"It wouldn't surprise me," James said, smiling crookedly. "It seems I haven't read any of the right books."
Rose made an annoyed noise. "Umbridge was the D.A.D.A. teacher," she explained. "She refused to teach them any usable defensive techniques because she was a Ministry tool, back when the Ministry was trying to squash any and all rumors about the return of 'He Who Must Not be Named'." She pronounced the euphemism with obvious sarcasm.
"I remember," James finally said, nodding. "But that's not what Debellows is about."
Sabrina cut James off. "It amounts to the same thing. So your plan is to solve it the same way."
"Oh no," James said, shaking his head. "No way. I'm not starting up another Dumbledore's Army. I just got done telling Cameron Creevey the other night that I'm not my father. I don't want people thinking I'm trying to relive all of his old adventures."
"Not to fear," Noah said, throwing his arm around James' shoulders. "No one will be thinking that. For one thing, we can't use that name."
"Agreed," Damien replied. "Too old-school. Maybe 'Merlin's Army'?"
Sabrina shook her head. "Too copycat. How about just the 'Real D.A.D.A.'?"
"Too long and too commercial," Damien replied.
"Look," Noah interrupted, "the name doesn't matter. The point is, you lot need to know this stuff. If you don't get it until you're as old and excellent as we are, it'll be too little, too late. You need to take matters into your own hands."
"But I can't teach any of it!" James exclaimed. "I barely know any of it myself!"
"Then I guess you need to find someone to teach it to you," Noah answered, shrugging.
"So why don't you three do it?" James shot back.
"Can't happen," Damien said matter-of-factly. "As great and inspiring as we may seem, we aren't teachers. You ever hear of muscle memory? It means that my hand knows how to cast an Expelliarmus spell, but my brain doesn't keep track of it anymore. It'd be like trying to explain how to walk. It's just second nature by now. No, you need a natural teacher; someone like your dad, back with the original Dumbledore's Army."
James turned to Ralph and Rose. "Shouldn't you two be speaking up, telling me what a ridiculous and irresponsible idea this is?"
"Actually," Rose said thoughtfully, "I think it makes a good bit of sense. I mean, it's true that we really aren't learning anything useful in Debellows' class. Especially the girls."
"And honestly," Ralph added, "I need all the help I can get with defensive magic. That's one area I've never really gotten a handle on."
"I'll say," James grudgingly agreed. "But still, this could get us into a load of trouble!"
"I don't see why," Rose reasoned. "There are lots of extracurricular classes and clubs. It's not like in our parents' day when Umbridge forbade anyone from practicing defensive spells. It could be a completely sanctioned school club. All we'd have to do is get the Headmaster's permission. You could ask, James. Merlin owes you one, after all."
James glanced at Rose. She shrugged.
"This leaves just one problem," Ralph commented. "Who will we get to teach?"
"You'd need somebody with a good, basic grasp of the defensive arts," Sabrina said. "Someone who's a natural leader and teacher, with some experience in actual battle."
An idea occurred to James. His eyes widened, and then he slumped slowly in his seat.
"What?" Rose asked, frowning.
"I think I just thought of the perfect teacher," James replied dolefully.
Ralph said, "So why is that a problem?"
"Because," James grinned crookedly, "I don't think he'll ever agree to do it."
Rose narrowed her eyes. After a moment, she smiled knowingly.
"Who?" Noah asked.
"Can't tell," James answered. "But if we can talk him into it, I'll let you know."
The Gremlins seemed a bit annoyed at James' secrecy but were generally content that their idea had been adopted. After a while, the group broke up, leaving only James, Ralph, and Rose in the dark corner.
"Do you think Cedric would ever do it?" Rose asked earnestly, keeping her voice low.
"Oh!" Ralph exclaimed, smacking his forehead. "I knew I should've known who you two were talking about."
"All we can do is ask him," James answered. "People say he had natural leadership skills. He was good enough to get into the Triwizard Tournament, and he made it through all the challenges, so he has plenty of experience."
"And from his perspective, it's all still fresh," Rose agreed.
Ralph asked, "But where can we find him? Last year, he just seemed to show up when he wanted to. We still don't really know where he hangs out."
James looked hard at Ralph, thinking. "Actually, I might have an idea about that."
"We should ask the Headmaster first," Rose said. "That way, we don't bother Cedric with it unless it's for sure. Let's all go together; tomorrow, after lunch. That'll give us a chance to figure out the best way to present the idea."
James nodded. "Sounds all right, I suppose."
"You don't think it's a good idea?" Rose asked, putting her head on one side.
"No, I guess it's a good idea," James admitted. "I just hate the idea of looking like I'm trying too hard. You know, doing everything like my dad did. Like I told Cameron, I'm not the one with the lightning bolt scar on my forehead."
Rose studied James. "Then why do you keep rubbing it?"
James dropped his hand, suddenly realizing that he was indeed touching his forehead. "What do you mean?"
"You've been rubbing at your forehead for the last few days," Rose replied. "You look like an advertisement for Haberdasher's Anti-Headache Headwear."
"It's true," Ralph added, nodding. "Maybe you should wear your glasses more if not wearing them is making your head hurt."
James was somewhat annoyed. "It's not my bloody glasses. I don't know what it is. I've just got an itch, that's all."
"You've got a constant itch on your forehead?" Ralph blinked.
"It's not 'constant'," James said. He glanced at Ralph and Rose. "Is it?"
Rose looked a bit concerned. "Maybe you should go see Madam Curio down in the hospital wing, James."
"That's the last thing I need," James said, chuckling. "It's nothing, really. I'd barely even noticed it. It does seem a little weird though."
"You've just been thinking about it all too much," Rose said reasonably. "No one is expecting you to be your father. Don't obsess over it."
James agreed, and he hoped Rose was right. As he said goodnight and climbed the stairs, he wondered about the phantom itch on his forehead. He really hadn't given it any thought until now, but it was a just a little bit strange, wasn't it, having a persistent itch in the place of his father's famous scar? No way would he be asking Madam Curio about it. It was bad enough, what with Cameron Creevey expecting him to shoot fireworks out of his bum on one hand, and Scorpius Malfoy accusing him of delusions of grandeur on the other. The last thing he needed was for a rumor to get started that James Potter was scratching at a phantom lightning bolt scar. Especially on top of the fact that he very well might be starting a club reminiscent of his dad's Dumbledore's Army.
As James was getting ready for bed, it occurred to him that, had he not had the conversation with Tabitha Corsica and gone away feeling worried and peeved, he might not have agreed so easily to the creation of the new D.A.D.A. club after all. Her words had left him feeling small and ridiculous, but the idea of starting a new Defence Club gave him a feeling of importance again. Was that reason enough to go through with it? He hoped it was a good idea, but really, he wasn't overly concerned about it. There were still two hurdles that needed to be overcome for the club to happen. The first was to get Merlin's approval, the second was to find Cedric and ask him to teach it. If either refused, then the club would never be. That seemed like good enough odds to James. Thinking that, he closed his eyes and drifted to sleep.
A grey, humid afternoon greeted James, Rose, and Ralph as they finished t
heir Saturday lunch and headed out to wander the school grounds. It was one of those strange days at the beginning of autumn when it is too muggy to wear a jacket but too wet and breezy to go without. Rose huddled in a heavy jumper as James and Ralph threw rocks into the lake, admiring the splashes.
"I think we should just ask him straight up," Ralph said, heaving a stone sidearm. "Like you said last night, Rose, there's no reason for him to say no."
"That's what I thought then," Rose replied. "But that was last night."
James glanced back at her. "A lot's changed since then, has it?"
"I stayed up late last night, reading," Rose said. "I wanted to get a head start on some of the books our Wizlit textbook suggested, like I told you in the library."
"You sure don't waste time," Ralph commented.
"I happen to like reading. Besides, not surprisingly, our Headmaster shows up occasionally in some of those books and I thought it'd be worth checking into his history a bit more before we talked to him."
Ralph lowered his throwing arm and looked up at the sky, squinting. "It's so weird. I was there when it happened, but I keep forgetting our Headmaster is the famous Merlin from all the old legends and myths. It's a little hard to wrap your mind around, isn't it?"
"I told you a lot of people find it a bit unsettling that Merlinus Ambrosius is Headmaster of Hogwarts," Rose said meaningfully. "And I found out why, a little bit. There's loads of stories about him in the old books of the kings. It's almost impossible to figure out what's made-up and what might be real, but even if only a tiny bit of it is true, it's pretty worrying."
"Like what?" James asked, prying a large rock out of the bank of the lake.
"Like kings used to hire him to curse armies. Not bad armies, necessarily; just any army that any king with enough treasure happened to dislike. More than once, when Merlin got to the army he was paid to curse, they would send out people to pay him more to go back and curse the king that'd originally hired him. And he did!"
"Sounds pretty practical, if you ask me," Ralph said, heaving a stone with both hands. It splashed nearby, wetting both James' and Ralph's shoes.
"This isn't funny, Ralph," Rose admonished. "He was a magical mercenary. A man like that wouldn't have any loyalty at all! Some of those armies he cursed… they got completely slaughtered, sometimes even before they got to the battle! There'd be floods, cyclones, even earthquakes where the ground would open up right beneath the army camp, swallowing them all whole."
"That can't be true," James commented. "I mean, Merlin's powerful, but nobody can do that."
"You're forgetting where Merlin gets his magic from," Rose replied as if she'd been prepared for such an argument. "According to the legends, Merlin can tap into the power of nature. We saw him doing that the night he took us to get his stuff. Nature is huge, and it was even huger back then, with less civilization. Who knows what a wizard like that would be able to do?"
Ralph brushed his hands off on his jeans. "I don't think 'huger' is a word."
"Don't you start correcting me," Rose said, looking back and forth between James and Ralph. "Why are neither of you taking this seriously?"
"Because like I said, we were there, Rose," Ralph replied. "We saw the man Reapparate from the Dark Ages. We worked with him in the days after. He helped us get rid of that Muggle reporter, who was going to blow the lid off the whole magical world. He was completely brilliant about it. He may have been a loose cannon in the past, but he's different now, isn't he? He's trying to be good, and he seems to be doing pretty well with it."
"Well," Rose said, "it isn't just that he was a loose cannon."
James plopped down on the grass next to her. "What? Did he put ketchup on his eggs? Did he draw mustaches on portraits?"
Rose looked at him, and then looked away. "According to some of the legends, he was supposed to be the bearer of an awful curse. His returning was to be an omen of the end of the world."
James felt a twinge of worry at that, but kept his voice even. "This is the part where it's hard to separate the fact from the loony made-up stuff, right?"
"Laugh if you want," Rose said, "but the prophecy shows up in a lot of places. Some call him the Harbinger of Doom. Other places just call him the Ambassador; of what, it never says. It gets pretty creepy," she admitted, shuddering. "Especially when you are reading it in the middle of the night."
"So far, he's just been the Ambassador of an extra ten points for Gryffindor and Slytherin because we helped him go get some magic box," Ralph said, shrugging. "Come on, it's almost two. He'll be expecting us."
"You coming, James?" Rose asked, climbing to her feet.
James glanced up. "What? Oh. Yeah, sure."
The three plodded through the foggy afternoon, heading for the courtyard. In the distance, thunder rumbled like a veiled threat and the wind began to switch. James was thinking rather nervously of the skeleton in the cave, Farrigan, the long lost associate of Merlin, and of Cousin Lucy's letter about the Gatekeeper. In the light of those things, Rose's tale of the legendary curse of Merlin sounded uncomfortably familar. James couldn't remember it exactly, but the skeleton had said something about a gate, and about things coming through, all because of Merlin's return. The Borleys had come through, at the very least. Merlin acknowledged that. But he claimed to have captured all of them except for the last one, the one that had followed James from that night at the Grotto Keep. Merlin said he'd trapped them all in his mysterious Darkbag. But the skeleton had warned of something else, something worse. Like the legends, it had also called Merlin the Ambassador, but Farrigan had identified the thing Merlin was supposedly representing: the Guardian, the Sentinel of Worlds, the Gatekeeper. Lucy's letter had corroborated those legends, and now Rose's studies were confirming them as well. James shuddered as he followed Rose and Ralph into the castle.
They threaded their way through the weekend-empty corridors, passing darkened classrooms and halls. Finally, they reached the gargoyle which guarded the entrance to the spiral steps.
"You remember the password, Rose?" Ralph asked. "I couldn't even pronounce it, and you know how they are about writing things like that down."
Rose screwed up her face, thinking. Finally, she carefully pronounced, "In ois oisou."
The gargoyle moved with the sound of millstones grinding. It stepped aside, revealing the doorway.
"What's it mean?" James asked as he hopped onto the rising staircase.
Rose shook her head. "It's more of that ancient Welsh, I'd guess. Who knows what it means?"
They arrived in the hall outside the Headmaster's office and James reached to bang the door knocker.
"Wait," Rose said, grabbing James' arm. "Remember this morning? He told us to wait outside. He said he had another appointment before us."
James remembered. He carefully lowered the knocker and the three settled onto a long bench situated across from the Headmaster's door.
On the wall next to the door, amongst an arrangement of old paintings and portraits, was a face James recognized.
"Look," James nudged Ralph, pointing. "I remember him. Old Stonewall used him in Technomancy last year to teach us about magical portraits."
The portrait of Cornelius Yarrow, former Hogwarts bursar, peered at James over his spectacles. "I remember you too, young man. You had a rather unseemly number of questions regarding the subject. I hope you were satisfied."
"I was," James answered. "I especially liked the part about how only the original artist can destroy a magical portrait. It was really wicked when Stonewall melted his painting of that horrid clown."
"Your Professor Jackson did leave out one small detail," Yarrow sniffed, chafing at the memory. "There is one other person who can destroy a portrait, although it has never been known to happen."
"Seems like a pretty important detail to leave out," James frowned doubtfully. "Frankly, with all due respect, I'd trust him rather more on the subject than—"
Two things happened simultaneously, inter
rupting James. The door to the Headmaster's office unlatched and swung open and a stab of pain shot through James' forehead. He clapped a hand to his head and squeezed his eyes shut, hissing in surprise.
"James?" Rose asked, concerned.
Almost as quickly as it had come, the pain vanished. James kept his hand to his forehead but risked opening his eyes. The first thing he saw was the view through the Headmaster's open doorway. Merlin was standing behind his desk, his face grave and his eyes piercing. He was staring very hard at James through the doorway, but the look on his face did not seem worried or alarmed. If anything, he looked intently watchful, perhaps even wary.
James Potter and the Curse of the Gatekeeper Page 20