Chapter Ten: The Madness of Marlowe
A cold wind blew in through the doors of the Entrance Hall, threatening to put out the candles that lined the walls. It rushed down the corridor into the Grand Staircase, passing portraits, suits of armour, shivering students, and up onto the third floor. More students felt the chill as it came through and pulled their robes around their chins to feel some warmth. It reached a wooden door, slightly ajar, and squeezed itself through. Papers on desks rattled and some people reached for scarves. A fire on one side of the room flickered, whilst the embers glowed and tried to fight back against the cold.
"Colloportus"
The door slammed shut. The cold wind was stopped. Students could pull their robes away and focus on the blackboard at the front of the classroom.
"Sorry about that," said Professor Constantine, pocketing his wand and returning to pacing up and down the row of desks. "As I was saying, the Disarming Charm is likely to be the most important defensive spell in your arsenal…" he continued.
On the second row from the back, Albus put his quill down and stretched his fingers out, they'd been aching for days. The detentions hadn't been getting any easier, but he, Scorpius, and Matt had made an agreement to get as close to finishing off their cleaning task as they could before Christmas. The result was that they were now three-quarters of the way through the suits of armour.
There was a yawn from the desk behind, and Albus glanced at it to see Scorpius rubbing his half-closed eyes. Matt was sitting next to him, his head resting on his hand, leaving the other one lazily copying down what Constantine was saying.
Albus turned back to the front of the classroom, where Constantine had written some notes on the board. Picking up his quill and wincing slightly, he started to copy them down.
1. Disarming should always be your first option in a duelling situation
2. The most successful duellists in history have all mastered their Disarming Charm.
3. Mastery of this charm will greatly increase your ability to use other defens-
A loud chiming of the bell made Albus jump and he ran his quill along the parchment, leaving a long black line that went over the edge and onto the desk.
"For Merlin's sake…" said Albus through gritted teeth. He rubbed at the ink on the desk with the sleeve of his robe to get it off.
Constantine clapped his hands together and rubbed the board clean, "Very good, excellent work today everyone. Now we have the theory side of this charm down, next week we will start with the practical use of it. So everyone will need to have their sensible caps on, yes, that means you, Mr Fleet!"
Caedus Fleet shared a nasty smile with some of his Slytherin cronies as he packed away and left the classroom. There was a general hubbub as the rest of the class followed suit. Albus was annoyed about missing the rest of the notes and he responded by haphazardly throwing his piece of parchment into his bag.
"Can I borrow your notes later?" he asked Bertie, who simply nodded as he placed his neatly folded parchment away.
Constantine walked over to their desk, "Everything alright here?"
"Yes, Sir" replied Albus, not looking at him.
A small chuckle came from Constantine's mouth, "Yes, I could tell by how you three spent the whole lesson yawning" he nodded at Albus, Scorpius, and Matt, who was illustrating the point by stretching his arms above his head and letting out a particularly loud yawn.
"Sorry, sir," said Matt whilst rubbing his eye
"Yeah, it's these stupid detentions," said Scorpius, "Don't take it personally"
Constantine chuckled again, "No offence taken, but should you ever need to catch up on anything, please let me know". He walked off to talk to some other students.
Matt left the classroom ahead of the others to talk to Leon, leaving the other three to talk alone as they walked down the stairs for break time. The castle was slowly being filled up with decorations, a sure sign that Christmas was just around the corner. A small swarm of pixies were flying around dropping tinsel on any spare surfaces, including students who dared to stand still for too long.
"What have you got after break?" asked Scorpius
"Charms" replied Bertie, dodging a low-flying pixie.
Albus sighed and leaned his head back triumphantly, "Finally, a lesson where I don't have to rush and finish an essay"
"What have you got, Scorpius?" asked Bertie
"Me? Err…" he pulled his timetable out of his bag and scanned it. He stopped walking and his eyes widened, "History of Magic…"
Bertie stifled a laugh, "Essay?"
"Yup"
"Library?"
"Yup"
They ran back upstairs, despite the protests of some annoyed-looking sixth years, and skidded across the stone floor to turn into the library corridor. Bursting through the doors of the library they were more than pleased to see that Madame Pince was not at the front desk, so they sprinted to their normal desk nestled between two tall bookshelves.
Scorpius performed his well-rehearsed routine of opening his bag and pulling out his inkwell, quill, and parchment in one swift movement, and then just writing whatever his brain came up with.
Seeing as they were well used to this by now, and because Scorpius hadn't yet had this method come back to bite him, Albus and Bertie left him to it and started to study their Grimoire notes again.
"I had some more thoughts about the quadrant," said Bertie. They'd decided on calling the wooden object the 'quadrant' after much debate.
"Go on," said Albus, intrigued.
Bertie opened his notes to the page that contained the transcript of Vitanster's introduction and ran his finger across it, eventually pointing at one section in particular.
"See this?" he said, as Albus leaned over, "The part about his students making a flower?"
Albus nodded and read the passage, "What about it?"
"One of them, Eda, makes a lavender flower," said Bertie, his face alight.
"Yeah?" said Albus, unsure about what Bertie was implying.
Rolling his eyes, Bertie pulled out another page of newer notes that he'd written down about the quadrant a few weeks ago, "The smell!" he said, "I thought it smelt of lavender, didn't I? Now I'm certain that it did, and I'm almost certain that it was Eda who put the quadrant there"
It finally clicked for Albus, who resisted the urge to hug Bertie, "That's amazing!" he cheered, causing the disapproving glare of Madame Pince to appear from around a bookshelf. He lowered his voice when she went away, "But it doesn't really answer the question about why it was in the kitchen"
Bertie looked slightly crestfallen, "I'm still working that out, but there has to be a link"
"If we can work that out, then it will help us find the others," said Albus, his mood lifting with the thought that they might be getting closer to solving at least one of the Grimoire's mysteries. "Where do we start then?"
A pondering look appeared on Bertie's face, and his eyes scanned around the nearby shelves in the vague hope of striking inspiration. "Can you think of anything?"
Albus scratched his head, "Well, it's got to have something to do with the flower" he too started to gaze at the books, "What do we know about lavenders?"
"They're purple" suggested Scorpius, who was taking a momentary break from his writing.
"Brilliant" snickered Albus, "Anything else?"
"They smell nice?" said Bertie, shrugging.
Albus sighed, "You're the one who worked out the smell was lavender, I thought you'd be good at this"
Bertie looked annoyed, "I only knew that because we have a lavender bush growing outside our house!"
"Ok, ok," said Albus, raising his hand in apology, "Let's just have a think about it"
Across the table, Scorpius was rolling up his parchment, seemingly satisfied that he'd written enough for Professor Binns to not complain. "Why don't you ask Rose? I bet she knows something about flowers"
"Because she's a girl?" asked Albus, raising an eyebrow
"No, you moron, because she's probably read a dozen books on the subject" replied Scorpius, packing his things away and standing up to leave.
The other two followed his lead, "Oh, right" said Albus, following Scorpius out of the library, "Probably best I don't, she'll only get suspicious"
"We'd better get reading then, in that case," said Scorpius, yawning again, "Tell you what though, I'm going to sleep so well in Binns's class- Oh, sorry Sir"
Scorpius had walked into Professor Marlowe, who was coming around the corner carrying a stack of rolled-up parchment. He dropped a couple on the floor and said nothing as he stooped down to pick them up. One of them rolled towards Albus and came to a rest at his feet, unfurling slightly as it did. Curious, Albus looked at what was on it. It was a list of runes and some words that he recognised. He barely got a second look before Marlowe snatched it up, he stared at Albus and their eyes met for slightly too long.
"S-sir?" he said, taking a small step back.
Marlowe coughed and broke his stare, "Yes, get to your next class" he said quietly, a hint of contempt in his voice. He proceeded down the corridor and turned away out of sight.
"Al, what was it?" asked Bertie
Albus swallowed, "I think those were his Grimoire notes, because he was translating some spells from runes"
Scorpius looked up and down the corridor before talking, "You're sure?"
"Positive" nodded Albus, "I'm sure I recognised a couple of them from our own notes"
Rubbing his forehead, Scorpius took a deep breath, "He's had the same idea as us then. He must have the whole book copied out, no wonder he hasn't tried to get it back!"
"Did you see the way he looked at me though?" asked Albus, who could feel a bead of sweat making its way down his cheek.
Bertie nodded, "Almost like he knew…" he trailed off, not wanting to think about the implications.
They stood in silence for a moment or two, before Scorpius broke the silence, "Potions later might be interesting then" he forced a laugh, prompting a dirty look from the other two, "I'll see you there" he said, waving them off and walking towards the dungeons.
Potions was indeed interesting. For the first time in weeks, Professor Marlowe was actually giving them some proper instruction, rather than just relying on his pupils to read the textbook properly. The relative delight at this news was tempered somewhat when they realised that the only reason he was doing this was because today's potion was a nastily difficult one called the 'Fire Protection Potion'.
Marlowe had to watch them closely as they crushed a Wartcap into powder, in order to prevent it coming into contact with their skin and causing a nasty rash to appear. Despite a couple of near misses, this was a success.
Albus allowed himself to breathe again as he slowly poured the fine powder into his cauldron, causing it to turn a pleasant canary yellow colour. Marlowe had moved onto the next desk once the powder was crushed, so he felt able to talk again.
"How's yours looking?" he asked Bertie, but one look inside the cauldron told him everything he needed to know. It was green and had the consistency of slime, Bertie had to pull hard at his ladle to free it.
Bertie watched the excess slime dribble off the ladle and groaned, "Why am I so useless at this?"
By now, Rose had walked over and was now looking into the cauldron with her brow furrowed, a familiar sight in this situation. She thumbed through the textbook, glancing back and forth between it and the cauldron. Eventually, she took the ladle from Bertie and placed it in, stirring it around as hard as she could.
"What did you put in this thing?" she asked, stirring with two hands now.
"Exactly what the book said" replied Bertie, double checking the list, "Three Bursting Mushrooms, neatly sliced. Half a vial of salamander blood. And crushed Wartcap powder"
Rose stopped stirring and rested her arms on the table, "Are you sure? Because none of those ingredients should've done this to it. What was it like before you added the powder?"
"Green, just like the book said"
Shaking her head in disbelief, Rose looked into Bertie's pestle and mortar, where there was a light dusting of the yellowish powder still coating the bottom of the bowl. She raised her hand and called out to Professor Marlowe, who came over quickly.
"Yes, Rose?" he asked, ignoring Albus and Bertie completely.
"Sorry sir, I wondered if you could tell what this powder is, because I don't think it's Wartcap powder" She held out the bowl to him.
Marlowe took it in his hands and he inspected the powder closely. To everyone's surprise, he risked touching it, rubbing his finger along the bottom of the bowl and covering it in a layer of the powder.
"It's not," said Marlowe shortly. He placed the bowl down and cleaned his finger with a tap of his wand. He went to the front of the classroom and clapped his hands together for silence. "Class, I need everyone to get out into the corridor, please. Quickly and calmly"
Rose looked stunned, "What?" she asked to no one in particular. She looked into the bowl again and tried to work out what he'd identified, but Marlowe whipped the bowl away before she could get a good enough look.
"Corridor please, Miss Weasley"
They all filed out, with no one being any the wiser as to what was going on. A quiet chatter broke out as they stood in the corridor outside the classroom, all in slightly nervous anticipation. Marlowe stepped out to join them and clapped his hands together again, stopping the chatter immediately.
"Who will own up then?" he said, sternly, looking into the faces of everyone in front of him.
Confused gazes greeted him back as they all looked around at each other, just in case someone else looked guilty.
"No one?" snapped Marlowe. He took a deep breath, "Someone in this class has found it particularly funny to replace Mr Hadham's Wartcap powder with crushed Death-Cap flesh"
There was a sharp intake of breath to Albus' left as Rose now stood bolt upright in shock. The rest of the class descended into a murmur again, speaking in hushed tones about what that could mean.
"Silence!" barked Marlowe, turning to Rose, "Miss Weasley, perhaps you'd be so kind as to inform the rest of the class what a Death-Cap is?"
Rose gulped, "Yes sir," she said slowly, "The Death-Cap is possibly the most dangerous mushroom in Europe, ingesting as little as half it is enough to kill a human. But sir, I…"
"Yes, thank you Miss Weasley," said Marlowe, interrupting her, "Now, I don't think I need to explain the seriousness of this 'prank', so I will ask again, who was it who thought it was funny to give Mr Hadham a Death-Cap instead of a Wartcap?"
Silence.
"No one?" said Marlowe, snorting derisively. He paced along the line, stopping in front of Bertie, "Mr Hadham, who here had access to your ingredients?"
Shaking, Bertie looked down the line at Albus, Rose, and Scorpius, the three others he was sharing a desk with.
Nodding, Marlowe turned his attention to them, "Are any of you prepared to confess?" he asked, staring at each of them in turn. Rose was staring at the floor. Scorpius had a stunned look on his face. Albus could only look perplexed.
Marlowe looked straight at Albus, "Anything to say, Mr Potter?"
Fighting the urge to shout his innocence at him, Albus replied, "Sir, I got Bertie's ingredients for him whilst he set both of our cauldrons up. I only got the ingredients listed in the recipe"
"And you just happened to mistake a Death-Cap for a Wartcap?" said Marlowe, looking down at him.
Albus twitched, "No, I know the difference between a Death-Cap mushroom and a Wartcap mushroom, it's not that difficult!"
"You will address me as 'Sir', or 'Professor', Mr Potter. This is a serious situation, you have endangered the life of a fellow pupil, one you claim is a close friend, and now you have the sheer cheek to claim that it wasn't you?" Marlowe glared at him and barely concealed a triumphant smirk from appearing on his face.
"Sir" spat Albus, drawing the word out, "I would never do anything like that!" He felt himself getting bolder, "And shouldn't you be asking yourself why the Wartcaps and the Death-Caps are kept so close together in the cupboard if it's so easy to mistake the two?"
The concealed smirk was now painted over Marlowe's face as he leant down towards Albus, "One toe out of line" he sneered, "What a shame, you'd been doing so well to keep out of trouble as well. Tut tut" he shook his head and grabbed Albus' arm, dragging him down the corridor. "Class dismissed!" he called back to the stunned crowd.
Rose cried out, "Sir! Sir!" but to no avail.
Marlowe was walking at a brisk pace, oblivious to the ever-tightening grip he had around Albus' arm, and the cries of pain he was making because of it. The corridors were empty, but it wouldn't be long before other classes ended and they filled up again. Albus was frogmarched up the stairs from the dungeons and into the Grand Staircase, where he was dragged upwards with his ankles being knocked on every other stair. He knew precisely where Marlowe was taking him, right to the very top of the tower.
"Stop!" Albus protested, feeling more and more helpless, and fearing that this was indeed it for him at Hogwarts. His pain was replaced with anger, surely even Professor Selbit wouldn't kick him out over something he didn't do, but when it was his word against a teachers…
There was nothing good about thinking about the consequences here.
He rehearsed his story in his head once, twice, three times, with each internal telling getting more and more desperate as they got closer to Selbit's office. They walked past a passageway, and Albus heard some footsteps coming from it. He desperately turned towards them and felt his spirit lift. At this moment the tall, pale, scarred figure of Professor Constantine looked like his guardian angel.
"Albus?" he asked, stepping out on the staircase. He looked searchingly at Marlowe, seemingly with no words.
Marlowe stopped walking, his hand still wrapped tightly around Albus' arm, "Professor Constantine" he said, sternly, "I'm in a hurry, so make it quick"
Constantine looked first at Albus, then back to Marlowe, "Loosen your grip" he ordered, "Mr Potter isn't going to run away"
There was a brief hesitation, but Marlowe obliged and released Albus, who stepped back rubbing his arm and grimacing. Albus gave Constantine a small nod of thanks.
"Are you here to tell me how to punish my students, Dario?" Marlowe asked with a certain amount of bile.
Constantine raised an eyebrow, "I wouldn't dream of it" he said, "But perhaps you could enlighten me about what exactly Mr Potter has done? I'm sure you're aware of his situation, and I'd hate for him to be expelled over something that any other teacher would find trivial"
A flicker of annoyance brushed over Marlowe's face, though it was quickly replaced with an incredibly smug expression, "Mr Potter attempted to pull a prank in my class. He swapped out Mr Hadham's Wartcap mushroom for a Death-Cap"
"Sir, that's not true!" bleated Albus.
Constantine held his hand up to him, "Just wait a moment, Albus, you'll have your chance. Continue, Professor"
Marlowe nodded, "I'm sure you'd agree that this is an incredibly serious situation and that I couldn't possibly trust Mr Potter to continue in my class. Any other student would be looking an expulsion, not least one with his…reputation"
Incandescent, Albus opened his mouth to speak again, but he was stopped by yet another raised hand from Professor Constantine.
"I agree that this is a serious charge, and I do agree with your assessment that expulsion would be a likely punishment for anyone found to be guilty of doing it," he said, prompting another smug smile to erupt on Marlowe's face, "However, I think it's normally the done thing to allow the accused to defend themselves, as someone who had a job interview with the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, I would trust that you'd know that"
Marlowe could barely hide his contempt, but he waved his hand in the air in defeat, "Fine, explain yourself, Potter"
As the only thing that Albus could now think about was his relief, he completely forgot what his story to Selbit was going to be. He saw Constantine give him a reassuring nod, so took a deep breath and recounted the truth.
"Bertie and I take it in turns to get our ingredients, whilst the other sets up our cauldrons and put them onto the heat. This time it was my turn to get the ingredients from the cupboard. I found everything on the ingredient list: Three Bursting Mushrooms each; a vial of salamander blood each; and a single Wartcap mushroom, ready for us to crush into a fine powder. The Wartcap mushroom is a mustard yellow colour and is easily distinguishable from a Death-Cap, which is an off-white or brown colour. We both started mixing our potions until we got to the step where we needed to crush up the Wartcap, which is when Professor Marlowe came over to assist us. He watched Bertie crush his Wartcap up, and then he watched me, Rose, and Scorpius do the same. After this he left us to pour the powder into our potions, which is when Bertie's went wrong" Albus took a breath once he finished and looked at Constantine, who flashed him a small smile and nodded.
"So you say that you got all of your ingredients from the store cupboard, yes?" asked Constantine.
"Yes, Sir," said Albus, breathing heavily with nerves.
He nodded, "Of course". His attention turned to Marlowe, "Remind me, Professor, where do you keep your most hazardous ingredients?"
"What do you mean?" asked Marlowe
Constantine chuckled, "Forgive me, it's just that I'm sure the Regulation for the Storage of Poisonous Materials states that anything that could do permanent harm to someone needs to be kept separately in a locked cabinet". He eyed up Marlowe, who had a blank expression, "You'll have a much deeper understanding of those regulations than me, it is your area of expertise after all, but I would've thought that Death-Caps and Wartcaps would not be kept in the same places as each other to prevent incidents like this"
Marlowe's eyebrow flickered dangerously, and he smoothed out a crease on his jacket. "And what exactly are you implying, Dario?" he drawled
"Nothing, Septimus" replied Constantine, "It's just that in order for this situation to have happened as you described it means that Mr Potter would've had to break into your locked cupboard and retrieve a Death-Cap, without you noticing, all to inexplicably poison his best friend. Or…" he paused, "You've been lax with your safety protocols and allowed Wartcaps and Death-Caps to be stored together. So, which is it?"
They stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity. Constantine's dark eyes penetrated Marlowe's skull, and he looked entirely uncomfortable under his gaze. Eventually, Marlowe backed down and pushed Albus towards Constantine, defeated.
"Excellent," said Constantine, beaming, "We'll consider this matter closed, shall we? And I trust you'll be doing your own investigation into how Death-Cap dust ended up in the cauldron of Bertie, yes?"
Marlowe glared and him whilst heading back down the stairs, "Of course, Professor" he sneered. It wasn't long before he reached the bottom of the stairs and turned down into the dungeons.
Finally free, Albus allowed himself to breathe as the fear of expulsion evaporated from his body. "Thank you, Sir," he said between breaths.
"Not at all, could you come with me for a moment?" said Constantine, beckoning for Albus to follow.
He led him down the third-floor corridor towards Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, leading him inside and through to the back of the room. Pushing it open, Professor Constantine revealed his office.
"Come in," he said, pointing at a spare chair, "Take a seat"
Albus obliged, taking the chance to look around as he did. The room was smaller than he expected, though it was made to look even smaller by the sheer number of magical objects that lined the walls, most of which Albus couldn't even begin to identify. A glass-fronted cabinet was on the wall behind Constantine's desk, and Albus could see several wine bottles behind them, most looked to be half empty.
Constantine sat down opposite Albus and clasped his hands together, requesting Albus' attention. "I don't suppose you'd know why Professor Marlowe was so keen to see you punished?" he asked with his eyes digging into Albus.
"Oh, um…" stuttered Albus. His mind was torn, on one hand, he knew exactly why Marlowe reacted as he did, perhaps he wanted to get his hands on the book? Or maybe he just wanted to get him out of the way? On the other hand, why would he react that way now? After all, Albus had had the book for months at this point, and he was pretty sure that Marlowe had copied most of it out anyway.
"Well?" prompted Constantine, gently
With a sharp intake of breath, Albus replied, "I don't know, Sir". It was an honest answer under the circumstances.
Constantine closed his eyes and breathed deeply. He reached into his drawer and pulled out a tin of biscuits, opening it and putting it on the desk. "Help yourself," he said.
Albus reached in and picked up a bat-shaped one that was covered in black icing.
"I think you should know that there has been an…agreement amongst the teachers to be slightly more lenient with yourself, Mr Malfoy, and Mr Bingham," said Constantine, "None of us wants to see you get expelled"
Albus had been aware of this, if only subconsciously, but it was a relaxing feeling to know that this was true. He took a small bite of his biscuit, dropping a few crumbs onto his lap. "Was Professor Marlowe part of this?"
"Yes," said Constantine, closing his eyes, "Which is why I'm more than surprised that he chose to deem you worthy of expulsion on such flimsy, if not completely non-existent, evidence". He opened his eyes and resumed his staring into Albus', "Are you sure there's nothing you wish to tell me?"
"Sir, I'm innocent" spluttered Albus, staggered that he would even be suggesting that he had any guilt after everything that had just happened.
"You misunderstand", replied Constantine, unflustered. His tone shifted and became serious, "Is there any reason at all why Professor Marlowe would act in the manner he did?"
Albus felt his stare burrowing deep inside his head. It was at this moment that he knew. Professor Constantine knew about the Grimoire of Anima, and he knew that Albus had it in his possession. So why was he asking? Did he just want confirmation of his suspicions? Did he want to act against Marlowe and want Albus's help doing it? Or did Constantine want the book for himself?
With his heart beating hard in his chest, Albus had to concentrate on not giving himself away. He thought about telling him, maybe he wouldn't mind? Maybe he really did want to help Albus.
Steeling himself, Albus replied as coolly as he could, "No, Sir, there's nothing".
There was a pause, and Constantine closed his eyes again, nodding slowly. "Very well," he said in a soft voice. He scribbled something on a spare bit of parchment, folded it up, and handed it to Albus.
"What's this, Sir?" he asked
"A note for Professor Longbottom" replied Constantine, "I believe you have Herbology now, yes? This is just to explain why you're late"
Albus' eyes widened with realisation and he pocketed the note before bidding Constantine farewell. Looking back into the office as he left, he saw Constantine rub his forehead, seemingly deep in thought.
Fortunately for Albus his class inside Greenhouse Three were too busy fighting with Devil's Snare saplings to notice him walk in. He was able to walk around the edge of the room and hand his note to Professor Longbottom, who was nervously tapping his fingers on the back of his chair as he watched Matt wrenching the plant from around his wrist. He read the note and nodded.
"Thank you, Albus. You can join Bertie and Rose at their desk. Try not to startle their sapling, it's particularly skittish" he said before stepping over to help Matt pull his away.
Rose looked relieved, "Oh, thank Merlin!" she cried, "I thought you'd be kicked out. What happened?"
"Long story" he replied shortly, whilst putting his apron and dragonhide gloves on.
Rose didn't look satisfied with this, but she turned her attention back to the Devil's Snare, which was currently trying to pick up a nearby pair of shears, though Rose was quick to spot this and move them away.
Taking a chance whilst she was distracted, Bertie stepped over to Albus, "You look worried" he whispered, "What's up?"
"I'll tell you later, but I think we're going to have to be very careful with the book" Albus whispered back.
Bertie gave him a nervous look and slowly nodded in understanding. "Ok, I get it"
A cold wind blew in through an open window, Albus shivered and rubbed his arms. Life suddenly felt much more complicated.
