On the Path
I wanted to spent the whole time talking to Harry about the murders – it was nice to finally have someone to share all my thoughts and fears with – but people would've gotten suspicious if I'd spent the next five or so hours in the interview, so I reluctantly got out of my chair and headed to the steps.
"Keep me informed," he said, already absorbed in the document files once more.
"You too," I said. When he glanced up, I added, "I need to know everything if I want to stay alive, right? Don't leave me out of things just because you think I'm a kid."
A slow smile spread across his face. "I remember feeling like that. Don't worry, I'll update you as soon as I find out anything new."
I nodded in acknowledgement and returned to the bridge, where the captain grunted a goodbye and I left for the main area. The hall was empty until the lounge area.
"There she is!"
People turned, swarming to me, peppering me with questions. What was Harry like? What did he ask me? Did I think he was going to solve the case? Where was he going to stay while in the castle? Did I get his autograph?
Abal Masri sat on the barstool, nursing another orange juice.
"What happened to your quiet drink?" I said over the chatter.
She raised her glass to me. "I opted for entertainment instead."
"Fair enough."
I squeezed through the crowd, muttering my apologies, and practically ran down the corridor to my cabin. Pippa leaped up the moment I returned.
"Well? Well? What was he like? Do you think he's going to solve the case? What did he ask you? Did you get his autograph?"
I groaned and slumped down in my chair. Kooky cocked his head, watching me. I dug into my suitcase and brought out a packet of raw bacon. He gulped it down happily while I gave vague answers to Pippa and Chelsea's questions.
Evie continued reading her book, but her gaze flicked up occasionally as I spoke.
The boat continued to cruise further up the river. The rugged terrain was thick with trees that twisted and hung over the river. The sunlight flittered in and out through the canopy. Colourful birds fluttered to higher branches at our approach, and a platypus slid into the water from the riverbank.
I sent Evie out to get lunch from the dining area, worried I'd get swamped with people again. Pippa and Chelsea rushed out with her in the hopes they'd catch a glimpse of Harry.
"Don't worry," Evie said when they returned laden with sausage rolls and vegetable pasties. "Harry's called a few people down now, and they've taken up all the attention."
They probably didn't have much to say. Harry had told me he'd call for people who lived in a twenty-kilometre radius from the murders in a desperate hope they'd seen something, but it wasn't likely. Anyone who'd been a witness would've told the Ministry by now.
"Maybe I could say I have information," Pippa said, peeling the top from her meat pie. "Then he'd have to interview me."
I groaned. "Please don't waste his time."
"You might have information," Chelsea said. "You just don't know it. Maybe you and he should have a good long chat about what you did over the summer holidays, just in case there's a detail you saw that might crack the case."
Pippa was getting her starry-eyed look. It was time to jump in. "Did you finish your Dreamtime homework?"
Pippa gulped. "Er…" She glanced at Evie, who had finally looked up from her book. "I started it, but I was having some trouble…"
"Get it out," Evie said, shutting her book. "Do it right now, while we're all watching."
"We don't want to see you getting eaten by the Bunyip," I added at Pippa's long-suffering sigh.
"I might," Chelsea said. "I've never seen the Bunyip eat anyone before."
She grinned as Pippa kicked her, and we spent the next hour or so going over the Dreamtime essay, helping Pippa finish hers and hurriedly getting out our own to make additions and changes. Evie's tattered book she'd picked up about the Muldjewangkturned out to be very useful. Apparently Diemen Pemulwuy knew plenty about Dreamtime magic, and had included the information in his book about the giant South Australian river monster.
Even though it was quite late, it was still bright when we pulled up at the Wattlegum jetty. The sun didn't set in the summer until at least eight thirty in Tasmania. It took longer to get off the ship than usual considering everyone was moving slowly, hoping to glimpse Harry Potter.
We walked off the jetty, lugging our belongings and pets, and started through the trees, up the winding path to the school. I glanced back to take in one last look at the Antipodean Odyssey. It gleamed, a shining shell in a green river, bobbing on the swell. Water sloshed along its hull, and it clacked against the jetty.
This would be the second-last time I had this view. The next time it would be coming home after graduating.
I inhaled a lungful of Eucalyptus-scented air, hoping to calm the dull ache that sat constantly around my sternum every time I had thoughts like this.
A group of students around the end of the jetty caught my attention. There was Harry, caught in the middle of them all. They were barely making any progress up the path. At that pace they wouldn't make it to Wattlegum until nightfall.
"Bah, look at them, like scavengers."
There was Ms Mathers, hurrying down the path from the school, glaring at the group surrounding Harry.
"Go on, you lot!" she hollered. "Get up to the school. Move!"
Ms Mathers wasn't the most intimidating-looking person. She was under five foot, which meant most of the students – even the first years – were taller than her. She made up for it by wearing platform boots, cute wedges, and teetering heels that made me worry about the state of her spine. Her silver hair was cut short and curled around her face like a fancy frame.
She was Aboriginal, of course, but she'd once threatened to expel a boy for calling her Aunty Mathers. Aunty Shelly could be the world's aunt for all she minded, but no one at the school was related to Ms Mathers, and she liked to remind them of it.
Ms Mathers pushed past the four of us to hurry to Harry and his fanclub. "Go on, shoo!"
She had her wand out, and the group scattered, laughing as they ran up the hill towards the school.
"Sorry, Mr Potter," she said when they were gone. Her voice travelled clearly up the slope. "I'm afraid they've come over all star struck."
He grinned. "Please call me Harry. And that's all right, there's something quite satisfying about hearing school children saying howyargarin? and 'scarinon?."
I giggled. His attempted Australian accent was terrible.
"I think that was supposed to be 'How are you going?' and 'What's going on?'" Pippa whispered, giggling as well.
We had slowed our pace so we remained about twenty metres in front of them. Ms Mathers didn't shoo us away, though. Kooky let out a trill that turned into a laugh, and several kookaburras in the trees echoed his call.
"I can't tell you how much we appreciate you being here," Ms Mathers said.
"Of course," Harry said. "I want to catch this killer as much as you do."
I couldn't turn around – I had to watch were I was going in case I slipped on a gumnut. The cursed things were everywhere.
The trees grew bigger here than I'd ever seen them. Swamp gums stretched to the sky, their buttress-style roots coated in moss. The rocks were covered in moss, too. Green, green, the world was green down here.
"The area's beautiful," Harry said, echoing my thoughts. "And I'm keen to see how your school differs to the one I went to. No one's wearing robes here, for a start."
"Robes are old fashioned, not to mention impractical," Ms Mathers said. "We have a regular school uniform that changes when the weather does. You European folk are too fond of tradition."
"Do you have houses? And a Quiddich pitch? And school ghosts?"
I smiled to myself. He sounded as excited as a first year.
"Yes, we have houses, but none of that segregation stuff I hear about in British schools. The students sit where they like in the dining hall, go to classes that best suits their timetable, and sleep in dorms according to age and gender." I heard her sniff. "I've read a report on the Hogwarts houses before. A sorting hat? Honestly. Our houses are mixed with students of all kinds of abilities and personalities."
"But if you don't have a sorting hat, how do you sort them?"
"A sorting kangaroo."
"Really?"
"No," Ms Mathers said with a snort. "It's according to enrolment numbers."
"Oh." Harry sounded embarrassed, and I might've felt sorry for him if I wasn't too busy snickering with the others.
Maybe Pippa was right. Having him in the school might be fun, after all.
