Chapter 19-Plots of the Forlorn
"Has anyone seen Rose?" Patricia asked. She shuffled her hair about after letting it loose from her ponytail. "We were supposed to brew some Plumium Nightgale today and pour it into some old socks."
"That's not strange at all," Nathan said as his bishop moved across the chess board and eliminated Albus's pawn.
"I wanted to ask her what she wants for her birthday. It's coming up."
Albus paused. "Rose? Red-headed Rose?"
"Do you know another one?"
"Oh…I turned her into a finch earlier..."
Nathan and Patricia looked at him simultaneously, waiting for more. Evidently, there wasn't any more and Albus commanded his queen to move several spaces forward.
"You turned her into a finch?" Nathan asked.
"Oh, yeah. I…probably nothing."
"Probably nothing what?"
"It's just…those spells wear off right?"
Nathan raised his eyebrows. "Merlin's beard. You can't be serious."
"YOU DIDN'T CHANGE HER BACK?!" Patricia screamed. "WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?! WHERE IS SHE?!"
Albus smiled sheepishly. "That's a very good question."
"WHAT?! You don't know where she is?!"
"Well, she sort of flew off and… Well, I made a self-discovery earlier today which rather distracted me from what I'd been doing. You know, I realized I'm a feminist."
"FOCUS, ALBUS! Your cousin is missing and it's your fault! Do you—wait, what? You're a—You know what? It doesn't matter. We'll talk later. Look at me, Albus. Do you know how dangerous it is for birds out there? She's never had to live in the wild and finches are so tiny. We might never find her!"
"When you put it like that…I'm inclined to think…Oh no. What if she was eaten by a hawk or something? Or a cat? Or a hippogriff? What if she was captured for her beautiful feathers to be used as a quill!"
Nathan rubbed his forehead, muttering, "Gryffindors…"
"What should we do?" Albus asked. "She could be anywhere. Aunt Hermione's going to be livid if we don't find her!"
"What are you asking me for? I don't know what to do!" Patricia squealed.
"Would you two stop panicking? She survived the Forbidden Forest; she can certainly survive a few hours as a finch," Nathan told them, standing. "Now, take some initiative."
Albus and Pat stood by one another and exchanged a thoughtless glance of pure nothingness.
"Oh, Merlin, fine. Here's what we do. Rose will probably wander back here eventually. Our main priority is circulating the lie that Scorpius turned her into a finch."
"What?" Albus asked. "No, no, I cannot do that. You see, that bloke already wants to kill me several times over."
"So once more shouldn't hurt," Nathan reasoned. "We'll set traps around the school for her that she'll hopefully be smart enough to go into and hopefully the administration will be so focused on Malfoy, they won't even think of you, giving us the time to find her. Meanwhile, to keep Rose from killing you, brew the potion the two of you were going to make and, come to think of it, if Rose wants to make a wand, get her the rest of the ingredients for her birthday. When you find her and change her back, she'll be happy not to have to spend the money and doubly happy that Malfoy finally got into trouble for something that wasn't his fault after causing the very same for other people in this school. She's a firm believer in justice."
"Did you just come up with that?" Pat asked. "That's quite good."
"He's the mastermind behind most of our plots," Albus confessed.
"But how do we trap a finch?" Pat asked.
"She's not really a finch," Nathan said. "It's Rose. Just think of something that'll make her come."
"Pumpkin juice," Albus and Patricia said in unison.
"Okay, pumpkin juice. Whatever. I have to get going."
"You're not going to help us?" Patricia asked.
"No. I've Quidditch practice." With that, he walked off and left the two.
"Leo!" Carina ran up to the boy just outside the doors to the Great Hall. "I need to warn you. The Pearl… It's planning something."
Leo raised his eyebrows. "It's planning something?"
"I don't know what it is, but…"
"Yeah. The Pearl is dangerous. Tell me something I don't know."
"It's not just that. Remember how my curse has changed? It's more than just that now. I know things now that I have no right knowing. Somehow, I knew that there was Bladderwrack seaweed at the bottom of the lake. I don't know where that information came from; I just knew it. So I essentially goaded Rose into going to get some for her wand."
"You think the Pearl gave you that information so Rose could finish her wand?"
"It has to be that! But I don't know how it could possibly know that. It knows all sorts of things, Leo. It's been telling me this and that and I've just been following along and doing what it asks because now I'm the Pearl's slave as much as I am the sun's. I don't want to be another object's slave, Leo! What do you want from me?!"
"Carina, I understand that you're upset, but please don't yell at my navel."
"What do I do, Leo? Scorpius is going to be in detention later and I'm going to meet him there."
"For what?"
"I don't know. I have absolutely no idea what he got in trouble for or what I need to talk to him about, but I know I need to be there and it'll all just…I don't know, fit together when the time comes. I know it sounds insane. It is."
"You can't just not do what it tells you?"
"What'll happen though? The dwarves seem to think I'm it's true owner and it wants me. If that's true, then maybe it's doing all of this to try and create a possible future in which we find out how to get the Pearl out of you."
"Or the dwarves could be wrong and the Pearl could want to go to Jagobin or someone else equally as terrible and is just manipulating us into thinking otherwise."
She shook her head. "I don't know the extent of its powers, but there is one thing that I can trust. The sun. Ever since I was cursed by it, I've learned it's more powerful than anything. The Living Pearl is no more than a grain of sand to it's million Earths. As long as it flows through me, it overpowers whatever the Pearl might possess."
"But it changed your curse."
"My curse connects me to the sun, yes, but it's ultimately tethered to the enchanted waters in the dungeons where I got it. It's like…a wand. It has a creator and then is passed off to someone who will use it for the rest of their life. The dungeon pool is my creator, but the sun is my owner. Right now, there's a power struggle between the Living Pearl and the enchanted waters, not the sun. In other words, the Pearl can only change those aspects of my curse controlled by the enchanted waters, not by the sun. Does that make sense?"
"Er…sort of."
"Again, a fish swimming against the current. It's nearly impossible to explain if you don't experience it for yourself. There are certain...magical laws involved that I've never experienced before. It's similar to the nuances of the legal system in which certain things are allowed while others aren't. Inherent in the nature of magic, the Pearl can only change certain things and my reasoning isn't one of them."
"How do you know the Pearl hasn't planted that idea in your mind?"
"Because it's been there long before that talisman came into the picture."
"I'll bet you're wondering why I've gathered you all here today," Albus said, standing atop the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall.
"Because you lost your cousin," George said.
"Stating the obvious. Don't be so rude," Leo told her. "He feels bad enough as it is."
"He doesn't much act like it."
"Well, maybe you'd see he does if you weren't so quick to judge negatively."
"Oh, and you wouldn't know anything about that."
"Guys, please," Albus stopped them. "I know you're not fans of one another, but we need to work together here. Rose will eventually wander back, but until then, we're going to have to shop around Hogwarts a bit in order to get the proper materials for Rose's wand so she doesn't horribly injure me."
"And why would we care about your safety?" George asked.
"Because Rose is your friend and you should want what she wants. I can't much call on my mates if this wand business is to remain a secret between those Rose has entrusted it to: myself, Patricia, Frieda, Mary, George, Leo, and…I'm sorry, who are you?"
"Carina," the girl replied.
"Right," he nodded. He held up a sheet of parchment. "Here, you can see, is a list of all the ingredients necessary for Rose's wand potion."
George walked forward and snatched the sheet from his fingers, reviewing it.
"Most of this is around Hogwarts," she admitted, "but we'll never manage to find Bladderwrack on school grounds. It doesn't live around here."
"Pessimistic as always," Leo commented.
"I wasn't being pessimistic. I was being realistic. There's no use in looking for it if it isn't here."
"I have some," Carina said.
Everyone looked over at her.
"This is Carina," Leo introduced.
George gave him a look. "I know her name. She just said it."
Leo looked confused for a moment, but Carina just smiled. Odd. She didn't know what was going on there, but she was going to find out.
"Leo and I can find the ginger. I know where the kitchens are," George volunteered.
Leo scoffed. "Find it yourself."
"Great. I'll assign a different one to you. Know what Eriophorum looks like?"
Leo paused. "Well, I—."
"Go with her, Leo," Carina urged him.
"You don't want to work together?"
"It isn't that," she said. "I know some places in which to look for Rose."
George folded her arms. "Since when are you Rose's friend?"
"Five years now. We met at a family gathering." To which George's family was never invited. Who was she?
"I didn't know you were her friend. She never talks about you."
"Funny, I was going to say the same about you."
George suddenly had a stronger desire to find out if Rose was really friends with this girl, but she'd already made a fuss about being with Leo.
While the two of them traipsed along a line of windows at the edge of the building towards the kitchens, George walked ahead and asked, "Who is that girl? Where did she come from, I mean? I don't remember ever seeing her before and now it seems like she's friends with everyone." Her eye caught the Ravenclaws practicing on the pitch for their game the next day outside the window. There was a dark-haired figure moving through the field beside it.
"Jealous?" Leo asked.
George stopped and turned around to face him. "Certainly not. I'm just worried. I like to look out for my friends and I'm not sure who she is."
"Right. But I was talking about the Quidditch players."
Her face went bright red. "Oh."
"Maybe if you'd taken my advice, you would've made the team."
"Your advice! 'Choke the bat.' What does that even mean?"
"Take out your quill."
"Take out my quill?"
"Here." Leo removed his quill from his robes and held it at the very end, crushing the feathers in his fingers. "Would I succeed writing like this?"
"What are you getting at?"
"You'll have a fine time writing like this. You've got to hold a quill as near to the tip as possible. You want to know why?"
"You're not as close to the page?"
"Less control. You're swinging to miss if you hold the bat in a ball at the end like you do."
"What do you know about Quidditch? You don't play."
"I've plenty of friends who do."
She pushed the quill back into his hands.
"For your information, I wanted to be a beater ."
"There's a surprise."
"But chaser was the only position left open. I didn't get it because I'm no good at that."
"Would be if you practiced."
"Maybe I won't need to," she smiled, walking on.
Leo followed after her quickened pace. "What's that supposed to mean?"
She shrugged. "Nothing. It's just I've been watching Lorcan lately. He's slower, doesn't pay attention as much. They lost the last game because of him. I hear if he misses one more practice they'll cut him from the team. I can just take his position."
Leo ran after her as she flew down the stairs, her robes billowing out behind her.
"You can't be serious."
"Where're all those friends who play Quidditch now? Certainly not keeping you in the loop, are they?" Her voice echoed up through the stairway.
"George, you can't take Lorcan's spot!"
She swiveled to face him at the bottom of the stairs, but he hadn't been expecting it so they came very close face to face when he finally managed to stop.
"It's not up to me, is it?" she said snidely.
He grabbed her shoulders before she ran off again. "George, Lorcan's—." he stopped.
George leaned in closer to his face so their noses nearly touched.
"Lorcan's what?"
"Nothing," he said, pushing her away. "It isn't my secret to tell." He pushed past her despite the fact that he had no idea where the kitchens were.
"Leo Wespurt, you are just full of secrets."
"And you're a pitiful gossip."
"I am not a gossip," she laughed from behind him. "I keep what I know to myself. I just don't like to be ignorant of the goings-on in this school."
Leo slowed his walking at the comment and looked at her. "And what about just the world in general?"
"The world has a fine amount of things happening in it, Leo."
"I know, I just…do you like to write?"
"Write? Stories and things? Of course, I can't imagine anyone enjoys writing essays. Sure, I like to write. How good I am is a matter of perspective though, isn't it?"
"I suppose so."
"Why? What are you getting at?"
"Nothing. Don't worry about it."
She jumped in front of him and began walking backwards.
"I'm going to find out what you mean so you might as well spill it."
"Not happening."
"Then I'll have to do it the hard way." She smiled before bumping into the picture behind her and turning about. "Oh. This is it."
When the two returned, the rest of the group was waiting and talking in the Great Hall.
"I hope they get back before dinner," Mary was saying. "We'll have to go to an abandoned classroom."
"There they are," Patricia was saying. "Luck I hope?"
George held up the ginger and a rather large assortment of food the house elves had forced on them.
"The house elves didn't seem to realize we're about to eat in an hour," she said, setting the food on the table.
"Ungrateful. It's food, George. Food," Albus informed her.
"You'll spoil your dinner."
"Pfft." As he went to snatch the food, Leo grabbed it and pulled the bags off the table. Albus threw his hands up. "What are you doing?"
"I…uh…" I have to take this to two dwarves I am currently hiding in the dungeons. "George is right. You'll spoil your dinner."
"Who are you, my mother? Give it here."
"I found Rose."
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Albus screamed. "WHERE DID YOU COME FROM…?"
"Carina."
"…Carina, yes, I knew that. Your name is Carina."
"It's fine," she told him. In that moment, a little bird swooped down onto the table and poked its head about.
"You found her!" Albus shouted, surprised. "Unless, you just have an uncanny knack for picking up finches."
"So that's why Outlier liked you earlier in the day," Leo realized. "It was Rose the whole time."
"She was in the owlery with Lovey," Carina told them. "I thought she might be with my bird."
Leo crossed his arms. "Your bird? My bird."
"No. My bird. She likes me better."
"She does not."
"Alright, let's get her back to normal before dinner," Albus said, raising his wand.
"Wait!" Carina stopped him. He paused. "When you transfigured her the first time, she didn't change with her clothes."
"There's a relief." The group gave him an odd look. "Ah, no, you see, I didn't mean it like…just forget it. What are you getting at?"
"She'll be naked, Albus." Carina removed her winter cloak and threw it down over the finch. "There."
Albus flicked his wand and recited the reversal spell so arms and legs grew from Carina's cloak. Rose wrapped the black sleeve around her. She looked directly at Carina.
"Carina!" she exclaimed getting down from the table. "I need to talk to you." She looked down at herself. "Preferably tomorrow when I've some actual clothes on."
George crossed her arms and watched the scene from sidelines. So they were friends. Odd. Rose had a very small group of close friends which George couldn't even say that she was a part of. Leo couldn't say he was very surprised. Carina had stopped surprising him very early on.
Scorpius sat on the stone ground in detention, scrubbing at the floor. "Lousy Potter family. I hate them. I hate every last one! Just because their precious Rose went missing, everyone just assumes it was me."
"Frustrating, isn't it?"
His head jolted up and he shot to his feet at the sight of a dark figure that had been sitting just on the floor beside him. How did he miss her? When did she come in? That was impossible. The room was empty. He would've noticed her.
"Who are you?!" he asked. "And what are you doing in detention?"
"You don't remember me?" she asked, a bit disappointed. "I suppose that's rather expected. You tend to ignore people."
"Get out of here. I'd rather spend my detention time in peace."
"I know you didn't turn Rose into a finch."
"Really? Thanks. Now scat."
"The Potter lineage does have too much influence at this school. It really isn't fair," she said. Still fuming over being thrown in detention, he took the bait.
"Albus wouldn't make it halfway to the passing mark if his parents didn't know every teacher like a relative. Rose the Brilliant would get crashing grades in Charms too, I bet."
"Why would you say that?"
"Have you seen her? Completely incompetent, even if she is amazing in her other classes. Pure stupidity, if you ask me."
"She's making a wand for herself to try and get it to bond to her so she'll perform spells properly."
Scorpius broke into a caustic laugh. "She's going to all the trouble of making a wand? For such a clever witch, she really lacks common sense." He smirked. "I'd like to see it when she's finally got her brand new wand all bright and shiny and then the same thing happens as with all her other ones! Merlin, what a bloody monumental waste of time, money, and talent."
"She's making it during the game."
"She's missing the game? But Gryffindor's playing."
"Before the game starts, Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. You should watch."
"Please. I've got better things to do than follow girls around, watching their idle activities."
"Because I think you're jealous of Rose Weasley."
He smirked. "Jealous of Rose Weasley?! You must be joking."
"Deny it all you like, but your family situations were once reversed. Yours was one of respectability and the Weasleys were poor and little-known. I think you wish you could be like Rose and Albus."
"What the Hell right have you got to go rummaging around in my personal business?! Get out of here! I'm just trying scrub the floor in peace!"
"Somehow, I expected a better comeback from a Slytherin," the girl sighed. "But I won't leave. I still need your help."
"My help? Why would I help you with anything?"
"Because I can help you. I've heard your conversations with Patricia in the dungeons."
Scorpius stepped back and widened his eyes in surprise. He gripped his wand inside his pocket, though he knew he wouldn't use it.
"And so you know everything."
"Perhaps not so much as everything, but enough to grasp that we can help each other."
She turned her head and looked straight into his eyes. The distant black orbs of infinitesimal darkness made his arm involuntarily release his wand and he shook down the shiver that ran through his body.
"We can help each other," he repeated robotically. He sat down on the ground beside her. "How?"