‘Only if you insist’, Daysen replied with a nasty smile, but then relented. ‘No. This one we should keep alive as long as possible.’
‘A pen, mebbe?’ Hagrid suggested hopefully.
Daysen saw an opportunity of getting the beast off his hands. ‘Well, why not? Provided you can make it safe ���’
‘I think I can.’
‘Good! I’ll leave that to your ��� capable hands then.’ With a satisfied grunt, Daysen got up, brushing soggy grass and earth from his knees.
‘I thought we’d found them all!’ Hermione Granger approached him. ‘And now they’re back?’
‘You have an uncanny way of stating the obvious, Miss Granger.’
‘Someone needs to tell McGonagall.’
‘That, too, is pretty obvious. And it’s just where I’m going to take these two offenders.’
Laurie Paik and Cindy Hollis who’d listened in attentively shrank when they heard this.
‘Surely they shouldn’t be punished?!’ Hermione glared at Daysen with impertinent strictness. ‘They just took out a satyr! On their own!’
‘Which would not have happened if they’d stayed in their common room ���’
‘Come on, Jack! They ���’
‘Ah!’ His hand jerked up at the use of his first name by Granger. It was true that he’d let it pass on a previous occasion, and yet he didn’t feel like he’d fully authorized it. ‘I’m not going to reward their disregard of school rules, no matter what kind of supposedly heroic act it led to. By the way, this is the same attitude that I had when you and your two Gryffindor friends took bested that troll. Unfortunately, Dumbledore wouldn’t listen to me ���’
Granger warranted this with a sly smile and Jack wheeled around at the two little girls.
‘You’, he said menacingly, ‘come with me.’
Paik and Hollis exchanged looks of ill foreboding, and as Daysen lead the way up the hill towards the castle ��� cloak fluttering ominously behind him ��� the two girls followed, stumbling as they tried to keep up with his swift pace.
‘Sir!’ Paik panted. ‘We didn’t do nothing by the Forest, we just ���’
‘Didn’t do anything’, Daysen corrected her without turning over his shoulder. ‘And if that was true, how come you ran into a satyr at all?’
‘We were just walking!’ Laurie Paik sputtered breathlessly.
‘After lessons? During your study time?’
‘We had something to talk about!’
‘Oh! Now that changes everything! Forgive me for bothering you with school rules when you had something immensely important to discuss!’
‘OK, so may-be that wasn’t ��� but ���’
‘We saw the satyr soon after Professor Flitwick and the others went into the Forest on their patrol, sir.’ Cindy Hollis had spoken, her awe of Daysen was giving her a hiccup. ‘We were scared that he might come upon them by surprise, we felt that the least we must do was warn them ���’
‘Right! We couldn’t not warn them, could we?’
At last, Daysen glanced over his shoulder. He bit the inside of his mouth so as not to smile. ‘Save your excuses for the Headmistress’, he growled and strode on.
Minerva McGonagall who was already in her nightgown and bathrobe and whose square spectacles sat on her nose slightly askew, listened gravely to Daysen’s account of the events and glowered at Paik and Hollis so sternly the two girls shrank even more. However, she was essentially a kind woman ��� and Jack sometimes suspected she was getting sentimental with age ��� and so, after a brief reminder of the Forbidden Forest being seriously off-limits, she informed the students that, considering their bravery, punishment would be suspended this time, to be meted out more ferociously should they ever be caught down there again at this time of day. They were to proceed to their common rooms immediately, and tomorrow there would be an announcement at breakfast to reinforce caution among the students.
‘Just a moment, Jack’, the headmistress called after Daysen when he was ushering the girls out of her office.
‘Yes, headmistress?’ Daysen shut the door behind him.
‘I’ll have to report this incident to the Ministry.’
‘I see.’ Daysen kept a straight face.
‘I don’t like it, either, but those are the rules.’
‘Well, if you must.’
‘They are probably going to send someone.’
‘Someone to ask a lot of questions, then leave and do nothing?’ Daysen grinned nastily.
‘They take student safety very seriously’, McGonagall said tersely, but her sigh suggested that she agreed with him. ‘That’s why all incidents of that sort have to be reported and will be investigated. And whoever they send, they are probably going to want to talk to you. As Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, this falls within your realm.’
‘Certainly’, Daysen murmured.
‘I am aware that you’re not on very good terms with the Ministry right now. Yet, I am going to ask you to cooperate with them as well as you can.’
Daysen twitched with resentment at McGonagall’s unspoken caution that he behave civilly. After a few deep breaths, however, he inclined his head mockingly. ‘Will that be all, Headmistress?’
The headmistress peered at him over the rim of her spectacles. She was clearly suspicious. ‘Yes, Jack’, she said pointedly, ‘that will be all. For now.’
He left the office, only to find Paik and Hollis waiting for him in the corridor.
‘What are you still doing here?’ he hissed, venting his general irritation. ‘Didn’t you hear the Headmistress? You’re to go back to your common rooms!’
‘Sir, we’ve been thinking ���’ Paik started.
‘You’ve been thinking!’ Cindy Hollis corrected her with a warning glare.
‘Alright, I’ve been thinking’, Paik looked up at Daysen with wide dark eyes and she forced a smile to her lips that was probably meant to be disarming, ‘that we might stay away from the satyr-self-defence lessons now.’
‘What the ��� hell makes you think that?!’ Daysen growled, his brow shooting up warningly.
‘Why, sir, it’s taking up a lot of time that we could well use for studying, and ��� um ��� we’ve proven that we can do it, haven’t we? I mean ��� we totally took’im out!’ She stared up hopefully at Daysen, though Cindy Hollis looked none too sure of herself.
‘I see’, Daysen said silkily, ‘you now consider yourselves two right little satyr slayers who don’t need the practice.’
‘Well, you have to admit, sir, that there are others who don’t do it that well ���’ Paik batted her almond-shaped eyes, the only delicately feminine feature in her tomboy face. Again, Daysen struggled for a straight face. There was a rumour at Hogwarts that Laurie Paik was his pet, that she had a special connection to him, and he saw now that she played on it. There was no doubt in Daysen’s mind that she sorely needed a harsh disillusionment.
‘The only thing I am going to admit’, he drawled menacingly, ‘is that you have learnt nothing! You may see yourselves as ready-made heroes, when only the continuous practice I impose on you put you in a position to ensure that neither of you ended up seriously wounded or even dead! So any praise that has so prematurely been paid to you tonight should really go to your ever-patient teacher for his zeal and efforts! ��� Thank you very much!’
Two pairs of eyes glared at him, one belligerent, the other fearful.
‘But sir ���’ Laurie Paik started.
‘OFF to your respective common rooms, NOW, lest I hand out detention to school your modesty!’
It was enough to make them take off at the speed of lightning. Daysen watched the two small figures scurrying down the corridor with a grin of satisfaction. It was good to know he still had it in him. Lately, he sometimes caught himself wondering whether he was getting soft with sentimentality ���
Routine was a given at Hogwarts
, and it had the power of burying anything. Hence, after a couple of days Jack had almost forgotten about the new satyr incident. Hadn’t Hagrid proudly presented him with the pen he’d built for the creature near his hut ��� needless to say that he had taken it upon himself to lavish any conceivable kind of loving care on his out-worldly prisoner ��� Daysen might not even have remembered. He had different things on his mind; the search for Ainsworth, the nightly patrols of the Forbidden Forest on top of a tight teaching schedule and his visits every night to Spinner’s End, ostensibly to let his mother check on his neck wound ��� although the exercise was by now a formality ��� but really to check on the Chinese lampion in the window of the opposite house. No surprises there, thankfully, the soothing glow invariably waited for him every night and put him at ease. ‘It’s alright’, he told himself, ‘she’s not stupid, she’ll watch her back.’ Whenever he thought that, however, he was simultaneously wondering whether he believed it himself.
Something peculiar had happened to that lampion. Whenever he saw it, association led him straight to her; or not so much to her, but to the touch of her fingers, her lips brushing his temple. That again led to the vivid memory of her body in his arm, pressed against him, warm and soft. That softness ��� in spite of himself, he was constantly trying to recreate it in his mind, the sensation of it, the luxuriousness of it. He had heard that women tended to object to their own softness and went to surprising lengths to reduce it. Didn’t they know what it did to men, what power it gave over them? A power so strong it could be evoked by no more than the orange glow of a Chinese lampion ���
The imprisoned satyr was doomed, anyway. Only hours after being put into the pen it became ill. The symptoms were the same that Jack had observed before; a high fever, rubbery skin turning blue. As the end of the week approached, the satyr died, and once more Hagrid was in tears.
‘It’s like they have a dead switch’, he was sobbing to an irritated Daysen when the latter came to visit the pen on the Friday, ‘once we catch’em, they die!’
‘They’re not made to last’, Jack replied tersely.
‘What do yer mean, not made to last?’
‘They’re fabricated. I’m certain of it. So stop wasting your ��� emotions on something that’s not even a creature, but really an animated object!’
Hagrid peered darkly at Daysen from under his fringe of scraggly hair and Jack thought he heard him growl ‘Cold basterd!’ under his breath. So Jack lived up to his reputation, gave an impassive shrug and walked away from the pen up to the castle.
It was about lunchtime and he had two hours until the next DADA lesson with an unusually bone-headed bunch of second-years (Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors, so who’d be surprised). Jack decided to spend the time in his office to do some reading and in doing so refill his energies to get through the afternoon. However, as he came closer to his retreat in the dungeons, he saw the door standing open. A strange feeling made itself felt in his guts, reminded as he was of the intrusion into his office several weeks ago. He still hadn’t made head nor tail of that, it had been swallowed up by daily routine like so many other things. Now, however, the theft of Lily’s photograph came back to him, and he felt a stab of pain.
When he entered his office, he indeed found an intruder, but one of the unexpected kind. In the chair in front of his desk ��� in the same place where he sat down worried parents, candidates for detention and any other sort of juvenile offender ��� lounged a man, with his back to the door. His hair was a gleaming white and his legs were comfortably crossed. The fingers protruding from a stiff white sleeve with eccentric cuff links were drumming impatiently on the arm rest.
Jack slid into the room as quietly as he could ��� and he certainly could ��� folded his arms and stared at the back of the snowy head for a while. He knew all too well who this was. Only after a few seconds did he issue a cough and watched the jolt going through his visitor’s body with grim satisfaction.
The probing eyes of Aeneas Crowley stared at him and Daysen observed the man regaining his composure. ‘Professor Daysen! I am sorry for the intrusion. One of your students told me that I could wait in here.’
‘Did they’, Daysen replied coolly, looking doubtful. Normally, his students knew well enough not to show anyone in here in his absence. He was quite certain that Crowley had made an independent decision, may it be out of disregard or in order to rattle him. Not knowing what to expect, however, Jack decided to let it pass.
‘May I assume that you know who I am?’ Crowley asked, but sounded confident as if it was only a hypothetical question.
Feeling a fiendish pleasure inside, Daysen issued a reserved ‘No?’ and looked gave the man a blank look.
Crowley’s eyebrows drew together and he introduced himself with extreme formality and an undertone of irony.
‘To which circumstance do I owe the honour?’ Daysen returned the sarcasm.
However, Crowley had recovered and smiled enigmatically. ‘My recent appointment as a Ministerial Inquisitor.’
Daysen was still in teacher mode and thus had to stop himself so as not to growl ‘Nonsense!’. Instead, he breathed and said ‘Inquisitor? Is that a new office?’
‘It is. Installed at my instigation, with a good backing from the Wizengamot. There is a consensus, you see, that the Ministry must stop its hands-off policy of the past and become more vigilant of new developments in the wizarding world; and it will be an Inquisitor’s job to do just that.’
‘And what do Aurors do these days?’ Daysen cocked an eyebrow. ‘Push quills?’
‘No, no, they still do as they have always done. The office of Inquisitor takes a different approach than that of Auror, though.’
Jack could only just about imagine it. While Aurors at least had the guts to go out and fight, the title ‘Inquisitor’ suggested interrogation, manipulation and blackmail, dirty little procedures carried out behind closed doors. Yet, Daysen shrugged. ‘I should have thought that one could have chosen a better title. The term ‘inquisitor’ evokes certain ��� associations, especially here at Hogwarts.’
‘It is only a title, Professor’, Crowley said evenly, an amused smile around his mouth. ‘May I sit?’
‘Suit yourself.’ Daysen watched Crowley reinstall himself comfortably in the armchair, then walked around his desk and sat down hesitantly. He would have preferred to remain standing, looking down on the man. ‘I guess you came because of the recent satyr incident.’
‘The Ministry takes those very seriously’, Aeneas Crowley explained. ‘It is unfortunate that this pest occurs precisely at the present time when the wizarding world should really put their energies into reconstruction.’
‘Things never occur at the right moment, is my experience’, said Daysen and flexed his fingers under the desk, ‘and although the infestation is certainly a problem, I feel that we have it under control, at least here at Hogwarts.’
‘You seem confident.’
‘I have every reason to be. The latest satyr we caught was overpowered by two first-years. I’ve been training my students conscientiously to deal with the threat, and the fact that even our youngest can do it makes me quite optimistic.’
Crowley didn’t appear at all impressed by that. ‘What happened to the caught satyr?’
‘Died. Today. All the satyrs we caught became sick after a short time.’
‘How do you explain that?’
The lie came without so much as a flinch. ‘The climate, I suppose. They’re really Mediterranean creatures.’
There was a tiny quirk around Crowley’s mouth, almost imperceptible, but years of spy work had trained Daysen to take due notice of such small signals. ‘Have you undertaken any efforts, Professor, to find out where these beasts come from?’
Daysen smiled nastily. ‘The fact that they come from the Mediterranean can be gleaned from any ���’
‘I didn’t mean that!’ Crowley interrupted with an irritated je
rk of the head. It showed ��� if only for a brief moment ��� that he wasn’t as smooth and in charge as he would have liked Daysen to believe.
‘I know’, Jack said quickly, using the advantage, ‘and of course I am as much in the dark as to the source of this infestation as you are ��� or appear to be. If pressed, I’d say it’s somebody’s twisted idea of a joke.’
‘No idea who that somebody might be?’
‘None at all’, Daysen drawled with a bored sigh.
‘Then why are you looking for Abelard Ainsworth?’
It took all of Jack’ self-control to remain seated. His instinct was to shoot up and pace the room, or at least to throw a tantrum. He’d known it, had felt it even in several moments during the last weeks: they were watching him! Outwardly, he remained calm, kept his eyes on Crowley’s face and, after a few seconds, allowed himself a sarcastic grin. ‘I think you can answer that question for yourself, Mr Crowley.’
‘I’d rather hear it from you’, the man replied curiously.
The advantage was lost. Crowley had caught him in a lie, or at least in an attempt of obscuring matters. However, he mustn’t allow the man to use this. ‘Since you are now an Inquisitor with the Ministry’, he started, thoughts racing through his mind, ‘it won’t have escaped your notice that the satyrs are not ��� natural beings.’
Crowley smiled slyly. ‘So you have performed an autopsy?’
‘Obviously’, Daysen said with a shrug.
‘And it didn’t occur to you to inform the Ministry about your findings?’
‘No. I trust in the Ministry of Magic’s ability to make their own investigations.’
‘Which you seek to undermine.’
‘Not at all. My primary worry is the wellbeing of my students.’
Crowley glared at him scornfully. ‘Is it, Professor?’
Daysen returned the glare, challenging the man to go on.
‘Tell me, Professor Daysen’, Crowley did just that while his eyes roved the room ��� the gloomy office and its shelves packed with obscure and sometimes disgusting artefacts, ‘does it bother you very much to be down here again, kicked out of the Headmaster’s chair?’
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