Halloween Is Always Scary

There were many things bothering Sirius during the next few days, but there wasn't much he could do. He told Dumbledore everything of course, but the Headmaster seemed to have too many other things on his mind already.

'Ah, yes,' he said when Sirius told him about Malfoy 'Neville had already told me. I do nt think Draco can do anyone much harm though.'

'Neville?'

'Yes. I have been… helping him prepare to fight Voldemort.'

This still sounded strange. Neville Longbottom, the Boy Who Lived…

'And another thing,' Sirius said 'My other self…'

'Have you learnt something about him that shocked you?' the headmaster asked, sounding slightly worried, but not much.

'No,' Sirius replied 'He has learnt something about me. He's found out!'

'Oh, has he?' Dumbledore wasn't as worried as Sirius had expected 'What did he do?'

'He came here, Professor. To talk to me. It seemed like he was… trying to find my weak points to use them against me or something…'

'That can indeed be very dangerous,' the headmaster agreed 'Especially if your counterpart is in league with Voldemort. But we do not have any evidence to prove that.'

'So now you're telling me not to worry?' Sirius was angry and disappointed.

'Worrying is not going to help you,' the old wizard replied calmly.

XXX

The most annoying thing about Dumbledore is his nasty habit of being right. There was no way worrying could solve any problems. Sirius finally gave up and on Halloween he tried to enjoy his day at Hogsmeade. It was an unpleasantly cold day, but apart from thatit seemed nice enough. After all walking around Hogsmeade in human form for the first time in so many years just had to be a good thing, didn't it? Sirius walked up to the Shrieking Shack, thinking about all the fun he had had there with the Marauders, and then he considered visiting Zonko's, not really to buy anything, but simply because he hadn't been there for such a long time. Unfortunately, the shop turned out to be closed and unlikely to open anytime soon. And it probably didn't have much to do with the fact that Fred and George Weasley's shop in London was better.

Halloween had never seemed particularly frightening to him before, but now, as another war was beginning (in both universes!), Sirius started to think of it as the night when his world's Lily and James had died rather than the fun holiday when people dressed up as weird things and did funny things to pumpkins.

But before his mind could wander too far, he heard somebody talking. A moment later he saw the Creevy brothers and Procyon walking up the street. Denis said something to Procyon, who quickly tried to hide behind Colin. Sirius saw him anyway, but pretended he didn't.

'Hello, Professor,' the Creevy brothers said together.

'Hello.'

'I was just showing Denis around,' Colin said 'First Hogsmeade trip, you see…'

'Not the best time for it, unfrotunately,' Sirius said (He suspected it was not really Denis's first visit to Hogsmeade, but that didn't really matter).

'It's still great,' Denis said, excited.

'By the way, Procyon, I can see you.'

The three boys looked rather embarassed. Apparently Procyon was not supposed to be there.

'Um…' Procyon said

'I would like a word with you,' Sirius looked up at Colin and Denis 'Alone, if you don't mind.'

'See you later then,' Procyon told his friends as they set off for the Three Broomsticks.

'You're not supposed to be here, are you?' Sirius asked.

'Err…'

'I'll have to take off some points for that,' Sirius said and then he laughed 'I wouldn't have remembered if you didn't try to hide,' he said

'Oh…'

'I fooled McGonagal once, you know,' Sirius added 'My parents didn't sign my form in third year, so I used the secret passage - '

'The one to Honeydukes?' the boy asked.

'Yeah. You used it too, didn't you?'

'Umm… yeah… Denis and I found it last year…' Procyon said 'Isn't it unfair,' he added after a moment 'Father wouldn't let me go just because I dared disagree with him once! He can be worse than Grandmother's portrait sometimes…' then he looked up at Sirius and remembered who he was talking to 'Er… No offence, Padfoot…'

'Right… I still have to take off some points, sorry,' Sirius said 'It's nothing personal,' he joked.

'Hang on!' Procyon suddenly had an idea 'Couldn't you…? I mean, you sort of are - '

'Not officially,' Sirius reminded him 'We don't want people to know.'

The boy graoned.

'All right,' Sirius said 'We can go to the Three Broomsticks for a while, but then, I'm afraid I'll have to take you back to the castle.'

XXX

But as they were reaching the Three Broomsticks, something unexpected happened. Two seventh-year girls were just leaving the pub, talking and, apparently, disagreeing about something. The 'something' appeared to be a package that Katie Bell was holding in her hand. Sirius didn't hear what they were saying, but then Leanne tried to grab the package and Katie wouldn't let her. Suddenly, as it fell to the ground, Katie rose into the air with her arms outstreached. Then the girl began to scream in terrible pain, as if she was being tortured at least with a particularly powerful Cruciatus curse. Her friend was terrified. She seized Katie's ankles to stop her flying away, but was unable to put her back on the ground. Harry, Ron and Hermione, who had been walking behind the girls, ran forward and grabbed Katie's legs as well. By the time Sirius and Procyon reached them, she was back on the ground, still screaming and writhing.

With the boys' help Sirius managed to hold her steadily enough to prevent her hurting herself any more.

'I'm going to need help to get her to the hospital wing,' he said loudly through the girl's screaming.

'What happened to her?' Procyon wanted to know.

'It's that thing!' Leanne said, pointing at the package, which was now lying on the ground, torn to reveal what appeared to be an opal necklace 'I think she - '

'Somebody get help,' Sirius said again and Harry and Procyon ran in two different directions, in search of someone who could help get Katie back to the school.

'Now what exactly happened?' Hermione asked Leanne.

'It's the necklace…' Leanne said through tears 'The package tore and then - '

Just then Harry, who had ran toward Hogwarts, returned along with Hagrid.

'Lemme see her,' the enormous man shouted.

'Good to see you,' Sirius said with relief 'We need to get her to Hogwarts - '

'I'll do it,' Hagrid said simply. He picked the screaming girl up and headed quickly for the castle.

'Don't anybody touch it,' Sirius warned, as Ron bent down and reached for the necklace 'It's cursed,' he explained.

Leanne was still crying and beginning to shake uncontrolably, looking almost as if she had been cursed as well.

'How did Katie get hold of this?' Harry asked her.

'She had it when she came back from the bathroom in the Three Broomsticks. Said she had to deliver it to someone at Hogwarts… She looked funny when she said it…' Leanne said 'Oh no!' she gasped suddenly 'I bet she's been Imperiused… '

Hermione patted her on the shoulder as the older girl began to sob again.

'She didn't say who'd given it to her?' Hary asked.

'No… She wouldn't tell me…' the girl continued sobbing and muttering something about their argument.

'Let's get back to the school,' Hermione said finally 'We'll be able to find out how she is. Come on…'

Harry took off his scarf and tried to pick up the necklace through it.

'I'll do it, Harry,' Sirius said 'Can't let more students get hurt.'

The boy handed him the scarf and he wrapped the necklace in it very carefully. As they walked up to the castle, Harry talked about his usual Malfoy-did-it theory. At some points it didn't make much sense, but nobody had a better one.

'Hagrid says you saw what happened to Katie Bell,' McGonagall greeted them at the entranceto the castle.

'It's true, Minerva,' Sirius replied 'Apparently she touched this.'

'It will have to be examined then,' she said 'And I must talk to these students,' she added 'Well, what happened?'