James Potter And The Morrigan Web (104 page)

“No!” James exclaimed, leaping to his feet, his voice echoing up into the enchanted rafters. “Everything’s definitely
not
under control! Something awful is about to--”

Hardcastle spun on James, his wand flashing upright again, his face red with fury. He was going to hit James with a Langlock curse, silencing him before he could finish his sentence. Instinctively, before James even knew what he was doing, he struck out with his right hand, forgetting for a moment that it did not bear a wand.

Magic sprang from his fingers in cold blue arcs. The bolts struck Hardcastle, flinging him right off his feet. He flew through the air and crashed onto the nearest table, sending goblets, tureens, and golden plates scattering like tenpins. The diners gathered around the table recoiled in fear and shock, scrambling to their feet. Half ducked in terror. The other half groped for their wands. The rest of the Hall erupted in a roar of mingled surprise, panic and anger.

“Stop!” James cried out, sweeping his arm before him, palm outwards in a placating gesture, but magic continued to crackle from his fingers like lightning, electric blue and cold as ice, drawing flashing arcs as it swept the air. The crowd recoiled in fear. Even the other Aurors, James noticed, kept a distance, although their wands were raised, trained on him with unwavering accuracy.

“Stun him!” Hardcastle roared, scrambling to climb off the table, the tablecloth tangled in his belt and dragging after him. “Put him down!”

Red bolts sliced through the air from five different directions, converging on James. Each one, however, snuffed harmlessly mere inches from his body, as if an invisible force swirled around him, deflecting the Auror’s spells.

James stared in shock at his own outstretched hand. Tendrils of icy power curled around his fingers, lancing and crackling like a dynamo. He glanced behind him, his eyes wild. Rose merely stared at him, both of her hands clamped over her mouth. Ralph was still half collapsed on the lowest tier of the student ambassador’s pedestal, frozen in the act of struggling up, his eyes wide, lit with the flashing magic of James’ hand.

“I…” James began haltingly, feeling that the room was suddenly waiting to hear from him, “er…
we
, I mean… are here to help! Everyone, to the doors! We have to get out of here immediately! And as far away as possible!”

This was met with a long moment of complete, bewildered silence. The only person to move was Hardcastle, who had regained his feet and disentangled himself from the table cloth. He glanced around at the stunned crowd. Then, seeming to realize he had lost control of the situation, pointed at the closed double doors at the rear of the hall.

“You heard the boy,” he shouted. “Everyone out, before he does anything else!”

The room was suddenly filled with the squeaking of chairs and the clatter of alarmed feet. Voices arose, first in confused alarm, then in increasing layers of rising panic. James was deeply gratified to see people piling up behind the double doors, clambering to make their exit. This relief, however, quickly soured into sinking dismay as the double doors remained firmly closed, despite the clamouring crowd.

“It’s locked!” Someone shouted.

“Where’s the key!”

“Titus!” This cry came from Lucinda Lyon, from her station by the door. James could just see her craning to look back over the milling, agitated crowd. “Titus! The doors won’t budge! They’re sealed right shut!”

“Stand back!” Hardcastle called, raising his wand and striding forward. The crowd parted before him anxiously, giving him a clear shot at the high double doors.

“James,” Lily said in his ear, her voice small and afraid. “What’s happening? How are you doing that with your hand?”

He shook his head, turning to glance back at her, his hand still raised at arm’s length, crackling with icy blue magic. “I don’t know, Lil. But it’s going to be all right. Just… stay back a bit.”

“EXPULSO!”
Hardcastle roared, flashing his wand forward with a long, powerful flourish. A bolt of deep blue light shot into the doors, exploding vividly and shaking the very marble floor beneath James’ feet. When the sparks cleared, however, the doors remained, closed and untouched.

The crowd began to scatter, to drift toward the windows in rising anxiety, apparently in the hopes of breaking them.

Hardcastle was ahead of them, however. He levelled his wand again, aiming at the furthest of the Hall’s tall windows. Another blast of blue flashed, accompanied by a massive shudder and explosion of sparks. The window remained whole and completely untouched.

“They’re all frosted over,” Lily said wonderingly. “Look at the glass! It’s covered in ice! Maybe that’s why Titus can’t break through!”

Amazingly, inexplicably, Lily was right. Every window, including the enormous rose window over the dais, was clouded with fronds of ice, coated to the point of opaqueness.

“James,” Hardcastle demanded, stalking back across the floor, his wand now lowered. “Forget
how
.
Why
are you doing this?”

“I’m not!” James exclaimed, shaking his crackling, lightning-filled hand. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you! Something terrible is about to happen, but I’m not the one doing it!”

“No,” a young woman’s voice interjected coolly. “I am.”

Every eye in the room turned, following the sound of the woman’s voice. She stood on the dais, directly in front of the sparkling, showering fountain and its golden statues.

It was Petra.

To James’ eye, she looked exactly as she had the last time he had seen her. A drab calico dress swung about her legs beneath a pale blue sweater. Her hair was pulled back in a neat ponytail. As he looked at her, she turned her eyes to meet his. They were cold, but not completely devoid of feeling. She cocked her head slightly and raised one hand to him, not in a wave, but in a sort of
catching
motion, as if she was snatching an invisible ball out of thin air.

The crackling ice-magic vanished from James’ hand. He glanced down at it in surprise.

“And I’ll thank you, James,” Petra said with a small, affectionate smile, “not to borrow anymore of my magic.”

24. THE MOST VEXING QUESTION

Leaving Titus standing speechless in the middle of the Great Hall floor, James dashed to meet Petra where she stood before the glittering fountain.

“Petra!” he gasped. “It’s the Clock! You can help us shut it down!”

For some reason, he expected her to show alarm, or to ask what he meant, or to jump down from the dais and join him. Instead-- as he should have known-- she simply nodded at him sadly. “I know it’s the Clock, James. I know what’s inside it. And I know exactly what’s going to happen in fifteen minutes, when the clock strikes eight.”

James looked up at her in dismay. “So, you’re here to help us, right?” he asked, knowing even as he asked that this could not be the case. The ice covering the windows and sealing the door made that all too clear.

“No,” she answered with a deep sigh. “I’m here to watch. And wait.”

Rose joined James, along with Ralph and Lily.

“Hi Petra,” Lily said, giving the older girl a little wave. “Where’s Izzy?”

“She’s home,” Petra smiled wanly. “Good to see you, Lil. Sorry about all this.”

“But if you know everything that’s going to happen,” Rose declared, “why aren’t you stopping it?”

Petra pressed her lips together in pained irritation. “Look,” she said, finally stepping down from the dais to join James and the others. “I
don’t
know everything that’s going to happen. Why does everyone keep thinking I’m all-knowing somehow? I’m a sorceress, not a prophetess.”

“But,” James said, turning as Petra walked past him, “but you knew what we knew when you met me in your grandfather’s gazebo! And just now you said you knew all about the Clock and Magnussen’s cane and the Morrigan Web!”

“Magnussen’s what?” Hardcastle frowned, drifting closer, his wand at the ready but his hard face creased with confusion. “Whose gazebo?” Behind him, the rest of the dozens of government leaders, ambassadors and diplomats watched with restless agitation and bright, worried eyes. The other Aurors hung back, taking protective positions around the crowd.

“I only know the things that I know,” Petra said, turning back to James and lowering her voice, “because I hired
him
!” She gestured with her right hand. With a crack and a puff of pale smoke, a man appeared next to one of the abandoned tables. He was thin with an unremarkable face and wore a limp fedora hat, a bedraggled trench coat, and a loose burgundy striped tie.

“I’m visible now, right?” he said, glancing around a little nervously. His American accent was unmistakable. “I can tell I’m visible because of all the people suddenly staring at me. Dead giveaway.”

“You’re safe enough, Mr. Parris,” Petra assured him. “I’ve already told you, the Morrigan Web won’t hurt Muggles. The point is,” she turned back to James. “It’s all because of
his
detective work that I know all of this. He tracked down Nastasia Hendricks’ family history. He discovered the connection between Rechtor Grudje and Professor Avior. He traced Judith’s movements as she brought the plan together, with everything leading us to here, tonight.”

“Hold up a second,” Hardcastle said, inching still closer to Petra and James, “So this Morrigan Web, it’s really going to go off tonight?”

“That’s what we’ve been trying to tell you!” Rose cried, anger rising in her voice. “Our parents believed us, and
you
arrested them for it!”

Hardcastle ignored her, his eyes still on Petra. “But it won’t hurt any of the Muggles, right?”

Rose rounded on him furiously. “It will once all the witches and wizards are dead and Grudje and his assassins start picking them all off one by one!”

The crowd stirred again, growing tense.

“Petra,” James whispered, moving alongside the dark-haired girl and ignoring the sudden row between Rose and Hardcastle. “My dad’s here. He and Aunt Hermione and Uncle Ron, they’re locked up behind the dais, in the antechamber. And Lily is right here with us, not to mention Rose, Ralph… you can let them all out, can’t you?”

She shook her head slowly, not meeting his eyes. “I told you to stay away from all this, James,” she muttered. “I warned you. I can’t help any of you now. I wish I could, but I can’t.”

“But why?” James pressed, becoming desperate. “Petra, why does this have to happen? Why can’t you stop it, or at least let everyone go before it does?”

“The Morrigan Web can’t be stopped!” Petra hissed, her icy façade cracking. “Parris and me, we couldn’t learn much about it, but we do know that once it’s put into motion it’s unstoppable!”

“No!” James interrupted her. “It
can
be stopped! We just need to find something equally--”

She overrode him, raising her voice. “And I can’t let anyone go-- not a single person!-- because if I do, it won’t be as tempting to
her!
She’ll only show up if it’s going to go off exactly as she planned! She won’t risk appearing-- and facing me-- if her plan falls apart! She’ll just start over again with a
new
plan, an even worse plan! She’ll only come if the Morrigan Web is actually going to go off and kill every witch and wizard here! She won’t miss
that
for the world, because she loves death! She lives for chaos! It’s the only thing that will bring her to me!”

“But that’s mad!” James exclaimed, grabbing Petra’s arm, making her face him. “Why, Petra?
Why
do you have to face her?”

“
Because I have to kill her!”
Petra shouted, her voice flying up into the rafters and breaking into rolling echoes.

The Hall fell silent in the wake of this declaration. Even Hardcastle and Rose stopped their argument. James stared at Petra, shocked and slightly horror-struck. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe Judith deserved to die. It was that he wasn’t certain, even if it cost him and every witch and wizard in the room their lives, that Petra could truly defeat her.

And the worst part was the look on Petra’s face. It was uncomfortably clear that, despite her resolve, she doubted this as well.