A/N:
I don't expect that this will make much sense, though it's a self-contained three part story.
It was a weird little experiement in a few things, and it serves as a companion piece to a massive AU HP story with Harry, that I've not published yet.
This is set during Grindelwald's War, and follows a young man called Tom, as he sails into Africa to find out what's going on with a former British wizard.
The massive AU is that Hogwarts was established in London, not Scotland, and butterflies means there is no and was never any Statute of secrecy.
1. The Sea
Start at the start?
That's easy to say, but hard to do. If I tell you about what he said to me, you won't get it, you won't know where I was, when I heard it.
A cigarette would really help, I think. No? No.
Fine. To tell you about Prewett you need to understand the circumstances under which we met and for that we must start somewhere before your more bureaucratic interests.
Fort Elizabeth, where I started this hell, was a stone ship, a port, on the coast of Portugal. She berthed three-thousand men, excluding visiting ships' crew, and was a frequent call for those taking the long way to Africa.
We spent our days stamping forms, looking out at the Atlantic, and waiting. Running drills. We were keen, and hungry, all of us ready for any chance that we might run over the peninsula and drive out the Hun from their enchanted hidey-holes.
"Reeve's looking for you, Tom."
Charm was looking at me, puzzled, from where he'd ducked through the tent flap. Couldn't blame him, it was definitely odd.
"What's he want with—"
The Reeve walked through the tent flap, Red Rod was right behind him.
Two dozen of us jumped to our feet in a wave of mistimed salutes and clattering cutlery.
Red Rod pointed me out quickly, but I'd seen the Reeve before at larger briefings and he locked eyes with me right away. He was a tall, thin fellow with a pinched face. Very pointy, like a wedge of cheese. They took the salute and our arms dropped.
"Ushers, please sit." The Reeve looked at me. "Tom Clarke, First Cursebearer?"
"Sir," I said.
"Need you in the big tent, Clarke. Follow along. Thank you, Brown." The Reeve took a salute from Red Rod and turned on his heel in one motion to stride from the tent in long steps.
Snatching up my beret from the tabletop to follow, there was time for a mournful parting glance at my untouched dinner: sausage and oil roasted peppers. Second Potioneer, the bugger, was already reaching for it.
It was dark outside. The anbaric lights were only just coming to life but the sunset came quickly in this part of the world, and, opposite the last deep blues and yellows of sunset the sky was darker, showing the first stars of the night.
"Warming charm, sir?"
He looked at me from the corner of his eye, not breaking his step. "Mendelli," he said, plucking at his rich magic-made sleeve. Then nothing.
"Where did you school, sir?"
"Hogwarts." His voice was clipped. "Same as you, same as every wizard."
Quite clearly, I had meant which Hogwarts college, who would ask anything else? A reformer? As Silver Rod, not likely. Was he so averse to a little junior brown-nosing? As an officer of any degree, also not likely. So, why so terse?
He had to have been sent for me. And wasn't that a peculiar thought.
We were at the big tent though perhaps tent was not a fair term. Fortresses could take less punishment than a canopy that heavily charmed. To either side of a fixed, wooden door stood an Usher, and besides them two Corporals with bolt-rifles. They saluted, he saluted, everyone saluted.
The Reeve led the way to an office door at the rear of the tent.
"Wait here," he said.
He wasn't all the way through before someone barked 'bring him in, Reeve.' Gruff, a real gruff voice.
Yes. Exactly, him. Very distinctive, I learned.
They were all arrayed like a jury. There was a grand desk opposite the door and behind it sat three officers. Officers I should never have expected to call for me or have knowledge of my existence.
The Banneret of course, in his gold mantle, was there, to have sent the Reeve. As the Usher to the whole port, and all the wizards at that station, I might only expect to see him outside a function if I were being sent down. He was sat next to his muggle equivalent, the Commodore for the port.
To his right was the Admiral.
In his whites, jacket off, hat resting on the table. With the anchor and crossed anchors and all that. Commander-in-chief for the whole Mediterranean fleet, looking right into my eyes.
He did a very peculiar thing then, while Reeve took his place with the Unspeakable and the Lieutenant. Upon my arrival and salute, he started plating up food for the assembled company like a skivvy.
Oh? Yes, there was an Unspeakable there, he didn't say a word until near the end. I had known that Unspeakables don't have a face, or names—or a soul, when working, it seems—still, I had always assumed a cowl filled with shadows for your lot. Not this... memory magic.
But yes, he did catch my eye. I spent half a minute looking at the colour of his eyes, his nose, his hair colour, trying to put it all together. I am that way when I encounter novel magic, I'm afraid.
The Admiral was assembling strawberries, and blueberries, and perhaps eggs or maybe a pancake onto china plates.
He left me saluting for at least half a minute. The CO, the Banneret, they looked right through me, and the whole while the Admiral plated for the gallery, then for his ranking officers.
At his leisure, he sat. He had a jar of honey at this time — I think the Banneret had summoned it for him — and he flung honey droplets over the table and open folders to his side.
There were photoplates of myself in at least three of them. One of them I recognised from my passing out.
My palms were a tingle at my side.
"Alright, that's quite long enough," he said. "You know who I am, son?"
"Yes, Admiral," I said.
"And these fine gentlemen around me?"
"Yes, Admiral."
"Introduce yourself," he instructed, waving a hand in a lazy circle. "For my friends in the back."
"First Cursebearer, Usher in Extraordinary to the Canoeists of Port Elizabeth, sir."
"Your name, son."
"Tom Clarke," I said.
He waved a hand again, at the Banneret this time. "Lay out the charges." In hindsight, I am glad that he never set me at ease. I would have unmanned myself then, I think.
Banneret drew his wand and cast a small charm against the wall. There was an image of me, passing out in the mantle of a half rod.
"This was your first commission, Cursebearer?"
"Yes, sir. Half rod to a company in the Royal Marines, sir."
He flicked his wand and there was an illusion of myself in full-mantle. My moustache still yet to come in.
"You excelled in that role and were quickly risen to Usher in Ordinary, is this correct?"
"Twelve months, sir, yes." Where was this going, I thought, my career track was no great mystery.
He flicked, and then there I was in France, at port in my Cursebearer mantle.
"Promoted to your current rank for excellence in the field, four years ago. Tell us why."
"Yes, sir. It was the extraction from Brittany after Grindelwald's sennight salvo—"
"No, Clarke. Tell us why you're still an Usher in Extraordinary."
Wrong-footed, it took me a minute to summon an acceptable answer.
"I value my contribution as a combatant, I allow my canoeists to excel and I am committed to doing my best for crown and for country."
Banneret looked to the Admiral, and he nodded sharply.
With a flick of the wand, there was a picture of someone else. Long hair, different skin, freckled and blonde. Different in a thousand overt details, but the same height as me, the same weight as me and, of course, the eyes were the same. He clearly wore a red mantle.
Ah, I thought. I see.
My eyes fixed themselves on the wall above your colleagues head. My chin was turned up. The cast of my mouth was changed and they saw. There was no politeness, no laissez-faire in their questions from that point onward.
"Where did you serve on promotion to Cursebearer, Clarke?"
"I was recruited to the Special Service Brigade, sir."
"What was your role in the SSB, Clarke?"
"Sir, I believe I am not authorised to discuss the internal policy of the SSB, at this point, sir."
The admiral cut in. "I am authorising you, Clarke." He gestured at the Banneret again, and the illusion wove itself into the smiling face of Professor Kurtz in his Gryffindor Professor dress robes.
"Do you recognise this man, Clarke?"
"I do, sir," I said.
"Now, our records say," he flipped a file shut, "Professor Kurtz was still in contact with former European students. He may or may not have been providing information on Gryffindor students lined up for the military to these friends."
I said nothing. I said nothing for a long while.
"Are you aware of the fate of Professor Kurtz, before your transfer to this port, Clarke?" He asked.
"I am, sir." I quickly added, "it was highly publicised."
"It was," he nodded. He looked around at his assembled staff. Looking at them in turn. When he turned back, he crossed his forearms on the desk, leaned towards me, slightly.
"Clarke," he said, "Banyard and the SSB are very far away, and we are not. So, I want you to think about this next question very carefully before you answer.
"Did the SSB instruct you to kill Professor Kurtz, and place you as Gryffindor's Red Rod to do it?"
My eyes drifted from the wall. My mind still, my thoughts slow, I met his eyes.
"Sir, I do not believe I am authorised to discuss SSB mission briefs at this time."
He sat back in his chair.
The Admiral stood, picked up a folder and walked round the table to me. Turned his back to me. When he turned back, he had made up another plate of this odd evening-breakfast and he handed it over.
"Take it," he said.
I did, out of reflex. I had missed my dinner.
"Have a seat, Mr. Clarke," he said. The only seat available was the one he had left. Very gingerly, I sat. Next to the Commodore, next to the Banneret. Very odd indeed.
The Banneret flicked his wand and there was a picture of Africa, and the Mediterranean above it. The upper border of the projection sliced across Southern Europe like a knife.
The map was mainly topographical, painstakingly illustrated, but vast swathes of the west and the coasts of Africa were shaded red. The East was highlighted in black.
This was the rough state of Grindelwald's expanding empire, and his encroaching onto British dominion, informal or otherwise.
The borders weren't unfamiliar to me. There was little to be done at Fort Elizabeth other than read papers, track the fronts, and accommodate a pervasive sort of dread that we might be suddenly overcome at any moment.
"Egypt, and the Canal, are vital to our navy and the war effort. We are making significant ground in reclaiming it. We have re-taken Alexandria, we are taking Cairo and we will use the small canals from there to launch an assault on the Canal's port cities.
"This is the heart of Africa," and he thwacked a finger against the projection. Not far from Tanganyika. "This is where I'd like to direct your attention."
He nodded to the Banneret, and an image of a bald man appeared.
Maybe forty years old, he was well built and bearded like a Merchant Navy Captain. In the illusion he looked back at the room and there was a depth to his eyes that most lacked.
"Do you recognise him?" asked the Admiral.
A shake of the head was the answer. So busy studying this character that the question was almost missed.
"Banneret Prewett," said the Admiral, "he was with the SSB, too. Brilliant man. Powerful, humanitarian man. A good mind, a good commander. He was called up by the SSB, same as you, and his practices became... unsound.
"This war, so close to home. Yet, many of us stationed so far from the homeland and proper civilisation. Magical warfare on a scale not seen since the Romans. It can make even the best of us have ... queer ideas. Forget what we're about. Indulge in ... inappropriate practices. You understand, son?"
I nodded, I felt that I ought to.
"He's out there, beyond the reach of any better society. Unbound by anything except his own initiative. We are each of us a product of two things, our nature but also our better judgement.
"You must be his better judgement now. The SSB made this mess. You can clean it up."
"I will, sir."
"Banneret Prewett is in a singularly unique position to act. The SSB sent him with a small command to the heart of Africa, the source of the Nile. Retracing Grindelwald's steps.
"We need you to persuade him to return to a sensible part of the world or to not return at all."
"Persuade, sir?"
It was the Unspeakable that spoke here.
"Persuade," he said, "with extreme prejudice."
"Your mission, Mr. Clarke, is to take passage with the 4th Corvette Squadron to Cairo. From there, you'll be joining a patrol up the Nile.
"Follow it to the source. Find out what Banneret Prewett has been doing with this native tribe he's pressed, bring him back to account for his actions, or don't bring him back at all."
That was the gist of it. They gave me details of his command, a stack full of intel. They talked about the watercourse, and the dysplottable nature of the Nile.
Then they sent me on my way. HMS Dryad was expecting my report that evening.
I told the Potioneer that he was acting First for the Canoeists and briefed him. My personals were quickly shrunk and I got dressed in my ones: Formal mantle over the epaulette, much longer than the usual pellegrine, then the marine frock coat and my hat, all very proper.
I was flooing to the bridge of Gibraltar within two hours.
There was a First Usher in Extraordinary on HMS Dryad already, a potioneer, and the ship's commodore set me to his service. The wizard's hackles were raised from the moment I stepped aboard. I don't know what he thought I represented. I imagine he was new to his command.
He ordered me down with the half rods preparing for launch. It was a reasonable assignment. I didn't know the ship's sequence of moments, nor its inventory or its guns. The dismissal wouldn't have irked so much, however, if he had not been such a prigg.
Still, there's something in casting basic magic. Charming the stilts for a voyage, settling the fins and inspecting the arcuates, that sort of thing, a simple pleasure. This is why we were ushers, not midshipmen, not captains, not surgeon-healers or whatever else the muggles might do instead, and it wasn't paper work, of course.
The corvette was a ten-gun cutter. The lead vessel of the squadron and a little bit greater for it. It had a turret on the aft and the fore and two more guns in barbettes mid-ship. Over the flaring, the final gun stood proudly from the fore-stilt, careful not to be within reach of the water.
Is this too much flavour? Too little? Your colleague by the door is sighing. I shall try and keep it concise from this point forward, just the important bits. Where were we? Ah, my welcome.
Morgrave, Commodore Morgrave, was in charge of the little four ship squadron. I never saw him in a coat, not once in two days, not when the sea was choppy and spray hit up over the steel deck, not at dinner, and not when the guns fired. But his hat—a great big two-pointed commander's hat like Hornblower would wear—he was never without it.
He welcomed me onto his ship alongside his senior staff with a handshake I thought might take my arm at the wrist. I was the last of several travelling officers, taking passage across the sea.
Yes this was before the Potioneer sent me to the stilts, exactly, and he was stood besides the Commodore, welcoming us with the other officers at this point.
"Commodore Morgrave," I said, but the handshakes were over and he was already walking towards the bow of the ship. "Commodore!"
"First Potioneer will get you squared away—" He pointed at something on the deck, and then he was bellowing at the nearest seaman. "Whose hat is this?! Pick up your hat, son. You will not disrespect my ship!"
"Commodore," I said, catching up, "I have a special brief from the Admiralty."
Morgrave took my missive from the Admiral, scanned it quickly.
"Cairo!" he said. Then, more quietly, "Cairo."
He whipped his hat off and threw it into the air. "We're going to Cairo, men!" The ship's crew were turning to look at him. "Cairo!" He shouted. An able hand nearby got a slap on the back. "We're going to see the pyramids, son! Tell the Cox." The commodore turned back on himself suddenly, marching past me, towards his staff. He took the Potioneer by the sleeve and dragged him with.
"Lieutenant! We're going to shell some history together. Are you excited? I am excited. Tell the squadron. Get the stilts down, and flare the fins. I want us there tomorrow night."
I caught the Commodore as he stopped again, "Commodore Morgrave," I said.
"What?" he asked.
"—Commodore," said his First Lieutenant. He had my missive in his hand now. "We're to put in at Alexandria first with the flotilla and then—"
"Pardon my french but fuck the flotilla!" he bellowed. "Get us to Cairo."
The Lieutenants took the opportunity to flee.
Morgrave straightened his peculiar hat back on his head. He put one foot up on the side of the boarding ramp. "Ready away!"
It was worth seeing if my mission could be advanced a little further, in a little more safety.
"Sir," I said, again, "if you could take the squadron south of Helwan, I could put down beyond the fighting, and it'll be English forts all the way to Khartoum."
"Helwan?" He turned to me.
"A small city just south of Cairo, Commodore."
"I know where Helwan is, Curse! No, no, no. It's Cairo for us!"
"Sir, the admiralty put you to this assignment—"
"The admiralty put me to war. And war I shall make. Don't harangue me. See what Potioneer has up his sleeve, I want you busy till we're ready to put you down."
He stomped towards the door to the bridge. "Cairo, and the pyramids!" he shouted to the ship. He closed the door with a clang, and I was left stymied.
"To the Stilts, Cursebearer, make yourself useful," said Potioneer, at my shoulder.
The half-rods stared at me with a sort of wary awe while I worked. Like I was perhaps a trap, a secret drill-sergeant there to catch them out and scream at them till their ears rang.
I took an arcuate, a stilt and a fin to myself and worked through the suite of charms. Somehow I was the first to finish. The value of a quality education, I suppose.
Afterwards, dodging Potioneer, my poky berth served as a hidey-hole to look through the intel I had on Prewett.
It was a waxy folder, full of loose sheets, but there was plenty to read.
The man was exceptional. He had been a scholar at Hogwarts, and a prize winner. Unusually for a military man, he'd then studied at University College before being accepted into the Navy's officers programme.
At 32, the war had started and he had been attached to high command. He was a Reeve by this point and, at the fall of Dunkirk, he had been one of the famous seven to engage Grindelwald.
After some months in St. Mungo's he had requested a transfer to the SSB. A new and peculiar unit, particularly affiliated with your people, he had had to apply three times before high command had let him leave them.
He must have known it was the end of his career. He had a position with the high staff, he was being groomed for command, maybe had a shot at Black Rod. With the SSB he'd never be more than a Banneret.
Somehow he forced their hand, and they put him in the field. Peculiar missions in peculiar locations. Mogadishu, Shanghai, Abyssinia.
He had been phenomenally successful, too. In Mogadishu, he had captured three ships and cursed them to the seafloor in the harbour mouth. Eventually the sea would wash the magic away, but for several years more Grindelwald's navy would be feeling the irritation of Prewett's efforts. It was clear that his brief had been something else entirely, from the language of his report, but how could they punish success? And he brought success after success, in his own violent way.
What interested me most, though, were the letters which had been received in the last several months, since his venturing into Africa. They were on that flimsy almost see through tracing paper that comms used for those far places beyond Floo.
February, 1935
Prewett. It said. No rank, no brigade, nothing else to identify him.
Epicurus said his soul was whole and immaterial, and we, blindly, believed his revelation. Let it take root, let it sink deep into the collective firmament.
I have experienced my own revelation, Admiral. I was in France, on the bridge of the flagship when Grindelwald attacked. The bombardment struck me dumb by ringing. A damnable, continuing ringing. All around me, muggles and wizards were shouting, screaming, dying. I could not hear, I was deaf, but I knew it, I was deaf and still I heard their screaming, communication deeper than sound.
Another, from just over a month before my setting out was equally incomprehensible.
May, 1935
Prewett
A special substance, endowed with reason, adapted to rule the body...
I find myself reflecting on the relationship between a ship and her crew. Between a nation and her people, and I am struck by how a granular substance can form a whole. Granular but whole. What am I to make of this, in this place, except an off-hand rejection of all holy and academic thought. Granularity, Admiral. Granularity, and we are all grains.
I am close to it now, Bob. I suspect this is the answer to our riddle, as it was before, for him. Whether I succeed or fail, whether I live or perish by the improvement... I shall show how we might be more than we are. Whole, at last.
The man had gone completely insane, his letters making no sense. It was a regret that they were typed. That there could be no insight into their composition. Would it have been an ink splotched feverish monstrosity of handwriting or something clipped, precise and lined?
There was a newspaper clipping of him in my folder, also, from a piece on his fight with Grindelwald. They, too, used the photoplate I had seen in the briefing. He looked away from the camera, staring into the distance at something only he could see.
At the back of the folder there was a copy of the aims for Prewett's final briefing. It was short. Capture the heart of the Nile. Secure river lanes for the transport of magical flora and fauna. Investigate evidence of Grindelwald's expedition, and report. Then some flotsam about company and inventory.
Brilliant and mad. Likely just mad, now.
What was expected, at the far end of the Nile? I can no longer recall, the reality of it has driven all earlier imaginings out of me.
We made good speed over the Mediterranean and there were no obvious difficulties as the squadron pulled further away from the main flotilla.
I spent the day assisting the half-rods with their general duties, for a given value of assist. I would try and loiter near any group of three or more, to get a sense of them.
The poor sprouts never grew used to me, overly polite even amongst themselves while I was there. I would offer tips, odd ideas, a few stories where I could think of them (though I'm not one for long stories), that sort of thing.
The important part was that Potioneer would come over whenever he spotted me, to bark out a command and disperse the group, and I made sure we all locked up tight and silent, whenever he stomped near.
His suspicious frown was my main contribution to that ship's happy sailing, I think.
You boys wouldn't know this—not having done a day's work under the light of the sun in your lives, I bet—but, generally speaking there might only be two or three ushers on any rated vessel before the war, often fewer.
These images and accounts you're reading in the paper, of a hundred of us enchanting a ship canal or summoning the rains over desert, are entirely a product of this peculiar conflict. Before, there was little advantage on a ship in having ten wizards over one because the other side used none at all. Half-rods, by all rights, shouldn't be afloat on anything that doesn't shoot rubber, or crosses more than a harbour mouth.
This war...
Six years of this war, well, perhaps it would be more surprising if the whiskerless lads weren't at sea with us.
Potioneer saw them as his wards, is my suspicion, and himself as their hard-done-by father. Which would make me the bachelor uncle, there to tempt them into dissolute ways. Of course, I was flattered, and I try to do as is expected of me, by those whose opinion I hold close.
Which, you are right to think, is why I've yet to tell you anything at all about the Nile.
It was raining and sunset, and intel is best picked over piece by piece. On the deck, the fine rain mixed with the spray off the waves, and I watched the waves from under a thick umbrella charm, rain catching on its surface, and reflected on the sketch of Prewett that I had obtained.
I stood at the fore. After a short while, I was cold enough that it dragged me from turning over those few same titbits. I cast a warming charm, a drying charm and then the umbrella charm over my head and turned back to the sea.
"Curse!" came Potioneer's scratchy voice.
"First Usher, Potioneer," I said, "how may I be of assistance to you, on this balmy Mediterranean evening?"
"Magic on the deck. Without licence."
My eyebrows near climbed off my head.
"Without licence?"
"Travelling officers, on voyage with a ship may only—"
A flick of the wand cancelled the umbrella charm. If it was cancelled poised to drop over his head it was none of my business.
He spluttered.
"You did that on purpose," he said. The man didn't even draw his wand to dry himself. Just stood there, sodden. He was beyond friendship, dignity, and even common civility. I am sorry to say that I had had entirely enough of him.
Stepping close, close enough to be uncomfortable, like lovers in a hidden corner, I looked down at him. Underneath the peak of his hat his short hair was peppered with grey, I realised.
"If you keep following me like a house-elf then I'll treat you like one," I said.
"An elf! How long have you been a UIE?" he asked. "Half a year? A year?"
"Nearly five years," I said. He startled.
"Well, it's eight for me," he said, "so I'm the senior Usher, and you just threatened me."
Eight years a Potioneer, during a great big war, and still on corvettes. No colour to the rod that hung from his hip, holding his wand.
"No threats, your highness," I said, "I don't threaten."
"You don't like me–"
"A seer as well," I said.
"I don't care if you don't like me," he said, "I don't care if you're the best thing since Merlin."
"I find that difficult to believe. I'm yet to see you by a cauldron, or chasing after any wizard but myself."
"You're a spare part," he said, "and you're determined to get in the way. There's a reason for rank, there's a reason you should've come to me properly when you got here, not gone straight to the Commodore."
I remember being surprised. That was the reason he was telling himself that he didn't like me? Because I took an order from the fleet Admiral to the squadron Commodore?
"You have to give over your ego, and start acting like what you are. A small piece in a big game, and if you're determined to be a piece of grit you'll ruin more than just yourself."
"Sounds like an important speck of grit," I said, "now get out of my way, unless you want to piss scorpions for a month."
He stepped aside, and the git smiled. Had the presumption to look as if he'd scored a victory.
Leaving the deck, to the cabin, my boots stamped through the metal corridors and I turned the corner and almost walked straight into the Lieutenant who was sharing the room with me.
"Curse," he said. "Clarke."
"Lieutenant," I said. He was in mess formals. Properly scrubbed up.
"Commodore is having a squadron dinner for the officers. Chop chop." My surprise must have been clear on my face. "Did your Potioneer friend not tell you?"
"It must have slipped his mind," I said.
There wasn't time to dress properly, so I banished the clothes to my bed, charmed them, then switched them with the threes I was wearing. There's never moments where I appreciate magic more than when I am rushed.
The officers were only filing into the Commodore's cabin when I joined the tail-end. Potioneer looked at me, eyes turned up like he'd just pissed vinegar.
There was a great long table in the centre of the room, over a middle-eastern carpet of some design. If the cabin wasn't magically expanded than I've no idea how the corvette contained enough space for all of us.
There were no place-cards, but Commodore shook our hands as we entered, standing in front of his two green coated stewards, and pointed us right – 'At the top, Captain, on my left' and 'Just here, Clarke,' – fortunately, Potioneer and I were opposites, not next to one another.
We sat together, the Commodore, the Captains, the Lieutenants and the First Ushers, the medical officers and the Captains-of-the-marines. Apparently the Chaplain and the Commodore never dined together. Never found out why.
There was silence on being seated, two stewards placed toasting glasses and filled them, before Morgrave spoke.
"Tudor glass," he said, "from an auction at the Athenaeum. They made them with sand from the Thames in a kiln charmed by the king himself."
One of the Captains seated at his left picked up his glass and turned it under the light, nodding his head a little. He placed it down to silence again.
The glasses were filled and Morgrave stood.
"The loyal toast, before dinner," he said, "on the night of our first sailing."
A steward plucked out a few verses on a violin and the anthem was sung.
"The Queen!" said Morgrave, and we downed our drinks. They were refilled.
"The Duke, the Princess Royal and all her royal family." We downed them again. They were refilled.
"Who's youngest then?" he asked. He gestured at my end of the table.
"Twenty-three" said a Captain-of-marines.
"Twenty-four," said a Lieutenant.
"Twenty-three," I said, "March."
"January," the Captain replied, and bowed his head to me.
I stood, careful not to knock my head on the strut that ran above my chair. I raised my glass.
"To our wives and sweethearts," I said.
"May they never meet!" came the reply. Morgrave slammed a flat palm on the table. There was a cheer and some laughter. Ever a popular one.
"To dinner!" cried Morgrave.
Supper was served français, which was a pleasant surprise for me.
Anything which reminds me of Hogwarts is always a treat.
There was a great big wobbly jelly in the middle of the table and then dishes all scattered around, and for a brief while all was quiet while people served themselves.
It was very good food, for at sea. The benefit of being on the Mediterranean without much fear of starvation. First it was prawns with a honey glaze, then a puree with chorizo and meatballs and fancy rabbit-leaves that floss your teeth when you chew them – which is the only reason I imagine anyone would include them. Then it was good roast beef, lamb, and decent stodge. Normally, muggle folk have just a hint of wariness around a cursebearer. I tried to do their concern justice by covering my whole course in mint sauce.
Morgrave was a surprisingly attentive host, if still as fierce as ever. Between monologues he was constantly snapping his fingers at the stewards, for any glass that had been dry longer than a few moments.
No matter how much he drank, his a-little-too-loud voice never wavered, never became obviously drunk. A true Navy man.
It became clear to me then overhearing his conversation, consciously, that the man loved history the way another man might love shooting or skiing.
"When we finish at Cairo, I'm going south," I said, too loudly, "to Helwan and the ruins of Memphis."
This was a relative non-sequitur. At my end of the table we had been talking about the travelling Lieutenant's time in the Americas—'Cairo? I'm supposed to be disembarking at Alexandria'.
"They say it's where proper, formal magic was first done."
If Morgrave heard, he gave no sign
"Do you know," I said, "Flinders Diggory breached the great temple spell, less than a week before Grindelwald swept west over Egypt."
The young Captain of the Marines broke off his conversation to turn to me.
"The Hut-ka-Ptah? Impossible."
A stumble, at the first moment. I wouldn't've predicted an amateur Egyptologist among our company.
"Diggory, Flinders Diggory, the cursebreaker? Who said that?" said Morgrave.
I indicated it was myself.
"What's this about Diggory?" he asked. "I saw him speak at the Crystal Palace, once. Hell of a man. Hell of an adventurer."
"The best," I agreed, "The temples at Memphis. It's a tragedy, those ruins he opened and was forced to keep secret. Whatever treasures inside left to rot, now open to the air."
One of the corvette Captains sighed loudly. I was calling down the table. There was a lull.
"Cursebearer, come sit here. Captain shuffle down."
I did as instructed. He preferred to talk than to listen but over several hours I spoke to him about the treasures of Memphis, just waiting to be plucked up.
I kept my voice low so that the Captain-of-the-Marines didn't overhear. Morgrave believed every word.
We made good speed over the Mediterranean and there were no obvious difficulties as the squadron pulled further away from the main flotilla. We sliced past Alexandria, to make on to the fattest strand of the Nile's Delta.
It got hot. The crack of rifles could sometimes be heard inland, as we skirted the coast. Sometimes we heard the boom of great guns. A flagship or a battery firing at something in the far distance.
It was good, we were untroubled until we reached the river water. There were cries to the Ushers, cries from the Ushers and all the crew rushed around preparing for the change from green water to brown. The stilts folded and the ship's hull slapped deeper into the water. We were crossed into river water, and charms would fail before long.
The Nile is the greatest river in the world. The most magical, certainly. Truthfully, there wasn't a difference that I could feel on reaching it, no great current of magic swirling around me, urging me on towards my destination.
Still, I looked at the water, I moved my hand in the air, and I imagined it, all the magic of the greater part of Africa flowing past me and I felt one of those moments where you really feel connected to the world. And, rarer still, a moment in which that was a good thing. To be a man but also a part of nature.
It took no more than two minutes for the sea charms to wick away and then there was a slight lurch, like stepping off ice onto carpet, and the world had that much more hold of us.
It took twice as long to reach sight of Cairo and Giza as it had for the ship to cover all the distance from Alexandria to the river mouth. On the banks there was far more green than expected. Everything was alive, and thriving. This was a great difference from the war seen in France, or at the margins of the Iberian peninsula. No craters, no warp of dark spell-fire, no splintered, blasted trees.
But then came the thunder of a great gun, then later still the great shudder of its shell landing somewhere out to the east of the delta.
The Pyramids rose into view gradually. Monumentally huge, dwarfing the city they overshadowed but could not turn the eye from the thick smoke that covered all in a shroud.
We weren't called to the briefing. Morgrave had no interest in the city, not as long as he could travel through it. When we reached the city docks we slunk past.
If Morgrave had informed them of our intentions, I am unaware. Perhaps the command knew. The Union Flag swung free over the port and several nearer portions of the city and soldiers lined the walls, cheering at us as we passed, at first. As the first ship travelled beyond them, then the second, the third, the fourth they quieted.
I watched the smoke recede into the distance.
Whatever essential business he had now concluded, Morgrave came to stand near me at the fore-deck. His Lieutenant stood beside him.
"Not long now," he said to his officer, "Mr. Jones, you've our handshake loaded? Good man."
"I have, Commodore." He pulled out his logbook from a pocket at his breast. "There may not be significant resistance at Memphis, you're certain there's no need of a reserve for Cairo? It looked pretty hairy there. More Hun around than expected."
Commodore flapped a hand at him.
"Curse!" His bicorn hat turned towards me. "Ready for some action?"
"Always, sir," I replied.
"Excellent," he said, "I'll have you accompany me when we land."
"Accompany you, sir?"
"Into the great temple, chap! I reckon you're more cut out for this work than Potioneer."
My plan worked too well.
"Commodore Morgrave, my mission is to join up with the river patrol and travel on."
"Nonsense," he said, "come along, Mr. Jones, Mr. Clarke. Best view will be on the bridge."
"Sir," I said, "my mission."
"First men to step into the Great Temple of Memphis. Now there's a mission."
"First Potione⸺"
"The chap doesn't know his arse from his elbow. We'll need you for whatever little curses lie inside. Now there's a mission with chest-hair."
We had reached the stair by this point. We clattered up the metal steps into the bridge. The windows commanded a view over the whole of that squat town. Morgrave continued,
"No, you stay with me. You're not getting through here until it's squared away."
The lieutenant met my eyes. He shrugged. Morgrave did what he wanted.
The deep rumble of the ship's motor stilled and slowly we came to a stop in the middle of the river.
"Make our introductions, men," said Morgrave.
We were by the west bank, closer to the ruins of Memphis. Opposite, over the swollen nile, Helwan, where most of the Egyptians lived and perhaps some small European force.
The guns turned to fire. It was a strange shot. They fired once, over the city. Then Ushers stood to and cast charms that caught them while they were high. Gusts and banishers and simple magic.
Lieutenant Jones must have seen my confusion. "We got our hands on a decent whack of Unctuous Unction at Gibraltar," he said.
Commodore Morgrave took down the microphone that allowed him to order to the ship, speakers now turned towards the city across the river.
"People of Helwan, please head to the Docks in an orderly fashion. You will not be harmed. You will be safe. Please head to the Docks."
He threw the speaker back to his man, and waved a finger in the air to say 'keep it playing'.
"Come on, then. Landing party, let's explore!"
"Commodore," said the Lieutenant, "should we begin shelling the city?"
Morgrave looked at him. "Shell the city? While we ask the civvies to come to the river-dock? Absolutely not! You sicken me, Lieutenant. You are the lowest of the low. You're off the shore team."
"Sir," he said.
There was my out, I thought, though I wasn't happy to use it.
"Commodore," I began, "perhaps some spell-fire to the city, to encourage them along in good fashion?"
Morgrave scratched his chin. But he wasn't even listening, I realised. He was looking out the west window at the squat temple some miles distant, and the sand-blasted pillars sticking out like little errant hairs.
"What do you think, Curse? Do you like the look of those ruins? Reckon they've cooked up some fierce ancient spells? I want an adventure, mind you. Something to talk about, something to interest the Royal Society."
To me it just looked like ruins. Evidence of the futility of trying to hold Egypt, or any land, for a length greater than the span of one man's life.
"Yes, there'll be some curses," I said.
He slapped my arm with the back of one hand. "Let's go."
Some of us trooped out with him, down the stairs. On the deck, Potioneer glared at me from his place besides the half-rods as I left him behind. We were half way down the boarding ramp when Lieutenant Jones' voice came over the speaker.
"Hun in the square, Commodore."
I can't imagine that the Lieutenant heard Morgrave's response. But the veins on his neck must have been visible. And the composure of his face.
"Ready to fire," came the Lieutenant's voice.
We stepped down into Egypt as the barbettes of all four ships started shelling. Deafeningly loud.
Morgrave turned to me. He waved his arms like a conductor.
"I love it," he shouted, "that sound. That great big sound. There's nothing quite like it." He held a hand to his chest: where that rumble was passing through him. So large and so terrible that you did more than hear it. "It feels like making the world anew.
"Come on," he said, heading towards where his marines were securing the dock.
I waited until he was a few steps ahead of me. Then I did something reckless. I focused on the east bank, twisted and held my thumb to my wand. With a pop, I apparated across the Nile, like some feckless daredevil.
For my troubles my eyebrow was splinched and there was a little off the skin off a finger, but I was otherwise unscathed.
This far across the river, I could only make out the rough movement of the landing party. If they were alarmed, I couldn't tell, perhaps I am painting an impulsive picture. I am not sure. I drew my wand and cast the summoning charm. After a moment, Morgrave's bicorn hat came into view. I snagged it under one arm, turned my back on the bombing of the docks and ran south, out of Helwan, too wise to try apparating again.