James Potter And The Morrigan Web (31 page)

James stared at him in the darkness, his expression blank, his mouth hanging slightly open. It would’ve actually been funny, if it wasn’t so preposterously frustrating.

“Don’t worry,” Scorpius said, turning and resuming his climb up the dormitory stairs. “There’s always next year. After all… it’s only Quidditch.”

5. SUSPICIONS & SECRETS

The next morning, James skipped breakfast for the first time in his career at Hogwarts. He simply couldn’t bear the thought of the jeering he would likely receive from the rest of the Gryffindors, and the Quidditch team in particular. Hungry and unhappy, he made his way to his first class, Advanced Flight with the irrepressible Professor Cabe Ridcully, his Thunderstreak propped over his shoulder and his full knapsack clumping against his back. He sighed, knowing that what he had avoided at breakfast would surely be waiting for him on the South lawn with the rest of the fourth years.

In this, he wasn’t wrong.

“James!” Graham called seriously, rushing to meet him on the dewy grass. “You’re alive! It’s a miracle!”

“Shut up, Graham,” James grumped, stalking past him. Graham turned to follow.

“Everyone else thinks you just skived off, but I told them you had to have been attacked by skrewts or something. What was it? Come on, you can tell me.”

James threw him a sceptical look. “It was Wendigoes, actually.”

“It was Wendigoes!” Graham announced loudly, cupping his hands to his mouth. “Wendigoes! Terrible, terrible things, that! Er,” he turned back to James. “Is that a thing or a person? Did you duel somebody named Wendy? Blimey, I hope you won.”

“You should have
seen
the look on poor Cameron’s face,” Deirdre Finnegan scolded, joining them on the lawn. “He and his little Potter fan club, all of them looked fit to cry.”

“Devindar had a spot all picked out for you,” Graham added. “Seeker, in honour of dear old dad. Assuming you could come up with the skills, of course.”

“All right, all right!” James hissed, dropping his knapsack to the grass and hefting his broom. “Don’t you think I feel bad enough about it?”

Deirdre shook her head. “No, I don’t. This isn’t funny anymore, James.”

“It’s not supposed to be funny!” James cried. “Do I look like I’m laughing?”

Graham cocked his head speculatively. “Well, you don’t have much of a sense of humour under the best conditions.”

James closed his eyes tightly, calming himself. After a moment, he turned to Deirdre. “So who got Seeker, then?”

Deirdre rolled her eyes. “Lance Vassar.”

“Lance…” James repeated disbelievingly. “But he’s no athlete. I’ve seen him fly. If it wasn’t for that fancy top-shelf broom of his…”

“
Or
the fact that his parents are having a new scoreboard built for the Quidditch pitch,” Graham nodded. “Complete with clockwork scorekeeping, lit numerals
and
firework scoring charms.”

“Really?” James said, impressed despite himself. “That’ll be pretty cool, actually.”

“But
Lance
at
Seeker
!” Deirdre repeated pedantically. “How often do you think those fireworks will be going off for a Gryffindor win?”

James sighed deeply. “Perhaps he’ll be better than we expect?”

Graham shook his head and frowned. “He’d better be. But seriously, James. Next year, just break your own leg or something. We’re running out of excuses for you not showing up at try-outs.”

The ribbing continued throughout the morning. Ralph, Rose and Scorpius, of course, knew the real reason why James had missed Quidditch try-outs, providing some cover for him at lunchtime. Few believed the fantastical tales about their adventure in New Amsterdam, although the story did provide a convenient distraction, and by afternoon most of the school seemed to have forgotten about James’ missed opportunity.

All except for Lance Vassar, who passed James as he queued up near the Yorke vanishing cabinet.

“I don’t blame you, James,” he said quietly, patting James on the shoulder. “It’s better this way, really. You’re a good kid. I didn’t want to embarrass you or anything.”

He swept on, followed by his usual entourage of older Gryffindors and hangers-on.

“He’s serious,” Ralph said wonderingly. “He wasn’t even being sarcastic. What a pompous berk!”

James shook his head, his cheeks reddening with anger and embarrassment.

A metallic slam sounded behind him. Turning, he saw the strange narrow doors of the Yorke cabinet. Of course, it wasn’t a true vanishing cabinet at all, having come from a strictly Muggle school. The green-painted lockers had been especially charmed to function as a portal, despite their completely mundane appearance.

Ralph shrugged. “Looks like we’re up next.”

Together, they approached the lockers and thumbed open two of the narrow doors. The interiors were very small and shallow. Ralph peered into his locker with obvious trepidation.

“It’s going to be a bit snug,” he commented.

James nodded. “Want a little help? I could try to
Reducio
you a little.” It was supposed to be a joke, but Ralph seemed to consider it. Finally he shook his head reluctantly. With a small shrug, James stepped into his locker. Next to him, the metal wall groaned as Ralph crammed into his own space.

A moment later, the metal doors swung to with a squeak and a slam. A flash of blinding light erupted all around James, accompanied by a sense of falling. The locker was too small to jump in, but the confined space kept him from tumbling out when the door popped back open.

He peered out, blinking. Shadows moved in a dim space, echoing with distant voices. James clambered out of the locker, joining his classmates.

“What is this?” he asked Joseph Torrance. “Looks like some sort of… dungeon.”

Joseph nodded as he glanced around. “But I’ve never seen a dungeon painted that particular shade of, er, mint green.”

“A little help?” Ralph said in a strained voice.

James turned around and saw Ralph still crammed awkwardly into his locker, waving a hand at him. James grabbed his friend’s hand with both of his and gave a sharp tug. Ralph tumbled out, nearly bringing the narrow metal door with him. As soon as he was out, the locker doors slammed shut, sending a loud CLANG echoing along the narrow room.

“Thanks,” Ralph muttered, running a hand through his dishevelled hair. “Blimey, it’s hot in here. What is this, a steam bath?”

“It might be, for all we know,” James said, glancing around the dim space. Painted cinder block walls formed a long room, floored with cracked concrete and divided by a long, wooden bench. The rear wall was covered with lockers beneath a single high, cramped window, its milky pebbled glass reinforced with wire mesh. At the head of the room was a heavy wooden door with a single square window set into it. Shapes moved beyond this, accompanied by the dense echo of raucous voices.

Fiona Fourcompass stamped her foot impatiently. “What kind of reception is this, anyway? What are we supposed to do? Where’s our teacher?”

“Door’s locked,” Kevin Murdoch announced, giving the door handle a futile pull. He produced his wand and grinned, fingering it. “Dumb Muggles don’t know locks can’t stop
me
.”

“I wouldn’t--” James began, but it was too late. Murdoch levelled his wand at the door handle and loudly called the unlocking spell.

There was a flash of dense, purple light and Murdoch flew backwards, propelled by some invisible force. He bowled into several other students, sending them tumbling backwards over the narrow bench.

James jumped back, bumping into Ralph but avoiding the domino effect that sent most of the others sprawling to the floor. At that moment, a loud clamour sounded in the hall outside, a sort of jangling bell. As if in response, the babble of voices rose in pitch. Doors slammed in the distance, closing off the sound by degrees, and then, just as Kevin Murdoch and the rest began to scramble upright from the floor, there came the unmistakable sound of a key socking into a lock. The door at the head of the room swung ponderously open, revealing a tall, middle-aged woman with stern features and iron grey hair pulled back into a tight bun. She surveyed the room grimly, her eyes enlarged behind a pair of heavy, black-framed spectacles.

“How
dare
you attempt magic in our school…” she breathed, her low voice echoing along the narrow room. James saw that she was quite thin, almost painfully so, and dressed in a severe grey pant suit. Her heavy glasses seemed far too large for her face, perched on the blade of her nose like a see-saw. Behind the bulbous lenses, her eyes flicked over every face in the room, as if cataloguing them. Then, primly, she stepped inside and allowed the door to swing shut behind her. Without a word, she approached the corner nearest the door and bent to pick something up. When she turned back, she was holding a white laundry bag, stuffed and dangling by its drawstring.

“While you are within these halls,” she said, speaking with such chilly calm that it seemed to lower the room’s temperature by ten degrees, “you will
not… work… magic
. You will not
use the word
magic. You will not say anything about witches, or wizards, or any other detail of your secret little world. I would not have thought I’d need to say that, but apparently I do. If that door had not been especially fortified by your own masters, you would apparently even now be roaming the halls of this school, wreaking whatever magical havoc you wished, regardless of the consequences. All of you, on your feet,
if
you please.”

James and Ralph made room as those that had fallen backwards clambered upright again. As the class shuffled into place on either side of the bench, James counted eight students total. All of them, strangely, were Hogwarts students.

“My name,” the woman said icily, “is Miss Corsica. I will be your liaison and teacher whenever you are here at Yorke Academy. If you have questions, you will address them to me. Is that understood?”

James took the opportunity to glance at Ralph, his eyebrows raised. He nodded surreptitiously toward the woman. Ralph shrugged one shoulder. It certainly wasn’t the Corsica they had been half-expecting.

The woman drew a quick breath and went on. “In the absence of any questions, allow me to enlighten you about your purpose here. As you are surely aware, certain events earlier this year have caused a serious crack in the shroud of secrecy that has hidden your world from ours for centuries. Many believe that this shroud will soon fall away completely, thrusting the magical and non-magical worlds together once again. To soften the potential shock of such a revelation, a programme of careful, deliberate integration has been undertaken. That, students, is why
you
are here.
You
will interact with a select group of Yorke students who have been made aware of your world. Then, when and if the time comes that your secrets are fully revealed,
they
will assist their friends in adapting to that new reality.”

As Corsica continued, James leaned toward Ralph and whispered, “So
that’s
why the Minister of Magic was so keen on international magical cooperation all of a sudden! It was all just a cover for
this
.”

Ralph bobbed his head. “I wonder if your dad knows about it?”

That, James thought, was a very good question. One he would get answered as soon as he could.

In front of James, Murdoch raised his hand. Corsica paused, obviously peeved at the interruption.

“Apparently we have a question after all,” She stated bluntly, raising one eyebrow at Murdoch.

“Just this,” Murdoch said, glancing around at his classmates. “If this is all about getting the Muggles ready for the magical world, then why aren’t there any other wizarding schools here? Why just Hogwarts people?”

“I’m sure I don’t know,” Corsica replied tersely. “It was a strictly voluntary programme. Perhaps not everyone in the magical world is quite as prepared to mingle with us as you lovely children are.”

James grimaced, not only at Corsica’s obvious sarcasm, but at the probable truth of her words. It was hard to imagine any Durmstrang students wanting to mix with Muggles, even if Durmstrang was a part of the programme-- which was unlikely, considering their attitude even toward Muggle-born witches and wizards. Beauxbatons students were more accepting of Muggles, of course, but would probably be bored at the very idea of attending a dull, non-magical school in some nondescript English village. Still, why weren’t there any Alma Aleron students? Considering the popularity of the Progressive Element at the American school, this sort of thing should have been just their cup of tea. He reminded himself to ask Zane about it next time he saw him. Then, of course, he reminded himself that Zane was a bit shirty with him at the moment. He sighed unhappily as Corsica went on.