When Jinx Floo'd back to her mother's apartment from King's Cross Station, she was met with the familiar sight of her grandmother arguing with her uncle. Queenie Goldstein had not lost any of her ferocity over the decades, and she certainly wouldn't quell it for the sake of her son. Meanwhile, Ellis seemed to have inherited that bit of his personality from her, as Jinx could hear the shouting even from a few fireplaces away.
"Welcome home," Sofia greeted her, raising an unimpressed eyebrow when Jinx somersaulted out of the fireplace.
"Jinx!" Queenie beamed, momentarily stopping her lecture. She engulfed Jinx in a tight hug. "It's wonderful to see you."
"So you're happy to see that grandchild," Ellis muttered darkly.
"Ellis Arthur Kowalski," Queenie said sharply, "you stop that nonsense right now! Of course we would love to have Quentin and Harry over for Hanukkah and New Years', it would just be nice if Lynn would come over too."
"Lynn is stubborn," Ellis said in defense of himself.
"You just don't want to argue with her," Sofia snorted.
"Well, neither of you wants to argue with her either!" He did have a point there, Jinx thought. From what little she remembered of Aunt Lynn, she knew that the witch was a prideful, no-nonsense type of woman. Unfortunately, Uncle Ellis was very much a nonsensical man. Still, Jinx mostly felt bad for her cousins Quentin and Harry. Quentin was ten years old now, and Harry had just turned five in November. Ellis and Lynn had divorced a year after Harry was born, so the separation had been particularly difficult on Quentin.
"Are Quentin and Harry coming over?" Jinx asked.
"Yes," Ellis sighed. "It should be good for them, they haven't seen the rest of the family in a while."
"Well, that should be fun," Jinx tried to say with some pep. "Is Quentin at Ilvermorny yet?"
Ellis didn't reply at first; he was too busy counting Quentin's age on his fingers.
Sofia groaned and answered for him. "Next year, Ellis! The kid starts school next year, Merlin, you're hopeless."
"You ought to take him school supply shopping," Queenie suggested.
"Yes, because Uncle Ellis just does such a great job of taking eleven-year-olds school supply shopping," Jinx muttered.
Ellis gave her a look, to which Jinx replied by sticking her tongue out at him.
"Children!" Sofia said sharply.
And now Jinx was once again reminded why she had always found her family a bit tiring. Too much personality and too much squabbling made her head hurt. She remembered the previous summer, how with her father's side of the family, everything had been going well until the Vaults were mentioned. Tensions had remained high, with Raul's letters over the past few months reminding her to try to stay out of trouble and to be safe. He was usually light-hearted in his correspondence, so the heavier tones caught Jinx by surprise. His last letter, though, was not as grim, probably since it was the holidays, and the Raiders took the winter holidays very seriously.
But as it turned out, Jinx's inner worries (and Sofia's very vocal worries) were all for nothing, as the holiday dinners passed by without any trouble. Quentin and Harry both looked very happy to be surrounded by family, although that could have been due to Queenie outdoing herself with the food this year. Still, even Jinx could admit that it was nice being around relatives when they weren't hounding her about school or the Vaults.
This year, the Scamanders were hosting, which meant that Jinx found herself as the oldest of the kids there. Great-Aunt Tina and Great-Uncle Newt had two kids, Delphine and Leopold, with Uncle Leo's son Rolf being their only grandchild. Rolf and Quentin were only born a few months apart, and a rivalry (albeit a rather one-sided one) had already been established between the two of them. Jinx noticed that even now, Quentin would not-so-subtly bring up how many Quidditch tricks he could do, or how many Potions recipes he had memorized. Meanwhile, Rolf didn't really seem to care all that much about comparisons, as he was content with playing with his grandparents' Kneazles.
She also noticed that Uncle Ellis seemed to be trying hard to get Quentin to stop bringing up his Quidditch playing, but his own hands were full with getting Harry to not engage in a biting contest with Mauler. Jinx was certain that the Kneazles wouldn't really hurt anyone (she trusted Great-Aunt Tina to make sure Newt wouldn't harbor any more dangerous creatures in his living space), but it was still adrenaline-inducing to see the Kneazles chasing around five-year-old Harry, who was not much taller than the creatures themselves. At one point, Tina picked up Mauler by the scruff of his neck. The Kneazle yowled petulantly, but after that, he was very well-behaved. Hoppy and Milly, the other two Kneazles, gave Mauler a look as if telling their brother that he did deserve it for chasing a tiny human around the house.
By the end of the holiday break, Jinx had gotten used to late mornings in the Scamander household. But she was still excited to get back to Hogwarts, mainly because of the hope that she would finally be able to get into Jacob's research room. While her family had done a decent enough job of distracting her from most school-related things, this hidden room had been weighing on Jinx's mind for weeks now. She was so close to uncovering this part of her brother, how could she not be anxious about getting into the room?
For now, though, all Jinx could do was to watch Quentin relish in his new broomstick and play fetch with the Kneazles.
"Curse you, Quirinius Quirrell!" Charlie groaned, slamming his forehead onto his Muggle Studies textbook.
Since the school year had picked up after the holiday break, Jinx had been spending too much time for her liking in the library. She had barely had any time to go through translating Jacob's notebook or bothering Tulip to take her to Jacob's room. Now even Muggle Studies had a larger workload than normal, so Jinx and Charlie had recruited the help of Ben and Bill to complete this assignment.
"Come on, Charlie," Bill rolled his eyes, pulling on Charlie's shirt collar to lift his head off the table. "You'll get through this. Dad goes through Muggle transportation all the time!"
"Yeah, but not the history of technological advancement," Charlie argued back.
"It's really not that difficult," Ben smiled slightly. "And the time range is only from the mid-1800s, that's really not that bad. The biggest thing is just we use cars now."
"Exactly! One-hundred-fifty or so years," Charlie said. "How am I supposed to read all of this and fit everything in two rolls of parchment?"
"By starting to read the book and stopping your moping," Jinx laughed, not bothering to look up from her reading. "Rowan's already finished the assignment, you know."
Charlie gave her a look. "Well, that's because Rowan is Rowan, you know?"
"Just start reading the bloody textbook," Bill said, turning back to his assignment. "If you want to, you can go searching through my old files. I'm pretty sure we had to do the same assignment when I was a Third-Year."
"That takes effort too," Charlie muttered.
Ben shook his head. "You're just lazy, Charlie."
"And what about it?" Charlie huffed.
But he finally relented and flipped the textbook to the right chapter. Jinx quietly duplicated the notes she had taken, and passed the copy over to Charlie. "You're welcome," she mouthed.
Charlie nodded in thanks, and flipped a few pages forward. From the corner of his eye, Bill saw the shuffling of papers but he remained silent. He knew how stressed out Charlie was with both schoolwork and the Quidditch team, and if Jinx was willing to help him out a bit, who was he to interfere with that?
After about an hour of quiet working, Charlie couldn't help but break the silence. "My brian needs a break," he announced, sneaking a sip of Pumpkin Juice.
"I have to agree with you," Ben said, squinting over his Divinations dream journal. "I can't seem to remember what I dreamed of on January 3rd, and I'm worried it's going to ruin the whole thing!"
"Just lie on it," Jinx shrugged. "That's how I finished mine. And Rowan's. And Tonks'. It's actually really fun to make things up," she admitted, snorting. "Trelawney eats it up everytime."
"I would ask you to do mine, but I'd feel bad," Ben sighed.
"Oh, I have an easy solution," Jinx grinned mischievously. "Are you familiar with the historical progression of Muggle transportation since the mid-1800s?"
Even Bill couldn't help but smile at that. Charlie looked positively offended at this, and quickly reached to grab Ben's dream journal. "I'm good at making up dreams too, Ben, I promise! Look." Then in a dramatic, spooky voice, Charlie whispered, "On the night of January third, I dreamt a most awful vision. I saw a….er….a car! Yes, a red automobile with three wheels-"
"Three?" Jinx interjected.
Charlie made a shushing motion and continued. "Yes, three wheels, symbolizing a lack of….stability! Yes, that's a good one, Charlie."
"I think you might actually want to do that Muggle Studies assignment yourself to learn something," Bill commented dryly.
Charlie opened his mouth, presumably to argue back, but the sound of someone clearing their throat directly behind him shut him up. Jinx sat up straighter in her chair to see who the newcomer standing behind Charlie was. She was surprised to see that it was Diego. He was not in Muggle Studies at all, and Jinx had hardly ever spoken to him, nor was she aware of Ben or Charlie being particularly close to him.
"Hey Diego," she greeted cautiously. Bill turned around in confusion, knitting his eyebrows together when he saw Diego standing by their table.
"Hello, Jinx," Diego said, his eyes scanning over the table. "Busy with studying?"
"Yeah," Jinx said shortly. "Muggle Studies."
"Fascinating," Diego said, looking at the illustration of a horse-drawn carriage in Charlie's textbook. "Well, I was just….curious as to what you were up to."
"Why?" Jinx asked, immediately suspicious.
"Just chatting as one Hufflepuff to another," Diego said brightly. "I didn't expect you to be in the library."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Jinx frowned.
"You're a bit thick," Charlie whispered jokingly.
Jinx made a face at him and Bill elbowed him in the ribs.
"Evidently not," Diego laughed. "It's just, you know, many people think that your interests lie elsewhere."
"Such as?" Jinx prompted sharply. She did not like the direction that Diego was going in here.
"The Cursed- Boggart!" Diego suddenly yelled, pointing at a dark cloud hovering a few bookshelves away.
Bill immediately jumped up to his feet and took his wand out. When the creature noticed Bill's attention was on him, it turned into a giant fire. Upon closer inspection, Jinx saw that it was a burning house, with little figures moving around inside of it. A rather graphic image of a little girl with red hair being consumed by the flames appeared at the forefront of the image.
Bill staggered back a bit but kept his composure. He jabbed his wand, and muttered something that sounded like "Ridiculous!" The Boggart turned into a balloon bouncy house and bounced away into the shadows.
When Bill returned to the study table, he looked visibly shaken. Charlie's eyes were wide in fear too, and Ben had blocked his eyes with his hands. Jinx and Diego exchanged confused looks. The image of the little girl had been burned into Jinx's mind and she couldn't help but wonder who it was. Perhaps it was Ginny, the youngest Weasley child? That would make sense why Bill's greatest fear would be seeing her get harmed in any way: Bill was extremely protective, and Jinx could imagine how much he loved his youngest sibling and only sister.
"It was just a conjuring," Charlie said softly as Bill sat back down.
Diego still stood by the table, albeit more awkward now. He scratched the back of his neck, and said, "I'll take that as my cue to leave then. See you guys around." And with a slight cough, Diego all but ran away from the table.
"I hate those things," Ben shuddered, finally opening his eyes again. "You know, I've been completely avoiding the Artefact Room because of the Boggart that's been there since before we left for the holidays."
"They are awful," Bill agreed, taking a deep breath. "But easy to defeat if you know how to. The incantation is Ridikulus; I'd recommend you all learn how to cast the spell."
With that, there was no more fun chatter during their soon-to-be-ended study session. Jinx supposed that she had lucked out so far and hadn't run directly into any Boggarts since that first one in Herbology class. She couldn't think of what shape the Boggart would take if she ever faced one, as there were just so many things she was afraid of.
It was a cruel reminder that the curse was still plaguing the school and that Jinx had to do something.
"I smell like a Dungbomb."
Jinx turned around, nearly falling off of her seat when she saw that Barnaby had approached her. She hadn't meant to get to the Potions classroom so early, but both Penny and Rowan were still asleep when Jinx had woken up. The Great Hall had been relatively empty, and Jinx was bored sitting alone, so she had decided to head down to class early, and ended up being the first person in the classroom.
"Er, thanks for the warning?" she asked, confused as to why Barnaby had approached her yet again, and why he was so early as well.
"I've had more baths since I got hit with that big Dungbomb than I've had in my whole life, but I still stink," Barnaby grumbled.
Jinx didn't know how to respond for a moment. "I'm sorry that happened," she finally said. She gave the air a sniff, and truly couldn't smell anything different from the usual Potions classroom scent. "You don't smell bad at all though," she said, noting a faint smell of something earthy. "But if it's really bothering you, you should use vinegar to get rid of the smell."
"Nah, it's not that bad," Barnaby confessed, taking the seat next to her. While she didn't dislike Barnaby, Jinx would rather that he didn't make a habit of sitting next to her during Potions. She needed the presence of her friends to make dealing with Snape tolerable. "It's more of a mental thing, I think."
"That would make sense."
"Still, congratulations on beating Merula before the break," Barnaby smiled. "I'm so glad she went home for the holidays and I stayed at school," Barnaby continued, "otherwise I would have gone mad listening to her mope."
"She does that a lot, huh," Jinx joked.
"Mope? Yeah, she's a certified expert in moping," Barnaby confirmed. "She didn't even wish me a Happy Birthday this morning because she was too busy complaining that her socks didn't feel right."
Jinx giggled at that. "Well, Happy Birthday," Jinx smiled. Then, on the corner of her parchment, she wrote "January 14 - Barnaby's birthday".
"Thank you, Jinx," Barnaby said softly. "You know, fourteen doesn't feel much different from thirteen."
"Well, its not that much of a difference," Aubrey Ngyuen remarked, taking the seat across the table from Jinx. Another Slytherin, Liz Tuttle, sat next to Aubrey, and Jinx sighed dramatically. As far as Slytherins went, the three sitting at her table were the most tolerable of the lost, but that didn't mean she wanted to spend a whole class period with them. Rowan had already mentioned it was strange enough that Barnaby was being friendly with her, she didn't need more comments from more of her friends about her sitting with more Slytherins. At least Aubrey was Sebastian's sister, so it wouldn't seem too strange if Jinx was friendly with her.
Still, Jinx was met with strange looks from the class when everyone else entered. Upon seeing her, Aiden immediately whispered something to Lenny and Diego. Sebastian didn't seem too bothered; he had even stopped by the table to give Aubrey a new quill. She didn't like the judgemental stares that Lenny and Aiden were giving her, and almost found it a relief when Snape started the lesson with his usual snide remarks.
At the end of class, Barnaby gave Jinx a friendly wave goodbye before running after Merula and Ismelda. This gave Aubrey the opportunity to drop her polite expression and give Jinx a calculating look.
"What are you doing, Jinx?" she asked.
"I didn't do anything," Jinx shrugged. "You should ask Barnaby."
"Alright," Aubrey said defensively. "I was just curious, that's all. You know, Barnaby's really good friends with Merula."
"For now," Jinx smiled cryptically.
Aubrey simply rolled her eyes and turned to help Liz pack up her rather extensive set of note-taking supplies.
As Jinx left the room, she found herself flanked by Tonks and Penny, the latter of whom was also quite curious about the recent developments with Barnaby Lee. But as she had been with Aubrey, Jinx remained tight-lipped about the whole thing. Still, Penny was persistent, even going as far to suggest that Barnaby fancied her.
"That's preposterous," Jinx exclaimed when Penny had suggested that. "He could just be looking for some new friends, Penny."
"Or something more," Penny giggled.
"Oh come on, Jinx deserves someone far more clever," Rowan chimed in.
"Our Jinx is in very high demand," Tonks grinned.
Jinx gave her a confused look. "What's that supposed to mean?" she demanded.
But Tonks only laughed, her hair flaring red at the ends. "Come on, let's just get lunch. Boys bore me anyways."
"Agreed," Rowan nodded.
Internally, Jinx also agreed. Who had time to worry about boys when she had a curse to break and a school to save? When she was certain that she would make it out of the school year alive (she was just being dramatic), then the next worry would be excelling in all of her classes. Romance was most certainly at the very bottom of that list of worries.
However, it seemed that with Barnaby wanting to be her new Potions partner and Diego's strange questioning, Jinx was just being approached by the people she simply didn't want to deal with. Meanwhile, the one person she actually wanted to talk to, Tulip, had been near-impossible to get in contact with. Jinx had to resort to waiting for her outside of the Potions classroom and catching her off-guard as she left for class. Talbott gave her a funny look as he walked past her, causing her to nearly miss latching onto Tulip. To Tulip's credit, she didn't seem too disturbed by Jinx pouncing on her.
"We're going to go check out Jacob's Room now," Jinx demanded, dragging Tulip to the closest stairwell.
"Very well," Tulip huffed. "Do you have your key with you?"
Jinx nodded. "Of course I do. Also, another question. What did Merula mean when she said that she already took what she wanted from my brother's room?" That had been bothering Jinx ever since Merula had said it. What right did Merula have to steal from Jacob's room?
"She's lying," Tulip replied forcefully. "We used his room to study the vaults because it was full of valuable research, but there was nothing worth taking. At least, I don't think there was."
Jinx didn't say anything in response. She didn't exactly trust Tulip's assessment of what was worth taking or not; that would be something she would have to see for herself. As the two neared the hallway within a hallway on the fifth floor, Jinx felt a weird tingling sensation in her spine. This hallway was strange. She hadn't felt this close to Jacob since he disappeared, yet he was almost certainly nowhere near her.
As they reached the door, Jinx put the key she had taken from Merula in the first keyhole. It made a satisfying clicking sound as she did. She turned around and stared at Tulip, who had stopped a few steps ahead of her.
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Tulip asked, her eyes wary. "You might not like what you find."
"I have to find him," Jinx said, her voice stiff. This research could be a valuable part of finding Jacob, or at least figuring out his thought process. And all that would be integral when it came time to actually search for him.
Tulip nodded in understanding. She dug into her pocket and handed Jinx her key. "Do the honors," she said solemnly.
Grasping the second key tightly, Jinx took a deep breath before sticking it into the second keyhole. With one twist, the lock clicked open, and the chains along the door slithered down into the lock. The doorknob seemed to glint brighter in the candlelight. For a moment, Jinx paused, hesitant to open the door. Tulip stared blankly at her. Shaking her head, Jinx opened the door and prepared to step in.
To her utter shock, a pale white hand emerged from behind the door. Its pale white fingers nearly touched Jinx's wrist as she frantically pulled her wrist back and stumbled backwards into Tulip. Then, the full figure stepped out into the light. Jinx only recognized the pale man from newspapers, but he was easily recognizable as the Dark Lord who had spread terror into the hearts of everyone in the Wizarding World only five years ago.
"Run, Jinx! Run!" Tulip shouted, already running down the hall.
"Depulso!" Jinx shouted. The Dark Lord hurtled back into the room and Jinx slammed the door shut. Then, she turned on her heel and sprinted after Tulip. She barely had enough time to pull the keys out of the lock. She risked a glimpse back to see the lock resetting itself, and the chains wrapping themselves around the door.
"How was that possible?" Jinx gasped when they were safely down the hall. "You-Know-Who… Vol- he's dead!"
"That had to be your Boggart," Tulip panted next to her. "Hogwarts is crawling with them these days."
"There's a spell," Jinx said slowly, making sure she had remembered Bill's suggestion, "called Riddikulus. It turns the Boggart into something else and drives it away."
Tulip nodded, immediately understanding what Jinx was trying to get at. "Let's figure out how to cast that spell, so we can get rid of the Boggart, and get back into that room." Then, she asked, "Why is your Boggart You-Know-Who?"
Jinx felt her stomach drop a bit at that question. Luckily, she was saved by the appearance of Snape, who she had never been happier to see in her life.
He approached the two of them swiftly, a contemptuous look already settling onto his face. "Tulip Karasu. Jinx Raider," he sneered. "I should've known I'd find you two here. Your brother was the most disobedient student Hogwarts has seen in a long while. You may have overtaken him. Stay away from this corridor, and give up your search for the vaults, or I will see to it that you share his fate."
Then, he stood there, blocking the way back to Jacob's room. That left the two of them no choice but to head down the nearest staircase, which would deposit them back down to the Great Hall.
"Now what are we gonna do?" Tulip asked, looking back to make sure they were out of Snape's earshot.
"We need to learn Riddikulus, but we can't wait to learn it in Defense," Jinx decided.
"If we ever learn it," Tulip groaned. "This year's Defense teacher is even worse than last year's!"
"Don't worry," Jinx reassured her, "I know of a place where we can practice in peace."
