Date, Time, Place
Al spent a week in the hospital wing after the Quidditch final but he was by no means lonely. For one Olive occupied the bed next to him. No one was quite sure what had happened to her but she was still confused but it was found that if someone constantly talked to her she began to remember better. This being Nikki spent all her available time in the hospital wing talking to her and Al had someone to talk to in the day. Rose, Scor and Caly also spent all their available time in the hospital wing, though their visit were considerably less cheerful because there was no news on the hunt for Scor's mum and the letters were hinting that the time for them to meet again was drawing near. Unfortunately they couldn't discuss this very much because the hospital wing, and Al's bed, was often filled with other people. Al's family came by every day. Caly knew both Fred and Rose felt guilty for allowing him to be hit by the bludger.
When Al came down for breakfast the Saturday after the Quidditch final he was greeted by a standing ovation from the Gryffindors. He turned red and buried himself in his breakfast. Al hated the attention he gained from being Harry Potter's son, or attention at all. He was pleased they'd won the cup but the after effect of having a load of crazy fan-girls storm the hospital wing to see him did not please him at all. Scor was the one who really enjoyed the after effects because the Gryffindors had accepted him as one of their own. They'd seen his actions on the Quidditch pitch and come to the conclusion he was not a bit like his father.
That breakfast Fawkes arrived with her letter per usual and when she read it she felt her heart jump to her mouth.
Tonight, 10 pm, dungeon 6. It burst into flames.
"Guys." she said bending forward. "Tonight 10pm in dungeon 6 and I still haven't remembered what it is!"
"I don't think it will matter." said Rose "They'll probably tell you." Scor was very pale.
"Do you think mother will be there?"
"Probably."
"We're all going, right?" said Al. Caly glanced around.
"I guess. They know you know so I don't think it will hurt. Besides I could really use someone who could do magic, especially if they're the joint top in our year and the top of Defence Against the Dark Arts." Rose, Al and Scor looked pleased with that, especially Scor who wanted to find the people who they thought had taken his mother.
Once they were done they walked out into the grounds to get away from the main population of the school. It was hard when you were with three members of the beloved Quidditch team but they eventually shook them off by going round the back of the castle away from the sun. They sat on the grass and started to make plans for tonight.
"Are we definitely going to hand it over?" asked Rose "What if it's really dangerous."
"We need to free Scors mother." said Caly definitely. Scor nodded along with her.
"Er guys two problems, one have they ever said that they would trade Scor's mum for what ever it is, and are you honestly going to trust them?" Caly bit her lip and glanced at the other two.
"We don't have a choice, Al. We have a chance to save her and we have to take it."
"What if you haven't brought?"
"I doubt that will be the case."
"What makes you say that?" asked Rose curiously.
"Well they thought I would have it out in the grounds so it must be something I might carry with me regularly." Al sighed but continued to look worried.
"You do realise you're playing right into their hands don't you?"
"Yes. I'm doing exactly what they want, I'm coming to rescue her but I don't have another option. We don't have another option. They know what goes on around here."
"Do you think that it's a student or a teacher then?" Caly paused.
"I guess that's possible, I mean, maybe the Madon's have something to do with it."
"How?"
"I have no idea."
"Do think we'll get out alive?" Caly shrugged
"Your dad did Al and he was always on his own."
"We're not my dad, though."
"Yeah but you're could easily be as good as him."
"But he's the chosen one, or he was."
"Al, being the chosen one didn't give him any special powers, not from what you said. He got by on love, luck and skill. We've got all those things. Being the chosen one just gave your dad a destiny he couldn't avoid."
"You think that?"
"Yeah, I mean that's what your description of events sounded like."
"Maybe but I don't think we're cut out for this."
"We're not, but think about this Al. When do you play your best Quidditch?"
"What do you mean?"
"When do you play at your best?" He thought for a minute
"When everyone is watching me."
"Exactly. You guys all work well really well under pressure, and there's no doubt we'll be under pressure in the dungeon so I think you'll be okay. Well as okay as you can be." Al pondered over this, then nodded.
"Alright but I'm freaking out a bit."
"We all are, Al." said Scor "I mean my mother is down there, or will be."
The rest of the day saw the four friends at a loss for anything to do, their nerves were so extreme. Rose and Scor had taken to pouring through advanced textbooks on magic whilst Caly tried to improve Al's game of wizards chess but they just couldn't sit still. Caly even brought out her guitar to try and while away the hours but it didn't work. Not even when she had the whole common room singing old muggle music could the daunting task off this evening be lifted from her mind. She did however know that whatever happened after tonight she would remember this year as the most insane of her life. She had become a witch, she had gone to a school of magic, watched sports played 50 ft in the air on brooms, brewed her own potions, failed at magical spells and made friends with a load of insane people. She had wholly decided that, of the ones she had met there was not a sane Weasley/Potter.
In the evening at eight o clock they decided it would be best to leave the common room and hide in a classroom as the common room didn't empty at 10 and they would be seen leaving. Just before they left Caly remembered something.
"Hey you guys don't happen to have any felix felicis left do you." Scor and Al shook their heads but Rose said
"I might have a bit." She hurried off to their dorm and returned with the little bottle. There wasn't much left. Caly took it and reckoned there was enough for 10 drops each. They took it and left the common room.
It was brilliant to walk through the hallways without a care in the world. The felix felicis gave them a feeling of utter confidence. There was no way they could be caught. It would be easy, they'd get in, get Scor's mother and find a way out. There was nothing hard at all. When Professor Longbottom came their way he simply turned and walked back, as if suddenly remembering something very important.
They slipped into their potions classroom and all found something to do to pass the two hours there. Al and Scor both found books Slughorn had been sent on Quidditch, Caly found one on very complex experimental potions that was fascinating and Rose picked up a slightly simpler potions book, but it was about O.W.L. level. The felix felicis made the two hours pass like two minutes but as they came to an end Caly felt a lurch of worry in her stomach. The potion was wearing off. She snapped closed her book and turned to look at the other three who seemed to have realised the same thing.
"We took it too early." whispered Rose. Caly closed her eyes. How could she be so stupid?
"What do we do?" She opened her eyes and saw that Rose, Al and Scor were looking at her for answers, for support.
"We don't have any choice. We have to go and try." Scor nodded.
"My mother." He didn't seem to be able to add anything else to that statement but it wasn't needed. They all knew the consequences. "Let's go." said Al.
They crossed to the door and were creeping across to dungeon six when they heard footsteps, unsure who it was, Al pushed Scor and Caly behind a statue, deciding to take the risk of being the son and daughter of war heroes.
"Al, Rose." It was Professor Longbottom
"Unc-I mean Professor." said Al, shifting from foot to foot. Rose bit her lip and twisted her curls.
"What are you doing?"
"Er-" said Rose unable to think of a good lie "We were… well, you see, we wanted to…"
"We wanted to live up to our family." lied Al quickly. "We heard about all the things they did, they do. James may be unpopular at the moment but when he pulls a funny prank everyone will love him again." Al said all of this in a rush "And he breaks rules all the time but no one hates him not even McGonagall. It's the same with Freddie. And everyone else in our family is so special and unique, Molly may seem boring but she's in Hufflepuff that makes her so different. Me and Rose we're just two chips off the old block, nothing we do is good because someone's already done it before." Rose tried not to look surprised at what Al was saying, like she'd heard this all before, because this was all news to her. "And well are friends are so much better than us." Caly and Scor looked at each other, trying not to feel guilty. "Caly's just so understanding, she's had some sort of crap up bringing that means she just so damn sympathetic, she's so kind and everyone loves her and Scor, well, Scor's changing the world isn't he. A Gryffindor Malfoy, one that's on the Quidditch team, one that saved the life of a girl he doesn't know. He's changing everything anyone ever thought they knew about the Malfoy's and us we're just carbon copies of our parents. Rose, she's a good Quidditch player, and yeah she's a beater and that's different but all the Weasley's play Quidditch, she's got red hair and she's as smart as her mum, nothing original. Me, I'm worse. I'm exactly like my dad but without the destiny, without what made him special." Professor Longbottom gazed at Al for a long time.
"I know how hard it is to grow up with the expectations of being your parents on your back, especially as your parents are great people. Therefore I will not punish you today." Al and Rose both sighed. "However if I find you out of bounds again, you will not be so lucky." They both nodded. "Come along. Let's get you back to the tower."
Caly and Scor let Al and Rose go and then paused it was 5 past 10 did they go on or did they go back? She glanced at Scor, she could see the worry, the guilt and the sheer determination to save the only family he had left. Caly didn't need to ask where they were going. They just turned and crept down the corridor towards dungeon 6. Both of them drew their wands as they reached the door. Caly reached for the handle and tried it. It wouldn't budge.
'It's locked!" she mouthed at Scor. Scor moved her aside and pointed his wand at the key hole.
"Alohomora." he hissed. There was a loud bang and they were thrown against the wall.
"What the-" Caly started the ask as she got to her feet but they were interrupted by
"PEEVES!"
"Filch!" Filch was the extremely old and bitter care taker of Hogwarts. He hated the students and Peeves the poltergeist. They ran off, not wanting to be caught out of bed by him, it would have been much better to have been found by Professor Longbottom.
The fact that Scor was a Quidditch player came in very handy on their flight back to Gryffindor tower. He was constantly hearing teachers, students, he even pre empted the appearance of Nearly Headless Nick once. He pulled himself and Caly into alcoves, behind suits of armour and into empty classrooms. They had Filch on their tails, who was convinced they were Peeves. They were also running away from his very old but surprising and very annoyingly agile cat, Mrs Norris. Caly was pretty sure she should be dead and that Filch was using some sort of potion on her, there were some that pre-long life, not the elixir of life per se but they could extend life for a little bit.
"Nitwit, blubber, oddment, tweak!" Scor gasped and was rewarded by a dozy fat lady swinging forward. Rose and Al both looked up in shock when they saw them. They ran across to them, looking worried.
"What's happened?"
"Were we too late?" Scor shrugged looking deflated.
"What's happened?" Al repeated.
"Well after you got taken away by Professor Longbottom, we decided to go on."
"Naturally." said Rose.
"We went to the door and it was locked."
"Well why didn't you just use alohomora." said Rose exasperatedly, like she was talking to a very slow two year old
"Oh shut up Rose, of course we used alohomora, you're talking to the person that did a perfect sixth year charm earlier this month. Maybe if you kept your fat mouth shut we could finish the story." Rose opened her mouth to reply but Al stepped in.
"Shut up both of you and keep your voices down. Caly continue."
"Well Scor used alohomora and there was a bang and we were knocked against the wall. Then Filch came, he thought we were Peeves and so we were chased back to the Tower, we never made it in."
Caly bit her lip and watched Scor's profile. His head was bent and his usual confidence and self assurance was gone. He seemed to have lost himself in thought, he gazed into the fire as if hypnotized by the slowly dancing flames. Maybe the gently crackling flames helped to sooth his pounding heart. Caly knew that he was blaming himself. If his mother was dead, it was his fault. That wasn't true but that was what was going on inside his head.
"My mother used light fires in all the rooms in Malfoy Manor." Scor was talking to his lap. His friends quirked their heads and listened, Scor never talked about his personal life. "Whenever there was something wrong she'd go light all the fires so that it wouldn't be dark. She always told me that all I'd need to do is light a fire and I'd be home. She had hope, my father gave up on people changing their attitudes to us but not my mother. She told look into the fire it was hope. It banished the dark in my house, all those rooms where he had been and it solved it because the fire gave light. There's always hope, it was my mother's motto on life, there's always a chance, no matter how small, how crazy, how wild, there is always hope. My mother isn't dead, not yet." He looked his friends in the eyes. "She isn't dead, we'll find her."
"So what do we do?" asked Al, the concern making his green eyes shine unnaturally bright. Caly and Scor looked at each other
"Wait."
The wait for the next letter lasted a week, a week of in which the attention spans of the four students dropped to an all time low. Instead of taking notes in class Al and Caly would sit and play hangman or noughts and crosses on their pieces of parchments. Rose and Scor, who were in constant competition, stopped putting their hands up to answer the questions and instead sat staring at the Professor with a glazed look. The staff put this down to the little night time excursion Al and Rose had taken, it had been well circulated amongst them, it had had been assumed that Caly and Scor had been informed of this and were now distracted by their friends views on them. At least that was what they hoped, anyway. They didn't honestly know, how could they?
Al and Rose had both received long letters from their parents on the matter telling them that they were, in fact, very special and unique and there was nothing wrong with looking and being like their parents. Gryffindor had lost 40 points because of it, because Professor Longbottom had accidentally told McGonagall who had felt it her job to take off points but no one thought that was too big of a deal either, though it did depress Al and Rose for a few days. Al's dad had also promised Al a big surprise for the weekend that would surely cheer him up.
When Saturday came, however, Mr Potter's surprise was not what they were all thinking about. They were all wondering whether the letter sender would contact them, once more. It had been a week and they were starting to get worried. What if they had missed their only chance to save Scor's mother? What if it was all over?
When the post arrived they scoured it for a sign of red and were rewarded with the sight of a magnificent phoenix swooping towards them. The four dropped their breakfast, hands clammy, feeling sick. Fawkes landed gracefully in front of Caly's plate just as Hedwig II, the Potter's family owl, landed in front of Al carrying a parcel. Everyone ignored Hedwig though, they were much more interested in the letter attached to Fawkes' leg. Fawkes waited patiently as Caly struggled to undo to knots with her shaking fingers. She opened the letter, read it and let it burst into flames. She petted Fakes and fed him the rest of her breakfast. Al was examining the parcel in awe.
"We need to go somewhere private."
"Why?" asked Caly.
"'cause that's what it says on here." Caly looked on the parcel and it read in capital letters.
DO NOT OPEN AT THE GRYFFINDOR TABLE!
The four leapt to their feet, abandoning their breakfast they sprinted off into a secluded part of the grounds.
"So?" asked Scor
"Today, same time, same place." They collapsed onto the grass, when they were completely out of sight of the castle.
"What is it?" asked Caly, looking down at the slightly squishy package.
"I'm not sure but I have a hunch." Al looked excited, he could barely contain his grin.
"You don't think." said Rose, in a near squeal. Caly looked at Scor with a confused expression.
"And for those of us who weren't raised in the Potter/Weasley fold this is?" Al and Rose turned to them and grinned, grins of mischief and glee.
"You'll see."
Al tore open the package. Out of it fell something made of a silvery grey material. Al picked it up with a kind of reverence, the kind that one might give to a sacred holy artefact of monumental proportion to the faith. The material was fluid in his hands and she watched as Rose gazed in awe at it. Caly was ready to exchange another puzzled look with Scor but she was shocked to find that he, too, was staring with holy reverence and astonishment. She let them gaze at the bit of cloth for a little while longer but it got annoying and it seemed no one was in a hurry to explain it to her.
"Er hem." she said loudly. They all looked round at her, as if they had been snapped out of a trance. "What the hell is that?" Rose and Al gaped at her like when she had mispronounced the names of the houses. Scor took up the mantle of explaining.
"This is Al's dad's invisibility cloak, remember Al told us about it. It's a true cloak of invisibility." Caly's brain was beginning to recall the conversation they'd had at the start of term.
"Oh." she said, staring at the cloak. After a pause she said. "Do you think it will cover us all?"
"I dunno, but none of us are as tall as my dad was and Caly well you're a midget." said Rose seriously.
"Hey!" shouted Caly and smacked Rose round the back of the head. This proved to be a very unwise thing to do because, although years of fighting older, stronger people had taught Caly how to fight, Rose was a beater and therefore very strong. Both boys watched in amusement as the two girls rolled around on the floor fighting in a well meaning way.
It took five minutes for Rose to finally pin Caly down so that she couldn't move a muscle. Rose let her up and they both took a potion Caly carried in her bag that dealt with minor cuts and bruises.
"Now that Rose and Caly have been kind enough to act their age." said Scor with an air of superiority "We can get on to planning tonight."
"Planning?" asked Al
"Yes planning." said Scor. "To say last week was a disaster would be an understatement."
"Your fault." muttered Rose. Scor shot her a glare that shut her up.
"We should leave at half nine."
"Why?"
"In case we run into teachers, we may be invisible but that won't make us ghosts, Al, we can't just walk straight through them."
"Oh right."
"Besides we need to get a good look at this door, I suspect there must be another way to get in, probably marked on the door, or maybe the alohomora charm only works at 10, I don't know, but either way I don't think I'm going to get another chance to rescue my mother." The other three let his words sink in. They then nodded one by one.
"Okay." said Rose. "This your mother, I'm sorry I blamed you."
"It's okay."
The day saw, for some reason, the four student much calmer than before. It was probably due to how hyped they had been before the first time and then in the end doing nothing had made them much calmer and they also seemed to have realised that this wasn't some great adventure, this was about saving Scor's mother from death. Death, it was something all four of them knew well.
Caly was an orphan, as far as anyone could tell, and half the children she knew from her childhood were orphans too. Kids came and went, some experienced the pain more than others, some even killed themselves. It never failed to shock her but she knew it, she was lucky she didn't actually know anyone who had died, not properly. Scor's grandparents on his fathers side had died before he'd been born. On his mother's side they had died when he was one and three, so he hadn't known them. He had had an aunt, however, who he had cared for very much who had died, two years ago. Al and Rose, well Caly thought, they were Al and Rose, they couldn't forget death, especially not Al.
Half nine came with them sneaking out of the portrait hole under the invisibility cloak when Freddie and his mates came back in. The four of them walked very slowly under the invisibility cloak. They had been right to think the four of them would fit under it because they were all quite small but they were all squashed together and Caly, in the middle, found that her friends were standing on her heels and toes. The halls were nearly deserted, but whenever they were unfortunate to meet someone it was simply a matter of keeping quiet and staying out of their way until the danger had passed.
The dungeon looked the same has it had when they had been there the week before. Al pulled the cloak off the four of them after they checked the that no one was coming and then they bent down to examine the lock. It was clear by just looking at it that 'alohomora' wouldn't just do it. There was an engraving of sorts on the door. The four of them bent down to get a closer look, Al, Rose and Scor's wands nearly touching the wood to try and illuminate the shape.
"What is it?" asked Al.
"I think." said Scor "I think it's a wand."
"A wand?" said Al.
"What so we need a particular wand to get in?"
"I don't know." Scor ran a hand through his hair.
"It's not just any wand." Caly was the only one still looking at the etching. "It's mine." She looked at her friends with a confused frown. "Look." she said pulling out her wand before they could issue a long round of 'whats?' Caly placed it underneath the etching and the other three crowded round.
The resemblance was weirdly obvious. You wouldn't think that you would be able to accurately draw a wand on wood, it would be assumed they'd all look the same but the one on the door looked like a faded, 2D copy of her wand. It would have been some work of art had it not been the thing preventing them from entering dungeon 6 and for that reason Scor felt very much like punching the door, but he knew that wouldn't do much good.
"Do I have to open it?" Caly asked in a quavering voice
"Yes."
"But I can't do the spell."
"You can." said Rose "Just remember what Professor Hardingly told you." Caly took a deep breath and tired to feel confident and good about her magic, as she had in Ollivanders, and put her wand in the lock
"Alohomora." she whispered. The lock clicked and the door swung inwards. Caly's eyes grew wide with shock. Her friends clapped her back and she grinned, proud that she'd pulled off the spell.
They entered the dungeon wands aloft and were surprised to find it completely empty. Scor checked his watch, 10:58. They were 2 minutes early. They looked around to see if there was another door, through which they would enter but couldn't see one. Dungeon 6 was completely unremarkable. It had 2 rows of benches with work tops. A desk stood at the front the front and the walls were lined with cabinets. In short it looked completely how it should. 10:59. Al, Rose and Scor gripped their wands and stood shoulder to shoulder facing the door, prepared to disarm whoever came through. Scor was keeping an eye on the second hand of his watch as it ticked ever closer to the top.
"10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1..."
"Ohhh." exclaimed Caly. She was standing behind her friends at a slight angle so could see the bright orange light that was penetrating the wall. The other three whipped round and stared as it formed a horizontal trapdoor in the wall. They crept towards it, Caly had her hand outstretched. The wood felt solid beneath her fingers and she could feel another engraving. She pointed her wand at the rectangle and reminded herself of what she must do.
"Alohomora." It creaked open to reveal a black hole. Caly stuck her head in and felt around it was clear that it was passage way. "Come on." she said. "This way."
James sat in bed feeling highly bored. He was scouring the Marauders Map and for the first time he hadn't found anything interesting happening on it. All the teachers were behaving themselves as were the students, god life was so dull all of a sudden. He allowed his eyes to wander, as if on legs, down the marble staircase and off towards the dungeons. You could sometimes find people doing naughty, dirty things down there but tonight they were empty. Or were they? His eyes fixed on a dot hovering in dungeon 6. It was labelled Albus Severus Potter. James had just registered it was there when Al was gone. James blinked. People couldn't just vanish off the map, he knew that. He looked back there and found it empty. He looked in the first year Dorm 1, there were two empty beds, Al's and Malfoy's. The girls dorm was empty. Panicking James leapt out of bed and pulled on his slippers and dressing gown, he took his wand and crept off, determined to, no matter how little he had spoken to his brother, make sure they were ok.