James Potter's Darkest Hour

"Accio wand!"

James wheeled around and saw his wand, just snatched from his hand, gliding towards MacAllister, who effortlessly caught it with his left hand, while his own wand in the right kept targeting James. James went weak at the knees, but he pulled himself together.

It was the night from Tuesday to Wednesday, shortly after half past twelve.

"Hello Potter," MacAllister greeted him as if they were just meeting in the schoolyard.

"Hello MacAllister," growled James, determined not to let his fear show.

"'Death to the Mudbloods'," MacAllister read out what James had just magically written on the wall, "and a nice Death Eater's Mark at that. Aunt Hermione will be delighted!" he sneered.

"Let that be my problem."

"Of course," MacAllister chuckled, "and there are a whole lot more things I'm going to let be your problem, of which your aunt is the least." Shaking his head, he looked again at James' shithouse slogan. "The third night in a row while the entire school is hunting for the culprit! You didn't even make yourself invisible! Wow, Potter, the nerve of you! For your coolness I could admire you if it served a better cause."

"My cause is nothing to be ashamed of!" shouted James defiantly.

"Isn't it?" Roy swayed his head in doubt. "Well, I think I would be ashamed of a cause that has so little truth on its side that it has to operate with lies. But this is nothing we are going to discuss tonight. Now let's go to the Head of your house first."

James had to go ahead while Roy followed him with his wand drawn. It took quite a while and a lot of knocking before Neville Longbottom, drowsy, opened the door of his small Staff flat.

"What's up ..." he began, then saw Roy's wand pointed at James, who was looking to the ground.

"Good morning, Professor, I've just caught Potter conjuring the slogan 'Death to the Mudbloods' on the wall along with a Death Eater's Mark."

Neville stared at James. "It was you?" he whispered in dismay. James continued to stare down.

"Check it." Roy handed James' wand to Neville.

"Wait a minute," Longbottom said, disappearing into his flat and returning two minutes later. He had hastily thrown on a robe over his pyjamas, his feet were in slippers. With the tip of his own wand he touched James'. Then he looked puzzled. "Err ... Prius incatandem!"

Nothing happened. Neville flushed.

"Primus impotentam!" James' wand did not do anything.

"Prima incarnatio!" shouted Neville with growing desperation. Roy pressed his lips tightly together to keep himself from snorting, and even James who was really in a jam had to struggle to suppress his grinning.

"Primela imbiscum!"

Roy, who was becoming afraid that the professor would turn James's wand into a billy goat rather than make it show its last spell, cleared his throat.

"Excuse me, Professor," he said courteously. "Might it be that you mean Prior Incantato?"

Neville gave him a grateful look. "Prior Incantato!" Like a wisp of smoke, a downsized image of James's infamous work rose out of the top of the wand. Longbottom stared at it. "James, how dare you ..." At this point he remembered that he had to act as a professor, not as a friend of the Potter family. "This will have serious consequences! First of all, we have to inform Professor McGonagall."

After getting the Headmistress out of bed – James was lucky that McGonagall's gazes couldn't kill him! –, the teachers decided to call in the two Gryffindor Prefects Ethelbert and Victoire. They went to the portrait of the Fat Lady. "Password" said the lady with a deep yawn.

Neville blushed. "Err, Potter, say the password."

"And what if I don't?" asked James, apparently still trying to throw a spanner in the works somehow.

"Don't be bitchy Potter," Roy said, "if anyone needs the Prefects now it's you, the teachers don't need them."

James sighed. "Vegetables." The portrait swung open and the two teachers got in to wake the Prefects.

After the six of them had arrived in McGonagall's office, the Headmistress first took one hundred and fifty points off Gryffindor and then gave James, who was sitting slumped in his chair, a twenty-minute thunderous sermon, at the end of which she summed up:

"You have discredited Hogwarts! You have discredited me! You have seriously damaged the reputation of Gryffindor! You have sullied the good name of your family! Maybe I could forgive you for all that. What I cannot and will not forgive you for is the fact that you tried to put the blame for your outrages on innocent schoolmates!"

"Professor McGonagall," Victoire tentatively tried to soothe the upset Headmistress, "please don't expel him. Certainly, he wasn't aware ..."

"... of the implications?" snapped McGonagall. "Are you pulling my leg, Miss Weasley? At the very latest when the Daily Prophet showered Slytherin with unfounded accusations this morning, the implications of this were obvious to him! And that's exactly what you were after, wasn't it, Potter? – Now there's exactly one chance left for you to avoid your expulsion. Tell me who put you up to it or who else knew about it."

In the corner of his eye, Roy could see Victoire turn pale.

"It was me alone. No one else knew about it, and no one put me up to it." He was clearly lying.

Wow, Roy thought, whatever that bastard may be, he's certainly not one to tell on others to save his own neck.

McGonagall eyed James with scrutiny. "All right," she finally said. "If this is your last word, it's your last hour at Hogwarts."

"You can't throw me out, Professor," James was now catching at a straw. "The Ministry would ..."

"Shut up, you idiot!", Victoire hissed at him, but it was too late.

"You dare threaten me with the Ministry, Potter?"

McGonagall jumped up with an agility one would hardly have thought her capable of at her age and banged her flat hand on the table.

"If the camel's back hadn't been broken already, this would be the straw that made it!"

"Professor, please ..." pleaded Victoire.

"No!" snapped McGonagall back.

Victoire turned to Ethelbert. "Aren't you going to say something too?"

"What?" asked Ethelbert with a shrug. "I've got no arguments."

"Professor Longbottom?"

Neville shook his head sadly. "I don't see what else could be done here. I have always stood up for James, God knows it wasn't his first escapade, but this is going too far. I am also too deeply disappointed as a friend." Neville's eyes were filled with tears.

McGonagall took a sheet of parchment and started to write. No one dared to speak a word. Then she rolled up the sheet and handed it to James, who took it like in a trance.

"This is the letter to your parents with the official information that you are expelled from this school."

Then she opened a tin of floo powder and threw a handful of it into the flames of her fireplace, which turned emerald green.

"That's it, Potter. You are to return to your parents immediately. Your stuff will be sent on to you. Have a good trip."

When James walked to the fireplace, white as a sheet and weak at the knees, a voice behind him said:

"Stop!"

It was Roy.

All the five of them turned to him, dumbfounded.

"Professor McGonagall," Roy said, "Potter's actions were to harm Slytherin. If I asked you on behalf of Slytherin not to expel Potter, would you do so?"

McGonagall leaned back and looked at him in amazement. "Why should you do that, MacAllister?"

"That would be my peace offer to Gryffindor," Roy said to Victoire and Ethelbert, who were gazing at him like at a Father Christmas appearing at Easter, "and my last one."

"What does that mean?", Victoire demanded.

"Do I have your word of honour that the Gryffindors will end their ongoing provocations and other hostilities against Slytherin if Potter is allowed to stay at Hogwarts?"

"Of course," Ethelbert answered immediately.

Victoire took a moment longer, but then she too said: "You've got my word."

"In this case," Roy now turned back to the Headmistress, "I would ask you, for the sake of school peace, to let mercy prevail."

McGonagall looked at one after the other. She kept tantalising the Gryffindors for a full minute, then reached out towards James. "The letter, Potter!" James handed her the letter with a trembling hand, and McGonagall made it disappear with Reductio.

"Neville," she said, "I expect you to punish Potter severely. I will notify his parents of what he has done. You may all leave now. Good night!"

The following morning, once again the Slytherins were woken up with the call to come to the common room immediately. Roy waited until they had gathered, then he called out:

"Last night the smearer was caught and convicted. It's a Gryffindor!"

Relieved cheers made the walls of the common room quake. "Who did it?", some wanted to know.

"James Potter!"

"Should have known!", – "At last, that bastard will be thrown out!".

"No," Roy replied, "he won't!"

The cheering stopped abruptly. Roy was looking into long faces. Only Albus looked relieved.

"What, even now?", – "That's typical, McGonagall is a Gryffindor too, they will get away with anything!"

"McGonagall had already signed the expulsion," Roy replied. "It was me myself who asked her to withdraw it."

The Slytherins stared at their Prefect with open mouths. "You?"

"In return, Ethelbert and Victoire gave me their word that the Gryffindors would stop bothering us from now on, and that was more important to me. Remember what the Sorting Hat said: The enemy is not within this school! You won't bother the Gryffindors, too!"

What Roy said was no doubt common sense. It was as reasonable as eating crispbread, but unfortunately it was not much yummier, too. Grumbling a little, the Slytherins went back to the dormitories and washrooms to start their day.

To the Gryffindors, going to breakfast that morning was like running the gauntlet. This was less due to the Slytherins, who did what Roy had asked them to and ignored the Gryffindors as best they could, but rather to the Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs. In particular those who had bet on a culprit from the Slytherin ranks and had now lost their bets gave full vent to their anger at Gryffindor.

It was worst for James, for he not only had to endure the taunts of students from both houses, but also the icy hostility of his own Gryffindors he had caused a hundred and fifty points loss and a huge embarrassment. Until yesterday, he had been rather popular – at least among peers whom he hadn't played any nasty tricks on. Now he was sitting at the Gryffindor table as lonely and lost as Bernie had been at the Hufflepuff table three weeks earlier. Nobody wanted to talk to him.

"He's getting what he deserves," Roy said, sitting down next to Albus, who was watching his brother sadly, "and even less than that. Good morning!"

"I still feel sorry for him," Albus said. "I can't help it. Besides, the Gryffindors are real hypocrites. Actually, they're not blaming him for doing it, but only for letting himself get caught."

Roy nodded. "I think so, too. Now don't let that drag you down. They will talk to him again, Victoire will make it sure."

"Victoire?" Albus was a little surprised. "Just because she's his cousin?"

"Not only because of that. I think she knew about it. She can't let him wait very long."

As if she had heard, Victoire was standing up at that very moment to sit down with James and start a conversation. On the one hand Albus was relieved, on the other he thought: It really wouldn't have needed to happen that quickly!

"At least Slytherin's reputation is now restored."

"As far as Hogwarts is concerned yes, but in the public's eyes a lot of dirt will stick to us."

"Why?" asked Albus incredulously. "After all, the Daily Prophet has to report on it after they have hyped the issue so much."

"Nope," said Roy, "they needn't and they won't. Let's not go on thinking about it, otherwise I'll regret having saved your brother's buttocks."

"Oh yes – thank you very much."

"Thanks back for the Map and Cloak. I put both under your pillow."

"How did you know McGonagall wouldn't throw him out?" Albus demanded.

Roy grinned. "I had arranged it that way with her before."

"What?" asked Albus. "McGonagall and you, you put on a show?"

"My friend, I asked you not to worry! So, I couldn't very well push your brother out the window without making sure there was a jumping sheet waiting for him." Roy's grin widened. "But he had to jitter a lot."

"Do you think we will get peace here at Hogwarts now?"

"Yes, I do."

Roy's confidence was well-founded, but premature. The few weeks of peace the Slytherins were actually enjoying now turned out to be the calm before the storm.