Chapter Twelve: "Event horizon"
Clara Ironstone looked far too young to be team leader for the twenty-five Aurors crowded around what Harry kept thinking of as Dumbledore's desk. Minerva McGonagall sat behind the enormous oak slab, with Harry, Ron, and Poppy Pomfrey standing beside her and Hagrid near the doors, as if guarding them. Not for the first time, the headmaster's tower had taken on the aura of a war-room. The magical golden toys off to one side were still and quiet; even the portraits were empty, as if their deceased occupants had been told in no uncertain terms to be somewhere else.
Harry could only imagine Dumbledore's dry reaction to what Ironstone had just finished conjuring: an enormous map of Hogwarts stitched together by lines of coloured light. The interior showed levels stacked like a layer cake, the moving stairs frozen in strange Escher-like patterns, while the grounds showed the Quidditch pitch, the lake, and the dark bulk of the Forbidden Forest. Near the forest's edge glowed several tiny oaks—the grove where Diana and Terry had been found, comatose. When Ironstone's wand tapped the forest at roughly mid-point, the image of a single oak appeared with "Site of Abduction" in tiny glowing letters beneath it.
Splendiferous. State-of-the-art. But Harry couldn't help noticing (with a touch of satisfaction) that unlike his Marauder's Map, this model seemed unable to show people. Though of course it was ridiculous to think of himself in competition with Clara Ironstone—like comparing chalk and cheese. Though no Metamorphmagus, the slight young woman with mousy hair had the ability to become utterly anonymous, to blend in anywhere and never quite be remembered afterwards. Rumour was she had infiltrated a notorious counterfeit wand operation as a shop girl in Diagon Alley, helped to smoke out a nest of Death Eaters at Beauxbatons while passing as a librarian, and even gone outside the Wizarding world to pose as a City cubicle rat, heavily into clubs and wine bars, to expose a gang of renegade Squibs trafficking in child witches and wizards. Harry simply couldn't do that kind of field work without the unpleasant assistance of Polyjuice, even if the Ministry would allow one of their most valuable assets to be exposed to such risk. Ginny had certainly made her views known on that matter. Not to mention he had two little sons to think about.
But sweet Merlin, at times how he longed to throw himself into danger again. Especially now, with the Aurors' eyes occasionally sliding in his direction, as if they were wondering whether The Boy Who Lived was good for anything these days other than hoisting a pint with his old mates or Scourgifying the nursery.
Ironstone had at last finished her map and was turning to the three equally young-looking Aurors standing closest to her. Harry recognized one of them as the "gardener" who'd been hacking away earlier at the roses. "Group Red. You'll patrol the grounds and gate," she ordered. As the three nodded curtly in response, their leader drew a glowing crimson line to represent their assigned patrol, then added, "Hagrid here will patrol with you." As the half-giant bounced on his toes and puffed his chest out a little, the Auror leader briskly designated two Green Aurors to the Owlery (Harry didn't envy them—too much guano). Two Blues were assigned to the Astronomy Tower, three Yellows to the Great Hall and the main entrance, two Purples to the hospital wing under Madam Pomfrey's sceptical eye, and four Greys to patrol the corridors.
Ironstone's map now glowed like a Christmas tree, and her teams crowded around it, tapping wands on their colours to accept their assignments. Yet nine Aurors remained unassigned. Most looked Harry's age or younger, but two or three seemed well into their thirties. One appeared even older, sporting a thick shock of silver hair and a seamed face. She looked as if she'd seen some serious action.
Standing beside Harry, Ron raised his eyebrows at the unassigned group.
"I bloody well hope that lot are for the dungeons," he whispered under cover of the hubbub. "Or the Forest."
"Dunno." Harry recognized one or two of the younger Aurors and none of the older ones. D.O.M., those—had to be. He thought of Hermione: were these her colleagues? Were they here on orders, or had they volunteered for this mission out of concern for her? He hoped so, since after leaving her husband Hermione had lost the love of every Weasley on the planet. As her boss, Arthur Weasley was at least obliged to maintain a professional relationship, but Harry knew Ginny would have been furious to know that her own husband occasionally checked in with Hermione by Floo to make sure she was all right. He found it comforting to think Hermione might still have a few friends at the Ministry besides him.
Going back into the dark trees behind was not an option, yet Hermione recoiled from the idea of picking her way through the wasteland ahead: knife-sharp black grass and cesspools, lit by that bar of greenish corpse-light low on the horizon. Somewhere at the heart of that glow lay the gateway, her only chance of returning home—if she could believe the man who was, and yet wasn't, Severus Snape. If she could trust that he wasn't taking her to the woman in green, the woman she had seen, not dreamt: the sinuous creature whose fierce, glowing beauty and voracious appetite Snape had been unable, unwilling to resist.
That searing kiss in the hollow tree had been nothing more than an after-effect. Hermione knew that now. Only the dying moments of the spell she and Snape had together conjured to banish Eznerif and his hideous kin—the brilliant magic which, for one scintillating moment, had bound them. It had opened her soul, and something in him had opened as well, like sunlight glimpsed through a crack in a prison door. But it wasn't real. Not as real as the woman in green. She felt sick to her stomach, rage and fear slowly churning like the thick, grey liquid in the pool at her feet. Her right hand twitched, craving the feel of her wand. If Snape delivered her to the enemy, she would use it take that woman apart, molecule by molecule, or die trying.
And if you die? whispered her cool, rational self. How will anyone at Hogwarts know what's happened? Who would warn them?
She had no choice. If there was even a small chance Snape could help her survive, she needed to take that chance. He might very well be using her. Fine. She would bloody well use him.
All this time, though it must have been mere seconds, Hermione had held Snape's eyes. He still wore that strange, disturbing expression: sadness and something less easy to identify. Something like reluctant admiration in anyone else, except she was quite certain Snape had no such feeling in his repertoire of emotions. But those eyes . . . oh, God. With sudden panic, she remembered he had once been a powerful Legilimans. In the Wizarding world, he would need to utter the spell to use it on her. But here?
She turned instantly away from Snape and crossed her arms.
"That woman," she said. "She controls this world, doesn't she? Maybe even this universe." And you?
"This is her realm," Snape said heavily.
"Maybe so, but I opened a hole in it."
"Like a fly blundering into a spider's web."
"Quantum magic," she muttered. I saved our lives, you ungrateful bastard.
"What?"
"Nothing."
Snape leaned into her face and hissed, "You've fully alerted her. If you'd helped me as I asked instead of acting like an insufferable know-it-all—"
"Your spell would have failed!" she snapped. "And we were out of time."
"You've been in this universe less than two days—and you profess to understand its magic? How impressive."
"I learn fast," she flung back. "But of course you've probably forgotten."
Snape's hands came down hard on Hermione's shoulders, forcing her to face him. Quickly she visualized thick steel doors barricading the chambers of her thoughts. "The moment you used your wand," he said quietly, "you cast a Dark Mark against the fabric of this realm. That cannot be undone." The lack of sarcasm or anger in his tone frightened her far more than his words, but his eyes were as uncompromising as stone. "More than that: now she knows the extent of your power. That is something I hoped would not happen."
Hermione stared at him, her mind absorbing his words. The extent of your power. Snape wasn't angry because he thought she was stupid. Quite the contrary.
She raised her chin. "I need to know more about this woman. Did she tell you to abduct the children?" As Snape hesitated, she snapped, "I need the truth!"
He blinked as if taken aback by her bluntness. Then he bowed his head. "Yes."
"And you just obeyed?"
Snape whirled away from her and began to pace. "I intervened when I could." He stopped pacing and took a deep, shaky breath. "At the very least, I reduced their suffering. I remember enough of my old skills to do that much."
With hideous clarity Hermione remembered her dream of Snape and the woman in the clearing: sinuous arms winding around him, that greedy mouth fastened to his as they sank to the ground. "You never tried to fight back?" she said shakily. "Never tried to stop her?"
Snape swung back to her. "How can you fight the very air you breathe?" His tone was savage. "An entire universe? She is this place. She is this realm." The lines around his thin mouth deepened. "I have tried," he said softly, "to trap her a dozen times, kill her a hundred different ways. She laughs. Laughs, as if I were putting on a magic show for her amusement." He took a deep breath as if forcing himself to be calm. "I do have one ability. I can occasionally pass into the Wizarding World unnoticed, but only for a short time, to supply myself with food and other necessities. I'd hoped that ability might help us. But the moment you used your wand, Miss Granger"—his voice sliced into her— "you earned her complete attention. Being unnoticed is out of the question now."
She joined her hands, fingers surreptitiously touching the wand up her sleeve, as Snape turned away to face the marshland, lit dimly by the sick green light of a hidden sun. His stillness unnerved her. "She brought me into this—life, if you can call it that," he said at last, low and rapid. "A life I didn't ask for," and Hermione shivered as another memory stabbed her, a dream from years ago of a cave, a woman's form bending over a slab on which a man writhed in pain. "Eons ago, her people gave life. But now she is darkness. A black sun in a starless night."
A black sun. "A singularity," Hermione whispered.
Snape swung to look at her. "A what?"
She drew herself up, trying not to sound flustered. "Erm—a black hole. The remains of a massive star. When it runs out of fuel, it collapses in on itself. If the star is really massive it keeps collapsing, and it pulls everything inside—even light."
"This isn't the time to be pedantic, Granger."
Hermione opened her mouth to say, I'm not being pedantic. I'm telling you I conjured a tiny singularity and yanked that Darkness out of this universe. But she bit down hard on the words. Whatever she told Snape now, the woman in green was likely to learn. Quickly.
Snape shifted the rucksack on his shoulders. "I have reason to believe you surprised her earlier. But I doubt that will happen again. This is her world; she has made it her own, and its laws bend to her will." He settled his rucksack on his shoulders. "We must move."
"Why?" she threw back. "Why not stay here and let her come to us? It's going to happen sooner or later."
"For fuck's sake, Granger. Do you think that's what I want?" Strangely, something about his peevish tone rang true. "Believe me, we're better off moving. Now listen: follow my footsteps exactly. And for Merlin's sake stay away from the pools. They're—"
"Deadly," she interrupted.
"Worse. Cannibalistic."
"Oh."
"And please keep your wand in your sleeve."
With great care, they skirted around the thick, grey pond into which she had almost fallen. The surface rippled, small thick waves moving toward them as if trying to follow. She shuddered and looked away, concentrating on the grey tussocky grass and Snape's thick black boots. Dim, greenish light crawled snake-like along the ground, but it was better to focus on that than the watchful horizon.
After an unknown length of time in which Hermione's world shrank down to one plodding step after another, to sudden turns and stops and long hesitations, to the soft whispering scrape of black grass rippling when they passed, Snape stopped. She almost ran into him.
"What is it?" she whispered.
"Do you truly think," he said, his back to her, "that I'm enthralled by her? That I would betray you to her?"
She stared down at the ground. Grey mud crept around the toes of her boots.
"I don't know what to believe," she said at last.
Without another word, Snape resumed his silent, steady tread.
"I know you came to Hogwarts as a friend, Harry. You weren't asked to join this mission," said Ironstone. Behind her, the nine unassigned Aurors stood at parade rest, legs apart and hands behind backs, their expressions carefully blank. "But if you . . . should decide to volunteer, well—our division would really appreciate your experience and expertise. Especially regarding Hogwarts."
"I'm happy to volunteer." Harry hoped he didn't sound too eager.
"That's brilliant." Clara's smile expanded, lighting up her grey eyes and infusing her squarish, unassuming face with radiance. Charm offensive: another one of her attributes, Harry supposed. He didn't allow himself to consider when or how he would break the news to Ginny about a volunteer mission that was, to put it mildly, less than safe. His hot-tempered wife would be less than happy.
"I'd like you to patrol the dungeons," said Ironstone. "With four of my team." Her smile dropped away as she turned to the waiting Aurors. "Bast. Horus." Two of the younger Aurors, female and male, stepped forward. "Khonsu." A slightly older man, bald and brown-skinned, gave Harry a curt nod. "And Sekhmet." The leathery-faced woman with white hair offered a knife-like smile.
Ron shouldered his way forward. "What about me? I've been at Hogwarts seven years. I know the inside almost as well as Hagrid or Professor McGonagall—and the outside even better." He smiled grimly. "Especially from above."
McGonagall, still seated behind the desk, shook her head. "Mr Weasley, for now I need all staff on hand doing their regular jobs, unless the situation changes."
As Ron bridled, Ironstone said, "Professor, I'm assigning my last five Aurors to patrol the Forest perimeter. Thank you for being willing to lift the Interdiction long enough to let them in." As McGonagall gave a single cool nod, Harry suspected the Auror team might have been able to bypass the headmistress's spell regardless. Ironstone added, "And actually, I was hoping you could spare Ron Weasley here to assist in patrolling the oak grove." She turned to Ron. "That's where you found the two missing students, isn't it?"
Ron swallowed. "Yeah. That's right."
Ironstone's eyes narrowed. "Ron, I'm sure that wasn't easy for you. But would you be willing to help us, if" —she turned back to McGonagall "—the headmistress gives you permission?"
Harry's mouth twitched. The Auror leader might look as if she were barely out of wizarding school, but she had, with exquisite skill, manoeuvred McGonagall into an impossible position. If the headmistress refused, she would seem not only ungracious but ungrateful for the Ministry's help. And McGonagall knew it; Harry could tell by the way she set her lips in a thin line before inclining her head to Ron.
"If you wish, Mr Weasley."
Ron looked strangely pale, freckles standing out against his skin. Whatever had happened to him in the oak grove, Harry thought, must have been worse than he'd let on. But the Quidditch master squared his shoulders and gave a curt nod. "I'm in."
McGonagall gathered herself and rose from her chair. Even slightly stooped, the headmistress topped Ironstone by several inches. Silence fell as she stared at the Auror leader, then she sighed and held out her right hand, palm up.
"I asked for your help, and I accept it gratefully. Whatever you can do to stop this terrible thing. All I want is for our students to be safe."
Ironstone said quietly, "We will do our very best to make that so."
Harry shot Ron a quick look. The red-head still looked pale, but before Harry could ask him if he was okay, Ironstone and McGonagall came up to them, the five Aurors assigned to the Forest tagging along behind.
It was then Ironstone explained her plan for the oak grove.
"Sunset?" Ron's mouth dropped open. "Bloody hell! It isn't safe even in daylight!"
"The Forest is a liminal space," said Ironstone, "and sunset is a liminal time. Certain forces that control magical laws may sometimes shift, become temporarily unstable. We've been developing spells that can take advantage of liminal space and time. It must be sunset." She put her hand on Ron's shoulder. "Are you with us?"
"Yes," he said glumly.
The meeting broke up, but Harry waited until after he and Ron left the tower and reached the bottom of the spiral stairs before saying quietly, "What's up, mate?"
Ron looked at him, eyes narrowed. "What d'you mean?"
"I mean—is there something you're not telling me about that oak grove?"
Ron glanced away. It seemed to Harry that he struggled for a moment before he shrugged dismissively.
"Nothing. Just that I went in by myself last time. That was a bit mental. At least this time the place'll be stuffed with Aurors and centaurs." He gave a crooked grin. "It'll be all right."
The dungeons were evacuated that very afternoon, all Slytherins moved to temporary quarters in the Astronomy Tower because, it seemed, the caretaker had discovered not just one but several nests of Blast-Ended Screwts. Probably some stupid spell gone awry, the unhappy evacuees muttered darkly at dinner in the Great Hall, shooting dirty looks at the Gryffindors.
During dessert, Harry and four Aurors slipped away to the dungeons, where Sekhmet split them into two patrol groups, assigning Harry with her and Bast. For what seemed like hours they moved slowly down the dim, stony corridors, their lighted wand-tips probing the gloom, using Stealth-Sensoring charms and some newer detection spells like McGonagall's elegant Exhibio. But with the over-eager Bast and steely-eyed Sekhmet breathing down his neck, Harry had no time to use the Marauder's Map. He didn't know these Aurors well enough to share what was, in effect, a family heirloom. Nor did he entirely trust them not to confiscate the Map and cart it off to the D.O.M. for dissection.
At last Harry thought of a trick from the days of Dumbledore's Army. Lagging behind the other two by a few steps, he silently conjured a Shadowghost down the corridor ahead. Bast took the bait and leapt eagerly toward the thin writhing shape, distracting Sekhmet just enough to let Harry slip into a long-disused closet.
"Lumos." Quickly he pulled the Map out of the field rucksack he'd been given for patrol duty and unrolled the Map over the dusty floor. "Exhibeo Memoria." Backward the tiny clock's hands raced until at last it reached the proper time.
Old Potions Classroom—NO ACTIVITY.
Harry's jaw dropped. "Sweet fucking Merlin."
That was impossible. He'd seen the blackness, seen that name. Ron had seen them.
Outside the door came Sekhmet's raised voice calling for Harry. She did not sound at all pleased. With another soft curse, Harry stashed the Map back in his rucksack and opened the door. "Nothing to see in here," he said coolly, stepping into the corridor.
Sekhmet whirled toward him, her face set in furious lines. "Do not ever disappear again, Potter. We stay in each other's sight at all times."
"Yeah, I get that," said Harry. "But—why did you two run ahead? Not exactly Auror protocol, is it?" He fixed Sekhmet with his best innocent look.
Bast said, "We thought we saw—"
"Belay that," Sekhmet growled, still holding Harry's gaze. He knew that she knew he'd been up to something. He kept his expression bland.
"Back to the potions classroom," she grunted at last, motioning Harry ahead of her and Bast. He would have no other chance to use the Map now, but he didn't need to. He knew what they would find when the patrol converged as planned in the old potions classroom and blazed their combined power into every nook and cranny.
They would find what the Map had shown him. No sign of invasion. No sign of magic. A blank space. Tabula rasa . . . as if nothing at all had ever happened in that room.
Unless Ron and his patrol found something in the Forbidden Forest, Harry thought bleakly, their search for Hermione had reached a dead end.
Note: PersephonePest, I really appreciated your review. But I'm afraid I'm addicted to cliff-hangers and promise many more before the end!
Ch. 13, "In the forest of the light," is coming on August 27.