– CHAPTER SIX –
When he arrived for dinner, Scorpius noticed that the Potter and Weasley families were gathered at the end of Gryffindor table together. Both parents and children sat around the humble dishes of onion soup and potato salad. They were uncharacteristically tense, so much so that they resembled his own family unit during a Christmas eve formal dinner. He was not used to seeing Harry look quite so tight-lipped. He kept sliding his fingers under his glasses to rub the bridge of his nose. James was refusing to look at him, sitting beside his mother with his entire body swerved towards his younger sister as if he could wipe the site of his father completely from view.
If it weren't for all the freckles and the less ambrosial spread, he could have sworn it was a mirror spinning back the Malfoy family over a meal—everyone was so utterly miserable.
He was about to find Isabella to take a seat beside her when he saw a hand pop up quickly from amid the inner circle, and it was Hugo Weasley waving him over.
"Hello," Scorpius said, a little awkwardly. Everyone immediately perked up, even Ron Weasley, which was an indication that they were truly desperate for distraction. Every single one of their children looked relieved to see them, their expression urging him to sit down. Lily scooted to one side to open up a space between herself and James.
"We're just having a family dinner," Ginny said, falsely bright, as if it needed to be stated. "Would you like to join us, Scorpius?"
Of course, he was being invited. He was their buffer. Tonight was the night that the exclusive Order members were leaving on a secretive Order mission, no doubt to track down Romnuk and the handful of goblins that remained alive. They were scheduled to leave in only an hour or two, where the immediate darkness would shroud their excursion. Rose was particularly surly about it. She stabbed her potato salad with great vigour. Scorpius decided to sit next to her to play the watchdog, to stop her from throwing a colossal fit that upended the little food on the table.
Without being able to explain the urge, Scorpius turned sharply to the teacher's platform at the front of the hall. It was mostly empty, and his father was certainly missing from the table. His father was most likely eating his humble dinner with his mother in their dungeon quarters, away from prying eyes. If it weren't for Scorpius, they would have never stayed. They would have fled the country many months ago. He wasn't sure whether it was guilt or irritation he felt. He had never asked them to stay.
Scorpius couldn't stand the veil of deference hanging over their meal. The Potter-Weasley brood had always been famously warm during meals. After swallowing a spoonful of soup, he leaned forward to address Hermione on Rose's other side. Hermione at least genuinely liked him.
"It looks like most of the Hogwarts residents have returned to their homes," he said. "I suppose there's quite a lot of cleaning up to do."
But what he had said, however innocuous, struck a nerve. James let his spoon fall into his half empty bowl with a clatter. Lily grabbed his wrist but he pulled it free and sent his long sprawling legs over the bench chair.
"Not hungry," he grunted, and took off down the hall towards the doors.
The Potters collectively sighed. Harry stared after James until the doors had shut behind him, then ran a hand over his face again. Scorpius could feel the heat rising to his cheeks in two blotches.
"Er, pardon me," he said, clearing his throat. "I did not meant to—"
"No, it's fine," Harry said, dropping his hand and smiling patiently at Scorpius. "Let James go. And your observation is right, Scorpius. Everyone is returning to Hogsmeade."
"But things haven't really gone back to normal, have they?" Hugo piped up. "I mean, it sort of feels like limbo, doesn't it?"
"I mean, how do they even go about setting up the government when so many wizards and witches have fled or been killed?" Lily burbled on, sharing words she had obviously discussed with Hugo behind closed doors. "Who's going to be the Minister now? Do we just go to another election?"
Albus glanced at his father then smiled half-heartedly. Scorpius could read that look exactly. Harry Potter had been rumoured to become the next Minister for Magic for as long as Scorpius could remember. It had irked his own father enormously over the years. Of course, Harry had always scoffed at the suggestion back then.
"We'll have to cross that bridge when we get there," Harry said diplomatically.
"I don't really think the battle is over yet," Rose said quietly.
They all leaned forward to look at her, waiting for her to elaborate.
"Things are messy in the Goblin Kingdom," she said slowly. "They've had their own civil insurgencies. We've just been the collateral damage."
"But the Kobold Könige are looking to bring down the Goblin King, not us," Hugo argued. "They've already killed Gladstone and basically destroyed their King's economic ties to us—which, mind you, will have hurt their King just as much as it has hurt us. So what business would they have attacking us now?"
"I think it's time we best have some desert," Ron said loudly, gesturing to the treacle tart on the table.
"Hugo," Scorpius said, raising his brows and pausing. "You're not that thick, surely. The Kobold Könige have repeatedly tried to get into Hogwarts. They need something from us before they turn on their King."
"And it's obvious what it is, isn't it?" Lily said, looking between the boys. "The Sword? Wouldn't that be it?"
As soon as she had said it, it seemed painfully palpable. Why else would the goblins try to get into the school, even still, when they had all but crippled their King? They wanted the Sword of Gryffindor.
Scorpius turned sharply to Albus, whose eyes were very large.
"Yes, well lucky that sword is very well protected," Harry said with complete finality.
"And lucky that the goblins are all but driven out of Britain," Ron added.
But Ron had done anything but pacify the group's unrest. Rose immediately turned on him, as if something had been switched on in her. Her leg was jiggling beside Scorpius'.
"You think Romnuk retreated? To that mountain James went to?"
"We think it's only him and a handful of Kobold Könige members left after Hogsmeade," Hermione said patiently. "And it's likely that's where they'll be. Orlick confirmed that it's the only place left in the United Kingdom where they could hide."
Rose rushed on furiously, "I should come with you."
Hermione's brown eyes studied her daughter's fresh, freckled face. Ron sighed heavily.
"It's better if you stay here, Rose. Only a few of us are going."
Rose was silent and sullen again. If her mother was going after Romnuk, she wanted to be there. There was no mistaking that look in her electric blue eyes; already she was thinking of ways that she, Scorpius and Albus may be able to catch up with the Order. They already knew how to sneak off the school grounds through the Forbidden Forest. Surely they could do it again.
As if her mother had also read her mind, she gave her daughter a reproachful look. She lowered her voice so that the others couldn't hear, speaking coaxingly into her ear so that Scorpius had to strain to hear her. "If you're planning to do anything at all," she said slowly, "there are only two things I ask of you, Rose."
Rose cocked her eyebrows, waiting impatiently for her mother to proceed. Scorpius almost smirked—Rose herself was guilty of the same tactic, always leaving the suspense hanging.
"I want you to only ever act if you think it will protect lives, not hurt them. Do you understand? No risks. We don't need any more deaths."
"The second thing?"
"Keep the bag I gave you packed and ready to go at all times."
"It's almost as if you think I'm about to leave," Rose replied a little more loudly, challenging her with a smile.
"I'm not dense, Rose. I was your age once. I disobeyed the Order. But I trust that you have enough sense to only do those things if there are no other options left, do you understand? A quest for revenge will never solve anything."
While the mother and daughter had been muttering to one another, Ginny had steered the direction of the group's conversation back towards resettling Hogsmeade. Harry was asking his remaining son and daughter where the Scamander's had gotten off to, needing an urgent favour from Rolf that involved the Romanian Sanctuary. There was a tone of safety in their conversation now, an implication that the threat was finally gone and it was simply a matter of tying up loose ends up. There couldn't be more than a dozen Kobold Könige members left and clearly this little knot of Order alumni thought they could handle it.
The tension was still there though. Scorpius could almost taste it. Rose wasn't all too daft with her silly ideas of Philosopher Stones after all, although her well meaning idea of trading it off for their freedom was probably smarter than trying to drive the last of the goblin rebels from their borders. What did they say? Cut off a snake's head and it can still bite.
Something had crystallised in Scorpius following the night of the feast, his heart candied into a toffee-hard sweet. Maybe it was Rose's phoenix revival that had inspired him, as she transitioned into a terrifyingly determined creature. There was no sadness left in her. Instead, she filled every room with her furious energy and ate her enemies like air. It left an impression on him.
Or maybe it was the raids, or what the Slytherin raids had become. Wake his roommates and duel for an hour. Wake the younger boys and have them duel each other. Intense regimes where they ran drill after drill until the sweat dripped down their backs and their fingers blistered around the handles of their wands. It had been Rose's idea, of course, but Scorpius was fond of the discipline. He was glad for the exhaustion he felt when he returned to bed just before dawn.
Or, maybe, it was the little black book in his possession. While he had confiscated it from Rose pretending it was for her own good, he had found himself drawn to it every evening. He would sit on his bed and pen down his thoughts in slick ink. He could feel Zabini and Fleischer press toward him in their curiosity before he drew the silky curtains around his bed. There was advice in there, of course, plenty to be found from the former seventh years that had also once poured over the pages of this book. He found advice on the best and most hidden books in the Restricted Section, the spells needed to unlock their covers, references to useful pages, inventive potion suggestions and self-created hexes or curses. The advice he found most interesting, one Wednesday afternoon, was from a neat cursive script that delicately explained the tricks behind being a gifted Parselmouth.
'Charming a small serpent is easy if you possess the skill to speak Parseltongue. Charming a more intelligent and dangerous reptile—a basilisk, for instance—takes true command and talent.'
And Scorpius had a creeping sensation that not all of this solicited advice was from well-meaning sources. He had to hold his mind away from himself, turn away from the truth of whose blood had touched these pages. Because he needed the knowledge—he was hungry for it in the way Rose had become hungry for blood—and he wanted to possess it all, to be prepared to face any enemy with a fully equipped arsenal.
Something in him had hardened, no matter how much he distanced himself from Rose's wild rhetoric. She was right. She was less in control of her own emotions, but she was right. Scorpius knew it. Soon, they would need to fight and nothing could be off limits anymore. He had a feeling he wasn't the only one thinking this way.
"Shit, Malfoy, put a bloody disclaimer on your reading material," Zabini muttered, flipping shut one of the books scattered on Scorpius' bed.
Protectively, he closed the little black notebook. But Zabini had only been referring to the other books strewn across his duvet. The page in question had been an illustration of how to turn a person inside out. It seemed almost comical when put simply but the diagrams were macabre, skinless sacks of organs and bones on display. Definitely not the usual material he would read at three in the morning.
"Sorry," he mumbled, scratching his jaw. The spells weren't proving useful anyway. Not only were they too complex, too convoluted, he wouldn't get them through the goblin armour. He tucked the little black notebook into his pyjama pocket.
Zabini leant against the chest of drawers and studied his roommate for a moment. He raised his thick eyebrows and waited, his gaze penetrating, until Scorpius distractedly looked up.
"What?" he demanded.
"You and Rose have really thrown yourself into the deep end with this," he noted, pointing at the library books. "Both of you are getting into some very Dark Magic."
"And that bothers you?" Scorpius retorted, raising his own eyebrows. "You've never struck me as being too concerned about learning the Dark Arts."
"I'm not. And like most Slytherins, I think the Dark Arts can be useful," Zabini said, moving across the room to sit on his own bed. He crossed his leg so his ankle perched on his opposite knee, the soles of his feet bare and pale compared to his skin. "But you're not like me, Malfoy—no offence. And Rose will be even worse if things unravel."
Scorpius twisted his body towards him, listening now. "Care to elaborate?"
"You both care too much. She probably cares more than you do, but you both have consciences. You'll use this magic and you'll either never recover from the guilt or never come back from the loony bin."
"You underestimate me," Malfoy replied coldly. "My head's locked down like a vault."
"But once you start diving into this very murky water, it'll be hard to come up for air. Do you really reckon you've got what it takes to dabble in the Dark Arts without turning dark yourself?"
He knew there was logic in what Zabini was saying. The more you dabbled in the Dark Arts, the more it changed the way you thought, the way you behaved. It wasn't that these spells were bad in themselves. Not even the Killing Curse was inherently evil. Using the Dark Arts in defence would be reasonable, Malfoy reasoned, as long as you knew how to draw the line.
Scorpius pushed the books away from him and turned so he completely faced Zabini now, his legs planted on the floor. It reminded Scorpius of being eleven years old, when Zabini and he would talk well into the evenings, but during classes or lunches they would act as if they had never spoken in their lives—as if they were embarrassed by their quiet acquaintance after dark.
"You think you're somehow immune to the effects of the Dark Arts?" Scorpius frowned.
Zabini snorted like a bull, belligerent towards the interrogation. "I'm immune to all those warm fuzzy feelings you nutters pride yourself on. That's the way I was born to be."
"So, no heart or soul to damage in the first place."
"Yeah, you could say that."
"I think," Scorpius said slowly, "that you like to use that as an excuse so you can stay hard. Perhaps you're not a very empathetic person, André, but I have seen you exercise both callousness and thoughtfulness. You can be surprisingly honourable when you feel like it."
He scoffed, as if the very thought of being honourable couldn't stick to him. His visible incredulity glanced off Scorpius, who remained stoic and solicitous.
"When?" Zabini demanded, frustrated by his peer's seriousness. "When have I proven to be honourable?"
"When you rejected Isabella knowing full well how easy it would be to manipulate her into doing whatever you wanted. Sexually, I mean," Scorpius clarified with great distaste, "because you were already using her to practically do all your homework. Or when you stopped pursuing Rose the moment you found out she was interested in me."
"That's not honour, you idiot," Zabini snapped back, almost offended. "That was fear of consequences. If I slept with Nott, do you have any idea how much of a pain in my arse she would become? She would be a clingy mess. And as for Rose, she wasn't worth it. It would mean putting up with your sulking every night before bed. I can fuck other girls with less drama. That's not honourable, that's common sense."
Scorpius shrugged, unabated by the tirade. "You can dress your motives however you like, Zabini. But the idea that you were somehow born bad, without any possibility of redemption, is nonsense."
"I dunno. You were born a pious prat who uses too many big words, and you seem to have held fast to that pattern of behaviour since you popped out of the womb."
Toby Fleischer opened their bedroom door, his piercing blue eyes catching the light of the green lanterns from the corridor outside. He grabbed his wand off the chest of drawers near the door.
"Lim said the girls aren't going to train tonight. We should wake the boys to get an early start."
The girls skipping a night raid was quite unusual, Scorpius was thinking, just as he felt the brass mirror heat up from the pocket of his pyjama trousers. He muttered beneath his breath and headed to the bathroom, snapping the door shut to answer the mirror in privacy.
Rose's expression jarred Scorpius out of his distraction. Her blue eyes were bright and wild, her face flushed, the picture wobbled on the glass as she must have been shaking. She took up the entire frame so he couldn't make out where she was. For a second, he wondered if she had somehow escaped the school grounds.
"What?" he asked, without greeting. His voice was high with panic. "Where are you?"
"I need you to, er, come to Bellucci's cell."
He felt his panic cool, like steam off ice. He said crisply, "I was planning a duelling raid with the boys tonight. I thought you and Albus were taking care of that."
"Scorpius," she replied sharply, her voice peaking. "I need you right now, alright? And bring—bring a Bezoar."
Bringing the Bezoar had been a waste of his time. When Scorpius arrived, Bellucci had long been dead. Probably since early that morning. She had that cold, heavy weight that a corpse gets after a while. He noticed it when he bent to test her pulse. She had vomited before she died, or perhaps choked on her vomit. The air was full of the acrid stench of bile and urine, and in her death, there was nothing graceful about her.
The cauldron was still bubbling and just by the smell of it, Scorpius knew she had brewed her own poison.
"Right. Well, she killed herself."
"Oh shit," Rose muttered, running her hands over her face. "When my parents find out my mum will kill me."
"Don't be too distraught," Scorpius said drolly, frowning at Bellucci's body. When he turned back to Rose he noticed that she was shaking. He softened a little. "We were going to set her free. She knew that would either mean living on the run or being sentenced to a life in Azakaban. She chose her own way out."
Which seemed fitting, he wanted to add. Bellucci's poisons had killed so many innocent people. It was not surprising that she had died by her own hand. Scorpius bent down and collected the ruby red stones off the floor, mockeries of the real Philosopher's Stone. They were good copies. They could almost be the real thing.
"Shit, shit," Rose muttered, rubbing her hands over her face. "Scorpius, what do we do? We can't just leave her body here. We need to get rid of it—burn it. Or bury it. If the house elves find out—no, let's just move it now. Oh Merlin, but we'll be seen. I mean, she would still be alive if I hadn't given her a cauldron. I can't explain this to my mum right now, she's about to leave for a bloody mountain and she trusts me not to kill anyone—"
"Calm down," Scorpius said, pocketing the stones. He moved across to Rose and hugged her firmly, his arms tight, holding her fast until she was no longer shaking. Then he let her go.
"Why didn't you ask for Albus?" he said, now that she was a bit steadier.
Rose looked at him as if he were dense. "If you think I'm panicking then imagine Albus in this situation. He'd have a right meltdown. You're—you're the one who can deal with these sorts of things without getting emotional."
He wasn't sure whether it was flattering or offensive. Whether she considered him stone cold or heartless. It was his favourite ever potions professor lying dead on the floor in abject disgust. Bellucci, who he had so admired, who had been so defamed, now dead by her own cruel hands.
Even still, Scorpius was able to swallow down his revulsion and anguish as if taking a very bitter pill. He felt the part of himself that his father had duteously trained kick into gear. His mind hardened, closing like a fist, as if everything taking place outside of it was somehow removed to himself.
"I have a plan," he said, lowering his voice. He was thinking of all the books from the Restricted Section he had read in recent weeks. A chance to practice that magic on a real life cadaver. "I have a plan that'll allow us to bury Bellucci properly and see it so your stupid Stone will be worth something. But you don't ask questions. I'm in charge now."
Rose blinked at him rapidly, almost in gratitude, her blue eyes still wide and electric.
Zabini was right. She couldn't deal with Dark Magic. She couldn't handle being responsible for her actions. She would do it anyway, of course. How she would survive killing Romnuk he would never know. Which is why he had to take charge.
"The spell I have in mind is complex Transfiguration and the book is sitting on my bed," he said, gripping her arm. "You need to go fetch it for me. It's called Corporeal Magic For Corpses."
"You need to run a midnight raid as usual tonight with the girls for one hour. Tomorrow, we pretend like it never happened, alright? We pretend she just ran away."
"Wait—where will you be?"
"I said no questions."
Rose swallowed hard, nodded once and turned. Scorpius was suddenly left alone, his mind working furiously.
He bent down and vanished the vomit from Bellucci's face with a quick Scouring Charm. He then tilted her head back, her mouth falling slackly open so that her pretty lips revealed the stench that came from deep within her poisoned belly. With his wand he removed one of her teeth with a crack.
He would have his own midnight raid to carry out, and the rules meant that he couldn't take the girls with him. Rose would stay behind. But perhaps for the better.
"What're you doing?"
Albus heard his sister ask this as he stood on top of a chair he had dragged across Gryffindor tower, wand wheedling at the corners of the glass case mounted on the wall. He was immediately annoyed upon hearing Lily's voice. Soon half the Castle would know the news that he was unhinged, trying to rip a priceless artefact from its case.
"Just a little experiment," he replied through gritted teeth.
"Albus, don't you pay attention to anything?"
"Hmm?"
"Mum has told that story about when she, Uncle Neville and Aunty Luna stole the Sword of Gryffindor about a hundred times. Remember? The only way you can remove the sword is through an act of bravery worthy enough for it to be presented to you—"
"Right, right," Albus said, jumping off his chair and swivelling around. "And did mum say how she did it?"
Lily rolled her dark brown eyes, flashing him with the exact same look his mother would have given him.
"Well, I'm not going to tell you if you won't pay attention in the first place. Anyway, the sword isn't supposed to be removed from its case."
"What if it was an emergency?"
Lily tilted her head to the side, puzzled.
"What kind of emergency?"
"Never mind."
"Well, if you're trying to get the Sword of Gryffindor out of its case it must be for a particularly good reas—"
"Never mind, Lily! I won't try and take it out from its case, alright!" Albus argued back, returning his wand to his robes.
He jumped off the chair and gave the case a final, fleeting look. Now that he was thinking a little bit more clearly, he knew Lily was right. The sword was well protected in its case. It was charmed tightly shut and his attempts to break the glass had failed. If he was unable to get it out, then the goblins certainly wouldn't be able to.
It was best to leave it safely where it was, guarded by the glass, guarded by the portrait's password, guarded by the walls of the school and the charmed soil that was impossible to dig through. There was no use removing the sword—but it still nagged at Albus. Why? Why did they so desperately want it?
"Mum and dad have already left with the Order, haven't they?" Albus asked.
"Yes, right after dinner."
The goblins may not be able to break the case to get the Sword, but that wouldn't stop them from dismantling it from the wall and stealing the entire case unharmed. To what end did they need the Sword?
"Right. Well, there's still someone I can ask."
Lily watched her brother sprint from the room, still shaking her head after him with her hands on her hips. "Even if you were to ask Neville or Luna, it's not as if they'll tell you how to get the sword out!"
"I'm not trying to get the sword out! Merlin, Lil, sod off, will you?"
"You've lost your bloody marbles!" she exclaimed after him, but he had already shut the portrait behind him.
Taphonomic Transfiguration
In this chapter, Transfiguration will be explored as a means of dispersing human remains, with a focus specifically on bones (return to chapter 2 for the decomposition of other organic tissues through potions and solutions). Putrefying bone is more difficult than other organic matter. While it is possible to completely decompose bone through highly advanced Dark Magic, it can be preferable to transform a body into a single bone. There are other benefits, too. Basic Taphonomic Transfiguration partially retains the bone, allowing it to be used in future as a key ingredient in potion making. Alternatively, by using this spell, it is much easier to hide the bone or retain it as a keepsake. For instance, in the Middle Ages, Egbert the Egregious transfigured the bodies of his victims into single bones, which he then kept as a token of his duels. Below is a diagram of the necessary wand movement required to complete this spell successfully.
Scorpius studied the page assiduously, his thin finger trailing the instructions of the spell. He could feel Rose reading over his shoulder. He snapped the book shut and handed it to her, readying his wand.
"You might want to leave for this," he warned.
"No," she said quietly. She took hold of his arm and lowered it. "This is my fault. I'm sorry you're cleaning up my mess again."
Scorpius turned back to her steadily, his face mask-like. While that expression had once unnerved her, she only felt calm reassurance looking into his eyes. It was as if he were untouchable, no matter how chaotic everything became around him. It was such a strange thing, but she utterly trusted whatever he was about to do next.
"Go back downstairs. Don't get caught."
"What if I need you?" she pressed urgently.
Calmly, he replied, "I'll have the mirror in my pocket."
"Be careful."
She was struck with how intensely she loved him. Despite all of his misgivings, he remained like marble. Secure and unmoveable.
It wasn't like before, the kind of fluffy love she had been too embarrassed to name. She recalled that as if looking up from a very deep well, this bright and superficial thing hanging up above her head, vaporous and intangible. This was different. She felt it like a bass to their every word. Even in their exchange just now, it hummed like an undercurrent. And if I need you? Be careful. Their words were an exchange of love far more certain than whatever they shared in their fifth and sixth years. She was overwhelmed by how much he had loved her, since the very start, perhaps since he was eleven years old. Had he always felt what she felt now?
She opened her mouth to tell him, to explain this revelation, but Scorpius shook is head and pushed her hand firmly closed around the book.
"We don't have time for questions. Go back downstairs and I'll see you later tonight, after you're done with the girls' duel."
Rose nodded and licked her dry lips. She stuffed the parchment into her pyjama pocket. There would be time to talk after this was done.
As soon as the door shut, Scorpius turned back to Bellucci's body. His stomach turned. Human Transfiguration always made him nervous, but it wasn't as if they could kill Bellucci twice. There was no point being sentimental now—she was dead.
He wasn't usually afraid of dead things, comfortable around the creepily pickled items in the potion's cabinet or the preserved relics in his father's office. But this was death most uncomfortable, where it was not wrapped up in grief or loss or spectacle. A corpse to be turned into a single bone, buried and forgotten.
He swallowed hard and turned his nerves to steel.
Finding a goblin was harder than Albus had anticipated. He had searched half the school without luck before doubling back to the common room, ruffling through his trunk until he extracted the Marauder's Map.
There were far less dots to search, so with the Map it didn't take him long. Orlick could be found in a series of underground chambers but it wasn't clear where the entrance to these chambers were. Albus muttered in frustration, flicking his wand over the map to check what was above them. They were beneath the grand staircase.
It was getting late and Albus wanted to find Orlick before curfew, but as he was leaving the dormitory, Map now tucked into his back pocket, he almost collided head first with Lorcan.
"Aw mate, you're just the person I wanted to see. Look, James is a right mess at the moment. D'you reckon you can have a quick word with him?"
"Lorcan," Albus said, a little impatiently, "you're closer to James than I am. Perhaps you—"
"He won't speak to me, Albus. Please, could you just come to have a chat with him? I wouldn't ask if I weren't worried."
Albus took a deep breath and sighed. "Sure. Where is he?"
"Here's in the first year dorm."
"W-what?"
"Well, they've packed up tent city and that's where we were living. And everyone has either moved back into the village or headed for Diagon Alley to join the troops there. But since last night, James has been—well, it might just be best if you have a chat with him mate."
Albus pocketed his wand. Orlick would need to wait after all.
James was sitting on one of the first year beds, the room vacant ever since last summer. It still had the awful smell of old socks that seemed to stick to first year dorms like the ghost of the dirty eleven year old boys who used to inhabit it.
Albus knew from years of experience that James was in a mood. He could tell by the hunch of his shoulders, the way he was pulling at the sleeves on his shirt. If they had been younger, these would have been the signs of an impending tantrum. But on profile he could see that James' lips were shut tight. Ever since last year, he had been shut tight as a box.
"You alright, James?"
"No."
He was surly, refusing to turn around. Albus came around to him instead, kneeling so that he was able to look up into his brother's face.
"D'you think I'm a coward?" James asked suddenly.
"No. Who's calling you a coward?"
"Dad did."
"That's not like Dad."
"Well, he did, alright?"
To his surprise, James recounted the night before—agreeing to his father's request to retrieve his thoughts for the Pensieve. He even explained what had happened in the memory, putting words to something he was having a hard time getting out. Albus kneeled before him listening, never interrupting. He explained that Lorcan wanted to move to Diagon Alley to join the others there but James didn't want to. He didn't want to be in anyone's army. And maybe it was wrong of him to be a Gryffindor after all, because he clearly was a coward.
For some reason, Abus' thought flickered to that forbidden place where Imogen was locked, where she too had guiltily shrunk under that label. How unfair that label was.
"You're not a coward, James. And Dad wasn't saying you were a coward. He just needed your help. He wasn't calling you a coward. He was asking you to be brave. And he only asked because he knew you could."
James sighed heavily and ran his hands over his face.
"Being brave is feeling scared but doing the thing anyway. You used to be fearless, James, and that made you reckless. Now you know what being brave really feels like."
Albus took his brother's hands and lowered them from his eyes, giving them a squeeze. James gave him a smile, the side of his mouth twisting up hopefully. He took in his brother's appearance and realised that he was still dressed to go out—sneakers on, jeans and a jumper, parchment sticking out of his back pocket that could only be the Map.
"Where are you going?" James frowned.
"Er, it's a bit hard to explain. I'm trying to find the entrance to some chambers under the school. They're under the staircase but I can't seem to find the entrance."
"Give it here," James said. "I think I know the ones. I think I can help."
There was no moon and a filmy layer of cloud even blotted out the stars. Scorpius didn't mind this. The darkness wrapped around them like an invisibility cloak. It made it easier to get down to the Forbidden Forest.
"This is still a raid, so all rules apply. We don't talk about this tomorrow morning, understood? We pretend like it never happened."
Scorpius withdrew the single bone from his cloak and kneeled down to the wet earth, scooping it aside with his wand until he had made a shallow shoe-box sized grave. He buried the bone in it, carefully packing the dirt over it in the limited light of his wand.
"What sort of night raid is this?" Fleischer asked uneasily, staring at the bone.
Scorpius stood, dusting his hand on his cloak. They had passed Hagrid's hut. They were at the point where the walkway began at the mouth of the Forbidden Forest. Scorpius lowered his weak wand beam to the damp panels.
"We need some potion ingredients," he said, conjuring a glass beaker and handing it to Fleischer.
"Can't you filch them from the cupboard?" Zabini muttered.
"They aren't your usual potions ingredients."
They began their walk slowly, their feet crunching on the ground. He could feel the hyper-vigilance of the young men behind him, the way they desperately peered into the dark brush around them.
When they got to a certain point, Scorpius stopped and hovered his wand in the palm of his hand like a compass. He paused for a moment, then turned sharply off the path.
"Wait—" Fleischer muttered, shuffling after him, "Is it safe to go off the path? Aren't there giant spiders in this forest?"
"That's one of the things we're looking for."
"You've got to be shitting me," Zabini stopped, his wand held tightly.
"Don't fret. We just need to find their eggs."
"Their what?"
"We must be close by," Scorpius muttered, raising his wand. "Accio."
The other two men froze, eyes wide, staring at Scorpius as if he were mad. But he remained utterly calm, his wand shining blindingly into the thick, dark trees around them until something came whirling towards him—a long, silvery piece of fine ribbon.
"Well, they'll certainly know we're here now, but at least this'll make our job quicker," Scorpius said, grabbing the silvery strand.
"Is that—a—a spider web?"
Scorpius didn't respond. He was already following the web quickly, almost pulling on it as he walked, a ghostly version of Ariadne's thread taking them to the monster in the middle of this labyrinth.
"We're almost at the colony. Look, we won't have very long. I'll be performing some very complex magic," Scorpius explained, speaking very quickly. "Our main concern is that the mother spider will be guarding the egg sac. All I need you to do is taking some of the silvery silk from the egg sac and bottle it."
"You've gone mental."
"Are you ready? We're almost there," Scorpius said, and they were indeed descending now, the forest floor sloping downwards. They could hear clicking and scurrying. The vibrations on the web had set all the spiders off. While they had now become too gormless to speak, both men were trembling from fear.
Scorpius let go of the strand of spider web. He took his wand and gave it a flourishing twist, murmuring, "Serpensortia." A snake burst from the tip of his wand, and a moment later, he was enlarging it with an Engorgement Charm so it was twenty, then thirty times it's size and as thick as a tree trunk. It hissed menacingly, swaying where it stood.
And Scorpius was hissing too, hissing like the snake, hissing and spitting with his teeth clenched. The snake was moving forward slowly, its heavy body sliding across the mulch and crunching the skeletons of small vermin beneath it. And whatever was beyond their point of vision in the dark was frantically scattering away, hundreds of feet and pincers clicking through the dark.
Fleischer blinked hard and then twisted his wand behind him, beneath where Scorpius stood. In the beam of the wand, he saw the glistening egg sac in a web as thick as rope, a spider the size of a car perched on top of it.
"This is fucking mental," he whispered.
"It's quite alright," Scorpius replied, returning to English and sounding so calm it was absurd. "I'll get the mother away. Just be quick to get the silk around the egg sac."
The entire scene was nightmarish. It did cross their minds to turn and run, but something kept them rooted to the ground. Then, Scorpius hissed again and the enormous snake began slithering back in their direction. Whatever Scorpius was saying in Parseltongue was no longer directed at the snake, but at the spider.
The snake lunged forward, snapping at the spider, and it snapped its pincers back. But it must have been terrified, shrinking further away from its precious cargo, its many eyes glinting in the light of their wands. The snake snapped again, spurred on by Scorpius, until finally they had a clear path to the eggs.
"Give me a bloody boost, will you?" Fleischer demanded of Zabini, who was still standing slack jawed. He checked himself and then aimed his wand at Toby, levitating him carefully up until the air with a simple charm and getting him close enough to the eggs without tangling him in the web. Fleischer used his wand to spool up the silver thread like candy floss, then shoved it into the glass beaker.
"We've got it," he called, as Zabini (rather roughly) returned him to the ground.
"Go ahead of me to the path," Scorpius said, speaking gently. He was backing away slowly, his attention still on the enormously oversized snake. As he backed away, the snake followed him as if it were on an invisible leash. The wand light shifted over its scales. "The spiders won't follow."
They were already feeling the ground slope back upwards. They were out of the spiders' den.
"Please tell me we can go back to the Castle now."
Scorpius was shrinking the snake back to its normal size now, his wand pointed at it precisely. "There's just one more thing we need."
James led Albus up to the third floor, down a corridor behind a locked door where a trapdoor blended into the flagstone ground. He pulled it open and they peered down into what must have been a three-storey drop. A metal chute extended from the trapdoor like a slide.
"Pretty sure this is where they guarded the Philosopher's Stone when Dad was at school," James explained. "Found it in third year."
Albus squinted down into the dark. His heart squeezed. He lowered himself into the steep chute.
"Wait, I'm coming with you."
Albus looked up, surprised. "Are you sure?"
"If you're going to question a goblin, I'm not letting you go alone."
There would be no danger in speaking to Orlick. He was on the Order's side. But James had that fiery look in his eyes that had long been dormant. In fact, Albus was quite glad to see it. He nodded, and with a gulp, let go of the trap door.
With a rush of cool air and the drop of his stomach, Albus found himself skidding to the bottom of the slide and coming to a gentle halt. He was in a large chamber, deep underground he assumed, with bracketed candles along the wall. He took out the Map to study as James came whooshing down the chute behind him, seeing with relief that Orlick was still up ahead.
They walked on, wands out and lit, noticing that the passage sloped downwards and trickling water could be heard down the walls. As they reached the end of the passageway, it opened up into a dazzlingly lit chamber with a high vaulted ceiling. There was a table and chair, a simple mattress. In the middle of the Spartan set up sat Orlick, a diamond saw in his hands as he carved a small slab of granite. He looked up and did not seem surprised to find the intruders before him.
"Hello, Orlick," Albus said, lowering his wand. "I'm sorry to barge in like this at such a late hour but I had some urgent questions and—and my parents have already left for Mount Bowfell. I thought you'd be the best person to ask."
Orlick regarded the two brothers carefully, placing down his working tools slowly. He gestured towards the bed, then positioned his chair in that direction.
"I have time," he agreed, inviting them over.
Back on the path once more, their feet clattering along the boards, the three boys were straining their ears to make sure they weren't being followed. In the womb of the forest, all sounds were submerged and alarming. A twitch of leaves, the hoot of an owl, the scurry of a fox. Everything sounded sinister.
"How'd you get those spiders to flee?" Zabini asked, curious.
"I told them that the snake was a Basilisk. Acromantula are terrified of Basilisks so I thought it would be easy to fool them."
Scorpius, who had always been so quiet and feeble as a boy, was startlingly in control. His face was hard and pale in the little light from his wand.
"What else do we need? Can't be worse than those spiders?" Zabini asked.
"Well, it's not as dangerous. But certainly worse."
Both the boys hung back. After a few more steps without them, Scorpius sighed and turned to face them. Their faces were suspended in the gloom, furious and staring.
"If you're going to make us risks our lives you need to tell us why," Zabini snapped.
"This is a midnight raid. You do what I tell you."
"Bollocks," Fleischer snapped. "This isn't some stupid challenge in the common room. We could've died—"
"No one is risking their life except me," Scorpius said calmly. "You two won't be in danger."
He was already turning to move on. But his roommates were finding their fury now, following him at his heels.
"Oi! Tell us what's going on, or we leave you in here alone."
Scorpius gritted his teeth and came to a stop. "I need unicorn blood, alright? These were the only two ingredients I can't find in a potion's cupboard. And it's not just a silly potion I'm learning for kicks—this is a part of a bigger plan. To stop the goblins."
The boys were both still now, processing this. Toby was thrumming his fingers against the glass beaker in his pocket. His fingernails made a high tinkling sound like laughter. After a few beats of silence, Scorpius turned around once more and continued walking. They followed him once more, a little less aggressively now.
"But—if you kill a unicorn—don't you get cursed?" Toby implored, sounding worried.
"There's no evidence of that," Scorpius said shortly. "It's just a wizarding superstition to deter people from slaying unicorns."
"Well, if it turns out to be true, it's a right lot worse than 'May-born witches marry Muggles', isn't it?" Zabini demanded. "Is it worth gambling a superstition like that?"
"You two won't be killing it in any case, will you? So I don't know why you are so worried."
Zabini and Toby shared a furtive look and didn't argue any further. Their adrenalin propelled them on through the dark, until, after what felt like ages, they came into a glen filled with a warm silver light.
Unlike the spider's den, the unicorn glen was filled with a glow that pushed away the dense darkness. The radiance of the unicorns was breathtaking. Their pounding heartbeats eased, but instead they were filled with an impending dread. There were only two unicorns, one smaller than the other, and both asleep.
"How much blood do you need?" Zabini asked quietly.
"Just a phial," Scorpius replied quietly, rolling up his sleeves. His face was set and pale in the light. Sweat beaded on his forehead, along his silver hairline.
"What's the curse supposed to do?" Fleischer added nervously.
"I don't believe it's like a wizard's curse," Scorpius said quietly. He licked his lips. He was hesitating slightly, his wand not entirely raised. "I think it's like using Avada Kedavra. I think it damages your soul."
This was somehow worse. The idea that one's soul would be damaged, perhaps beyond repair, was a more formidable curse—especially for someone like Scorpius. There was something very whole about him. Something that was about to fracture. It could be seen in the look that betrayed his mask like expression as he raised his wand. Scorpius didn't want to do this. He cringed away from his own wand.
"Wait," hissed Zabini, stepping forward. "I'll do it."
"Pardon?"
"I'll do it. And you don't need to bloody murder the thing to get a phial of blood. Let me do it," he insisted, extracting his own wand. "I'm already cursed. Why would it matter if I get another curse thrown on top?"
"You don't have to—"
"Restrain the bigger one. I reckon she'll kick up a fight."
And before Scorpius could begin arguing, he aimed his wand at the smaller unicorn and sent an Incarcerous Spell to bind it. It woke immediately, terrified, whinnying as it strained against its ropes. It was a terrible sound, splitting the air the way lightening shocks darkness.
Without a choice now, Scorpius and Toby narrowed in on the larger unicorn that had reared up in fury. They used a simultaneous Full Body-Bind curse to freeze it to the spot. It became rigid, its eyes wild and rolling, its muscular legs and neck pulsing with veins. It was frozen in its terror. Zabini had already ducked in to kneel by the smaller of the two creatures, leaning down with his wand to knick it across its shoulder. He held the phial to the cut as the unicorn continued to strain, its eyes rolling in fear. But the cut was small. It would heal. The silvery blood trickled into the small bottle. And for a moment, Scorpius felt a huge surge of relief.
The terror of these poor creatures was enough to make his heart spasm. He couldn't believe that for a moment he truly considered killing one.
He couldn't believe that it was Zabini who had shown greater sense and empathy. He shook himself slightly, wondering what exactly was running through his head. He was not as in control of the Dark Arts as he thought.
"That's alright, isn't it?" Zabini said, so casually, holding up the phial of thick silver blood.
It would have to be enough. Scorpius couldn't bear seeing the unicorn bound up in pain and fear.
"Yes. Yes, I have everything I need. Let them both go. It is time to go back to bed."
A/N: A happy new year to you all. I hope you had a safe, holy and happy Christmas and are settling into 2019. This has been one of my favourite chapters to write for a long while now. I hope you enjoy it too. Xx