Chapter 7 - Ghosts of the Past
"Get in here!"
"We can't go in there!"
"Do you want Filch to catch us? We'll get another detention! Get in here!"
"It's - the - girls' - bathroom!"
"We don't have a choice! Come on!"
"Do you see them, my sweet?" a new voice was heard. Aaron and Hugo looked in panic at the corner of the hallway, which was keeping them hidden from the old caretaker - for the moment. But any minute now, they knew, Filch and his disgusting cat would walk beyond the corner and see them - and then they'd be doomed. There was only one hope left for them.
They walked through the door and into the girls' bathroom.
Luckily, no one was in there except Houda and Lily, who were breathing hard. Outside the door, they could hear Filch. "Where have they gone, my sweet?" he whispered. "Perhaps through that door?"
The four of them froze - but no, Filch must have meant another door. It was long rumoured that Argus Filch knew every secret passageway inside the castle, and it appeared they were lucky enough to go inside a toilet that was right in front of such a passageway. In no time at all, the wheezing noises of the caretaker were gone, and the four dared breathing again.
"It's lucky this toilet was here," Aaron said at last.
"And even luckier no one was already inside," Hugo now dared a smile. "Can you imagine what could have happened?"
"There would probably be a lot of screaming and Filch would have come running," Lily said sensibly. "And then we would have got an even heavier detention - at least you two."
Houda allowed herself a smile. "We did it, though," she said - and the four of them started laughing. "I can't believe we got away with it!"
"And Filch didn't even see our faces! He doesn't know it was us! We really got away with it!" Hugo said in obvious delight, and they laughed even harder.
"This is so much better than climbing on top of the Astronomy Tower," Aaron agreed.
"Yeah - we didn't get caught!"
"Yet."
The laughter froze immediately at the new voice. Houda looked around - was it an older girl, ready to tell Filch they were the ones who had built a snowman in the middle of the corridor? A girl who was unhappy that two boys had found refuge inside the girls' lavatory and was going to make sure Aaron and Hugo got punished?
But no - it couldn't be. It was a girl - an older girl, too - but she wasn't a student; she was a ghost.
Houda looked at her in interest. There were ghosts all around them, of course - there was Nearly Headless Nick, with his almost-severed neck; the Bloody Baron, who flew around the castle in his chains and was covered in blood and pretty scary; and other transparent people who had their gruesome death and came back to tell the tale to generations of unsuspecting Hogwarts students.
But the girl seemed different - for one, she was a girl, not that much older than they were. Another thing was her body - she didn't sport any stabbing marks, blood stains, or other visible wounds. It looked like she didn't die a terrible death like the rest of them.
"Oh, you wouldn't turn us in," she said at last.
The ghost of a girl eyed her. "Why not?" she demanded sulkily.
"Because it wouldn't be very nice. We're not bothering you - we're just about to leave."
"No one ever wants to talk to me," the girl was almost in tears.
"Oh, I'm sorry! I didn't realise you'd be - be - lonely, I guess."
Houda was trying to be kind, but it only served to infuriate the ghost further. "Oh, yes! No one ever thinks I could be lonely too! That I would like some company! No one ever considers me!" She huffed.
"Well, we could stay, if you'd like," Aaron said all of a sudden. "We just didn't know you were here. We've only been to Hogwarts for a couple of months. We don't know all the ghosts yet."
The girl didn't answer. Houda was sure she was looking for something else to complain about. Eventually, she was pacified by Aaron's words. She didn't start shouting again, but floated gloomily above them.
"What's your name?" asked Houda, trying to be nice and get on the ghost's better side.
"Myrtle," the ghost sniffed.
"Nice to meet you, Myrtle."
Myrtle shrugged - as much as the ghost could shrug. "No one ever means it," she said. "Even people who come to my toilet only come here because they need something. Like a hiding place," she eyed them all.
And then, she caught sight of Hugo. "Well, you look like someone who used to come here only when he needed a hiding place," she pouted at him.
"But it's only my first year!" he protested. "I've never been here at all! That's not fair."
"It was a long time ago," she conceded for a moment. "Maybe you're related to him." All of a sudden, she eyed him suspiciously. "You wouldn't know Ron Weasley, would you?"
"Hey - that's my dad!" he said and started to laugh.
She didn't laugh with him. Instead, she gave him an annoyed look. "Well, he only came here when he and his friends needed a place to brew Polyjuice Potion," she said.
"Polyjuice Potion?" Hugo asked the ghost in interest. Lily, however, looked just as lost as Houda and Aaron were. For once, the Muggle-borns weren't the only ones not in on the story.
"What's Polyjuice Potion?" Houda asked.
"It's a potion that allows you to look like someone else - but he can't have brewed it here - not when he was in school!" Hugo said, incensed. "Who were these friends of his?"
"Harry Potter and Hermione Granger," she said glumly. "They didn't come to visit me either. Except when they needed to enter the Chamber of Secrets."
Now even Hugo didn't know what she was talking about. "What's the Chamber of Secrets?" Lily asked, interested.
"It's a secret chamber," Myrtle said. Her voice turned all secretive and excited - it was clear she wanted very much to tell that particular story. "It was built when the school was built, a thousand years ago - and it had a monster in it! That's how I died," she finished dramatically.
"What, you entered the chamber?" Aaron asked.
"No! Why would I want to go into a secret chamber? No, there was a boy, a terrible boy, who set the monster loose - and he killed me!"
Lily gasped audibly, and Hugo was gaping at the ghost with eyes open wide. That obviously was the reaction Myrtle was hoping for, because she continued her story, looking rather pleased with herself. "You must have heard of that boy," she said now in half a whisper. "He's very famous."
"What was his name?" Hugo asked immediately.
"Tom Riddle," Myrtle said.
Now they all gasped. Houda remembered the name - it was in their history books, and in that biography they read in the library. That was Lord Voldemort, the evil wizard Lily's dad had killed.
"You died during the War?" Lily asked, excited.
"No," Myrtle now sounded irritated, "I told you, he was a boy then. He killed me before he was Lord - Lord -You-Know-Who. I was probably the first person he ever killed," she said that with an air of a great achievement and pride. Houda thought it was probably an honour of sorts, if a somewhat dubious one.
But unlike Myrtle, Lily looked disappointed. Undoubtedly, she hoped Myrtle could tell her something about the War - but no, all she could tell them was about Voldemort as a boy, and who would be interested in that?
As if realising that, Myrtle immediately added, "But I was important during the War, too! Like I said, the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets was here. And Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger needed to go there to help defeat You-Know-Who."
"Really?" Lily's attention was back with Myrtle, and so was Hugo's now.
"How do you get into the Chamber?" Aaron asked.
"What's in there?" was Houda's question. "Some sort of a secret weapon?"
"Why did they need to brew Polyjuice Potion - oh! Was that in order to defeat Voldemort? So he wouldn't know who they are?" Hugo was rather pleased with himself over that deduction.
"Why wasn't my dad with them?" Lily asked.
Myrtle didn't answer. The sulky, unhappy expression returned to her face, and she looked more annoyed than excited by their questions. Her plan, it was obvious, had backfired. The four kids didn't find her interesting at all - no, it was the rest of her story that they found interesting.
"Well, I don't know about these things," she sulked at them. "I never go in there. There's something awful down there. I have better things to do - and better things to do than answer your questions! Now, if you'll excuse me," she said and dived into one of the toilets.
"Ew," was Aaron's opinion.
"And I think you better leave!" a muffled voice was heard from the u-bend of the toilet.
Houda ignored her. Instead she started looking around the bathroom, through the cubicles - even the one Myrtle had disappeared to - and then looked at all the basins.
"What are you looking for?" Lily asked in confusion.
"Myrtle said the entrance to the Chamber was here - but I don't see it anywhere."
"It's hidden, obviously," Lily answered in an impatient voice. "Otherwise anyone could find it! What kind of a Chamber of Secrets would it be if it wasn't a secret?"
"Well, it can't be hidden too well, people have found it - your dad did!"
"Maybe we should ask him," Aaron suggested dryly. All four of them laughed.
The rest helped Houda look for the entrance for a while longer, but after a few more minutes they gave up. Wherever the entrance to the Chamber was, it really was well hidden - or, at least, well hidden for the magical abilities of four eleven-year-old kids.
Houda sighed. "I guess Myrtle was right," she said, defeated. "Let's go."
As the closest one to the door, Houda was the first to walk towards it and then open it slightly to take a peek outside. There was no sign of Filch or his cat. She drew her entire head outside the door, looked right, then left, then called behind her "Coast is clear!" and walked to the corridor. Lily, Aaron and Hugo soon joined her outside of the bathroom, and together, they started talking towards the Gryffindor common room.
"You know, it looks like Hogwarts has a lot of secret chambers," Aaron said quietly.
"How d'you mean?"
"Well, there was the mirror we saw - and now this. The mirror was also hidden in the castle, wasn't it?"
"I guess it's 'cause Hogwarts is the safest place there is - probably even more than Gringotts, seeing as it's run by goblins."
"Yeah - how come your parents keep their money in there?" Houda asked all of a sudden, remembering the day they went to Diagon Alley. "Aren't they scared the goblins will take all their money?"
"I guess there's some magic on the bank," Lily said, frowning.
"Forget about the goblins for a moment," Aaron said. "Think about it - if the mirror was hidden in that abandoned corridor - what do you think is hidden in the Chamber of Secrets?"
Lily snorted. "You heard Myrtle - something used to be hidden there, but not anymore. Not since the War."
"Yeah, but she also said there was something there still," Hugo objected. "And she didn't sound too happy about whatever it was that was there."
"But what if - " Lily started, and they never got to hear what she thought, because at that moment, she screamed in surprise. A moment later, Houda screamed as well - not because Lily had screamed, but because she was hit with something very cold and very wet. A snow ball.
They had not realised that they walked back to where they had erected the snowman only half an hour before. By now, Peeves had discovered it, and took great pleasure in dismantling their snowman - and was doing a much better job of it than Filch, too. If only he hadn't decided to ambush the next students who came along, and if only those students hadn't been Houda and her friends... she ducked just as another snow ball was thrown towards her, and it hit Aaron instead.
"What - aargh!" he shouted.
"Go away, Peeves!" Lily said now, having recovered from her snow ball.
Peeves, however, wasn't to be deterred from his new source of entertainment. Every time Houda or one of the others tried to pass through the corridor, their path was blocked by a new onslaught of snow balls.
The problem was that, even two months after they had started going to Hogwarts, they still didn't know any way around that particular corridor to Gryffindor tower. There must be one, Houda knew - she was pretty sure there was more than one way to get from any one point to any other point in the castle. But they just didn't know what it was - so they had no choice but to stay there and try and get beyond Peeves somehow.
Or, as it turned out, stay there and wait for someone else to come and rescue them. "Peeves!" they heard an angry voice behind them, and turned around.
It was Madam Potter - Lily's mum. Her robes were wet, and covered with traces of snowflakes that hadn't melted yet, her red hair was messy from the wind and snow, and she was carrying a couple of broken broomsticks.
Her wand was drawn; it seemed as if she was in half a mind to curse Peeves, if he continued. Peeves must have realised that, too - he quickly disappeared from the scene. With a small smile, Madam Potter Vanished the snow from the corridor and from everyone's clothes.
"Thanks, Madam Potter!" Aaron said appreciatively as their clothes turned hot and dry.
"It's a shame we don't know the castle better," Houda said. "We couldn't think of a different way to get to the common room."
"Yeah..." Lily said, and all of a sudden Houda got the feeling she wasn't really thinking about their encounter with Peeves anymore. "I mean, Hogwarts is full of passageways and secrets rooms, isn't it? And we don't know any of them!"
Madam Potter laughed. "You'll probably find them in time," she said.
"Did you find any of them when you were studying here?" Hugo joined in with the questions. Houda did her best to hide her smile - and elbowed Aaron, who all of a sudden realised where the questions were leading and was doing quite a bad job of hiding his excitement.
"Yeah," Madam Potter said. "For example, just here, this piece of wall is actually a door. It leads you to the fifth-floor corridor - and much closer to Gryffindor tower."
"Oh - that could have helped us against Peeves!" Lily said, still sounding excited. "There could probably be secret passageways like that all over the castle!"
"There are," her mother said.
"And secret rooms, too?"
"Well, I don't know about that," Madam Potter said. "I think the only secret room I know is four floors up, and I'm not even sure if it's still there anymore!"
"What - a secret room that can move?" it didn't sound like the Chamber of Secrets, not if it was on the seventh floor and moving about, but the idea of a room that could disappear was exciting for various other reasons.
"Well - not quite - although it did tend to open at odd places when we needed it to," Madam Potter said with a smile. "I think it was destroyed during the War, though. It was called the Room of Requirement. It would only appear when you really needed it, see - you had to think really hard about what you needed, and then it would show up. But then, during the War..." she stopped for a moment. "Well, I think it was damaged pretty badly."
"I wish there was a map of all of Hogwarts, so we'd know all these things," Hugo said.
Madam Potter gave him a calculating look, but then smiled. "You wouldn't have half the fun of discovery, then! Anyway, guys, gotta go. And you - go back to your common room. Don't go looking after any secret rooms tonight!"
She started walking in the opposite direction. Just as the four thought she was going to disappear, she paused, the turned on her tracks. "But if you are determined on going tonight, I have two pieces of advice for you," she said with a wide smile. "One, you'd do well to start looking around the old tapestry on the seventh floor, the one showing Barnabas the Barmy and the trolls."
They all looked at her in excitement. She was actually helping them have some fun! That was... unexpected, Houda had to admit.
"What's the other one, Mum?" Lily asked.
"That it's already half seven, and you really should go to your common room soon. I'd hate for the four of you to end up in detention. Again." She smiled and left.
The four looked at her disappear - then looked at each other. None of them paid too much mind to her warning about the hour - they could deal with another evening of doing boring, repetitive work, like polishing the trophy room or writing lines. No, they were all excited at her first advice. As Houda looked at the faces of her friends, she knew they were all thinking exactly what she was thinking. They should go up to the seventh floor and look for the Room of Requirement.
"Well," Lily was the first to speak the words out loud, "if we can't find the Chamber of Secrets..."
On the seventh floor, there was a tapestry, of a man and trolls in tutu. Houda and Aaron stared at it for a moment and giggled, but then Lily said they needed to find the Room of Requirement and will they stop mucking about, so they stopped laughing and let her try.
She stared at the tapestry for a long time. Nothing happened. She stared at it some more. Nothing. Houda wondered for a moment whether they were all getting in the way - what if they were all thinking different things and confusing the room?
"Maybe we should step back?" she whispered to Aaron and Hugo. They nodded, and went back. Lily kept on staring at the tapestry.
Houda, meanwhile, was staring at the opposite wall. It was blank, boring and ordinary. It allowed her to think. If she was the one trying to get the Room of Requirement to open, what would she ask? That was what Madam Potter had said, wasn't it? They needed to ask it to be something. What if, she thought to herself as she started pacing up and down the corridor, they could get the room to become something else entirely? Like - like the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets, the thought came to her suddenly. After all, there was always more than one way to get anywhere in the castle. They just didn't know all the shortcuts. And if the room could give them what they needed - well, what they wanted was the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets. They needed the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets.
"Houda," Aaron whispered and caught her sleeve. She looked up. On the ordinary, boring wall opposite the tapestry, a door appeared. The three of them looked at each other in amazement.
"Do you mind?" an annoyed voice was heard behind them - Lily was still concentrating hard on the tapestry.
Hugo stifled a giggle.
"Erm, Lily?" Houda said, trying hard not to laugh.
"What? I'm trying to concentrate here. It's hard, you know, with you three talking and laughing all the time!"
"I think you can stop concentrating now."
"I'm not giving up!"
"No, it's just - please turn around?"
Lily turned around. Her mouth opened in shock at the sight of the door that hadn't been there before. "How did...?"
"By accident," Houda said. "I think. I don't even know if it was me. I just thought - we could use another entry to the Chamber of Secrets."
They stopped laughing now and looked at her. Hugo looked almost frightened. "You think that's what's in there?" he asked. "The Chamber of Secrets?"
"I think we should find out!" Lily jumped and made to the door, but then paused right before opening it.
"I think you should be the one to open it," she told Houda. "You did it, after all."
"Nah, we don't know if it was me, and - "
"Go on," Lily said. "Open it."
Houda smiled a nervous smile, and advanced to the door. She hesitated for a moment, her hand almost on the door knob. And if it were the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets - there was something there that made a ghost scared. Maybe they shouldn't go there. Even if Madam Potter helped them find the Room of Requirement - she didn't know they wanted to use it to enter the Chamber of Secrets. What if it were dangerous? What if...
No; no more 'what if's', she decided, and opened the door.
Behind it was a small chamber. Its walls were black - covered by soot, by the look of it, and there was a strong smell of smoke in the room, even though the air was clear.
"It stinks in here," Hugo whispered behind her. Houda nodded, and took a tentative step inside. There was nothing in the room, just the black walls, the odd smell - and another door at the other end.
"Well?" Aaron asked. "Is this the Chamber of Secrets?"
"I don't think so," she said.
"I think it's beyond that door," Lily said quietly and her hand pointed at the other door. Her voice shook slightly. They looked at each other, Houda and Lily, and Houda knew Lily was thinking of the same thing she was - what was it, inside the Chamber of Secrets, that could scare a ghost?
Lily swallowed. "I think we should open the door," she said.
"Yeah..."
They advanced towards the door, but reluctantly. Houda had to convince her legs to move - for some reason, looking at the door on the other end, Myrtle's words became more and more real. She wasn't so sure anymore she wanted to go inside the Chamber of Secrets.
They stopped in front of the other door, and looked at each other again.
"We could go back," Aaron said quietly. "We don't have to do this."
"No," Houda agreed. "We don't."
"We found the Room of Requirement. That's cool enough. And it really is getting late," Hugo added. "I'd rather not get into detention if we can avoid it."
Lily said nothing. She reached a shaking hand, and opened the second door.
Behind the door, there was complete darkness.
"Lumos," Lily whispered, and the tip of her wand came to life, lighting the darkness in front of them. It was a tunnel - a tunnel that looked almost like a slide. The surface was smooth, and the slope was very steep. They would definitely not be able to climb up it.
"We really don't have to go, Lily," Houda said quietly, and put a hand on her shoulder.
But there was a curious expression on Lily's face. Not just her usual determination. She looked almost scary. "I want to go," she said, and jumped into the tunnel.
Another moment, and Houda followed her.
It really did work as a slide. Houda felt like she was going down forever. After a while, the surface beneath her stopped feeling like stone, and started feeling like something else entirely - a pipe. Behind her, someone was screaming - or was it in front of her? She didn't have enough time to think, as all of a sudden the slope was getting steeper and steeper and she was going faster and faster and she thought she heard a muffled bang somewhere in front of her and someone screamed again behind her and - BANG.
She got up and out of the way just in time - Aaron crashed on the floor right where she was, and then Hugo fell on top of him.
Everything was dark. She couldn't see anyone. Lily's wand must have gone dark, she thought, and then remembered her own. She pulled out the wand and lit it up to look around.
They were in a magnificent chamber. There were large columns, decorated with serpents. In front of her, there was a huge statue of a face, that looked monkey-like and had a long beard. And right in front of her -
It was a snake. No, she thought as she walked closer - it was a dead snake. But it couldn't have been a snake - it was the biggest monster she had ever seen. It must have been twenty feet wide, with a row of ugly teeth - some of which, Houda noticed as she got closer, were missing. She reached with a shaky hand to touch the snake lightly - and all of a sudden, the skin of the snake disintegrated and disappeared in a cloud of dust. Once she stopped coughing and the air cleared, she could see what was left of the snake. It was only a skeleton now, fully preserved where it fell, years and years ago.
She tore her eyes from the monster, to see her friend's red hair behind it. "Lily?" she asked tentatively.
But Lily wasn't looking at the skeleton. She was looking beyond, towards the statue. As Houda stepped closer, she could see Lily had picked up something from the floor of the Chamber, something which had been forgotten next to the skeleton - a small, golden goblet, into which, she could see, someone had driven one of the monster's teeth.
"Lily?" she asked again.
Lily was looking ahead, her eyes fixed on something - and now Houda noticed it too. It was - a ghost.
No exactly a ghost, Houda thought. It didn't look anything like Nearly Headless Nick or Myrtle or any of the other ghosts in the castle. Ghosts were transparent, and lacked substance - but even they looked more real than this image - then this boy.
Because it was a boy - somewhat older than they were, perhaps James Potter's age. He, too, must have been a Hogwarts student once, for he was wearing Hogwarts robes. He was sitting at the edge of the monkey-like statue, his head in his hands. He looked completely alone
Houda felt sorry for him - all the other ghosts, even Myrtle, walked around the castle. Why would this boy stay here, in this damp and scary place? She made to go towards him, but Lily's hand shot and grabbed her. "Don't go near him," she whispered.
Her whisper seemed to alert the boy to their presence. He raised his head from his hands, and looked directly at them. It took one look at his face for Houda to step back. It was terrible. Despite his general lack of colour, his eyes were a distinct shade of red. And while his features were handsome, he gave off a feeling that Houda could only describe as ugly. He scared her. It scared her - she felt that, even though it looked like the ghost of a boy, it wasn't really human. All of a sudden, she had no doubt that this was the thing in the Chamber of Secrets, the thing Myrtle was afraid of.
It - the boy - smiled. His smile made his face look even uglier.
"Well, well," he whispered. "Some kids found their way to my home."
Lily and Houda both took a step back. Another hand held hers - Aaron, coming up with Hugo from behind. The boys looked at the ghost as well, and Houda could feel Aaron jumping a little.
"Who are you?" Lily asked, staring at him.
"But how did you find the way to my Chamber, little children? No one ever finds their way here."
"We did," Lily said.
"That you did. That you did..." he studied her for a moment. Houda thought that, just for a moment, he flickered, looked somewhat older, but it must have been her imagination, because when she blinked, he looked the same age, but still smiling creepily, still studying Lily.
"You must be very brave, little Gryffindors," he whispered. "Coming here where the monsters hide."
"We're not afraid of you," Lily said, but her voice betrayed that she was, for a change, afraid. She saw something in that boy, Houda thought, something Houda didn't quite understand.
"Who are you?" Houda asked this time, trying to understand, but both the ghost of the boy and Lily ignored her. The ghost was looking hungrily at Lily, while Lily herself was clutching even harder the small golden cup.
"You look like sweet little Ginny Weasley, don't you?" the boy whispered.
Perhaps it was the mention of her mother's name that gave Lily her confidence back. "I'm Lily Potter," she declared. "Ginny Weasley's my mum."
The boy looked at her, his expression betraying - surprise? Amusement? "Lily Potter," he repeated, then laughed. "I should have known. Your father has always been a sentimental fool," he said. "And your mother really should have taught you better than to come in here to my Chamber."
The taunts about her parents angered Lily. She stretched herself, looking much taller than she normally did, and stared at the ghost. "You can't hurt me," she said simply. "You're dead. You're a ghost."
"But I'm not a ghost, Lily Potter," he said pleasantly. "Can't you see?"
Next to her, Houda could feel Lily trembling slightly. "No," Houda said, trying to help Lily. "You're less than a ghost, aren't you? We've never seen you with the other ghosts. You don't even look as real as a ghost!"
He shrugged. He didn't mind the challenge. "An echo, then, perhaps," he agreed, still pleasantly - still feeling anything but pleasant. "But you'd be surprised the influence that an echo could have," he laughed.
"You're dead," Lily insisted again.
"Go on, stupid girl," he said, focusing back on Lily. "Go away. Go away before you find me haunting your dreams. I think haunting the dreams of one Potter is quite enough for me."
The boy laughed. Lily turned back and fled, dropping the golden goblet with a loud clunk on the floor. Houda wasn't sorry to follow her friend and leave that echo of a ghost behind her.
Behind them, the golden goblet lay forgotten on the floor. The echo of a ghost, shaped like a boy, sat back at the statue, holding his head in his hands, in silence.
-X-
James paused as he walked into the common room. His original intention was to proceed with Lysander straight to the Great Hall, where Hogwarts' magnificent Hallowe'en feast was about to start. But in the common room, in a corner by the fire, he could see Lily sitting alone, her face buried inside a book.
She was acting like that for the past few days, he had noticed; often he saw her friends - Hugo, Houda, and that Muggle-born kid, Aaron - outside, playing or doing something silly, but Lily didn't join them. For the past week or so, every time James saw her, she looked subdued and miserable, sitting on her own.
It was time, he thought, that he should check what it was all about. He knew his sister - she wasn't prone to bad moods or depressions. Something was wrong, he was sure of it.
"You go down," he told Lysander. "I'll catch up with you."
"You're sure? The feast's about to start."
"Yeah, don't worry, I'll be right there," James insisted, and Lysander walked out of the common room. James, meanwhile, sat down next to Lily on the thick carpet.
She raised her head for a moment, looked at him, then returned to her book.
"Hey, Lily," he said.
She shrugged and continued reading. He waited a second or two, then grabbed the book from her and closed it. From the tip of his eye, he could see the name: Tom Marvolo Riddle: the Rise and Fall of Lord Voldemort. What was she reading about Voldemort for?
"Give me back my book, James," she said in an irritated voice.
"After you talk to me," he said. "And if you don't talk to me, you're not getting the book back."
"It's a library book. I have to return it."
He raised an eyebrow. He meant it, and he knew that she knew that. She tried to stare him down - and she might have succeeded, had it not been for the fact he really was worried about her.
After a minute or so of staring in silence, when she realised he wasn't going to back down, she sighed. "What is it?" she asked.
"The feast's about to start. Why are you here instead of down there?"
"I'm not hungry."
"You've barely come down to meals this entire week," he said. "And you're not hanging around with Hugo and Houda anymore. Did you have a fight?"
"No!" she said.
He raised an eyebrow.
"Really, James. We haven't had a fight. I'm just... not in the mood, alright?"
"You're starting to act like Al."
"I'm becoming a teenager too, is it?" she repeated the words Mum and Dad said often during the summer with such earnest anger, that he had to laugh.
"Yeah, you are. See, the thing is, it turned out Al was acting like that 'cause he was hiding something." He paused for a moment. "You're not secretly dating Scorpius Malfoy, are you?" he asked in the most serious concerned voice he could muster.
"What - Ew! No!" She said in a surprised and disgusted voice and started hitting him with her hands.
He laughed and laughed until she stopped and glared at him.
"Sorry, had to ask," he said, the smile still on his face.
After a moment, he got the result he wanted - Lily stopped looking angry and smiled herself, even if her smile was small and slightly sad and not at all her regular smile. "Alright," she said, "you asked and I answered, so don't ask such stupid questions again."
"What is it, Lily?"
She looked at the book again without talking. Her expression looked almost frightened. He looked at the book for a moment, then at her.
"He's down there," she whispered suddenly, in a miserable, terrified voice. "Lurking."
"What - Voldemort? Voldemort's dead, Lily. Dad killed him, ages ago."
She nodded. "I know. He's like... like a ghost. He said he'll haunt my dreams. I keep on dreaming about him, he had scarlet eyes and such a terrible smile, James."
She looked at the book for a moment. "He's scary," she said then. "Much more scary than goblins."
"He's dead, Lily. He can't hurt you. And Dad wouldn't have let him even if he could."
She nodded, but still didn't look satisfied.
He sighed. What on earth did she get into her head, he thought, and looked around for anything that could get her mind off that ridiculous idea. Perhaps, he thought, the book?
"Look," he said, fetching back the book and opening it on a random page, "if you want to - hey," he paused.
There was a picture on that page. It was taken, so the caption said, from the Quidditch World Cup, 1994, the first sighting of Voldemort's sign and servants for thirteen years. It was an old picture, in faded colours, taken from the Daily Prophet, and depicted the campsite next to the world cup, and above it, a big smokey skull with snakes.
James had seen the sign before - recently. He knew it. What was it, what was it... and then he remembered. It was the sign on the arm of the wizard at the Hog's Head, when they went there a couple of months ago. Why would anyone have Voldemort's sign tattooed on their arm?
All thought of Lily left his mind. He knew who could help him now, and it wasn't his little sister - no, it was his little brother.
"Look, Lily, really, stop worrying about it, and come down to the feast," he said hurriedly. He needed to go down there. He needed to find Al. "Alright?"
"Alright," she said finally, and got up.
He followed her down, but when they walked into the Great Hall, he didn't sit down next to Lysander. Instead, he progressed until he located Al, who was seated next to Rose.
"Al," he put a hand on his brother's shoulder, "I need to talk to you."
"James, the feast's about to start."
"Yeah, I know, but I need a favour."
"Now he needs a favour," Al rolled his eyes and got up. "What is it?"
"I need to ask Scorpius Malfoy something, and I thought it might be - erm, you know, not completely awkward and inappropriate if you came with me. It's a bit of a personal question."
"Look, if you want to harass Scorpius about - "
"It's not about that," James cut across him. "Honest." He didn't have time to hear lectures. This was important. For once, it was really important.
Al looked at him through slightly narrowed eyes, trying to find deceit, no doubt, then sighed. "Alright, alright." He scanned the Slytherin table.
"I don't see him here, though. They must still be on their way."
"Can you come with me?"
Al nodded. "This had better be good, James, or I'll hex you something awful."
"It is. You have my permission to hex me with your best Bat-Bogey curse if you disagree."
Al snorted. "Fine, let's go."
They left the Great Hall, Al at the lead, James following closely behind. He had no friends in Slytherin, and no reason to ever go to their common room. He had no idea where they were going. He half expected Al to go up one of the staircases, but instead, Al turned towards the dungeons. They walked the damp corridors for a few minutes, until they had reached a wall - or at least, what looked like a wall.
"It's here," Al said. "The Slytherin common room. But I don't know the password."
"I guess we're going to wait here until - " but James didn't have the chance to finish that sentence, because at that moment a door appeared where before there was just a blank wall, and Scorpius Malfoy walked out of his dormitories, accompanied by a couple of other Slytherin boys.
"Al - what are you doing here?" he sneered at James.
"Look, Malfoy, I need to ask you a question. It's kind of urgent. And, erm," he looked for a moment at the other two boys. It was a sensitive question. He didn't really want to ask it in front of anyone else.
Scorpius seemed to understand this, without James saying a word. He told his friends he will catch them later, then glared at James. "What d'you want, Potter?"
"There's this sign. I think... Voldemort's sign. A skull and a snake."
Scorpius turned pale immediately. It was amazing how, pale as the boy was, he could still turn even paler. James now knew he was on the right track.
"What's this?" he asked Al.
"I swear, Scorpius, I didn't know what he wanted, he just said it's important," Al said immediately, and unlike Scorpius, he was flushed red.
"Look, I'm not trying to bait you or anything. Really, it's important. What's that symbol?"
Scorpius shrugged. "Like you said. The Dark Lord's symbol."
"Would anyone have it tattooed on their arm?" he asked.
Scorpius froze, then nodded briefly.
"You saw it tattooed on someone's arm, or are you guessing?"
The look Scorpius gave him was full of venom. "I saw it," he said, spitting the words. "My father has it."
"Why? What does it... I mean... does it mean anything?"
"Death Eaters, alright? It was tattooed on Death Eaters. The Dark Lord's inner circle. A way for the Dark Lord to communicate with the Death Eaters. Father wasn't just on the wrong side, he was actually one of them! Happy?"
On any other day, the news that Professor Malfoy wasn't just a creepy bloke with a questionable past but a full-blown Death Eater would have completely rattled James - or at least, would have given him fodder for years. Now, it didn't matter anymore. Voldemort was gone for a long time, but all of his Death Eaters were supposed to have been killed or put away - if there was one of them, out and about and contacting the wizards' worst enemies...
He had to tell Dad.
He turned on the spot and started running up the stairs, back to the Great Hall. "What's the matter?" one of the boys shouted after him, but he paid them no mind.
Only when he entered the Great Hall did he pause. He had to tell Dad - but he couldn't tell Dad, not without telling Dad how he came by that information. He could get into trouble - and worse, get Colleen, Lysander and Lorcan into trouble as well. And even worse than that, it would probably ruin any chance they had of ever using the secret tunnel to get into Hogsmeade ever again, even if they did manage that Disillusionment charm.
He couldn't tell Dad.
But he had to.
In his hesitation, he scanned the teachers' table. Dad wasn't even there. He saw Mum, sitting next to Hermione on one side and Professor Scamander on the other, the three of them talking in low whispers. Maybe Mum was the answer. She was so much more sensible on these issues than Dad.
He approached the table quietly. "Mum?" he asked.
Mum stopped talking, and all three teachers looked at him, curious.
"What is it, James?" she asked.
"I need to talk to you."
"Do you want to wait until - "
"Now, please?"
She nodded immediately. His heart warmed at the thought - of course, Mum realised he wouldn't have disturbed her if it wasn't important. How didn't he think of Mum before?
She got up and left the table. She took him and led him without another word to the end of the Great Hall, next to the small door which the teachers used to go in and out.
"What is it, James?" she asked in a serious voice.
"What if - what if you found out something important, right, something that you really needed to tell someone, but you knew that the way you found out wasn't really..." he struggled with a way to express the question without incriminating himself or his friends - "well, it could get you in trouble. And other people, too."
She studied him for a moment. "I think, James, that you're old enough to recognise when something's important and when it's worth taking risks for."
Yeah, that was Mum, too. Taking him seriously - but never offering an easy way out. At least she didn't start questioning him immediately, like Dad would have, but let him decide on his own. Maybe that was what he wanted, he thought darkly. Someone to tell him that getting another detention over skiving out of Hogwarts was worth it.
"A couple of months ago, we discovered this... I don't know how to call it. Passage. Near the statue of the one-eyed witch."
"To Hogsmeade?" she asked him sharply.
"Yeah. To Hogsmeade. We didn't know it led to Hogsmeade! We just saw it was a secret passage and thought it'd be nice to see where it went."
"Okay, so you left the school even though you knew it was dangerous and that students of the school had been attacked in the past at Hogsmeade."
"We didn't know, I told you! But once we got there, we had to have a look around, you know?"
She rolled her eyes. "No, James, I don't know. But this can wait for later. What happened in Hogsmeade?"
"We went to the - to the Hog's Head. We didn't want to go to the Three Broomsticks 'cause Madam Rosmerta might have said something, so we went to the Hog's Head."
"And Mundungus Fletcher didn't say anything?" she asked, and her nostrils flared - a sure sign she was angry. At least, James thought to himself - although he would never have dared to speak these words out loud - she was angry this time with Mundungus Fletcher more than she was with him.
"No, he didn't. Anyway, we sat there, right? And on the other side, there was a goblin. And he was talking in Gobbledegook with this wizard and then all of the wizard's papers spread around and I helped him gather them and when I gave them to him I noticed there was a tattoo on his arm and it was Voldemort's sign." He said all this with one breath, worried about any more disturbances. "It was a Death Eater, Mum. Talking to the goblin."
"We're going to see Dad," she said immediately. She didn't mention his breaking of the rules again, or said anything about the Hog's Head or Mundungus Fletcher or the one-eyed witch statue. They just marched towards the small room that was given to Harry and Ginny Potter at Hogwarts.
Something was up. James knew it the second they walked inside. Dad's travelling cloak was outside, spread on the chair. He was just tying his shoes, looking disturbed.
Mum opened the door, and let James in, then leaned on the wall, her arms crossed. When James looked at her questioningly, she just gestured with her head, as if saying, go ahead.
"Dad?" he asked tentatively.
Dad didn't raise his head.
"Dad, I need to talk to you about something."
"It'll have to wait, James," he said, his voice full of stress. "I have to go."
"Harry." Mum's voice was sharp and worried. "You'll listen to him now." Dad raised his head for a moment in confusion, then looked at James.
"What is it, James?"
James repeated his story, of how they found the one-eyed witch statue and discovered the passageway to Hogsmeade and went to the Hog's Head. "I just realised today what that symbol was," he said, "there was this book and then I went to ask Scorpius Malfoy and he said it was something only Death Eaters had."
Dad swore loudly. Even now, worried that he will get punished - and even more worried about Dad being so stressed and worried - James couldn't help but be impressed. He didn't think Dad knew language like that.
"Harry," Mum said again.
"There was a mass breakout from Azkaban," Dad said, looking grim. "The Death Eaters are gone. They must have planned it with the goblins." He swore again, then looked at James.
"James, thanks for letting me know. I'll see you soon, I promise. Ginny - " he looked at Mum. "I have to go."
She didn't look surprised. "Don't be too long," she said quietly.
Dad put on the cloak and left without another word.