Chapter 8: Seeing Things and Hearing Things
Hermione arrived at Secret Room Number Eight that evening after Harry, Ron, Neville, and Ivy had already assembled there. She was carrying a library book of only moderate thickness, /Madcap Magic for Wacky Warlocks/.
"That's never got eight hundred pages," said Ron in disbelief.
"Not even close," said Hermione. "But it starts on page 734."
"That's really sneaky. I bet even Fred and George wouldn't have thought of that."
"I remember noticing it last year when we were looking for a spell to help Harry with the Second Task of the Triwizard Tournament. And you know what else?" she demanded.
"Not until you tell us."
"I found the Bubble-Head spell for breathing underwater in more than one of those books we checked last year. You know, the one some of the other champions were using. There's no reason we shouldn't have found it then."
"Actually, there is a reason," said Harry. He and Ron said in unison, "Dobby."
"Honestly, I'd rather have him for an enemy," Ron said, shaking his head. "What did he do, bewitch the entire library?"
"Can house-elves really do that?" asked Harry.
"Oh, I could tell you stories about our house-elves that would curl your hair," said Ivy. "But I want to know what's on page 818."
"Oh, that. Well, it's the last page of a section on how to make mirror-doubles. I'll show you on something simple." Hermione put the book on the table and produced an apple from her robes. Secret Room Number Eight was furnished with a large oval mirror in a carved frame, and Hermione went over to it. "This works with any ordinary mirror. It doesn't need to be a magical one."
"It works with a magic mirror too, dear," said the mirror. "I'd be happy to demonstrate."
Hermione held up the apple so that everyone in the room could see it reflected in the mirror. She turned it to expose all of its sides to the mirror. Then she took her wand and pointed it at the reflected apple. "Carpe Veritatem!" she chanted. The reflected apple sailed out of the mirror in a high arc, and Harry, instinctively moving into position, caught it as if it were a Snitch. It felt solid and real, and looked completely normal. But when he sniffed it cautiously, it smelled like no apple he had ever eaten. He placed it carefully on the table, and Hermione set the original apple down next to it, turning it to show that each was a perfect mirror image of the other.
"Cool," said Ron. "Let me try that." He picked up the original apple and held it in front of the mirror, but no reflection of it appeared. His reflected hand was empty. "Wait a minute."
"We can't get an unlimited supply of apples that way, can we?" said Neville.
Hermione shook her head. "That's not the way it works. Ron, let me have the apple."
Ron came back to the table and tossed the apple down carelessly. Instead of bouncing, it crumbled into a heap of dust.
"Important lesson: when you make a mirror-double the original object is weakened," Hermione lectured. "It looks the same, but the double sucks most of the substance and reality out of it. If you want to reverse the spell and restore the original object the way it used to be, you have to handle it very carefully."
"Now that you mention it, that apple seemed lighter than it should have," said Ron, looking interested. Hermione took another apple from her robes and repeated the process. This time Ivy caught the mirror-double, and brought it over to the mirror. No image of either apple appeared in the glass.
Hermione touched the mirror-double with her wand. "Fallax," she said, and the double flew out of Ivy's hand and back into the mirror, where it settled into Hermione's reflected hand. "Now the original apple is back to normal, and I'll show you something else." Again she pointed her wand at the mirror image of the apple and said, "Carpe Veritatem," and again the mirror image came through the glass and landed in Ivy's hand. Hermione pocketed her wand, took the double from Ivy, and brought both apples back to the table. "Who has a knife?" she asked. Ron held up a pocket knife. "Cut the mirror-double into four pieces," she told him, and Ron did. "Now bring them to the mirror." Ron gathered up the pieces and sniffed them curiously. "Don't eat any of it," warned Hermione. "Strange things will happen to you if you do."
"What sort of things?" Neville wanted to know.
"First, everything will look backwards to you. The floor plan of Hogwarts will be reversed, most people will look like they're left-handed, and you'll have to hold your schoolbooks up to a mirror to read them. Scissors and screws will go the wrong way, and so will your quills. All of your food will taste very odd."
"No thanks." Neville hunched his shoulders.
"But will you look backwards to everyone else?" asked Ivy.
"The book doesn't say. Now," continued Hermione, "Ron, hold up one piece." He did so, and Hermione touched it with her wand and said, "Fallax." The quarter-double traveled through the mirror until it was opposite the real apple in Hermione's hand. "Now one-quarter of the real apple is back to normal," she said. She did the same to the other three quarters, one by one, and they fitted themselves together in the mirror. "Notice that the real apple looks just the same as it did before, and now it's as whole and strong as ever," she said, "but look carefully at the reflection." Harry, Ivy and Neville crowded close to the mirror to look.
"I see cracks in the reflection where it was cut," said Neville.
"As long as you have all the parts of the double, you can restore the original," said Hermione, putting the reconstituted apple away, "but not if any of the double is destroyed or changed. If you cooked a mirror-double, what you restored would look unchanged on the outside, but it would taste like a cooked apple, and its reflection would look like one."
"I'll bet Fred and George don't know any of this stuff," said Ron. "Think of the jokes they could add to their collection. Can't wait to give them a taste." He smirked in anticipation.
"So all of this is in the book, Hermione?" asked Ivy. She pulled /Madcap Magic for Wacky Warlocks/ towards her, turned to the right page, and studied it for a moment. "Oh, I should have expected this," she said, and held up the book to show the rest of them.
"Ruddy backwards," said Ron. "Of course."
"I used a hand mirror to read it," said Hermione. "It wasn't difficult."
Ivy looked thoughtful. She picked up the double to the first apple and held it up to the mirror. "This double does have a reflection."
"That's because the original was destroyed," said Hermione.
"And if I used the spell to make its reflection real, would it be just like the original apple?"
Hermione shook her head. "No, a double of a double has unpredictable properties."
"This I have to see," said Ivy, pointing her wand at the reflected apple. "Carpe Veritatem!" The apple obligingly popped out of the mirror and veered in Ron's direction. As soon as he caught it, the skin split into a mouth and the apple burst into song.
/Oh, I wish I were a really truly apple,
That is what I'd bloomin' like to be-ee-ee,
Cause if I were a really truly apple,
Everyone would want a bite of me!/
Ron almost dropped the apple. He stared at it in bemusement as it sang the song again. "Shut up," Ron told the apple after the third rendition, but it kept right on singing. Its voice was high and squeaky and quickly became annoying. "It's not going to happen, you know," said Ron, addressing the wish expressed in the song. "Can't you sing something different?" he pleaded. Apparently not. Ron shrugged and tossed the singing apple back to Ivy, who hastily fallax-ed it back into the mirror, where it mercifully subsided, although its mouth continued to grin at them with a hint of mischief.
"Believe it or not, you were lucky that time," said Hermione.
"Sometimes double-doubles blow up, glow in the dark, change colours, or turn into awful-smelling goo. The book admits that this area of magic needs more research."
"Way cool," said Ron.
"So are we ready to investigate the Marauder's Map?" asked Harry.
"The Marauder's Map is a magical object," said Hermione, "so it's more complicated. You'll see. Go ahead, Harry."
Harry took the map from his robes, unfolded it, and held it up to the mirror. The Sprinkling Can verse was still on it, and the mirror reflected it in a perfectly ordinary way. He turned the back of the parchment to face the mirror, and its reflection, like the original, was completely blank. "I reckon that would have been too easy," said Harry.
Next, he touched the parchment with his wand and spoke the words, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good!" The Marauder's Map appeared, and when Harry looked at its reflection in the mirror, the floor plan of Hogwarts was reversed as it should be, but the labeled dots on it were swarming around in confusion, hopelessly lost and disoriented. "Hmmm," said Harry, watching the dot labeled with a backwards "Severus Snape" abruptly leave his office, move quickly down the corridor, and suddenly stop short and turn the other way. The dots on the real map remained undisturbed.
"For some reason the people on the mirror-map aren't reversed," Ivy observed, looking over his shoulder, "even though their labels are."
Neville frowned as a thought came to him. "So if you made a mirror-double of the map …" He paused to work it out. " … Would the real Hogwarts look backwards to all the real people in it?"
"Maybe if you sent the real map into the mirror in its place," said Hermione.
"Oh, that's REALLY sneaky," said Ron in admiration.
"I'd better not," said Harry regretfully.
"Not unless you absolutely have to," Ron agreed.
Next, Harry turned the map so that the back of the parchment faced the mirror again. The reflection started out blank, but then words began to appear on it, words that were not reversed.
/Behind the Marauder's Map
Are you curious about the masterminds who created this amazing device?
Are you wondering who Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs really are?
Would you like to know more about them?
Well, have you tried doing what works on the front of the parchment on the back instead?/
"Actually," said Harry, "I haven't."
/Well, that was silly of you./
"I suppose it was," Harry admitted.
/So what are you waiting for?/
Harry shrugged and took the Marauder's Map back to the table, where he laid it face down. The back of it was still blank. He touched it with his wand and said the same spell that showed the map, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."
Nothing happened.
"Well, now I can answer 'yes' to the question the map's reflection asked me," said Harry a bit testily.
Hermione stopped him before he got up. "Wait, Harry. The map is already revealed. You could blank it first. Or why don't you try the spell for hiding it, on this side?"
"Why not?" Harry followed her second suggestion and tried again, this time using the words, "Mischief managed!"
Sure enough, the words Behind the Marauder's Map began appearing on the parchment, followed by the next three lines of writing they had read in the mirror. After /Would you like to know more about them?/ the script changed.
/Did you think it would be that easy? Now you say the password./
Harry thought about that for a while. Hermione started thumbing through Madcap Magic for ideas. Neville made an I-don't-know gesture and Ivy said, "Don't ask me. Ask the map."
With his wand still touching the parchment, Harry asked it, "What is the password?"
"/What is the password?" is the password./
The map continued at considerable length, and Hermione read the sentences aloud as they appeared.
/MOONY is R.L., a distinguished member of Ravenclaw House. Due to an unfortunate incident in childhood, R. has good reason to dread the full moon. R. excels in his Defense Against the Dark Arts classes, and we suspect we have seen him consorting with a Boggart on the school premises. He is extremely fond of his pet owl, Artemis. He is also quite musical and plays the hummonica. Moony drew the plan of Hogwarts for the Marauder's Map.
/WORMTAIL is the name taken by P.P. of Slytherin, due to the rat form he assumes as an Animagus. P. is also interested in learning about the Dark Arts. He and L. M. enjoy performing flaky experiments on their pet rats, as we have concluded after coming across some of their more peculiar results. Wormtail is responsible for making the Marauder's Map look like an ordinary piece of parchment and for creating the spells that hide and reveal its true nature.
/PADFOOT is S.B. of Gryffindor. He turns into a large, shaggy black dog when the mood strikes him. S. is a Beater on the Gryffindor Quidditch team. He is an avid reader of murder mysteries and owns a pet Fwooper. Padfoot found and drew the secret passages (complete with passwords) for the Marauder's Map, an undertaking requiring years of research and the ability to get himself out of more than a few tight spots.
/PRONGS is J. P., also a Gryffindor, whose animal form is that of a stag. J. is Quidditch captain and Seeker for the Gryffindor team. He is Head Boy at Hogwarts. He and L.H., who is Head Girl, are as spoony as can be, and we hope their future together will be long and happy. Prongs gave the Marauder's Map the power to indicate the name and location of everyone at Hogwarts. We still don't know exactly how he did this./
Harry passed the Marauder's Map around so the rest of them could study it in turn. Based on what she had recently learned, it didn't take long for Ivy to figure out that P. P. was Peter Pettigrew, S. B. was Sirius Black, and J. P. must be James Potter. Hermione explained Remus Lupin's part in the story to Ivy and Neville, telling them how the other three had become Animagi to keep him company during his werewolf time of the month. L. H. was, of course, Harry's mother, the future Lily Potter.
Ron was rereading the blurb about Wormtail. "'Flaky experiments on their pet rats … peculiar results,'" he muttered. "I'll bet you anything you like that L. M. is Lucius Malfoy. Those two must have been quite a pair."
"Draco mentioned to me that his father used to breed rats when he was a student at Hogwarts," Ivy recalled.
"Did Draco tell you what the old git did with them?" growled Ron.
"Not in detail," Ivy replied, avoiding a direct answer.
"Probably a lot of obscene, cruel, and disgusting things," Ron said bitterly.
Harry realized that he had momentarily forgotten Ivy's attachment to Draco Malfoy. He had an uneasy feeling that he would be forcibly reminded of it again before much longer, probably by Draco himself. Someday (still not yet, though) Harry would have to ask Ivy about what was between her and Malfoy. He wondered how much of what Ivy was learning would find its way into Malfoy's ear, and then reminded himself that there was no point in trying to keep from her anything she was determined to find out. He pictured her sitting in the closet, listening to the rest of them and busily putting two and two together. It was too late to exclude her now; it had been too late from the moment he sought her out. He had done so knowing he was taking a risk. Harry still wasn't sure how far he trusted Ivy. But he and his fellow Gryffindors were here now because she had been willing to introduce them to Salazara.
"It might help if you did find out—in detail," Harry said to her. "Especially if he happened to mention Pettigrew."
"I might," she said, looking at him as if she guessed his thoughts.
They discussed some of the other snippets of information the map had given them. Neville explained to Harry that a hummonica is an instrument that hums along when you play it. Hermione wondered what power James Potter had had that was a mystery even to his friends. (Harry wondered the same thing.) Then Harry addressed the map again. "Is there anything else you can tell us?"
/Pushy, aren't you? Not today./
"Okay," said Harry. "Fair enough." He tapped the parchment with his wand and said, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good!" The words on the back disappeared; then he turned the parchment over and spirited the map away with "Mischief managed!" He folded it and tucked it into his robes. "I'm convinced that this map has more to tell us," Harry said.
"There's a lot of things we haven't tried yet," agreed Hermione.
"So that's it for tonight, then?" said Ron. "What shall we do with this?" He picked up the mirror-double of the first apple. "We could just leave it lying around somewhere for some innocent student to find. Or some not-so-innocent student." His eyes brightened.
Hermione took the apple from Ron's hand and put it back on the table. "Fallax," she commanded it with her wand, and it sailed through the glass and landed next to its reflection on the table in the mirror. "Both of them should be safe there," she said. She picked up Madcap Magic for Wacky Warlocks and marched to the door. "When do you see Professor Snape again?" she turned back to ask.
"A week from tomorrow," said Harry. "Anyone who wants to come and join the fun and games is welcome."
"I second that," added Neville.
In the intervening week, Harry tried to put his extracurricular problems out of his mind and concentrate on his schoolwork, with imperfect success. He had decided to give the Marauder's Map some time off before he tried to wring any more information from it, but he couldn't help thinking about its description of Prongs. We hope their future will be long and happy. But thanks to Wormtail, James and Lily Potter's future had been short, ended by terror and violence. As Harry fed more batches of bright-red Jell-O to his fire crab, now apparently covered with rubies, he looked sidelong at Draco Malfoy, who tried to seem oblivious to him but wore an ominous expression of smug hostility. Draco and Ivy still sat together at meals, and appeared to be on good terms. He whispered in her ear a lot.
* * * * * * * *
When the Wednesday evening for Harry and Neville's session with Professor Snape came round again, Ivy, Ron, and Hermione all decided to go too. Confronted with five students where he expected two, the Potions Master raised his eyebrows in surprise and said, "What have we here? More students in need of my special services?"
"I invited them to come, sir," said Harry.
"So did I, sir," added Neville.
"Well, Miss Parkinson, Mr. Weasley, and Miss Granger," Professor Snape addressed the other three, "are you willing to participate in the exercises I will assign to Potter and Longbottom? They are neither easy nor pleasant, as I am certain they can tell you."
"That's why we're here, Professor," Ron said resolutely. "Hermione and I have already practiced the Tickling Charm and the Drenching Spell. And we know the Opposition Verse, too."
"I'm willing, Uncle Severus," said Ivy with a firm chin.
"Well, I suppose so," said Hermione doubtfully, looking as if she might regret deciding to come after all. Harry realized that Hermione was the only one there who didn't bear a personal grudge against Wormtail, although she had seen with her own eyes what a pitiful excuse for a wizard he was in his human shape. She was attending this session more out of curiosity than anything else; the rest of them had added incentive.
"Very well," said Professor Snape. "Today's lesson will be somewhat different from those we have had in the past. So far we have covered the use of the Opposition Verse as a defense against various short-acting spells and potions. Now I will introduce a spell of longer duration, against which the Opposition Verse will be of little use."
/Please, not a long-acting Sickening Potion/, Harry hoped. /Or a tickling charm either/.
"Your assignment will be simply to perform your daily activities under the effect of the spell. We wil begin with you, Potter." As usual. Snape raised his wand, and Harry felt a familiar dread. "/Phonoperpetuate!/" exclaimed the professor, and Harry waited for something to happen. Slowly he became aware that a tune was playing inside his head, a tune he didn't recognize. It started quietly and gradually grew louder. It sounded scratchy, as if a damaged record were being played on an old-fashioned record player, and every once in a while the needle skipped and a short phrase played itself over and over for a while, until finally the rest of the piece resumed and played to the end. Then the whole thing started over from the beginning.
"And I have to listen to this for how long?" Harry asked.
"You will return to this room tomorrow evening at this time to have the spell lifted," answered Professor Snape. He pointed his wand at each of the other students in turn and spoke the word "/Phonoperpetuate!/" four more times. Soon they all wore the same uneasy, vaguely preoccupied look that Harry sensed on his own face.
"Couldn't you have used a better-quality recording?" Hermione asked irritably, putting her hands over her ears in a futile gesture. "And I think the phonograph needs a new needle."
"Phonograph needles are hard to find these days, Hermione," Harry reminded her. "Most music shops don't sell them anymore." He remembered hearing Uncle Vernon complaining about this very thing when trying to enjoy his collection of long-playing vinyl records on the living-room stereo. Hermione looked at Harry in exasperated amusement.
"This is known as the Broken Record Spell," Professor Snape informed them all with satisfaction. "It is far more potent than Fwooper song in driving its victims to insanity. However, twenty-four hours of it will not put you in any serious danger of permanent derangement."
"What about temporary derangement, Uncle?" asked Ivy.
"It is a risk," he conceded, "but the educational benefits make it worthwhile. There are several things you can do to make the spell less burdensome, but you must discover them for yourselves. Do you have any more questions? Very well. That will be all. Class is dismissed until tomorrow evening."
"I can't believe I let myself in for this," groaned Ron, holding his head, as they left Secret Room Number Eight.
"As long as we get extra credit for it," said Hermione a bit grimly.
"Ivy's got to go it alone," Harry pointed out. "At least the rest of us can stick together."
Ivy shrugged. "Not a problem. I'll just go back to the Slytherin common room and act as if nothing's the matter."
"If anyone can do it, you can, Ivy," said Neville.
"Why don't you put the Broken Record spell on Draco Malfoy so he can keep you company?" suggested Ron. "I'm sure he'll love it. He's already deranged anyway."
The lone Slytherin parted ways with the four Gryffindors, who returned to Gryffindor Tower to take a half-hearted stab at doing homework. Ron muttered the Sprinkling Can verse to himself, but didn't find it very helpful. Hermione was determined not to let a little static set her back in her studies; she wrote steadily on a History of Magic essay with her lips set in a thin line, only to find when she read over her work that it made no sense at all. She flung down her parchment in disgust. "I'll do it in the morning," she decided.
"I wouldn't count on it, Hermione," said Harry, who was trying unsuccessfully to keep his mind on a reading assignment for Transfiguration class.
"Morning? What's that?" said Neville, who seemed to be having trouble keeping his parchment in focus. He had made a shambles of his essay, with some of the lines crossing over each other and even going off the edge of the parchment onto the table, and he was covered with ink blots. Ron took Neville's quill away from him and corked his ink bottle before he could do any more damage. They all decided to give it up as a bad job and go to bed.
Harry resigned himself to a sleepless night; any fleeting slumber that might come his way he would regard as a bonus. Sometime during the small hours he actually did doze off from sheer exhaustion, but the record continued to crackle away in his dreams. He woke up far too early and lay in bed wondering how long it would take for the spell to drive him over the brink of sanity. He dressed in the darkness and went down to the common room to find Hermione already there, taking another crack at her homework. She looked up when he came in and said excitedly, "Harry, I finally turned the record over!"
Harry rubbed his eyes. "Turned the record over?" he repeated. "How?"
"Yes, if you wait until the music ends, there's a moment when the static stops too, and if you picture pulling the record off the spindle and turning it over before the needle comes down again, you can get it to play a different tune, not quite so scratchy."
"Great, Hermione. Let me try it." Harry sat down in an armchair next to her and concentrated. The timing was crucial; he missed it on the first try, and had to wait through another rendition before he could make another attempt. Fortunately (or unfortunately) the record was a single, not an LP. Probably 45 RPM, too, Harry thought.
Ron and Neville appeared and Hermione told them, "Don't bother Harry; he's trying to turn over his record."
"Turn over his what?" Ron asked blankly.
Hermione sighed. "If you had taken Muggle Studies, Ron, I wouldn't have to explain to you about record players." She proceeded to do so, and then ended thoughtfully, "Whoever originated this spell must have been a student of Muggle artifacts."
"Like my Dad," said Ron.
"But with a much sicker and more twisted sense of humour," said Harry.
"Probably a Slytherin," Ron figured.
Harry said, "Wait … I think I've got it. Yes, I'm playing the other side of my record!" He hummed a bit of the new tune playing in his head.
"That's the one I've got," Hermione confirmed. "It won't take you long to get tired of that one too."
"Maybe I can find the volume control, or even pull the plug," said Harry hopefully.
"I never thought of records having two sides," said Neville.
They arrived at the Great Hall for breakfast early enough to watch most of the students come in. Hermione kept her eye on the entrance used by the Slytherins, and when Ivy appeared with dark-circled eyes, went over casually and said a few quiet words to her. Ivy nodded absently and sat down at the Slytherin table without seeing it. "She says she thinks she might be able to figure it out," Hermione reported to them when she got back to the Gryffindor table.
"If anyone can do it, she can," said Neville, watching Ivy with concern.
Harry forked up a slice of sausage and stopped with it halfway to his mouth. "Guess which class we have first today," he remembered suddenly.
"Double Potions with the Slytherins," sighed Ron.
"At least it's early in the day, so we can get it over with," said Hermione bracingly, as Neville turned white and put a forkful of scrambled egg back on his plate.
"I have to do better in Potions this term," said Neville. "I almost failed the last exam."
"You don't suppose Professor Snape will …" began Ron.
"Go easy on us? Not on your life," said Harry. "That would undermine the whole point of this exercise, as I'm sure he'd say if you asked him."
Ron and Neville still hadn't succeeded in turning their records when they got up and headed for the Potions classroom. "You've got to get it all the way off the spindle," Hermione coached them in a whisper as they walked along the corridor humming under their breaths, "and then flip it right away. Don't worry about putting it back on; the spell takes care of that."
As Harry had foreseen, Professor Snape was not disposed to be lenient. Neville didn't dare ask him to repeat his instructions; he had to rely on Dean and Seamus to fill in the parts he had missed. The other Gryffindors watched with growing puzzlement and the Slytherins with indredulous glee as the four of them blundered through the lesson, spilling ingredients, cutting their fingers, and adding things in the wrong order, in attempting to concoct a relatively simple slug-repellent potion. Even Hermione came to grief when she let her potion scorch on the bottom, something she had never done.
"I don't recall asking you to add human blood, Potter," Snape reproved, watching Harry's cut thumb drip into his cauldron. "I suppose you think you're advanced enough to invent something new instead of following instructions. Five points from Gryffindor."
"I suppose you think I did it on purpose," Harry retorted recklessly.
"What's the matter with you lot?" hissed Parvati as they left at the end of class. "Gryffindor's twenty points down."
"Nice going, Potter," sniggered Malfoy. "We hope you and your friends will keep it up, don't we, boys?" he asked Crabbe and Goyle, who chuckled and nodded agreement.
Fortunately Care of Magical Creatures didn't tax their powers of concentration too much. By this time they had switched colours of Jell-O to gain a better idea of whether the jewels on their fire crabs would change colour one at a time or all at once. Harry and Hermione skipped taking notes that day. Ron's fire crab wandered around eating the wrong flavours off the wrong plates, and he appeared not to hear his classmates shooing it away in annoyance. By the end of class Neville was covered with tutti-frutti Jell-O and had several marshmallows stuck to his robes.
At lunchtime Harry at last found the volume control and lowered the volume on his inner record player. This gave him temporary relief, but the music kept getting louder again and he had to turn it down repeatedly. He tried turning up to see if it would get quieter, but no such luck.
Throughout the interminable afternoon, during which he reversed his record several times, Harry kept himself going by counting down the time left until eight o'clock that evening. Six hours to go … Five hours to go …Four hours to go … They abandoned all pretense at functioning and sat through History of Magic in a glassy-eyed stupor. Fortunately this didn't make them stand out among their fellow fifth-years. As Ron pointed out after Professor McGonagall had sent them out of Transfiguration, thinking they must be coming down with something, it was a good thing Defense Against the Dark Arts didn't meet that day.
Harry, Ron, Hermione, Neville, and Ivy all arrived at Secret Room Numbe Eight that evening with commendable promptness. Ivy looked ready to drop. She sat down at the table and closed her eyes. Soon Professor Snape walked in, looking fresh and alert, and swept his eyes over his students' various signs of disintegration. Neville had laid his head down on his marshmallow-studded arms, Ron was absently shredding a scrap of parchment and whistling through his teeth with an edge of desperation, and Harry wore a large, clumsy bandage on his left thumb. Hermione's hair was bushier and her eyes wilder than usual. The Potions master said, "All of you will report on how you managed during the past day, and any discoveries you have made, before I lift the spell. Before we begin I would like to add that the only one of you who even came close to paying proper attention in Potions class was"—Hermione got ready to look modest—"Ivy Parkinson."
Ivy's eyes flew open. "I was?"
"Congratulations, Miss Parkinson, on exercising the discipline of dissimulation. Now who would like to begin?"
"I will," said Hermione without raising her hand. "Early this morning I discovered that I could turn my record over."
"Ah," said Snape, "and how many of the rest of you were able to listen to Side Two?"
Harry and Ivy raised their hands. Harry added, "But only after Hermione did it and told me how."
"Me too," said Ivy. "But it helped that I took Muggle Studies last year."
"Not many Slytherins do," said Hermione, "but they might be surprised at how useful it can be."
"Couldn't get it off the spindle," mumbled Ron. "Whatever that is."
"I'm not sure my record has an other side," said Neville, raising his head. "Whatever that is." He put his head down again.
"Can anyone report anything else of interest?" Snape asked.
"I turned down the volume," said Harry, "but it kept creeping up again."
"Very well," said Professor Snape. "You all did about as well as I expected, though I hoped for a better effort in keeping up appearances." He looked witheringly at Neville, who now sported a marshmallow on his cheek and another in his hair. "I will now lift the spell." He pointed his wand at each of them in turn and said, "/Phonoterminate!/" Sighs of relief filled the room. But when he got to Harry, he paused thoughtfully. "So, Potter, you located the volume control. Did you find it helpful?"
"A little," said Harry. "It's really stiff and hard to turn."
"In that case, Potter, you should have no trouble with another twenty-four hours of the spell," Snape told him. "The extra practice will be useful to you. You may return tomorrow evening to be released from it."
/No, please, sir/ … Harry clamped his jaw on the words before they could escape. He /wouldn't/ beg. Not anything for himself, and especially not from Snape. He stared back at the Professor, the music sizzling in his ears like frying bacon, and thought about giving Snape a good whack on the head with the hot frying pan, splattering him with hot bacon grease and strips of …
"No, he won't, sir," said Neville, breaking in on Harry's thoughts, "because you're going to end it tonight." He sounded quite certain of this.
Snape's wand changed direction until it pointed at Neville. "Perhaps you would like to try another day of it yourself, Longbottom."
Neville looked alarmed, but he didn't quail. "If Harry does, then so will I," he said.
"If you do, you'll make a complete fool of yourself, Longbottom," Snape predicted sourly. "Why, look at you now. Pathetic."
"That doesn't matter," said Neville. "Fair's fair."
Snape continued to glare at him. "Mr. Longbottom," he said coldly, "you persist in seeing this as a game. It is not. If Mr. Potter truly wishes to help your father, he cannot measure his trial by the clock. He cannot say, I will put up with it until eight o'clock, but no later, because then it must end. There is no telling when it will end." He spoke as if from bitter experience.
But Neville countered, "That's no excuse. The training isn't the the race, sir. And you gave your word."
Ron looked shocked and gratified. "That's the stuff, Neville," he breathed.
"Very well," said Professor Snape, "I don't recall making any guarantees, but I will lift the spell. I had no intention of doing otherwise, but I wanted to illustrate an important lesson first." He pointed his wand at Harry and said, "/Phonoterminate!/"
Finally, finally it was over. Harry sagged with relief, closed his eyes, and listened to the beautiful silence running like a cool river through his head. He started floating away on the sweet and gentle current …
"Harry? It's time to go. We're dismissed," said Ron, shaking his shoulder.
"Oh, okay," said Harry, rousing himself with difficulty.
"I hope to see all you at our next session," said Professor Snape.
"Not me," said Ron.
"As you wish," said Snape. "The advanced work we're doing is not for everyone."
Ron opened his mouth as if he might change his mind after all, but shrugged his shoulders and let it drop. The five of them filed out of the Secret Room, Neville walking a little taller than usual in his sticky robes.
"I didn't know you had it in you, Neville," said Ron, looking at his fellow Gryffindor with new respect. "I had to see it for myself. You never act that way in Potions class."
Neville laughed. "You know why. For one thing, I've got Professor Dumbledore to back me up if I need it. Besides, I thought it was a rotten trick."
"Yeah, but still, this is Snape we're talking about. The original monster teacher. Your worst nightmare. Sorry, Ivy," Ron said swiftly to her, "but you know what he's like."
"Yes, I've watched Uncle Severus teach for a long time. He gets the job done, but I never said he was perfect, or even …"
"Any good at all," Ron finished. "Neville, you called his bluff, but would you really have gone through another day of the Broken Record Spell?"
"If I had to," said Neville. "I do all the same assignments that Harry does. That's why I'm there. But I tried to make sure it wouldn't come to that. That's my job too."
Ron shuddered. "I hope I'd do the same in your place." But he didn't sound at all sure.
"Maybe if it was your Mum and Dad rotting in hsopital, you would," Harry said. He put a hand on Neville's shoulder, giving him a squeeze and getting a smile and a glob of tutti-frutti Jell-O in return. "Professor Snape was right, you know," he said.
"About what?" Hermione demanded.
"That there's no telling when it will end. No being saved by the bell and all that rot."
And on that note, although it was only half-past eight, they all went straight back to their dormitories and fell into bed. Even Hermione left her homework undone.
****************************
AN: A double-double is so unpredictable that it's perfectly plausible for it to sing an Anglicized version of an American commercial jingle from 30 years ago. You might wonder if a git like Uncle Vernon is likely to listen to music. Maybe he just likes to complain about not being able to. As for Neville, he's the sort of person who can stand up for someone else more readily than for himself.
Hermione arrived at Secret Room Number Eight that evening after Harry, Ron, Neville, and Ivy had already assembled there. She was carrying a library book of only moderate thickness, /Madcap Magic for Wacky Warlocks/.
"That's never got eight hundred pages," said Ron in disbelief.
"Not even close," said Hermione. "But it starts on page 734."
"That's really sneaky. I bet even Fred and George wouldn't have thought of that."
"I remember noticing it last year when we were looking for a spell to help Harry with the Second Task of the Triwizard Tournament. And you know what else?" she demanded.
"Not until you tell us."
"I found the Bubble-Head spell for breathing underwater in more than one of those books we checked last year. You know, the one some of the other champions were using. There's no reason we shouldn't have found it then."
"Actually, there is a reason," said Harry. He and Ron said in unison, "Dobby."
"Honestly, I'd rather have him for an enemy," Ron said, shaking his head. "What did he do, bewitch the entire library?"
"Can house-elves really do that?" asked Harry.
"Oh, I could tell you stories about our house-elves that would curl your hair," said Ivy. "But I want to know what's on page 818."
"Oh, that. Well, it's the last page of a section on how to make mirror-doubles. I'll show you on something simple." Hermione put the book on the table and produced an apple from her robes. Secret Room Number Eight was furnished with a large oval mirror in a carved frame, and Hermione went over to it. "This works with any ordinary mirror. It doesn't need to be a magical one."
"It works with a magic mirror too, dear," said the mirror. "I'd be happy to demonstrate."
Hermione held up the apple so that everyone in the room could see it reflected in the mirror. She turned it to expose all of its sides to the mirror. Then she took her wand and pointed it at the reflected apple. "Carpe Veritatem!" she chanted. The reflected apple sailed out of the mirror in a high arc, and Harry, instinctively moving into position, caught it as if it were a Snitch. It felt solid and real, and looked completely normal. But when he sniffed it cautiously, it smelled like no apple he had ever eaten. He placed it carefully on the table, and Hermione set the original apple down next to it, turning it to show that each was a perfect mirror image of the other.
"Cool," said Ron. "Let me try that." He picked up the original apple and held it in front of the mirror, but no reflection of it appeared. His reflected hand was empty. "Wait a minute."
"We can't get an unlimited supply of apples that way, can we?" said Neville.
Hermione shook her head. "That's not the way it works. Ron, let me have the apple."
Ron came back to the table and tossed the apple down carelessly. Instead of bouncing, it crumbled into a heap of dust.
"Important lesson: when you make a mirror-double the original object is weakened," Hermione lectured. "It looks the same, but the double sucks most of the substance and reality out of it. If you want to reverse the spell and restore the original object the way it used to be, you have to handle it very carefully."
"Now that you mention it, that apple seemed lighter than it should have," said Ron, looking interested. Hermione took another apple from her robes and repeated the process. This time Ivy caught the mirror-double, and brought it over to the mirror. No image of either apple appeared in the glass.
Hermione touched the mirror-double with her wand. "Fallax," she said, and the double flew out of Ivy's hand and back into the mirror, where it settled into Hermione's reflected hand. "Now the original apple is back to normal, and I'll show you something else." Again she pointed her wand at the mirror image of the apple and said, "Carpe Veritatem," and again the mirror image came through the glass and landed in Ivy's hand. Hermione pocketed her wand, took the double from Ivy, and brought both apples back to the table. "Who has a knife?" she asked. Ron held up a pocket knife. "Cut the mirror-double into four pieces," she told him, and Ron did. "Now bring them to the mirror." Ron gathered up the pieces and sniffed them curiously. "Don't eat any of it," warned Hermione. "Strange things will happen to you if you do."
"What sort of things?" Neville wanted to know.
"First, everything will look backwards to you. The floor plan of Hogwarts will be reversed, most people will look like they're left-handed, and you'll have to hold your schoolbooks up to a mirror to read them. Scissors and screws will go the wrong way, and so will your quills. All of your food will taste very odd."
"No thanks." Neville hunched his shoulders.
"But will you look backwards to everyone else?" asked Ivy.
"The book doesn't say. Now," continued Hermione, "Ron, hold up one piece." He did so, and Hermione touched it with her wand and said, "Fallax." The quarter-double traveled through the mirror until it was opposite the real apple in Hermione's hand. "Now one-quarter of the real apple is back to normal," she said. She did the same to the other three quarters, one by one, and they fitted themselves together in the mirror. "Notice that the real apple looks just the same as it did before, and now it's as whole and strong as ever," she said, "but look carefully at the reflection." Harry, Ivy and Neville crowded close to the mirror to look.
"I see cracks in the reflection where it was cut," said Neville.
"As long as you have all the parts of the double, you can restore the original," said Hermione, putting the reconstituted apple away, "but not if any of the double is destroyed or changed. If you cooked a mirror-double, what you restored would look unchanged on the outside, but it would taste like a cooked apple, and its reflection would look like one."
"I'll bet Fred and George don't know any of this stuff," said Ron. "Think of the jokes they could add to their collection. Can't wait to give them a taste." He smirked in anticipation.
"So all of this is in the book, Hermione?" asked Ivy. She pulled /Madcap Magic for Wacky Warlocks/ towards her, turned to the right page, and studied it for a moment. "Oh, I should have expected this," she said, and held up the book to show the rest of them.
"Ruddy backwards," said Ron. "Of course."
"I used a hand mirror to read it," said Hermione. "It wasn't difficult."
Ivy looked thoughtful. She picked up the double to the first apple and held it up to the mirror. "This double does have a reflection."
"That's because the original was destroyed," said Hermione.
"And if I used the spell to make its reflection real, would it be just like the original apple?"
Hermione shook her head. "No, a double of a double has unpredictable properties."
"This I have to see," said Ivy, pointing her wand at the reflected apple. "Carpe Veritatem!" The apple obligingly popped out of the mirror and veered in Ron's direction. As soon as he caught it, the skin split into a mouth and the apple burst into song.
/Oh, I wish I were a really truly apple,
That is what I'd bloomin' like to be-ee-ee,
Cause if I were a really truly apple,
Everyone would want a bite of me!/
Ron almost dropped the apple. He stared at it in bemusement as it sang the song again. "Shut up," Ron told the apple after the third rendition, but it kept right on singing. Its voice was high and squeaky and quickly became annoying. "It's not going to happen, you know," said Ron, addressing the wish expressed in the song. "Can't you sing something different?" he pleaded. Apparently not. Ron shrugged and tossed the singing apple back to Ivy, who hastily fallax-ed it back into the mirror, where it mercifully subsided, although its mouth continued to grin at them with a hint of mischief.
"Believe it or not, you were lucky that time," said Hermione.
"Sometimes double-doubles blow up, glow in the dark, change colours, or turn into awful-smelling goo. The book admits that this area of magic needs more research."
"Way cool," said Ron.
"So are we ready to investigate the Marauder's Map?" asked Harry.
"The Marauder's Map is a magical object," said Hermione, "so it's more complicated. You'll see. Go ahead, Harry."
Harry took the map from his robes, unfolded it, and held it up to the mirror. The Sprinkling Can verse was still on it, and the mirror reflected it in a perfectly ordinary way. He turned the back of the parchment to face the mirror, and its reflection, like the original, was completely blank. "I reckon that would have been too easy," said Harry.
Next, he touched the parchment with his wand and spoke the words, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good!" The Marauder's Map appeared, and when Harry looked at its reflection in the mirror, the floor plan of Hogwarts was reversed as it should be, but the labeled dots on it were swarming around in confusion, hopelessly lost and disoriented. "Hmmm," said Harry, watching the dot labeled with a backwards "Severus Snape" abruptly leave his office, move quickly down the corridor, and suddenly stop short and turn the other way. The dots on the real map remained undisturbed.
"For some reason the people on the mirror-map aren't reversed," Ivy observed, looking over his shoulder, "even though their labels are."
Neville frowned as a thought came to him. "So if you made a mirror-double of the map …" He paused to work it out. " … Would the real Hogwarts look backwards to all the real people in it?"
"Maybe if you sent the real map into the mirror in its place," said Hermione.
"Oh, that's REALLY sneaky," said Ron in admiration.
"I'd better not," said Harry regretfully.
"Not unless you absolutely have to," Ron agreed.
Next, Harry turned the map so that the back of the parchment faced the mirror again. The reflection started out blank, but then words began to appear on it, words that were not reversed.
/Behind the Marauder's Map
Are you curious about the masterminds who created this amazing device?
Are you wondering who Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs really are?
Would you like to know more about them?
Well, have you tried doing what works on the front of the parchment on the back instead?/
"Actually," said Harry, "I haven't."
/Well, that was silly of you./
"I suppose it was," Harry admitted.
/So what are you waiting for?/
Harry shrugged and took the Marauder's Map back to the table, where he laid it face down. The back of it was still blank. He touched it with his wand and said the same spell that showed the map, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."
Nothing happened.
"Well, now I can answer 'yes' to the question the map's reflection asked me," said Harry a bit testily.
Hermione stopped him before he got up. "Wait, Harry. The map is already revealed. You could blank it first. Or why don't you try the spell for hiding it, on this side?"
"Why not?" Harry followed her second suggestion and tried again, this time using the words, "Mischief managed!"
Sure enough, the words Behind the Marauder's Map began appearing on the parchment, followed by the next three lines of writing they had read in the mirror. After /Would you like to know more about them?/ the script changed.
/Did you think it would be that easy? Now you say the password./
Harry thought about that for a while. Hermione started thumbing through Madcap Magic for ideas. Neville made an I-don't-know gesture and Ivy said, "Don't ask me. Ask the map."
With his wand still touching the parchment, Harry asked it, "What is the password?"
"/What is the password?" is the password./
The map continued at considerable length, and Hermione read the sentences aloud as they appeared.
/MOONY is R.L., a distinguished member of Ravenclaw House. Due to an unfortunate incident in childhood, R. has good reason to dread the full moon. R. excels in his Defense Against the Dark Arts classes, and we suspect we have seen him consorting with a Boggart on the school premises. He is extremely fond of his pet owl, Artemis. He is also quite musical and plays the hummonica. Moony drew the plan of Hogwarts for the Marauder's Map.
/WORMTAIL is the name taken by P.P. of Slytherin, due to the rat form he assumes as an Animagus. P. is also interested in learning about the Dark Arts. He and L. M. enjoy performing flaky experiments on their pet rats, as we have concluded after coming across some of their more peculiar results. Wormtail is responsible for making the Marauder's Map look like an ordinary piece of parchment and for creating the spells that hide and reveal its true nature.
/PADFOOT is S.B. of Gryffindor. He turns into a large, shaggy black dog when the mood strikes him. S. is a Beater on the Gryffindor Quidditch team. He is an avid reader of murder mysteries and owns a pet Fwooper. Padfoot found and drew the secret passages (complete with passwords) for the Marauder's Map, an undertaking requiring years of research and the ability to get himself out of more than a few tight spots.
/PRONGS is J. P., also a Gryffindor, whose animal form is that of a stag. J. is Quidditch captain and Seeker for the Gryffindor team. He is Head Boy at Hogwarts. He and L.H., who is Head Girl, are as spoony as can be, and we hope their future together will be long and happy. Prongs gave the Marauder's Map the power to indicate the name and location of everyone at Hogwarts. We still don't know exactly how he did this./
Harry passed the Marauder's Map around so the rest of them could study it in turn. Based on what she had recently learned, it didn't take long for Ivy to figure out that P. P. was Peter Pettigrew, S. B. was Sirius Black, and J. P. must be James Potter. Hermione explained Remus Lupin's part in the story to Ivy and Neville, telling them how the other three had become Animagi to keep him company during his werewolf time of the month. L. H. was, of course, Harry's mother, the future Lily Potter.
Ron was rereading the blurb about Wormtail. "'Flaky experiments on their pet rats … peculiar results,'" he muttered. "I'll bet you anything you like that L. M. is Lucius Malfoy. Those two must have been quite a pair."
"Draco mentioned to me that his father used to breed rats when he was a student at Hogwarts," Ivy recalled.
"Did Draco tell you what the old git did with them?" growled Ron.
"Not in detail," Ivy replied, avoiding a direct answer.
"Probably a lot of obscene, cruel, and disgusting things," Ron said bitterly.
Harry realized that he had momentarily forgotten Ivy's attachment to Draco Malfoy. He had an uneasy feeling that he would be forcibly reminded of it again before much longer, probably by Draco himself. Someday (still not yet, though) Harry would have to ask Ivy about what was between her and Malfoy. He wondered how much of what Ivy was learning would find its way into Malfoy's ear, and then reminded himself that there was no point in trying to keep from her anything she was determined to find out. He pictured her sitting in the closet, listening to the rest of them and busily putting two and two together. It was too late to exclude her now; it had been too late from the moment he sought her out. He had done so knowing he was taking a risk. Harry still wasn't sure how far he trusted Ivy. But he and his fellow Gryffindors were here now because she had been willing to introduce them to Salazara.
"It might help if you did find out—in detail," Harry said to her. "Especially if he happened to mention Pettigrew."
"I might," she said, looking at him as if she guessed his thoughts.
They discussed some of the other snippets of information the map had given them. Neville explained to Harry that a hummonica is an instrument that hums along when you play it. Hermione wondered what power James Potter had had that was a mystery even to his friends. (Harry wondered the same thing.) Then Harry addressed the map again. "Is there anything else you can tell us?"
/Pushy, aren't you? Not today./
"Okay," said Harry. "Fair enough." He tapped the parchment with his wand and said, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good!" The words on the back disappeared; then he turned the parchment over and spirited the map away with "Mischief managed!" He folded it and tucked it into his robes. "I'm convinced that this map has more to tell us," Harry said.
"There's a lot of things we haven't tried yet," agreed Hermione.
"So that's it for tonight, then?" said Ron. "What shall we do with this?" He picked up the mirror-double of the first apple. "We could just leave it lying around somewhere for some innocent student to find. Or some not-so-innocent student." His eyes brightened.
Hermione took the apple from Ron's hand and put it back on the table. "Fallax," she commanded it with her wand, and it sailed through the glass and landed next to its reflection on the table in the mirror. "Both of them should be safe there," she said. She picked up Madcap Magic for Wacky Warlocks and marched to the door. "When do you see Professor Snape again?" she turned back to ask.
"A week from tomorrow," said Harry. "Anyone who wants to come and join the fun and games is welcome."
"I second that," added Neville.
In the intervening week, Harry tried to put his extracurricular problems out of his mind and concentrate on his schoolwork, with imperfect success. He had decided to give the Marauder's Map some time off before he tried to wring any more information from it, but he couldn't help thinking about its description of Prongs. We hope their future will be long and happy. But thanks to Wormtail, James and Lily Potter's future had been short, ended by terror and violence. As Harry fed more batches of bright-red Jell-O to his fire crab, now apparently covered with rubies, he looked sidelong at Draco Malfoy, who tried to seem oblivious to him but wore an ominous expression of smug hostility. Draco and Ivy still sat together at meals, and appeared to be on good terms. He whispered in her ear a lot.
* * * * * * * *
When the Wednesday evening for Harry and Neville's session with Professor Snape came round again, Ivy, Ron, and Hermione all decided to go too. Confronted with five students where he expected two, the Potions Master raised his eyebrows in surprise and said, "What have we here? More students in need of my special services?"
"I invited them to come, sir," said Harry.
"So did I, sir," added Neville.
"Well, Miss Parkinson, Mr. Weasley, and Miss Granger," Professor Snape addressed the other three, "are you willing to participate in the exercises I will assign to Potter and Longbottom? They are neither easy nor pleasant, as I am certain they can tell you."
"That's why we're here, Professor," Ron said resolutely. "Hermione and I have already practiced the Tickling Charm and the Drenching Spell. And we know the Opposition Verse, too."
"I'm willing, Uncle Severus," said Ivy with a firm chin.
"Well, I suppose so," said Hermione doubtfully, looking as if she might regret deciding to come after all. Harry realized that Hermione was the only one there who didn't bear a personal grudge against Wormtail, although she had seen with her own eyes what a pitiful excuse for a wizard he was in his human shape. She was attending this session more out of curiosity than anything else; the rest of them had added incentive.
"Very well," said Professor Snape. "Today's lesson will be somewhat different from those we have had in the past. So far we have covered the use of the Opposition Verse as a defense against various short-acting spells and potions. Now I will introduce a spell of longer duration, against which the Opposition Verse will be of little use."
/Please, not a long-acting Sickening Potion/, Harry hoped. /Or a tickling charm either/.
"Your assignment will be simply to perform your daily activities under the effect of the spell. We wil begin with you, Potter." As usual. Snape raised his wand, and Harry felt a familiar dread. "/Phonoperpetuate!/" exclaimed the professor, and Harry waited for something to happen. Slowly he became aware that a tune was playing inside his head, a tune he didn't recognize. It started quietly and gradually grew louder. It sounded scratchy, as if a damaged record were being played on an old-fashioned record player, and every once in a while the needle skipped and a short phrase played itself over and over for a while, until finally the rest of the piece resumed and played to the end. Then the whole thing started over from the beginning.
"And I have to listen to this for how long?" Harry asked.
"You will return to this room tomorrow evening at this time to have the spell lifted," answered Professor Snape. He pointed his wand at each of the other students in turn and spoke the word "/Phonoperpetuate!/" four more times. Soon they all wore the same uneasy, vaguely preoccupied look that Harry sensed on his own face.
"Couldn't you have used a better-quality recording?" Hermione asked irritably, putting her hands over her ears in a futile gesture. "And I think the phonograph needs a new needle."
"Phonograph needles are hard to find these days, Hermione," Harry reminded her. "Most music shops don't sell them anymore." He remembered hearing Uncle Vernon complaining about this very thing when trying to enjoy his collection of long-playing vinyl records on the living-room stereo. Hermione looked at Harry in exasperated amusement.
"This is known as the Broken Record Spell," Professor Snape informed them all with satisfaction. "It is far more potent than Fwooper song in driving its victims to insanity. However, twenty-four hours of it will not put you in any serious danger of permanent derangement."
"What about temporary derangement, Uncle?" asked Ivy.
"It is a risk," he conceded, "but the educational benefits make it worthwhile. There are several things you can do to make the spell less burdensome, but you must discover them for yourselves. Do you have any more questions? Very well. That will be all. Class is dismissed until tomorrow evening."
"I can't believe I let myself in for this," groaned Ron, holding his head, as they left Secret Room Number Eight.
"As long as we get extra credit for it," said Hermione a bit grimly.
"Ivy's got to go it alone," Harry pointed out. "At least the rest of us can stick together."
Ivy shrugged. "Not a problem. I'll just go back to the Slytherin common room and act as if nothing's the matter."
"If anyone can do it, you can, Ivy," said Neville.
"Why don't you put the Broken Record spell on Draco Malfoy so he can keep you company?" suggested Ron. "I'm sure he'll love it. He's already deranged anyway."
The lone Slytherin parted ways with the four Gryffindors, who returned to Gryffindor Tower to take a half-hearted stab at doing homework. Ron muttered the Sprinkling Can verse to himself, but didn't find it very helpful. Hermione was determined not to let a little static set her back in her studies; she wrote steadily on a History of Magic essay with her lips set in a thin line, only to find when she read over her work that it made no sense at all. She flung down her parchment in disgust. "I'll do it in the morning," she decided.
"I wouldn't count on it, Hermione," said Harry, who was trying unsuccessfully to keep his mind on a reading assignment for Transfiguration class.
"Morning? What's that?" said Neville, who seemed to be having trouble keeping his parchment in focus. He had made a shambles of his essay, with some of the lines crossing over each other and even going off the edge of the parchment onto the table, and he was covered with ink blots. Ron took Neville's quill away from him and corked his ink bottle before he could do any more damage. They all decided to give it up as a bad job and go to bed.
Harry resigned himself to a sleepless night; any fleeting slumber that might come his way he would regard as a bonus. Sometime during the small hours he actually did doze off from sheer exhaustion, but the record continued to crackle away in his dreams. He woke up far too early and lay in bed wondering how long it would take for the spell to drive him over the brink of sanity. He dressed in the darkness and went down to the common room to find Hermione already there, taking another crack at her homework. She looked up when he came in and said excitedly, "Harry, I finally turned the record over!"
Harry rubbed his eyes. "Turned the record over?" he repeated. "How?"
"Yes, if you wait until the music ends, there's a moment when the static stops too, and if you picture pulling the record off the spindle and turning it over before the needle comes down again, you can get it to play a different tune, not quite so scratchy."
"Great, Hermione. Let me try it." Harry sat down in an armchair next to her and concentrated. The timing was crucial; he missed it on the first try, and had to wait through another rendition before he could make another attempt. Fortunately (or unfortunately) the record was a single, not an LP. Probably 45 RPM, too, Harry thought.
Ron and Neville appeared and Hermione told them, "Don't bother Harry; he's trying to turn over his record."
"Turn over his what?" Ron asked blankly.
Hermione sighed. "If you had taken Muggle Studies, Ron, I wouldn't have to explain to you about record players." She proceeded to do so, and then ended thoughtfully, "Whoever originated this spell must have been a student of Muggle artifacts."
"Like my Dad," said Ron.
"But with a much sicker and more twisted sense of humour," said Harry.
"Probably a Slytherin," Ron figured.
Harry said, "Wait … I think I've got it. Yes, I'm playing the other side of my record!" He hummed a bit of the new tune playing in his head.
"That's the one I've got," Hermione confirmed. "It won't take you long to get tired of that one too."
"Maybe I can find the volume control, or even pull the plug," said Harry hopefully.
"I never thought of records having two sides," said Neville.
They arrived at the Great Hall for breakfast early enough to watch most of the students come in. Hermione kept her eye on the entrance used by the Slytherins, and when Ivy appeared with dark-circled eyes, went over casually and said a few quiet words to her. Ivy nodded absently and sat down at the Slytherin table without seeing it. "She says she thinks she might be able to figure it out," Hermione reported to them when she got back to the Gryffindor table.
"If anyone can do it, she can," said Neville, watching Ivy with concern.
Harry forked up a slice of sausage and stopped with it halfway to his mouth. "Guess which class we have first today," he remembered suddenly.
"Double Potions with the Slytherins," sighed Ron.
"At least it's early in the day, so we can get it over with," said Hermione bracingly, as Neville turned white and put a forkful of scrambled egg back on his plate.
"I have to do better in Potions this term," said Neville. "I almost failed the last exam."
"You don't suppose Professor Snape will …" began Ron.
"Go easy on us? Not on your life," said Harry. "That would undermine the whole point of this exercise, as I'm sure he'd say if you asked him."
Ron and Neville still hadn't succeeded in turning their records when they got up and headed for the Potions classroom. "You've got to get it all the way off the spindle," Hermione coached them in a whisper as they walked along the corridor humming under their breaths, "and then flip it right away. Don't worry about putting it back on; the spell takes care of that."
As Harry had foreseen, Professor Snape was not disposed to be lenient. Neville didn't dare ask him to repeat his instructions; he had to rely on Dean and Seamus to fill in the parts he had missed. The other Gryffindors watched with growing puzzlement and the Slytherins with indredulous glee as the four of them blundered through the lesson, spilling ingredients, cutting their fingers, and adding things in the wrong order, in attempting to concoct a relatively simple slug-repellent potion. Even Hermione came to grief when she let her potion scorch on the bottom, something she had never done.
"I don't recall asking you to add human blood, Potter," Snape reproved, watching Harry's cut thumb drip into his cauldron. "I suppose you think you're advanced enough to invent something new instead of following instructions. Five points from Gryffindor."
"I suppose you think I did it on purpose," Harry retorted recklessly.
"What's the matter with you lot?" hissed Parvati as they left at the end of class. "Gryffindor's twenty points down."
"Nice going, Potter," sniggered Malfoy. "We hope you and your friends will keep it up, don't we, boys?" he asked Crabbe and Goyle, who chuckled and nodded agreement.
Fortunately Care of Magical Creatures didn't tax their powers of concentration too much. By this time they had switched colours of Jell-O to gain a better idea of whether the jewels on their fire crabs would change colour one at a time or all at once. Harry and Hermione skipped taking notes that day. Ron's fire crab wandered around eating the wrong flavours off the wrong plates, and he appeared not to hear his classmates shooing it away in annoyance. By the end of class Neville was covered with tutti-frutti Jell-O and had several marshmallows stuck to his robes.
At lunchtime Harry at last found the volume control and lowered the volume on his inner record player. This gave him temporary relief, but the music kept getting louder again and he had to turn it down repeatedly. He tried turning up to see if it would get quieter, but no such luck.
Throughout the interminable afternoon, during which he reversed his record several times, Harry kept himself going by counting down the time left until eight o'clock that evening. Six hours to go … Five hours to go …Four hours to go … They abandoned all pretense at functioning and sat through History of Magic in a glassy-eyed stupor. Fortunately this didn't make them stand out among their fellow fifth-years. As Ron pointed out after Professor McGonagall had sent them out of Transfiguration, thinking they must be coming down with something, it was a good thing Defense Against the Dark Arts didn't meet that day.
Harry, Ron, Hermione, Neville, and Ivy all arrived at Secret Room Numbe Eight that evening with commendable promptness. Ivy looked ready to drop. She sat down at the table and closed her eyes. Soon Professor Snape walked in, looking fresh and alert, and swept his eyes over his students' various signs of disintegration. Neville had laid his head down on his marshmallow-studded arms, Ron was absently shredding a scrap of parchment and whistling through his teeth with an edge of desperation, and Harry wore a large, clumsy bandage on his left thumb. Hermione's hair was bushier and her eyes wilder than usual. The Potions master said, "All of you will report on how you managed during the past day, and any discoveries you have made, before I lift the spell. Before we begin I would like to add that the only one of you who even came close to paying proper attention in Potions class was"—Hermione got ready to look modest—"Ivy Parkinson."
Ivy's eyes flew open. "I was?"
"Congratulations, Miss Parkinson, on exercising the discipline of dissimulation. Now who would like to begin?"
"I will," said Hermione without raising her hand. "Early this morning I discovered that I could turn my record over."
"Ah," said Snape, "and how many of the rest of you were able to listen to Side Two?"
Harry and Ivy raised their hands. Harry added, "But only after Hermione did it and told me how."
"Me too," said Ivy. "But it helped that I took Muggle Studies last year."
"Not many Slytherins do," said Hermione, "but they might be surprised at how useful it can be."
"Couldn't get it off the spindle," mumbled Ron. "Whatever that is."
"I'm not sure my record has an other side," said Neville, raising his head. "Whatever that is." He put his head down again.
"Can anyone report anything else of interest?" Snape asked.
"I turned down the volume," said Harry, "but it kept creeping up again."
"Very well," said Professor Snape. "You all did about as well as I expected, though I hoped for a better effort in keeping up appearances." He looked witheringly at Neville, who now sported a marshmallow on his cheek and another in his hair. "I will now lift the spell." He pointed his wand at each of them in turn and said, "/Phonoterminate!/" Sighs of relief filled the room. But when he got to Harry, he paused thoughtfully. "So, Potter, you located the volume control. Did you find it helpful?"
"A little," said Harry. "It's really stiff and hard to turn."
"In that case, Potter, you should have no trouble with another twenty-four hours of the spell," Snape told him. "The extra practice will be useful to you. You may return tomorrow evening to be released from it."
/No, please, sir/ … Harry clamped his jaw on the words before they could escape. He /wouldn't/ beg. Not anything for himself, and especially not from Snape. He stared back at the Professor, the music sizzling in his ears like frying bacon, and thought about giving Snape a good whack on the head with the hot frying pan, splattering him with hot bacon grease and strips of …
"No, he won't, sir," said Neville, breaking in on Harry's thoughts, "because you're going to end it tonight." He sounded quite certain of this.
Snape's wand changed direction until it pointed at Neville. "Perhaps you would like to try another day of it yourself, Longbottom."
Neville looked alarmed, but he didn't quail. "If Harry does, then so will I," he said.
"If you do, you'll make a complete fool of yourself, Longbottom," Snape predicted sourly. "Why, look at you now. Pathetic."
"That doesn't matter," said Neville. "Fair's fair."
Snape continued to glare at him. "Mr. Longbottom," he said coldly, "you persist in seeing this as a game. It is not. If Mr. Potter truly wishes to help your father, he cannot measure his trial by the clock. He cannot say, I will put up with it until eight o'clock, but no later, because then it must end. There is no telling when it will end." He spoke as if from bitter experience.
But Neville countered, "That's no excuse. The training isn't the the race, sir. And you gave your word."
Ron looked shocked and gratified. "That's the stuff, Neville," he breathed.
"Very well," said Professor Snape, "I don't recall making any guarantees, but I will lift the spell. I had no intention of doing otherwise, but I wanted to illustrate an important lesson first." He pointed his wand at Harry and said, "/Phonoterminate!/"
Finally, finally it was over. Harry sagged with relief, closed his eyes, and listened to the beautiful silence running like a cool river through his head. He started floating away on the sweet and gentle current …
"Harry? It's time to go. We're dismissed," said Ron, shaking his shoulder.
"Oh, okay," said Harry, rousing himself with difficulty.
"I hope to see all you at our next session," said Professor Snape.
"Not me," said Ron.
"As you wish," said Snape. "The advanced work we're doing is not for everyone."
Ron opened his mouth as if he might change his mind after all, but shrugged his shoulders and let it drop. The five of them filed out of the Secret Room, Neville walking a little taller than usual in his sticky robes.
"I didn't know you had it in you, Neville," said Ron, looking at his fellow Gryffindor with new respect. "I had to see it for myself. You never act that way in Potions class."
Neville laughed. "You know why. For one thing, I've got Professor Dumbledore to back me up if I need it. Besides, I thought it was a rotten trick."
"Yeah, but still, this is Snape we're talking about. The original monster teacher. Your worst nightmare. Sorry, Ivy," Ron said swiftly to her, "but you know what he's like."
"Yes, I've watched Uncle Severus teach for a long time. He gets the job done, but I never said he was perfect, or even …"
"Any good at all," Ron finished. "Neville, you called his bluff, but would you really have gone through another day of the Broken Record Spell?"
"If I had to," said Neville. "I do all the same assignments that Harry does. That's why I'm there. But I tried to make sure it wouldn't come to that. That's my job too."
Ron shuddered. "I hope I'd do the same in your place." But he didn't sound at all sure.
"Maybe if it was your Mum and Dad rotting in hsopital, you would," Harry said. He put a hand on Neville's shoulder, giving him a squeeze and getting a smile and a glob of tutti-frutti Jell-O in return. "Professor Snape was right, you know," he said.
"About what?" Hermione demanded.
"That there's no telling when it will end. No being saved by the bell and all that rot."
And on that note, although it was only half-past eight, they all went straight back to their dormitories and fell into bed. Even Hermione left her homework undone.
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AN: A double-double is so unpredictable that it's perfectly plausible for it to sing an Anglicized version of an American commercial jingle from 30 years ago. You might wonder if a git like Uncle Vernon is likely to listen to music. Maybe he just likes to complain about not being able to. As for Neville, he's the sort of person who can stand up for someone else more readily than for himself.