A/N: I opened my WhatsApp after a while without an internet connection – and saw 666 new messages. O_O
Also, I took the new (improved) Pottermore Sorting Hat quiz (I found it somewhere online and the questions seemed familiar) and I got 78% Gryffindor, 73% Ravenclaw, 56% Slytherin, and 53% Hufflepuff. Not sure how I got a choice between the last two when I took the quiz originally…
Thanks to war sage, who is my beta for this story.
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters.
October arrived, spreading a damp chill over the grounds and into the castle. Madam Pomfrey, the nurse, was kept busy by a sudden spate of colds among the staff and students. I had gone to her with a particularly bad case and found that her Pepperup Potion worked instantly, though it was hotter than curry and left me smoking at the ears for several hours afterward.
"You look like there's a fire in your ears," Dean said to me when I came back into the common room.
"Shut up!" I said, throwing a nearby roll of parchment at him.
Raindrops the size of bullets thundered on the castle windows for days on end; the lake rose, the flower beds turned into muddy streams, and Hagrid's pumpkins swelled to the size of garden sheds. Oliver Wood's enthusiasm for regular training sessions, however, was not dampened, which was why Harry and I were to be found, late one stormy Saturday afternoon a few days before Halloween, returning to Gryffindor Tower, drenched to the skin and splattered with mud. Even aside from the rain and wind it hadn't been a happy practice session. Fred and George, who had been spying on the Slytherin team, had seen for themselves the speed of those new Nimbus Two Thousand and Ones. They reported that the Slytherin team was no more than seven greenish blurs, shooting through the air like missiles.
"Well, they may be fast," I said to Harry on the way back, "but they also need to be good. It's no good having a good broom if you're no good riding it – what's wrong, Nick?"
Nearly Headless Nick, the ghost of Gryffindor Tower, was staring morosely out of a window, muttering under his breath, "… don't fulfill their requirements… half an inch, if that…"
He turned around. He wore a dashing, plumed hat on his long curly hair, and a tunic with a ruff, which concealed the fact that his neck was almost completely severed. He was pale as smoke, and Harry could see right through him to the dark sky and torrential rain outside. "Why, hello, Mr. Potter, Mr. Alderton," said Nick, folding a transparent letter as he spoke and tucking it inside his doublet.
"What's wrong?" I asked again.
"Ah," Nearly Headless Nick waved an elegant hand, "a matter of no importance… It's not as though I really wanted to join… Thought I'd apply, but apparently I 'don't fulfill requirements' —" In spite of his airy tone, there was a look of great bitterness on his face.
"But you would think, wouldn't you," he erupted suddenly, pulling the letter back out of his pocket, "that getting hit forty-five times in the neck with a blunt axe would qualify you to join the Headless Hunt?"
I thought it tactful not to say that you needed to be headless and not just nearly headless. Instead, I said, "Of course."
"I mean, nobody wishes more than I do that it had all been quick and clean, and my head had come off properly, I mean, it would have saved me a great deal of pain and ridicule. However —" Nearly Headless Nick shook his letter open and read furiously: "'We can only accept huntsmen whose heads have parted company with their bodies. You will appreciate that it would be impossible otherwise for members to participate in hunt activities such as Horseback Head-Juggling and Head Polo. It is with the greatest regret, therefore, that I must inform you that you do not fulfill our requirements. With very best wishes, Sir Patrick Delaney-Podmore.'"
Fuming, Nearly Headless Nick stuffed the letter away. "Half an inch of skin and sinew holding my neck on! Most people would think that's good and beheaded, but oh, no, it's not enough for Sir Properly Decapitated-Podmore."
Nearly Headless Nick took several deep breaths and then said, in a far calmer tone, "So — how are you?"
"Not much," I said. "Slytherin have really fast brooms, but we've got much better –"
The rest of my sentence was drowned out by a high-pitched mewling from somewhere near my ankles. I looked down and found himself gazing into a pair of lamp-like yellow eyes. It was Mrs. Norris, the skeletal gray cat who was used by the caretaker, Argus Filch, as a sort of deputy in his endless battle against students.
"Bloody hell," I said.
"You'd better get out of here," said Nick quickly. "Filch isn't in a good mood — he's got the flu and some third years accidentally plastered frog brains all over the ceiling in dungeon five. He's been cleaning all morning, and if he sees you dripping mud all over the place —"
"Right," Harry and I said together, backing away from the accusing stare of Mrs. Norris, but not quickly enough. Drawn to the spot by the mysterious power that seemed to connect him with his foul cat, Argus Filch burst suddenly through a tapestry to Harry's right, wheezing and looking wildly about for the rule-breaker. There was a thick tartan scarf bound around his head, and his nose was unusually purple.
"Filth!" he shouted, his jowls aquiver, his eyes popping alarmingly as he pointed at the muddy puddle that had dripped from our Quidditch robes. "Mess and muck everywhere! I've had enough of it, I tell you! Follow me, Potter, Alderton!"
"Bye, Nick," I said gloomily.
"Bye," said Harry.
We followed Filch back downstairs, doubling the number of muddy footprints on the floor. Neither of us had never been inside Filch's office before; it was a place most students avoided. The room was dingy and windowless, lit by a single oil lamp dangling from the low ceiling. A faint smell of fried fish lingered about the place. Wooden filing cabinets stood around the walls; from their labels, I could see that they contained details of every pupil Filch had ever punished. Fred and George Weasley had an entire drawer to themselves. A highly polished collection of chains and manacles hung on the wall behind Filch's desk. It was common knowledge that he was always begging Dumbledore to let him suspend students by their ankles from the ceiling.
Filch grabbed a quill from a pot on his desk and began shuffling around looking for parchment.
"Dung," he muttered furiously, "great sizzling dragon bogies… frog brains… rat intestines… I've had enough of it… make an example… where's the form… yes…"
He retrieved a large roll of parchment from his desk drawer and stretched it out in front of him, dipping his long black quill into the ink pot. "We shall start with you then, Potter… Name… Harry Potter. Crime…"
"It was only a bit of mud!" said Harry.
"It's only a bit of mud to you, boy, but to me it's an extra hour scrubbing!" shouted Filch, a drip shivering unpleasantly at the end of his bulbous nose. "Crime… befouling the castle… suggested sentence…"
Dabbing at his streaming nose, Filch squinted unpleasantly at Harry. But as Filch lowered his quill, there was a great BANG! on the ceiling of the office, which made the oil lamp rattle.
"PEEVES!" Filch roared, flinging down his quill in a transport of rage. "I'll have you this time, I'll have you!"
And without a backward glance at us, Filch ran flat-footed from the office, Mrs. Norris streaking alongside him. Peeves was the school poltergeist, a grinning, airborne menace who lived to cause havoc and distress. I didn't much like Peeves, but couldn't help feeling grateful for his timing. Hopefully, whatever Peeves had done (and it sounded as though he'd wrecked something very big this time) would distract Filch from us.
"We should wait for Filch," said Harry.
"Are you mad?" I said incredulously. "Let's go!"
"He'll tell McGonagall," he said. "Or Snape."
"Right," I said, sinking into a moth-eaten chair next to the desk. I didn't particularly fancy getting in trouble with either of those teachers.
There was only one thing on the desk apart from his half-completed form: a large, glossy, purple envelope with silver lettering on the front.
"What's that envelope?" asked Harry, glancing at the door.
"Let's look at it," I said, picking up the envelope and holding it together with Harry. It read:
KWIKSPELL
A Correspondence Course in Beginners' Magic
"I'm opening it," I said.
"Right," said Harry.
I flicked the envelope open and pulled out the sheaf of parchment inside. More curly silver writing on the front page said:
Feel out of step in the world of modern magic? Find yourself making excuses not to perform simple spells? Ever been taunted for your woeful wandwork?
There is an answer!
Kwikspell is an all-new, fail-safe, quick-result, easy-learn course. Hundreds of witches and wizards have benefited from the Kwikspell method!
Madam Z. Nettles of Topsham writes:
"I had no memory for incantations and my potions were a family joke! Now, after a Kwikspell course, I am the center of attention at parties and friends beg for the recipe of my Scintillation Solution!"
Warlock D. J. Prod of Didsbury says:
"My wife used to sneer at my feeble charms, but one month into your fabulous Kwikspell course and I succeeded in turning her into a yak! Thank you, Kwikspell!"
"Why would Filch want a Kwikspell course?" said Harry.
"Come to think of it, I've never seen him do magic," I said. "Let's see…" I thumbed through the contents. "Lesson One: Holding Your Wand (Some Useful Tips) –"
"He's coming!" said Harry. I stuffed the parchment back into the envelope and threw it back onto the desk just as the door opened. Filch was looking triumphant.
"That vanishing cabinet was extremely valuable!" he was saying gleefully to Mrs. Norris. "We'll have Peeves out this time, my sweet —"
His eyes fell on us and then darted to the Kwikspell envelope, which, I realized too late, was lying two feet away from where it had started.
Filch's pasty face went brick red. I braced myself for a tidal wave of fury. Filch hobbled across to his desk, snatched up the envelope, and threw it into a drawer.
"Have you — did you read —?" he sputtered.
"No," we said together.
Filch's knobbly hands were twisting together. "If I thought you'd read my private — not that it's mine —"
Harry and I were both staring at him; Filch had never looked madder. His eyes were popping, a tic was going in one of his pouchy cheeks, and the tartan scarf didn't help.
"Very well — go — and don't breathe a word — not that — however, if you didn't read — go now, I have to write up Peeves' report — go —"
We sped out of the office, up the corridor, and back upstairs.
"That was so lucky," I said.
"I know," said Harry. "We must have set a record."
"Harry! Jonathan! Did it work?"
Nearly Headless Nick came gliding out of a classroom. Behind him, I could see the wreckage of a large black-and-gold cabinet that appeared to have been dropped from a great height.
"I persuaded Peeves to crash it right over Filch's office," said Nick eagerly. "Thought it might distract him —"
"Was that you?" said Harry. "Yeah, it worked, we didn't even get detention. Thanks, Nick!"
We set off up the corridor together. Nearly Headless Nick, I noticed, was still holding Sir Patrick's rejection letter.
"I wish there was something I could do for you about the Headless Hunt," Harry said.
"Yeah, me too," I said. "If there's anything we can do – "
Nearly Headless Nick stopped in his tracks and Harry walked right through him.
"But there issomething you could do for me," said Nick excitedly. "Would I be asking too much — but no, you wouldn't want —"
"What is it?" said Harry.
"Well, this Halloween will be my five hundredth deathday," said Nearly Headless Nick, drawing himself up and looking dignified.
"Oh," I said, not sure whether to look sorry or happy about this. "Right."
"I'm holding a party down in one of the roomier dungeons. Friends will be coming from all over the country. It would be such an honorif you would attend. Mr. Weasley, Mr. Thomas, and Miss Granger would be most welcome, too, of course — but I daresay you'd rather go to the school feast?" He watched us on tenterhooks.
"No," said Harry quickly, "I'll come —"
"Yeah, we'll come," I said.
"My dear boy! Harry Potter, at my deathday party! And" — he hesitated, looking excited — "do you think you could possibly mention to Sir Patrick how veryfrightening and impressive you find me?"
"Sure we can," I said. Nearly Headless Nick beamed at us.
"A deathday party?" said Hermione keenly when we had changed at last and joined her, Ron, and Dean in the common room. "I bet there aren't many living people who can say they've been to one of those — it'll be fascinating!"
"Why would anyone want to celebrate the day they died?" said Ron, who was halfway through his Potions homework and grumpy. "Sounds dead depressing to me…"
"It's the day they became ghosts," said Dean. "Maybe sort of like a second birth."
Rain was still lashing the windows, which were now inky black, but inside all looked bright and cheerful. The firelight glowed over the countless squashy armchairs where people sat reading, talking, doing homework or, in the case of Fred and George Weasley, trying to find out what would happen if you fed a Filibuster firework to a salamander, which was now smoldering gently on a table surrounded by a knot of curious people. I was at the point of telling the others about Filch and the Kwikspell course when the salamander suddenly whizzed into the air, emitting loud sparks and bangs as it whirled wildly round the room. The sight of Percy bellowing himself hoarse at Fred and George, the spectacular display of tangerine stars showering from the salamander's mouth, and its escape into the fire, with accompanying explosions, drove both Filch and the Kwikspell envelope from my mind.
By the time Halloween arrived, Harry was voicing his regret for his promise to go to the deathday party. The rest of the school was happily anticipating their Halloween feast; the Great Hall had been decorated with the usual live bats, Hagrid's vast pumpkins had been carved into lanterns large enough for three men to sit in, and there were rumors that Dumbledore had booked a troupe of dancing skeletons for the entertainment.
"A promise is a promise," Hermione reminded Harry bossily. "You said you'd go to the deathday party."
"'Sides," I said, "there are Halloween feasts every year."
So at seven o'clock, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Dean, and I walked straight past the doorway to the packed Great Hall, which was glittering invitingly with gold plates and candles, and directed our steps instead toward the dungeons.
The passageway leading to Nearly Headless Nick's party had been lined with candles, too, though the effect was far from cheerful: These were long, thin, jet-black tapers, all burning bright blue, casting a dim, ghostly light even over their own living faces. The temperature dropped with every step they took. As I shivered and drew my robes tightly around me, I heard what sounded like a thousand fingernails scraping an enormous blackboard.
"Is that supposed to be music?" Ron whispered.
We turned a corner and saw Nearly Headless Nick standing at a doorway hung with black velvet drapes.
"My dear friends," he said mournfully. "Welcome, welcome… so pleased you could come…" He swept off his plumed hat and bowed us inside.
It was an incredible sight. The dungeon was full of hundreds of pearly-white, translucent people, mostly drifting around a crowded dance floor, waltzing to the dreadful, quavering sound of thirty musical saws, played by an orchestra on a raised, black-draped platform. A chandelier overhead blazed midnight-blue with a thousand more black candles. Our breath rose in a mist before us; it was like stepping into a freezer.
"Shall we have a look around?" Harry suggested.
"Careful not to walk through anyone," said Ron nervously, and we set off around the edge of the dance floor. We passed a group of gloomy nuns, a ragged man wearing chains, and the Fat Friar, a cheerful Hufflepuff ghost, who was talking to a knight with an arrow sticking out of his forehead. I wasn't surprised to see that the Bloody Baron, a gaunt, staring Slytherin ghost covered in silver bloodstains, was being given a wide berth by the other ghosts.
"Oh, no," said Hermione, stopping abruptly. "Turn back, turn back, I don't want to talk to Moaning Myrtle —"
"Who?" said Harry as they backtracked quickly.
"She haunts one of the toilets in the girls' bathroom on the first floor," said Hermione.
"She haunts a toilet?" I said, laughing.
"Yes. It's been out-of-order all year because she keeps having tantrums and flooding the place. I never went in there anyway if I could avoid it; it's awful trying to have a pee with her wailing at you —"
"Look, food!" said Ron.
On the other side of the dungeon was a long table, also covered in black velvet. We approached it eagerly but next moment had stopped in our tracks, horrified. The smell was quite disgusting. Large, rotten fish were laid on handsome silver platters; cakes, burned charcoal-black, were heaped on salvers; there was a great maggoty haggis, a slab of cheese covered in furry green mold and, in pride of place, an enormous gray cake in the shape of a tombstone, with tar-like icing forming the words,
Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington
Died 31st October, 1492
Harry watched, amazed, as a portly ghost approached the table, crouched low, and walked through it, his mouth held wide so that it passed through one of the stinking salmon.
"Can you taste it if you walk through it?" Harry asked him.
"Almost," said the ghost sadly, and he drifted away.
"I expect they've let it rot to give it a stronger flavor," said Hermione knowledgeably, pinching her nose and leaning closer to look at the putrid haggis.
"Can we move? I feel sick," said Ron. We had barely turned around, however, when a little man swooped suddenly from under the table and came to a halt in midair before them.
"Hello, Peeves," I said cautiously. Unlike the ghosts around us, Peeves the Poltergeist was the very reverse of pale and transparent. He was wearing a bright orange party hat, a revolving bow tie, and a broad grin on his wide, wicked face.
"Nibbles?" he said sweetly, offering them a bowl of peanuts covered in fungus.
"No thanks," said Hermione.
"Heard you talking about poor Myrtle," said Peeves, his eyes dancing. "Rude you was about poor Myrtle." He took a deep breath and bellowed, "OY! MYRTLE!"
"Oh, no, Peeves, don't tell her what I said, she'll be really upset," Hermione whispered frantically. "I didn't mean it, I don't mind her — er, hello, Myrtle."
The squat ghost of a girl had glided over. She had the glummest face I had ever seen, half-hidden behind lank hair and thick, pearly spectacles.
"What?" she said sulkily.
"How are you, Myrtle?" said Hermione in a falsely bright voice. "It's nice to see you out of the toilet."
Myrtle sniffed. Peeves opened his mouth but before he could say anything, I said, "The Bloody Baron's here. Should I call him?"
"I'd like to see you try," Peeves cackled. "Miss Granger here was talking about you."
"OI! BLOODY BARON!" I shouted. "PEEVES IS –" The rest of my words were drowned out by Peeves putting a hand on my mouth.
"Just saying — saying — how nice you look tonight," said Hermione, glaring at Peeves. "Let him go."
"Oh, I don't think I will," said Peeves, cackling. His cackle soon turned into gasping when I socked him in the gut, making him withdraw his hand from my mouth.
Myrtle eyed Hermione suspiciously.
"You're making fun of me," she said, silver tears welling rapidly in her small, see-through eyes.
"No — honestly — didn't I just say how nice Myrtle's looking?" said Hermione.
"Oh, yeah," I said, "she did."
"Don't lie to me," Myrtle gasped, tears now flooding down her face. "D'you think I don't know what people call me behind my back? Fat Myrtle! Ugly Myrtle! Miserable, moaning, moping Myrtle!"
"You've forgotten pimply," Peeves hissed in her ear, seemingly recovered from the punch.
Moaning Myrtle burst into anguished sobs and fled from the dungeon. Peeves shot after her, pelting her with moldy peanuts, yelling, "Pimply! Pimply!"
"Oh, dear," said Hermione sadly.
"Brilliant punch," said Dean.
"That's how you deal with Peeves," I said.
Nearly Headless Nick now drifted toward us through the crowd. "Enjoying yourselves?"
"Oh, yes," I said.
"Not a bad turnout," said Nearly Headless Nick proudly. "The Wailing Widow came all the way up from Kent… It's nearly time for my speech, I'd better go and warn the orchestra…"
The orchestra, however, stopped playing at that very moment. They, and everyone else in the dungeon, fell silent, looking around in excitement, as a hunting horn sounded.
"Oh, here we go," said Nearly Headless Nick bitterly.
Through the dungeon wall burst a dozen ghost horses, each ridden by a headless horseman. The assembly clapped wildly; Harry started to clap, too, but stopped when I punched his arm.
The horses galloped into the middle of the dance floor and halted, rearing and plunging. At the front of the pack was a large ghost who held his bearded head under his arm, from which position he was blowing the horn. The ghost leapt down, lifted his head high in the air so he could see over the crowd (everyone laughed), and strode over to Nearly Headless Nick, squashing his head back onto his neck.
"Nick!" he roared. "How are you? Head still hanging in there?" He gave a hearty guffaw and clapped Nearly Headless Nick on the shoulder.
"Welcome, Patrick," said Nick stiffly.
"Live 'uns!" said Sir Patrick, spotting our group and giving a huge, fake jump of astonishment, so that his head fell off again (the crowd howled with laughter).
"Very amusing," said Nearly Headless Nick darkly.
"Don't mind Nick!" shouted Sir Patrick's head from the floor. "Still upset we won't let him join the Hunt! But I mean to say — look at the fellow —"
"I think," said Harry quickly, "Nick's very — frightening and — er —"
I buried my face in my palms. Harry was terrible at this.
"Ha!" yelled Sir Patrick's head. "Bet he asked you to say that!"
"If I could have everyone's attention, it's time for my speech!" said Nearly Headless Nick loudly, striding toward the podium and climbing into an icy blue spotlight.
"My late lamented lords, ladies, and gentlemen, it is my great sorrow…"
But nobody heard much more. Sir Patrick and the rest of the Headless Hunt had just started a game of Head Hockey and the crowd were turning to watch. Nearly Headless Nick tried vainly to recapture his audience, but gave up as Sir Patrick's head went sailing past him to loud cheers.
"Ahem," I coughed loudly.
Everyone turned to look at me.
"Right," I said to the Headless Hunt. "Your games are very amusing and all that, but I don't think you're invited. Are they, Nick?"
"No," he said.
"So there," I said. "You come barging in uninvited and ruin Nick's deathday party. You know this is a sore point for Nick; why do you push it?"
There was silence. And then –
"Ha!" Sir Patrick cackled. "You brought a Hogwarts first-year to kick us out, Nick? How creative."
"Second-year," I said.
The rest of the ghosts started to laugh. The Headless Hunt resumed their games.
"Sorry, Nick," I said apologetically.
"No matter," he said miserably. "Thank you for trying."
"I can't stand much more of this," Ron muttered, his teeth chattering, as the orchestra ground back into action and the ghosts swept back onto the dance floor.
"Yeah, it's been enough," I said.
"Let's go," said Harry.
We backed toward the door, nodding and beaming at anyone who looked at us, and a minute later were hurrying back up the passageway full of black candles.
"Pudding might not be finished yet," said Ron hopefully, leading the way toward the steps to the entrance hall.
Suddenly, Harry stumbled to a halt, clutching at the stone wall, looking around, squinting up and down the dimly lit passageway.
"Harry, what're you doing?" I said.
"It's that voice again — shut up a minute —" he said.
"Listen!" said Harry urgently, and we froze, watching him.
"This way," he shouted, and he began to run, up the stairs, into the entrance hall, and up the marble staircase to the first floor, the rest of us clattering behind him.
"Harry, what're we —" I said.
"SHH!" he said. Then, "It's going to kill someone!"
He ran up the next flight of steps three at a time and hurtled around the whole of the second floor, not stopping until we turned a corner into the last, deserted passage.
"Harry, what the bloody hell was that all about?" I said, panting.
"I couldn't hear anything…" said Ron.
But Hermione gave a sudden gasp, pointing down the corridor. "Look!"
Something was shining on the wall ahead. We approached slowly, squinting through the darkness. Foot-high words had been daubed on the wall between two windows, shimmering in the light cast by the flaming torches.
THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED. ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE.
"What's that thing — hanging underneath?" said Ron, a slight quiver in his voice.
As we edged nearer, Harry almost slipped — there was a large puddle of water on the floor; Hermione and I grabbed him, and we inched toward the message, eyes fixed on a dark shadow beneath it. We all realized what it was at once, and leapt backward with a splash.
Mrs. Norris, the caretaker's cat, was hanging by her tail from the torch bracket. She was stiff as a board, her eyes wide and staring.
For a few seconds, we didn't move. Then Ron said, "Let's get out of here."
"Shouldn't we try and help —" Harry began awkwardly.
"Trust me," said Ron. "We don't want to be found here."
But it was too late. A rumble, as though of distant thunder, told me that the feast had just ended. From either end of the corridor where we stood came the sound of hundreds of feet climbing the stairs, and the loud, happy talk of well-fed people; next moment, students were crashing into the passage from both ends. The chatter, the bustle, the noise died suddenly as the people in front spotted the hanging cat. We stood alone, in the middle of the corridor, as silence fell among the mass of students pressing forward to see the grisly sight.
Then someone shouted through the quiet.
"Enemies of the Heir, beware! You'll be next, Mudbloods!"
It was Draco Malfoy. He had pushed to the front of the crowd, his cold eyes alive, his usually bloodless face flushed, as he grinned at the sight of the hanging, immobile cat.
A/N: This has been another chapter of Jonathan Alderton and the Chamber of Secrets, brought to you by yoneld. Updates will be more often now that school's out.
Review or your best friend will start running after voices only he/she can hear.
