Chapter 13

INCANTATIONS

A week later, Ron, Hermione, and Harry were still debating the Day of the Griffin as they stole down the pitch-black corridor to Moaning Myrtle's lavatory to say the final incantations over their dream and truth potions. On this night of the new moon, not a lumen of light shone through the high, arched windows. Harry wondered whether crowding together inside his invisibility cloak was really necessary. They'd already passed by Filch unnoticed. Only Mrs. Norris had peered at them with her suspicious cat's eyes.

At his left ear, Hermione whispered, "I still say Professor Snape was lecturing Draco for being such a coward."

At his right, Ron gave a loud snort. "Snape chew out Malfoy? You've got to be— Hey! Watch it! Those were my toes."

"Sorry," Harry mumbled, recovering from his stumble. "But I agree. A lot of us heard Snape tell Malfoy not to push an inquiry. So why take him off privately? I think Snape was explaining that inquiry would lead to him."

Hermione shook her head, almost dislodging the cloak. "Innocent until proven guilty. If you want the truth, wait until you question him."

Harry grimaced. He had waited. And the wait had almost killed him. That he was one perched on the dragon statue when it came to life might have been coincidence. That the meanest griffin in all of Britain had been brought to Hogwarts when he was the one set to parade it—that was one coincidence too many.

"I'm not certain we even need this potion," he muttered. "We should just go to Dumbledore. He can put two and two together. Avery works for the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. His letter to Snape must have been about the griffin. Obviously, they—"

A blood-curdling shriek cut Harry short.

Ron gasped. "Where'd that come from?"

"Up ahead." Without thinking, Harry wrapped an arm around each of his friends. "Let's run."

"Please, yes!" Hermione breathed.

Harry took off, dragging his friends with him.

Hermione gulped. "I didn't know you meant towards it!"

A second screech jarred Harry. Definitely a girl. A girl in danger. A girl needing to be saved. But when he pulled his friends around the corner, another voice drifted down the hall that slowed the trio to a halt.

"Calm yourself, woman. This is a friend."

Nick? Harry peeked out the folds of the invisibility cloak. Up the hall floated three spirits, emitting their own spectral light. Nearly Headless Nick was patting Moaning Myrtle's shoulder. Beside him hovered a ghost Harry had never seen before—a cave woman with a humped back and dangling arms wearing scraps of fur. When she turned, he saw why Myrtle had screamed. The cave woman's skull had been bashed in by a crude stone axe. And the axe still hung there dripping ghastly, silver blood.

The cave woman grunted.

Myrtle stuck her nose in the air and vanished through her door.

Nick waved. Apparently, invisibility cloaks were not invisible to ghosts. "Gryffindors! Come! Meet my new friend!"

Hermione sucked air through her teeth. Harry knew ghoulish introductions were not her favorite thing.

"Certainly, Nick." Ron ducked out from under the cloak and strolled ahead. "Nice to meet you, uh—"

In a guttural voice, the cave woman said, "Fire."

"Fire?" Hermione repeated, suddenly interested. "Could she actually be—?" She dropped her half of the cloak and hurried to join the group.

Harry raised his eyebrows. Sandwiches were named after the Earl of Sandwich weren't they? Walking forward, he let the cloak slip to his shoulders. His hands he jammed in his pockets. He wanted to be sociable—but not to the extent of risking a sub-zero handshake.

"Almost axed, see?" Nick's pearl-white eyes danced. "We'll show that snobby Sir Patrick Delany-Podmore. His Headless Hunt will turn positively green."

Whistling a spooky tune, he and Fire glided up the hall, taking all the light with them. At the far end, Harry saw the faint gray outlines of half a dozen more ghosts. Three Scots had arms and legs barely attached. A maiden in a diaphanous Napoleonic gown leaked mist-colored gore from deep gashes. Just like Nick, two male phantoms in flapping wizard robes had heads that wobbled—almost, but not quite, axed.

Hermione's teeth chattered. "It's nearly the witching hour. Let's go see Myrtle. At least being killed by a basilisk doesn't leave one gruesome."

Hermione tossed the last of the bandersnatch skin flakes into the dream potion cauldron. They floated on the bubbly surface, then slowly submerged into the simmering cerulean liquid. She chanted a long incantation that Harry knew by heart—having repeated it himself over forty tedious times in the last three weeks.

Drift into dreams.
Sail by notion.
Stray along streams
Of thought without fetters, a limitless ocean
Of passions and secrets and hopes and illusion.
Push open your shutters and free your emotion.

"And spend five days belching from drinking our potion," Ron added softly.

Hermione cast him a warning scowl. Harry bit his lip to keep from laughing.

Embark on adventure. Create your own fusion
Of danger and rapture and chance and confusion
With memory, reverie, truth and delusion.

"And please be too thick to detect our intrusion," Ron mumbled.

Hermione poked him.

Harry raised his eyebrows appreciatively. If Ron had been adding such lines to each of his forty repetitions of the spell, Snape would definitely be under their control.

Contemplate fantasies, one of a kind.
Penetrate mysteries in your own mind.

"And may a fat warthog soon bite your behind." Harry grinned, surprised he'd managed a rhyme on such short notice.

"Shut UP," Hermione growled through gritted teeth.

Discover in dreams
Life's not as it seems.

The spell was over. Hermione's glare dared Harry and Ron to make another joke.

Then a ghostly giggle sounded one stall over. "We hope you have nightmares on gross, icky themes."

Ron and Harry burst into pantomimed applause.

Moaning Myrtle pressed her face through the divider wall. For once, she was smiling.

"If this dream potion fails, it'll be all your fault," Hermione grumbled.

Myrtle shrugged and wafted away.

Harry shot Ron a worried look. He didn't want to flush three weeks of sleepless labor down the toilet. Nervously, he watched Hermione lift her hand above the simmering cauldron and release one sprig of narcissus. When the yellow blossoms touched the potion, it fizzed. Then a huge bubble erupted from the surface. Instantly, the delicate cerulean liquid congealed into a black paste.

Ron groaned.

Hermione smiled.

"You're certain it's not ruined?" Harry asked.

"It's perfect."

After another hour, Harry wasn't feeling so humorous. One in the morning, and he had to get some sleep. He didn't want to nod off in Advanced Defense Against the Dark Arts. Afternoon Quidditch practice would be useless if his reactions were sluggish. And if he wasn't alert that evening for meditation with Cho, she'd think he wasn't serious about learning Wudang Shen.

"Verbena, verjuice and a dollop of vermouth," Hermione said, adding the elements one by one. "The three vers of verity." The piss-yellow potion turned a bilious green. She reached back into her pocket.

"Don't tell me you're going to add vermin," Ron mumbled.

Hermione ignored him, gazing wistfully at the sapphire pendant now sparkling in her hand. "Sacrifice for a good cause." With a sigh, she dropped the glittering blue jewel into the revolting, turbid brew. The potion turned as crystal clear as a glacial spring.

"Brilliant," Harry said. "The truth is transparent. That has to be perfect."

Hermione nodded.

Twenty minutes later, Harry flung himself into the Little Nemo Hammock—for what he hoped would be the last time. Hermione had added a superstructure of glass tubing to the truth cauldron to trap solid particles while the remaining liquid steamed away. Then she and Ron had toddled off to Gryffindor. Harry had stayed to keep first watch over the process of recrystallisation. Hermione had rigged the tubes to sound a tiny bell if something needed checking. With luck, he'd be able to snooze in between.

Rolling over brought him face-to-face with Myrtle. She was perching on the stall divider, watching him tenderly. Some luck.

"You look so much like him," she sighed for possibly the hundredth time in three weeks.

"I know, I know. I remind you of Teach." Harry tried to keep from sounding disgruntled. Myrtle was so touchy that the wrong tone could send her wailing until dawn. "You liked him. I'm flattered."

Harry's first stay in the hammock, he'd asked Myrtle if she'd known the young Voldemort, Tom Riddle. Me know Thomas M. Riddle the Prefect? She'd giggled as if she'd have liked to, but Harry had realized a first-year student from a different house wouldn't have had much chance. With a wink, she'd said, The only fifth-year I knew was Teach. He was nicer than Prefect Riddle any old day. Her first year, spells had so flummoxed Myrtle that her Muggle parents had paid for a tutor. Harry didn't know whether Teach was his last name or his nickname, but he knew she'd adored him.

In low, mysterious tones, Myrtle chanted:

Not by four and never by two
Onward marching, guided on through
Down the halls, and up the walls
Ever silent, coming to you.

She closed her eyes dreamily. "He told me that, and I still remember. He made it up himself. That's what a Runes master does—craft spells that are completely new."

Teach had taught Myrtle well. Harry figured this was at least the fiftieth example of his doggerel she'd recited. If his bad luck held, she'd be rattling off rhymes till sunup.

"Some people think runes only mean magical writing," Myrtle continued in a know-it-all tone of voice Harry suspected she'd copied from Hermione.

"But that's where they're wrong," he finished for her.

Myrtle looked perturbed at having her line stolen. "Right. They're wrong. Rune also means magical poem. And the ones Teach created are very powerful."

"Tell me one of the sleep ones," Harry mumbled as his eyelids drifted closed.

Myrtle gave a loud cough. "Don't you want to know what the spell is for? Not by four and never by—"

Harry's eyes snapped open. "I already know." The truth was, he hadn't a clue, but he couldn't bear another sleepless three hours while Myrtle explained it to him."

"Bet you don't. Bet you can't even guess. Come on. Twenty-one questions. Animal, Mineral or Vegetable? What do you want to ask first?"

Harry stared at Myrtle, torn between pity for the loneliness that made her pester him and the torturing exhaustion that made his eyeballs feel like someone had rubbed them with sandpaper. Taking a deep breath, he said, "Okay. I have a question . . . What did you do to your hair tonight? It looks positively . . . beautiful."

"Beautiful?" Her ghostly white features scrunched into an injured expression. "Go on! Make fun of poor Myrtle. Look at her stringy hair. Look at her gawky glasses. Look at the pimple in the middle of her forehead. But she'd be really bea-u-ti-ful if she smiled once in awhile." She gulped as pearlescent tears dribbled down her nose. With a moan, she stretched her non-corporeal body into a misty arrow and aimed for the toilet. Water shot up like a geyser as she dived out of sight.

Wiping spray off his cheek, Harry grimaced, thinking of what a mean, petty rat he'd just been. A moment later, he fell asleep. He rested peacefully until Hermione woke him at six.

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