2. Cardinalius

The four wizards apparated just below the brow of a steep hill. Harry looked out into the darkness and could see only twinkling lights climbing the far side of the valley. What lay below them was unfathomable in the night. The wizards slowly made their way up the remaining heights of the hill, with more than one foot slipping on the wet grass. They hauled each other up onto the flat land at the top of the hill, only to find their way blocked by wrought-iron railings running from left to right in front of them. Beyond the railings was a steep, narrow street ascending the hill in terraces, lined with rows of stone houses with slate roofs, glistening under the streetlights from a recent downpour.

'Where are we?' said Harry.

Caius pulled his wand out from his jacket and discretely cast an enchantment. A little gate appeared in the railings. Caius pushed on the gate and it swung open. He turned to Harry and smiled, his face pale under the streetlight.

'Home, for the time being.'

Caius opened the door of a terraced house and the wizards stepped into a narrow hallway. The living room door was ajar, and the flickering light from a television illuminated the walls of the hall and stairs, which were covered with ancient-looking wallpaper. The television set was turned up loud, and what sounded like a late night talk show was blaring out of the speakers.

'Uncle Glynn?' Caius shouted through the door. 'It's me. I brought a few friends round. We're going upstairs'

'Just as you wish,' came a booming voice over the din of the television.

They did their best to arrange themselves around Caius' cramped bedroom. Henoc and Caius sat on the bed, while Ilaria and Harry sat cross-legged on the floor. The room was decorated with equally ancient wallpaper and an oil painting of a cocker spaniel hung over the bed.

'Your dog?' asked Harry, gesturing at the painting.

'The General,' replied Caius.

'The General?'

'He was my grandfather's dog. Lysander Hanmer, Lysander the Drygue. Head of the Coven of the White Tooth. His painting is downstairs in the living room.'

Harry looked at him blankly. Caius tutted.

'You don't know your wizarding history very well, Harry,' he remarked.

Harry smiled in spite of himself. How many times has Hermione told me that?

'What is the Coven of the White Tooth then?' asked Harry.

'You'll just have to go and look it up in a library.' Caius had jumped to his feet and was stalking the cramped bedroom with an air of mock pomposity. 'I fear I couldn't do something as illustrious as the Coven of the White Tooth justice.'

'The Coven of the White Tooth was founded by Lysander Hanmer in nineteen err … twenty …' began Ilaria in a bored voice, as if reciting a story she had heard many times.

'1928,' Caius chipped in solemnly.

'1928,' Ilaria continued, 'after a wizard was murdered by a mob in a village in … Cheshire I think, wasn't it?' She turned to Caius, who was listening with some satisfaction.

'Quite right Ilaria, thank you,' he replied. 'See Harry,' he continued, 'over time there've been lapses in the protection of the wizarding world.'

'I know,' replied Harry.

Wiping the minds of Muggles who inadvertently witnessed magic was not always easy. Sometimes people were missed. Such people quite understandably became firm believers in the existence of magic. Some liked the idea. Others abhorred it.

'Back in my grandfather's day,' Caius continued, 'one slip and the villagers were at your door, pitchforks at the ready. So after the Farndon lynching, my grandfather set up a Killk, to protect wizards in his local area.

'A what?' said Harry.

'A Killk. A coven,' Caius replied. 'Like a sort of little wizarding militia. They operated locally at first, but after a while they were getting called out all over the country.'

'And what happened to this Coven?' asked Harry. He didn't remember hearing of it at school or afterwards at the Ministry. Hermione would know though.

'The Ministry improved its protection of wizards, so there was no longer a need to call on my grandfather,' replied Caius. 'Still, if all of a sudden the Ministry was able to offer such top-rate protection spells, you have to wonder why they hadn't done a better job until then.'

'Caius thinks the Ministry felt threatened by the Coven, so they were forced to offer better protection,' added Henoc.

'That's exactly what did happen,' retorted Caius.

'If it was that important,' Harry commented, 'you'd think it would be better known.'

'Yeah, like the Ministry is going to advertise its own past shortcomings,' Caius replied.

Harry decided that he would definitely ask Hermione. She hadn't even seemed to judge him for hanging out with Slytherins.

'So what happened to the Coven after that?'

Caius seemed more serious, for once.

'It became more like a society that met at my grandfather's house, studying wizarding heraldry and preserving ancient incantations that were being forgotten.'

They sound like Sirius's family.

'But eventually they stopped meeting,' he continued. 'The original members started to die, and not many new ones joined. My father wasn't interested, for one.'

'Did it stop meeting when your grandfather died?' asked Ilaria in a hushed voice.

'It had already stopped by then,' Caius replied, seemingly not wanting to add anything more on the subject.

A few moments of silence passed in the cramped bedroom.

'So is your uncle a wizard?' asked Harry, partially changing the subject.

'Squib,' Caius replied nonchalantly, his sombre tone gone. 'He keeps a spare room for me here, which is ready anytime I get tired of London and I don't feel like going back to my parents.'

'What's the problem with your parents?' asked Harry.

'Oh nothing in particular,' Caius replied. 'It's just that whenever I go back, they're on me in two seconds, pestering me to do something with my life.'

Harry wasn't sure exactly what it was that Caius did with his life. Nor Henoc and Ilaria, for that matter.

'But enough of my biography,' Caius said with a flourish. 'Who fancies a drink?' He drew his wand from his pocket, and with a little swish, produced a tall glass bottle containing a black liquid, which floated in the air between them.

'Dementico?' asked Ilaria.

'It is indeed,' said Caius, who grabbed the bottle out of the air and uncorked it. 'Also known as green horse juice. A few mouthfuls of this and you'll be doing well if you remember who you are tomorrow morning.'

'Doesn't look very green to me,' remarked Harry.

'It's so called because it might cause you to see green horses on the walls,' replied Henoc by way of explanation.

'More of that later,' Caius exclaimed, once again producing his wand from his pocket. This time he conjured a small, oval object that rotated silently in mid-air. The object, made of highly polished wood and covered in intricate carvings, comprised two interlocking and calibrated pieces that fitted together. As the object rotated, the two interlocking pieces themselves turned, but in different directions. Mounted on the top of the object was what looked like a tiny gargoyle made of wrought iron. The gargoyle had staring eyes and seemed to be sticking out its long tongue, which took the form of an arrowhead.

'We could just pass the bottle around, but to liven things up a little, this Cardinalius here will choose the order in which we drink, based on certain criteria.'

'What criteria?' asked Harry, who had never come across the object before.

'The Cardinalius ranks objects, or people, according to its reading of certain aspects of their personality', explained Henoc. 'For example, it selects a category, let's say selfishness for example, and ranks those present according to how selfish they are. Then it swivels round and points to the one who's the most selfish.'

'And the lucky winner gets to take a swig from the bottle,' said Caius.

'How do we know what characteristic we're being ranked by?' asked Harry.

'Look over here, Harry,' said Ilaria, pointing to a tiny plate made of what looked like ivory, mounted on the Cardinalius. 'There's a little dial, which clicks round and indicates the characteristic that has been chosen. There are dozens.'

'How come I never heard of this object before?'

'Being such a subtle piece of machinery, it's pretty rare and expensive. Slytherin people know about it because there's one sitting in a glass cabinet in the Slytherin common room. When you get to year six you can get it out and use it, with the permission of the Head of the House.'

Harry smirked at Ilaria.

'Professor Snape let you use it?'

She smirked back.

'Of course. He used it himself sometimes.'

'Is that right? And Professor Snape used to brew up the odd bottle of Dementico himself too, I suppose?' he remarked.

Ilaria smiled back at him with an air of mock innocence.

'He was known to take the odd swig of it now and then.'

'Really,' said Harry doubtfully, trying to picture Professor Snape in a state of discrete inebriation after a tipple during a quiet moment alone in the Slytherin common room.

'Somehow it sounds just like the kind of object that you would find in the Slytherin common room,' he continued drily.

Caius sat down in front of him and looked him straight in the eye.

'Harry, tonight we will initiate you in the ways of Slytherin house.'

Everyone laughed loudly at this. Caius clapped his hands.

'Enough talking! Let's wind up the mechanism.' He clicked his fingers and the Cardinalius started to wind itself up in mid-air, clicking as it went. Finally the clicking stopped and the Cardinalius stood still, hovering patiently. A little bell could be heard, and the dial whirled around, revealing the selected category.

Infatuation.

'Ah, an interesting start,' said Caius. 'Let's see which of us is the most infatuated. Shame the Cardinalius can't tell us the object of that person's affection. If there's a tie, both people selected have to drink.'

Once again the Cardinalius began to rotate, this time making a low whirring noise. Harry could make out a little pointer spinning around. After a few seconds, it stopped in mid-air, with the arrow pointing at Ilaria. The boys all roared with laughter and Ilaria blushed. Ruefully she grabbed the bottle of Dementico out of the air and took a long swig, throwing back her head theatrically. She let go of the bottle, wiping a little trickle of black liquid from her lips. Everyone applauded.

The Cardinalius began to wind itself up again.

Might.

The little object set itself in motion, rotating until it settled on Henoc.

Henoc gave himself a discrete cheer of self-approval under his breath and gave a little wave of acknowledgement to the gathered company. He seized the bottle and took a vigorous swig from it.

The Cardinalius went back into operation. Everyone listened closely for the bell.

Timidity.

Again it whirred around and around, until the pointer selected Caius. Everyone fell about laughing, except Caius, who looked a little taken aback. Then his face broke out into a grin and he drank deeply.

'Again!' he shouted.

This time the Cardinalius wound itself up more deliberately, taking a longer time to make its selection.

Disenchantment.

The Cardinalius spun into action, rotating rapidly as it flew past each of the four wizards in turn, over and over again. Then it began to slow, fixing finally on Harry.

He couldn't help feeling a little uncomfortable. The others laughed and Ilaria cast him a knowing look that he pretended not to notice.

'Disenchanted with what?' he asked quietly.

'You tell us, Harry,' said Henoc.

'I'm the last person with anything to complain about,' Harry retorted.

'Your life must almost be perfect, then,' Ilaria remarked, her eyes probing him for a reaction.

'I wouldn't say that,' he replied, as nonchalantly as possible.

'Time to take your medicine, Harry,' said Caius. 'You may even feel less disenchanted.'

Harry reached for the bottle. It was warm in his hand. He raised it to his lips and took a long mouthful. The drink was thick and sweet, tasting something like distilled marzipan, and burned his throat on the way down. He stared at the threadbare brown carpet he was sitting on, his head spinning.

'See any green horses yet?' Through the dizziness he heard Henoc's voice not far from him.

He sat up and looked around. The three Slytherin wizards were all grinning at him, and Caius was waiting to set the Cardinalius back in motion. They made a charming trio, crammed onto the floor of Uncle Glynn's spare bedroom, slightly intoxicated and grinning beneath the painting of the proud General.

They continued for a second round. The Cardinalius selected Henoc for vanity and Caius for indolence. Then it selected Ilaria and Harry jointly for nostalgia. Once again Harry seized the black bottle from the air and took another long mouthful. Once again the drink scoured his throat on its way down. He wiped a remainder of the sticky black liquid from his mouth. His head reeled and he leaned his back against the wall behind him. He closed his eyes and the sensation of dizziness intensified. Then suddenly the sensation lifted and Harry heard a woman's voice speaking faintly in his ear.

'What a beautiful, sad boy… How I'd love to know your name.'

At first he was silent. The strange voice didn't repeat its wish to know his name, but he couldn't help stammering out 'Harry Potter,' in reply anyway. A peal of laughter erupted around him. He opened his eyes. It was just Caius and Henoc.

'I see you're having trouble remembering who you are already, Harry,' said Caius with a smirk.

Harry swayed to his feet, Ilaria following him with her eyes as he did so.

'I'm just going outside for a bit,' he began hesitantly. 'To get some air.'

He walked out of the bedroom and down the narrow staircase. The television was still blaring from the front room as he came down into the hall. This time he headed not for the front door but towards the back of the house. He passed through a darkened kitchen, turned the key in the back door and went out into the backyard.

The yard was about twenty feet long and mostly paved over. In one corner stood a dilapidated shed. A pair of bicycles were propped up against the back wall and the entire space was scattered with packing crates. To one side of the yard was a small, overgrown lawn. Harry stepped onto the grass and sank to his knees. The night air was cool and his head felt clearer, but his legs buckled under him and almost immediately he dropped down onto the damp grass.

He lay on his back, the grass brushing against the nape of his neck, and looked up into the dark sky. The clouds had lifted in one sector of the sky, uncovering a bank of stars, which pulled in his gaze. His eyelids began to droop and he felt himself slowly slipping unconscious.

Suddenly he found himself looking out to sea from the edge of a low hill. Below him the hill descended a short distance to a pebble beach. The sky was overcast and the sea a disconsolate grey-green. A breeze had got up, and the sea writhed and turned in on itself, as wave after wave broke against the beach, then withdrew with a hissing sound. He looked along the line that divided the land from the water, which curved round to form a bay. The bay ended in a low headland, and just beyond it lay a small, rugged island. He felt a great longing to step off the mainland and onto the island. Although the island lay at least fifty feet offshore, Harry felt confident that all it needed was a determined footstep and he would reach it.

The island seemed quite desolate. Low, shattered cliffs rose above and hemmed in a narrow pebble beach, and above them the island spread away into the distance, covered with nothing more than a blanket of gorse. The wind whipped around him and down below the sea continued to churn and writhe, but on the island nothing stirred.

He stretched out his leg and straight away brought it down on the other side of the water, on a patch of bare earth high above the shore. He steadied himself and climbed the remaining few feet to the summit of the island. From there he could see the rest of the island quite easily: it ran in undulating, gorse-covered mounds and hillocks to the sea on the far side, covering no more than a few square miles in total. In the air all around him he could smell rosemary. The place seemed quite uninhabited. This suited him. He looked back for an instant: the mainland behind seemed dull and distant. He sat down just to the side of a tangled, overhanging bush and looked up to the sky, revelling in the stillness.

Feeling a warm wind start to blow in the air around him, he scrambled to his feet. Standing before him was a tall, black-haired woman with strange green eyes. She wore black robes that seemed to glisten and swirl as if somehow alive. She smiled at him.

'Harry Potter,' she said, 'Welcome to your domain. Do with it what you wish.'

'I have big plans for this place as it happens,' he replied.

'I'm sure you do.'

'By the way,' said Harry. 'No offence, but what are you doing on my island?'

The woman looked at him serenely.

'Oh I won't stay long,' She glanced about her. 'What a beautiful spot,' she added. 'And so peaceful. If this was mine I'd never want to leave it.'

Harry followed her gaze over the sides of the island and out into the churning grey sea that surrounded it. She's right. It's the perfect place to shut out the world.

'Here no one will bother you,' said the woman.

'That sounds good,' he said.

'And you won't have to worry about trying to be who they want you to be.'

'So much the better.'

'And all those bad memories will be left behind on the mainland.'

'What about the good memories?'

She smiled.

'Whatever you want to reach you here will reach you. Whatever you want to keep away will not pass the sea.'

He took a deep breath. He felt more relaxed already. Then he reached into his pocket for his wand. Fortunately it was where it was supposed to be.

'Well then,' he said. 'I should be getting started.'

The woman nodded and smiled, bowing her head slightly.

'Goodbye, Harry Potter,' she said, and then she was gone.

An unknown length of time passed, during which Harry busied himself with the transformation of his island. Now the waves broke on sandy beaches, and beyond them dunes rose in shimmering lines to the sea of tall grasses he caused to grow in place of gorse and bracken, swaying in the steady breezes that enveloped the island. Here and there little copses of trees provided shelter. In one of them, near to the island's centre, a spring began to gush from the rock and flow in a little stream down to the sea. There, by the spring, he would lie in the grass beneath the branches of the stunted trees and listen to the sound of the water.

More time seemed to pass. Suddenly he became enraged at what he found around him. He took out the wand and began to stalk the island, setting everything before him ablaze. The fires raged on all sides of the island until he tired and he sat on the beach until they went out. Then he walked about the smouldering ruins of all that lived on the island and set about cultivating it anew. And the dunes rose higher, and the grass more luxuriant, the trees grew broader and taller and their foliage denser.

For a long time he remained alone. One day after walking the island, he returned to the copse, only to find a young woman kneeling before the spring. She was pale and thin, with long blonde hair and blue-grey eyes, and wore a long dress of brocaded silk that shimmered silver in the shade of the copse. She looked up at him and smiled.

'Forgive this intrusion.'

She spoke with the voice of Hermione.

'I've been waiting for you to return, to ask your permission to drink from this spring, to quench my thirst. I am so thirsty.'

'Please drink,' he said, 'but first, if you don't mind my asking, how did you get here?'

'I came from the land behind you,' she said, and just beyond her shoulder in the distance he saw the towers of a city. 'I was walking in the wood in the early morning, when a rider on horseback came galloping towards me through the trees. The rider told me that the wood I was walking in was a private hunting ground, and that the lord of the manor and his hounds and riders were even now bearing down on this very spot. He warned me that the lord of the manor took whatever living thing he found in the wood for game and would be sure to hunt me down. I thanked the rider, and he raced away. Straight away I turned and began to flee, but soon I heard horses and dogs behind me. They pursued me relentlessly. Before they could reach me I ran out of the wood and found myself at the water's edge. Rather than face them – I never caught sight of their faces – I jumped into the sea and swam away. The first land I came upon was your island. So here I am. Does this answer please you? May I drink from the spring?'

'Please,' he said and gestured for her to drink.

She lowered her head to the stream and cupped her hands to gather some water. She began to drink, but as she did so, blood began to pour from her chest. Harry walked up to her and touched her arm.

'You're hurt,' he said, pointing to the wound in her chest.

'One of the hunters' arrows pierced me,' she said. She raised her hand to her chest and pulled a long arrow from the wound there. The flow of blood stopped. She held the arrow up to him.

'See what cruel weapons they use: this arrow is wrapped in barbed wire.'

He looked at the arrow, and so it was. She handed him the arrow, then knelt again to drink. Again as she drank, blood began to course once again from the wound in her chest. She drank deeply, and then lay down by the side of the stream, her dress now completely soaked with blood. Harry knelt down beside her.

'Is there anything I can do for you?'

'No,' she said in a quiet voice, 'I don't feel so thirsty now. May I rest here in the shade?'

'You seem very weak,' he said, taking out his wand. 'I could cast a healing spell. I'm quite good at magic. I'm sure I could help you.'

'There's no need,' she replied, 'I've trespassed here too much already. But if you don't mind, I'll just lay here with my hand in the stream, so the water can rush over it.'

She stretched her pale hand into the water, and turned away from him on her side. Her eyes were closed, the grass beneath her smeared with blood. He tried to rouse her. She made no movement but her eyes flickered open.

'You want to be alone,' she said. 'This is your place of solace.'

Her face suddenly turned an even paler, sicklier shade and her eyes ceased to focus on him.

'No, you can stay here,' he replied, more and more worried.

'I can't,' she replied. 'This way isn't open to me. The darkness has closed it.'

She was gone from beside the spring.

'Come back!' he cried. 'Hermione, is that you?'

'She's not here,' came another voice.

The island had vanished. Harry opened his eyes. He was sprawled on the grass in the backyard under the night sky. Ilaria was looking over him, concern in her eyes.

'Harry, are you feeling ok? The Dementico seems to have had a bad effect on you.'

'I'm fine,' he said in a strangled voice, his throat seemingly still full of the viscous liquid.

'Can you get up?' she asked, offering her hand to help him.

'I'm fine,' he mumbled again, but took her hand anyway and pulled himself to his feet.

They stood in the yard looking at each other for a minute.

'I had some weird sort of dream, or hallucination,' said Harry. 'Is that normal?'

'It can happen,' said Ilaria, touching his arm as if to steady him. 'Do you want to come back inside?'

Harry looked around, and then down at his watch.

'I'd better go home,' he said finally.

She looked disappointed

'You know best, Harry.'

'Tell Caius and Henoc I'm sorry,' said Harry. 'Contrary to appearances, I can hold my drink. Don't let them make fun of me too much.'

'Don't worry, I'll put in a good word for you,' she said, smiling.

'I'll see you around,' said Harry.

'Bye Harry,' she said, and kissed him impetuously on the cheek. That's the second time she's kissed me this evening. He waved to her and then disapparated.