Harry and the Pirates
Chapter 32
by Technomad
Like Hermione, the other Slytherins who had placed their faith in Lockhart were very subdued the next few days. The boys' chart of the inaccuracies and apparent lies to be found in their Defence Professor's works was quietly circulated, but only to those who were clearly disappointed and disillusioned with him. The True Believers were left till later.
"All he ever talked about in practices was the Great Gilderoy Lockhart!" snarled Ginny Weasley. "If it weren't for the older ones knowing something about spells, we'd have wandered in there like so many sheep to the slaughter!" She gave Luna a rueful look. "Not that I'd have stood much chance against you, anyway! What in Merlin's name was that spell you used?"
"Spell?" Luna sat up, looking slightly startled, as she so often did.
"Yes, Luna. Spell. The one you used to make yourself so limber." By now everybody was watching. Luna Lovegood did not lie, but she could be marvelously opaque when she wanted to be, and her Housemates had found that getting information from her could be an adventure in itself.
"Oh. That." Luna smiled. "That was no spell. That was yoga."
"Yoga?" Along with most of the purebloods, Ginny was utterly nonplussed. Meanwhile, Harry, Dudley, and Hermione smiled. They had all seen yogis before, in the Indian district of Roanapur and elsewhere. "What in Merlin's name is 'yoga,' and if it isn't magic, how in the world do you make your skeleton suddenly act like India-rubber?"
"It's not magic at all, Ginny," Luna explained patiently. "It's a spiritual exercise done in coordination with physical exercise. Daddy and I spent a year in India, and I learned it then. It came in very handy…this was just after Mummy died, and I was in a bad place mentally…and I kept it up once I got back to England. There's a yoga instructor in Exeter, and I go in to see him every week when I'm home." By this time, Ginny's eyes were wide, and everybody's attention was fixed on the blonde first-year.
"Well, it looks dead useful," said Ginny. "Can you teach us?" Several others, not all of them on Lockhart's team, made agreeing noises.
Luna looked thoughtful. "I'm just a beginner myself," she said. "I can owl Daddy for some of my books, and maybe we can get an instructor here in Hogwarts."
"And if it makes all girls that flexible, I'm all in favor of it-YEOW!" Pucey broke off, rubbing his shin and glaring angrily at one of the sixth-year girls, who smiled smugly and tucked her wand back into her decolletage with a demure gesture. The other girls grinned approval.
"Good on her," Dudley muttered. "Anybody who gets ideas about Luna…!" Harry looked at his cousin closely. He had known that Luna was sweet on Dudley, but how sweet was Dudley on Luna?
Harry thought for a second about how it would feel to have Luna as a permanent part of their little family. He was surprised to find how much he liked the idea. Luna's calm, unruffled serenity would do them all some good, and she could probably take Roanapur in stride. The thought of how someone like Revy Two-Hands would react to Luna, and vice-versa, made him smile to himself.
The Slytherins were startled when Professor Snape came in. "Ah, I see we're in the midst of the post-mortem on the dueling tournament. My congratulations to all of Flitwick's Furies, and condolences to Gilderoy's Gladiators. Allow me to remind you that dueling-team rivalries are not to be brought within Slytherin. Slytherin House stands united, and, thus, surpasses all foes."
Harry could see the upperclassmen and –women nodding, and agreed silently. As always, Snape's advice was good.
The advent of "mudbloods" and half-bloods into the House had thrown some of their more traditionally-minded Housemates for a loop. However, by this time, Harry, Dudley and Hermione had carved themselves a permanent place in the ranks. Even the stodgiest upholders of tradition were willing to say that they were an exception to the usual strictures about Muggle-born or Muggle-raised witches and wizards. Harry wasn't satisfied with that, but was willing to work with it.
By the time we're out of here, even the stiffest-necked pureblood supremacists will have to acknowledge they're wrong, he thought to himself.
Snape was going on: "And I would particularly like to congratulate our Miss Lovegood for clever use of a non-magical skill. Too many magical folk refuse to believe that non-magical methods can be of any use to us. This can lead to disaster." The Potions Master looked very stern. "I do not want to have to explain to any parents how any of my snakes fell to the first random encounter they meet outside this school!"
As Snape swept out, Harry thought about what he had said. Snape was oblique sometimes, as oblique as Luna, but Harry thought he'd figured out what the House Head had meant. No matter which side of the dueling club they were on, Slytherins were expected to share their knowledge with each other.
The Christmas holidays were approaching quickly, and Harry and Dudley weren't sure what to do. Petunia had written to say that she'd have to be staying in Roanapur, which meant that a repeat of last year's fun in London was right out.
"Do you want to sign up to stay here in the castle?" Dudley asked.
"Don't know just yet, Dudley. We might get invited to stay with some of our housemates."
Sure enough, when Ron Weasley heard about them being stuck, he promised to owl his mother. "Mum'd be over the moon to have you there, and Ginny'd be tickled pink. I haven't had a chance to talk to my brothers yet, but I don't think they'd mind much."
"You sure about that?" Dudley looked a little worried. "The twins might bear us a grudge."
"Not after the way you saved their bacon for them," Ron assured his friends. "You may noticed they toned things down considerably after that." He grinned a jack o'lantern grin. "Mum was very pleased at how the two of them calmed down. Their grades perked up as well, which made both the 'rents happy."
Everybody in the school was visibly looking forward to Christmas. Everybody, it seemed, except one person. Hermione and Ginny both reported that Pansy Parkinson was still acting oddly. "She's awfully quiet, and even though she turns in as early as the rest of us do, she never seems like she's had enough sleep."
"That's not good," Ron remarked. "Have you taken her to Madame Pomfrey?"
"She won't go. She spends a lot of time scribbling in some damn diary, and won't talk to us. Not that we miss her…much." Hermione scowled. "At least we're free of her snide comments, gossip and catty behavior in general."
"Well, count your blessings," Harry said. Just then, Ron came in, grinning.
"Hey, you lot, look what Hagrid found!" He had a box in his arms, and he opened it, to reveal a snake curled up in a nest of grass.
They were Slytherins, and none of them were afraid of snakes. Harry reached in, and the snake coiled around his arm. "Oooh, who's a little beauty, then? Who's Daddy's little friend, then?" He looked up, to find his Housemates all staring at him.
The silence was broken by Adrian Pucey. "Harry…mate…you can speak Parseltongue!"
"What's Parseltongue? What are you talking about?" Harry held up the snake, which wriggled up and flicked its tongue at him. "Aren't you a love? Do you want to stay and be our friend?"
The snake hissed. "You are nice, human, but I would prefer to be free."
Harry said: "The snake likes us, but would rather be let loose again." Then it struck him. "I can talk to snakes?"
Pucey nodded. "Yes. You have the rare gift of Parseltongue. Salazar Slytherin had it, or so it is said-records from his time are incomplete."
"Yes!" piped up Draco. "And so did He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, the true heir of Slytherin!"
Draco wilted as everybody turned to give him a disapproving glare. In a voice like poisoned honey, Marcus Flint purred: "I do hope I don't need to explain why this little titbit of information stays strictly in-house, do I, now, Draco?"
Staring at the tall, stern upperclassmen and –women who suddenly were surrounding him, Draco visibly shrank into himself. His last little encounter with his displeased housemates had made an impression, and he clearly didn't want to repeat it. "I'll keep quiet! Honest!"
Flint nodded. "Of course you will." His smile would have looked just right coming out of a dark alley. "Because you know what'll happen to you if you forget and blab, don't you?" Draco nodded frantically.
Just then, a fifth-year ran in, full of news. "Justin Finch-Fletchley was just found petrified! And right beside him, Nearly Headless Nick, the Gryffindor ghost!"
Flint and Pucey grabbed the fifth-year. "Are you sure about that? What could paralyze a ghost?"
The fifth-year shook his head. "Don't know! I came around a corner and found them, with some of the teachers bending over them. And on the wall was written 'The Heir Has Returned! Tremble, Unworthy Ones!'"
"When'd it happen?" Harry narrowed his eyes.
"It can't have been long ago. Justin was in class until half an hour ago," piped up Dudley. "I heard some of the Puffs talking about how they were getting some extra training in Herbology in his year. Sprout expects everybody in her House to be as close to an expert on the subject as she can make them. Neville Longbottom was wishing he could be there, too."
"So everybody here has alibis?" At this, the others got what Harry was driving at. If the petrifications were thought to be the work of the Heir of Slytherin, or someone claiming his mantle, at least, even the thickest people in the school would be taking a long, careful look at Slytherin House. And many of them, Harry thought, might well have things to hide that they wouldn't want brought into the open.
"The interesting question to me is, who or what could petrify a ghost?" That was Hermione. "Anybody have any bright ideas?"
That question got the Slytherins thinking. "Good on you, Hermione," said Millicent Bulstrode. "If we can narrow down what's causing this uproar, we've a better chance at finding it."
"I'd say, myself, that it couldn't be a student. Even we seventh-years aren't that good at magic. Not good enough to do anything to a ghost." Lucian Bole's statement drew many nods from the other upper years. Ghosts were famously all but invulnerable even to the mightiest wizards; otherwise, Peeves would have been blasted to atoms long ago.
"So-we've got another House project. Call it 'Operation Save our Bacon.' If we can find whatever's doing all these things, and prove that nobody in our House had anything to do with them, we're in the clear. Otherwise, it's far from impossible that all our necks will be on the block no matter how innocent we may be." Ron had put it rather bluntly, but that was him-a typical Weasley, through and through, for all that he wore green and silver instead of the more normal red and gold.
Terence Higgs took charge of the project. "Right, you lot! I'll want a division of labor on this. I'll need some studious types,for starters. You know, the sort who might as well have sorted Ravenclaw." Hermione's eyes went wide and she raised her hand instantly, along with some of the other more bookish Slytherins. "Good. Your job is to hit the library. Divvy it up, and find anything you can about powerful Petrifiers. I'll want some upperclassmen and –women on this; they can access the Restricted Section. Anybody on good terms with Flitwick, I'll want to pump him for information; petrification is a charm, after all. If any of you can dig some sense out of Binns, pump him; this may not be the first outbreak.
"The rest of you, just keep in groups and be careful going around corners. If you can, use a mirror to see what's there before you do. We don't want to lose anybody to this. Between this and having that incompetent glory-hound as a DADA teacher, we're going to have enough trouble without our numbers getting whittled down."
"However, if one of us did get petrified, that might help convince the rest of the school that we're innocent." Malfoy had regained his self-confidence; nothing kept him down for very long, it seemed. Abstractly, Harry rather admired his pluck, even while deploring his utter lack of common sense.
"A splendid idea!" Higgs gave Draco a smile. "And since you've thought of it, you can be our first volunteer!"
Draco turned an unappetizing shade of green, as the other second-years, save only his two tame goons, loudly applauded. "What a wonderful notion!" leered Blaise Zabini. "On your stone, we'll have carved the words: 'Here lies Draco Malfoy, as usual. He gave his life to save his House!'"
"We'll all miss you, Draco," Hermione purred, grinning evilly as she ostentatiously patted Draco on the back. "Without you, who'll be our main source of stupid ideas?"
"After you're gone, Draco, who gets your stuff?" asked Dudley. "Shall we auction it off with the money going to your estate, or just raffle it off?" By now, Draco was obviously terrified, staring around as though his Housemates were planning to throw him to whatever danger lay outside their doors that very instant. Whatever he saw in his Housemates' faces didn't reassure him; he whimpered aloud, looking like he wanted to crawl under some furniture and hide.
Harry almost felt sorry for the blond fool, but reflected that if Draco didn't learn to keep his big mouth shut, or at least not to let whatever was in his empty head spill out through it, he was going to end up in the soup no matter what.
On that note, things broke up for the night. Before he went to bed, Harry sat down and wrote a long letter to Aunt Petunia in Roanapur, with Dudley's help. They both knew that the letter would come under Balalaika's eye, and they hoped that the Russian woman would have some good ideas.
END Chapter 32
