Chapter 8

Before going to bed that night, Hedgely stayed true to his word and tidied the room we were to share. I was mightily surprised when he retrieved a vacuum cleaner from a small cupboard filled with cleaning supplies, as I had grown used to the idea that wizards did everything with magic. I was proved correct when Hedgely sank onto his mattress, using his wand to direct the vacuum over the carpet, sweet wrappers to hop to the bin and clothes to fold themselves neatly into drawers.

"Wow!" I enthused once he had finished, "That was amazing!"

Hedgely smiled and set his wand down on his bedside cabinet.

"Thank you. I'm very gifted. The clean sheets for your bed will be at the bottom of the wardrobe."

Hedgely threw open the wardrobe's doors, causing an avalanche of his belongings to pour out onto the freshly vacuumed floor. He sighed, and began hunting through the pile, occasionally throwing random objects at me. I ended up holding a squeaky, rubber ball, a sketchbook and a framed photograph of a man and woman, both of them tall and blond. I assumed they must be Hedgely's parents and decided not to ask further questions, before remembering his unfazed demeanour when I had inquired about them earlier.

"Hedgely, why don't you put a spell or something on this photo to make it move?" I asked, thinking about the picture of Professor Flip I had seen in the kitchen, as he pulled the crumpled bed sheets from the bottom of the wardrobe. He scooped up armfuls of his possessions and piled them back into the cupboard, hastily closing the doors and leaning against them so it couldn't all burst back out. When it was clear there would not be an explosion, Hedgely looked at the photo of his mother and father and shrugged.

"Dipping it in potion to make it move makes photos come to life," he said, "but both of my parents are dead. They'll never move or smile or wave ever again, and I don't want to pretend otherwise."

With that emotional answer hanging in the air, he took the photo, ball and sketchbook from me and stashed them beside his bed.

I couldn't sleep for ages that night. Maybe it was sleeping in a strange room with a strange roommate in a strange bed, or it was the thoughts whirring through my mind. It was hard to believe that just yesterday; I had been at home living a normal life, free from the bizarre happenings that must have plagued Harry's life for the past ten years. I was racked by guilt for bullying him and adding to the misery he already faced without my input. I worried about Mum and Dad, stuck in a world with which they weren't familiar, without me. I feared for my own safety, living with Professor Flip who expected me to go out and fight monsters I shouldn't be able to see, aided only by a boy who was thin as a rake but deep as an ocean.

After breakfast the next morning, Professor Flip led Hedgely and I to the top of the house, to what he called 'the training room', which turned out to be a large, empty room with one wall panelled with mirrors. It reminded me of a ballet studio, but after a bad night's sleep and a meagre breakfast that had consisted of muesli and fresh berries that were a factor in my new healthy diet, I was not in the mood to dance.

Professor Flip, who had exchanged his yellow jacket, shirt and trousers, for a raspberry suit in the same style, brandished his wand.

"Why don't you start off with a simple jog around the room?"

I was so surprised at being asked to do such a normal, boring exercise, that I stood and gawped at the Professor until Hedgely took hold of my arm and dragged me along. I couldn't keep up with his long-legged pace, and was soon out of breath.

"Hedgely," I gasped, "Let go of me, I can't keep going."

Hedgely smiled smugly, keeping a firm hold of my elbow.

"Sorry," he said, not even breaking a sweat, "You'll have to keep up if you want to live."

"But nothing's chasing me now!"

I pulled my arm free of Hedgely's spidery fingers and slowed to barely more than a walk, allowing him to run at his own ridiculous pace, even if it meant he out lapped me again and again and again.

After my third time, and Hedgely's twenty third time, around the room, I was alarmed when he called out and threw himself on the floor. I craned my neck to look over my shoulder to see what was wrong. Professor Flip was standing, smiling, where we had left him at the start of the exercise. He pointed above my head. I looked up. And screamed.

An invisible monster was soaring several feet above me, pounding its great, feathery wings. I ran harder, despite the protests of my burning limbs and dry throat. When I reached Hedgely, who was curled up into a foetal, position, I dived down and shook him.

"Get up!" I shouted, "You have to kill it! Quickly!"

Hedgely remained unresponsive and I wondered if the shock of seeing a monster inside a supposedly safe house had killed him. I tried to run again, but the monster was too close behind me. I fell back to the floor and threw my arms over my head, preparing for the burning scratch of talons in my back and the teeth that would clamp around my neck. But it never came. It took me several minutes to process that I was safe. I rolled over onto my back to find Hedgely and Professor Flip standing on either side of me.

"What happened?" I asked Hedgely who, in his sports vest and oversized shorts, looked more like an American basketball player than an English magical monster murderer, "Why didn't you kill it? Where did it go?"

"It wasn't real, Dudley," said Professor Flip, even though the question hadn't been addressed to him, "I conjured up an illusion of an invisibilis monstrum, to see how you would react. Obviously, in a real situation, Hedgely would have tried to kill it, but I asked him to pretend he didn't have magic, for the purpose of this training session. If you had followed his lead, and curled up on the floor, it is highly likely that the monster would have ignored you. My research shows that invisibilis monstrum have poor eye sight, and rely on their hearing to stalk their pray."

I stared at him. What kind of twisted person makes an image of a monster to chase someone else around a room?

"Why didn't you tell me that before I started to panic like an idiot?"

"Like I said, I wanted to see your reaction, so I can judge how much work you'll need to do before you're ready to go out and fight properly."

"So what did your judgement tell you?"

Professor Flip sighed.

"We're going to be here for a while."