus's name in unison. While everyone was enjoying treats like Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, Pumpkin Pasties and, the most favourite, Skiving Snackboxes, one particular boy was sitting in a corner, eating what looked like cotton candy.
Albus recognised him as the same boy he had asked the question to, and now noticed that he was not only shy but scared as well. He called the boy to sit beside him but he wouldn't move.
Just when Albus was losing hope of making contact with the boy, after several failed attempts, the boy decided to come and see Albus. What mystified Albus was that the cotton candy that the boy had been eating just seemed to vanish into thin air just as the boy moved.
"Hello Albus, my name is Joshua Grace. I'm a first year too." Joshua didn't sound confident at all, but at least he was talking. However, instead of getting relieved that he was finally getting some words out of the boy, Albus was shocked.
"Did your parents teach you magic? How did you make that candy disappear?" Albus knew that it was illegal to use magic outside school if you are under seventeen, then Joshua couldn't have practiced magic at home. How did he do it then?
Finally, Joshua smiled. He was a special child; he had known that from the day that he knew anything worth knowing. But he also knew that he was more special than any person on the train, or in that compartment at least.
Joshua had never known his family; he had grown up with an Italian family, somewhere in the middle of London. He knew, however, that he belonged in America. He often had dreams of Long Island, and a place like a camp where everyone wore orange shirts.
Amongst all his dreams, two dreams in particular caught his attention: in one he found himself on the top floor of the Empire State building, which seemed way too big. In the other, he seemed to be staring at a girl who was dressed in battle armour with a shield which had a woman with snakes for hair on it. In that dream, he also seemed to be calling the name Thalia over and over…
But putting that all aside, Joshua deliberated on how to answer Albus's question; he reflected on alternatives to the truth, some rather clever ones but otherwise mostly absurd. In the end, he decided to stick to the truth.
"That wasn't candy, it was a cloud, and I wasn't eating it, I was playing with it." Albus's looks went from shock to confusion so fast that it was impossible to tell what he was actually feeling. Instead of responding to Joshua, Albus looked out the window to see a bright, sunny, cloudless sky.
"It's a clear day." Joshua had a smirk on his face, but was laughing heartily inside. Whoever he told the truth to would react much in the same way as Albus. "These things seem to happen to me all the time. Whenever I am sad, a little bubble of cloud just floats about near me, but others usually think that it is candy. It gets weird because whenever I am angry, people get fried up!"
Albus didn't find the last part weird at all; he knew that wizards could do that. His father had set a python on his cousin before he had gone to Hogwarts, before he even knew that he was a wizard.
"I have a cousin, a distant one, named Alice Dursley. She was pulling the legs off of the frogs in our pond, and I got mad. Suddenly, all she could do was croak; every time she said something, it came out as a croak! Even mum and dad couldn't fix her; we had to call in Aunt Hermoine!" And both the boys laughed out loud, clutching their stomachs.
Unknown to them, they had just marked the beginning of a friendship stronger than any before. Stronger than Harry's and Ron's, stronger than Percy's and Grover's, stronger even than Edmund's and Caspian's.
Sitting amidst some of the most powerful people in the world, they didn't realise the danger they would go through and impose on the world, or on each other. They sat, opposite each other, taking in the beautiful countryside, eating sweets and reading information about Harry Potter on the Wizard Cards.
Suddenly, the train stopped and the sky turned from warm blue to a fiendish grey. Lightning and thunder rolled across the sky, shaking the train itself. Then a voice, not unlike the thunder itself, boomed in the very air:
"Demigod! Be warned, you tread down a path from which there is no return! Do not turn to us for help when you destroy the very civilisation you cherish so much!"
Everything went back to normal after that, but when Albus looked across the seat, Joshua was gone.
"He's back!" the cries of terror from all around the train. Albus, who knew that Voldemort still struck fear into the hearts of thousands of witches and wizards, could understand exactly what the panic was all about. Desperately, he tried to calm everyone down.
"Sonorus" whispered Albus, pointing the wand at his throat, and trying to sound as old as possible. "It's all right, he's not back! My father killed him nineteen years ago. And Voldemort would never talk like that, surely you must realise that. This was someone's idea of a practical joke! It's all right; none of us have been harmed! Quietus" He knew that the last part wasn't true; Joshua was missing and who knew where he was.
"Al, exactly where is that kid you were talking to just now? He sure disappeared fast." Rose had received her mother's brains, and her gentle nature.
"I was thinking about that too, maybe we should–" But just at that moment, the train shook violently, and was nearly saved from toppling over. Then, with a sudden jerk, the train began to move. Albus had expected everyone to start screaming again but, surprisingly, everyone was calm and everything quiet.
Too quiet, thought Albus and he went out of the compartment to investigate. Everyone was in their compartment and against their seat. He thought that they were sitting there hoping for a calm journey the rest of the way, but then he tried the compartment doors and found that they were all jammed in place.
A closer look at the people inside showed him that they were struggling to break free, from an apparently invisible force holding them back. If only I had read my books with a bit more concentration, he thought, I would have been able to smash this glass to bits.
Luckily, Rose had. She took out her twelve and a half inches, Elm and Dragon Heartstring wand, pointed it at the glass and whispered "bombarda". At first nothing seemed to happen and then all of a sudden cracks started appearing through the glass.
"Well done Rose, let's just hope this worked." But, to the dismay of both, it didn't. The force holding the door in place was also apparently holding the glass together; the cracks merely stayed on the crack. Hearing the only noise on the train, James came to where Albus and Rose were.
"What's the matter do you think? And how are you guys outside? I thought all the doors were shut." James was, probably for the first time ever, the most serious person in the room.
"I was going to ask you the same thing, how are you outside?" Albus had never imagined that his first day would be quite as exciting as this, but was a descendant of the Potters, excitement followed him everywhere.
"Something very weird happened in the compartment which I was in. I was just visiting Aaron Thomas and his pals when suddenly we heard the voice. Then we felt the train shake and suddenly everything stopped and there was no noise afterwards. Aaron got up to check outside but he couldn't get the door open, so he called me to try. I opened it easily enough but the moment I got out into the corridor, the door slammed shut behind me. I looked back and saw that everyone was sort of stuck to their seat. What's going on?"
"Our door never got locked, but we tried to shatter this glass, but it didn't work. Do you know any spell which can help?"
"Wait" said Rose before James could reply, "I think we should all cast a spell together. If only my casting a spell was able to create a crack, I am sure all of us could shatter it completely." Rose looked eagerly at both James and Albus with hope. Even though Albus was beginning to see her point, James disagreed.
"This is obviously some powerful magic; certainly no first or second year magic could overcome it. We shouldn't bother wasting our energy." Only about a second after James finished talking came a roar loud enough to shatter all the glass in the train, and shatter it did.
The noise that followed was louder than anything they had heard that day. James, Albus, Rose and Hugo rushed into their own compartment, away from the screaming students. Again, their compartment seemed to have been left out; its glass was perfectly intact. Just as a precaution, Rose cast Protego on the door after locking it.
"What is happening?" Asked Albus and Hugo in unison, receiving no reply. James sat down on the seat nearest the door, looking out into the corridor intently. Rose meanwhile pulled out a small, beaded bag from under her jacket.
"It's got to be in here, everything's in here." She muttered to herself more than to anyone else. She thrust her had into the bag, then pushed her hand deeper and deeper into the bad until her entire arm was inside the bag, somehow.
"Uh, Rose? Your hand, it's disappeared, into a bag. Aren't you worried?" Rose, of course, ignored Albus still. Then she pulled out three lockets and closed the bag. After putting it back under her jacket, she turned her attention to the lockets.
"If any of you feel very hot" she said "don't worry, I expect it to happen." Then, after slipping two lockets onto her wrist, she brought the third close to her lips and whispered a single, inaudible word.
Immediately, Hugo started screaming loudly. "Something's burning inside me!" he said through gritted teeth. He fell down to the floor and started clawing at anything within arm's reach, including Albus.
Albus, by contrast, found Hugo's hand to be extremely cold. He tried to help Hugo but he didn't know what to do, so he turned to Rose. He found Rose to be looking at the pendant of the locket, apparently oblivious to her brother's condition.
She hastily put the pendant around Hugo's neck and the moment he touched it, he stopped squirming and just lay there. He woke up seconds later, smiling slightly.
Only while looking back at Hugo did Albus get his first good look at the locket. The chain was made up of small silver rings, tied together by seemingly invisible string. The pendant itself was a long thin glass cylinder which a single strand of golden hair in it, of about two inches. The brass top of the glass cylinder was engraved with a lion and the bottom with what looked like a castle between two hills.
Upon looking more closely, Albus was able to make out some text engraved on the glass itself. However, just before he could read it, his vision blackened and he felt all sensation leave his body. Then, every part of his body seemed to be on fire. He could almost see the fire spreading through him, but he just couldn't trace it back to its source. He knew it was inside him, he just didn't know how he knew. As the fire inside him burned hotter, he felt his fingers tingle and he made a grab at something. He recognized a familiar velvety substance and tried to pull it. He couldn't though, as just then, something seemed to stop his heart and smash his brain.
Albus awoke what he thought was hours but was really only a few seconds later. He had been having a really nice dream, though he didn't exactly remember what it was. He also realised that the dream had left a smile on his face. Even though he knew that he looked stupid, he couldn't seem to wipe it off his face.
"What was that all about?" Albus asked half interestedly, as most of his attention was occupied by the locket around his necklace. However, he wouldn't even have notices the presence of the locket had he not seen it because it was weightless and was the same temperature as him. He looked up at Rose and was delighted to see that she was looking at him too, holding up the last locket.
"These are lockets of protection, they were made at the same time as the world these originate from, but were hidden from everyone. Then, when the war was over and the two sons of Adam and the two daughters of Ever had been crowned kings and queens, these lockets were given to them.
"Last year, while playing in the backyard of The Burrow, I stepped over some sort of wire and landed in a place where it was snowing, in the middle of summer. A bit of looking around landed me near a lamppost, which I marked as where I would need to return to for getting home. Just as I was about to enter the woods at the edge of the road on which I was four large horses came running out. Astride the horses were the most wonderfully dressed people I had ever seen.
"The youngest was a young woman who was dressed in the softest of red silks possible and carried a dagger and a cordial at her belt. The older one to her was a young man who had over his shoulders a long, trailing purple cloak of the same material, who in turn carried a bronze sword. The second oldest was a woman who looked as though she had descended from heaven itself, both by face and by cloth, which changed colour even as I looked. Slung over her shoulders were a large, carved bow and a quiver full of arrows. The oldest was a man of amazing build and pride, wearing a golden cloak, shining armour and a ring with the face of a lion.
"These, I learnt later were the four kings and queens of the land, hence their magnificent crowns. They also had, however, identical lockets around their necks, too simple to belong to kings and queens.
"The royalty stopped all around me, both the kings with their swords drawn and both the queens with their weapons drawn as well. The first to speak was the oldest sibling. 'I, Peter Pevensie, High King of Narnia, demand you to tell me who you are and why you find yourself on the lands of Narnia.' I was frightened; therefore, I told them the truth. They listened intently and then they sheathed their weapons and spoke to me in a gentle tone. 'Rose Weasley, I admire your courage, but I advise you to return to your homeland, Narnia is not for ones with families waiting. Leave now, or forever remain with us.'"
"At this, I looked desperately around me for any sign of where the lamppost might be, as the snow had risen to almost twice what it was before. 'You are lost, dear, let me help you find your way.' The voice of the High Queen was just as beautiful as her. 'Yes please, if you could just help me locate a lamppost, I can find my way back from there.' My saying this triggered something amongst the royals, and the youngest one looked at me. Then, she got off her horse and walked me straight to the lamp. I turned to thank her, but she was gone.
"Around five months later, in the farm beside The Burrow, I saw the youngest sibling sitting there, looking stunning as ever. I approached her, and bowed down in front of her, but she merely smiled and laid her hands on my shoulders. 'I am no longer in Narnia' she said 'I am here just another girl'. Only when she said that did I notice that she was wearing normal clothes, and also that she looked much younger.
"'My name is Lucy Pevensie, and I have come here to give you something, after which I must return to Narnia for the last time.' I felt like asking her why for the last time, but I realised that it wasn't the moment to do so. Instead, I let her continue. 'While we were in Narnia, we were in danger, and as well in the land of Adam and Eve, but now we are safe, but you aren't.' I protested that our biggest threat had vanished but she told me that I was making judgements too fast.
"She pulled out a bag made of the same material as her dress had been. She pulled out four lockets from it, each with a single golden hair in them. 'All of us were given this by Aslan himself, as protection. I now give these to you. But first I must make it a part of you.' She performed the same magic that I performed, and I felt my insides burn. She told me the way to perform the magic but made me promise not to tell it to more than one person, as that was the only way the magic could work. Then she disappeared, and I haven't seen her since."
Albus decided to look at the glass of the locket, and found that it indeed said "The Kings And Queens of Narnia, may rain the protection to the locket bearer in the heartstring of Aslan." Albus, though, didn't believe her any word.
"You were in a different world altogether, and a queen gave you four royal protection lockets? Do you think I am an –" but what he thought Rose thought he was would never be known as just then James started screaming as they all had.
Moments later, Albus and Hugo were sitting opposite James and Rose in their compartment. Albus was looking out the window, trying to think where Joshua might be and if he was okay. Hugo was still trying to process what Rose had said about Narnia. James was still staring out into the corridor and Rose was unnaturally quiet, staring down at the floor.
"Why the long faces?" All four looked up at each other to see who had said that. The small, airy voice, it turned out, came from outside the compartment, somehow penetrating the soundproof glass. There stood Joshua with a smile on his face, hovering inches above the ground. "Is something wrong?"
"Josh, you're okay?" said Albus, who instinctively got up and ran to the door, fighting fruitlessly with the lock. Rose realised, in good time, that Albus was denying the fact of the matter that the door was locked.
"Alohomora." said Rose in a quiet voice, pointing her wand at the door. Just as Joshua was about to enter, however, she remembered that she had placed a protection charm on the door, and if Joshua entered he would disintegrate.
"WAIT!" she screamed at the top of her voice. Having opened the gate, her voice was able to travel through and Joshua stopped a hair's breadth away from the door.
Everyone turned to look at her, and she pointed her want at the door. "Finite Incantatem". The door shimmered for a second and then Joshua entered the compartment.
Smack!
Albus slapped Joshua hard on his left cheek which had started glowing red. He had fire in his eyes, fire of a nature known to be seen in a certain dark wizard's eyes…
"Albus, what's wrong with you? I thought we were friends!" Joshua, no matter how powerful, was still only an eleven year old, as could clearly be heard by his wavering voice.
"Some friend you were; leaving us alone then coming up here brightas day as though nothing at all had happened! Who do you think you are, Son of God?"
"No, but someone close!"
"STOP WITH THE JOKING!"
Then, once again, the train shook, preventing Joshua from returning another cheeky reply. In fact, Joshua now looked positively worried, as though he knew what was going to happen and wasn't looking forward to it at all.
The compartment door slid open and shut at a sickening pace, the train shook madly all over, lightning flashed perilously close to the train and James went mad with his wand.
Had Rose not cast the same protective bubble around the four of them, Albus, Joshua, Hugo and her would have ended up with broken limbs and bones at the mercy of James's powerful and completely stupid wand waving.
Albus's shouts of Petrificus Totalus were completely in vain as James's flashes of red and purple deflected the blue of Albus.
Finally, one of Albus's jinxes went and hit James and he froze in place, reducing the activity in the train by a considerable amount. Rose realised that it was safe enough to remove the bubble of protection, big mistake. Her removing the bubble acted as if like a cue for multiple cracks to sound in the air all around and inside the train.
A whole army of black, cloaked men boarded the train, and stated binding and disarming people in every compartment, rendering them incapable of any movement. They then seemed to realise that disarming took way to long and so continued on with just the binding. Albus was thinking about a curse to fight them off with when he found himself unable to move.
Albus realised that it would be no use struggling as the ropes were bound to be strong, but then he found out that the ropes were alive. Devil's Snare, he instinctively thought, but then he saw that the ropes had faces, and all life seemed to drain out of him.
Snakes!
These cloaked people were using snakes to tie them up. This fact drove all thoughts of escape from Albus's mind; instead he started to think about who these people were. He realised that he would never be able to figure it out on his own, so he turned to the only smart person in the compartment, Rose. He expected her to be furiously working out the mystery but the expression on her face was that of tired admiration.
"Mum." The single word uttered by her explained everything to James, but Albus, Hugo and Joshua were clueless. "I'm Hermione Weasley's daughter, and these are my relatives!" she called out at large and instantly two of the men were at the door.
"Your claims are being received by the official on–field in charge of the S.P.E.W, as appointed by Mrs Hermione Weasley. I, Arnold Bishop, promise to listen to your every claim with an unbiased view. Begin." The taller of the two had already struck Albus as a leader but his introduction proved Albus right.
"I am the daughter of Ron and Hermione Weasley and I clearly haven't got any house elves that I brutally torture, at all."
"Do you have any proofs to support your claim?"
"LOOK at me, you blithering idiots! Do I not look like her daughter to you? And, by the way, under the S.P.E.W and Ministry of Magic Collaboration Act 28982, clause A, you aren't allowed to hold any underage witch or wizard bound or prisoner for any length of time, are you? Albus, send a note with your owl to Mum asking her to put a leash on her dogs please."
"Um, Rose, I am a bit restrained here." Then Albus turned to the two S.P.E.W officials "do you mind freeing us now, that is, if you are convinced."
"Haven't you been listening, Albus? They aren't allowed to hold us like this; Mum should fire them instantly, if only…"
The officials seemed to realise that she knew enough about their organisation to get them in trouble, hence one of them disapparated with a loud crack, leaving the in charge behind. The in charge in turn looked frightened to death.
"Pardon me, Ms Weasley, I had forgotten the law, I will withdraw my forces this instant and you shall never have trouble from me. Excuse us ma'am, we will take our leave now." And with that, Arnold flicked his wand, causing all the snakes to disappear, along with the enforcers. Then with a final bow to Rose, he disapparated too.
Rose turned back to the other four present in the room and addressed them at large. "Now that we are all protected, with the exception of Joshua, I think we should sit down and brainstorm about what is happening in the world around us. Joshua, can you think of any way in which you can be permanently protected?"
"I can." James was speaking directly to them for the first time since they had re-entered their compartment. He took off his locket, handed it to an astonished Rose and walked out of the compartment, breaking the door in the process.
Another crack caused all the four occupants of the room to look up in fear, but it wasn't someone they needed to fear, in fact they positively rejoiced at the sight of him. Standing right in the middle of the compartment, stood the tall, redhead, bandaged Weasley twin, George Weasley.
"I had to apparate into five compartments before I could reach this one; the train seems so much bigger than before. By the way, what is that ear–splitting noise all over the train, it sounds as though someone let a Hungarian Horntail loose in Weasley's Wizard Wheezes?"
Instead of responding, all three kids, excluding Joshua, hugged George right around the middle, screaming Uncle George in unison. Joshua smiled sheepishly and turned to look out the window, however the single tear glistening in his eye wasn't hidden from Albus, who left his cousins and Uncle to check on Joshua.
"I know you must miss your family, but we are your family while you are at Hogwarts. Come on, I'll introduce you to Uncle George, he's what one might call…amusing."
Joshua wiped his eyes and smiled even more sheepishly. If only it were that simple, Joshua thought, I give anything for a different life.
"Who's this young lad?" George didn't feel like joking at every trifle matter anymore, not since nineteen years.
Albus left Joshua and George to introduction and dragged Rose out into the now completely crowded corridor. He had some questions to ask Rose which had been nagging him since the presence of those S.P.E.W officials.
"I thought you said that these lockets were supposed to protect us! How is it that we managed to end up bound by snakes with these on?" asked Albus. It was amazing how Rose could still hear him whisper amongst all the commotion.
"If you noticed, Albus, the snakes were fangless and their venom would have been ineffective. Those were just for binding, there was no need for protection, hence the lockets did not react. These were given to me by a queen, Albus, they are not likely to be fake." And with that, Rose walked back into the compartment and started chanting the same mantra she had before to make the lockets a part of them. In a few moments, Albus heard the expected scream from Joshua, but another unexpected one from somewhere down the train, which he later learnt was James's.
Finally as the train began moving normally again, the sun sank below the horizon to the west and darkness crept up from the east. The sky had turned well dark as the train drew into the station.
