“Well, it’s pretty simple, really. Jackson assumed we were trying to swap the cases, but that we hadn’t gotten around to it yet. He found the case under my chair and believed it was the fake one. The Visumineptio charm on the fake briefcase worked on both briefcases, letting him see what he expected to see. That’s how it preserved the illusion that the fake case was the real one!”
Understanding dawned on James. “The Fool-the-Eye Charm extended to the real briefcase, making it look like the fake one, since that’s what Jackson expected! That’s brilliant!” James clapped Zane on the shoulder. “Nice one, you goon! And you doubted yourself!”
Zane looked uncharacteristically humble. He grinned. “Come on, let’s go find Ralph and make sure he’s okay. You really think he needed to eat two of those Nosebleed Nougats?”
“You’re the one that said we needed a diversion.”
James stuffed Jackson’s briefcase under his robe, clutching it under his arm, and the two boys ran to find Ralph, stopping only long enough to collect the Invisibility Cloak from the floor of the empty Technomancy classroom.
Five minutes later, the three boys clambered up to the Gryffindor common room, rushing to hide Jackson’s briefcase before their next class. James buried it in the bottom of his trunk, then Zane produced his wand.
“Just learned this new spell from Gennifer,” he explained. “It’s a special kind of Locking Spell.”
“Wait,” James stopped Zane before he could cast the spell. “How will I get it open again?”
“Oh. Well, I don’t know, to tell you the truth. It’s the counter-spell to Alohomora. I wouldn’t think it’d work against the owner of the trunk, though. Just anybody else. Spells are smart that way, aren’t they?”
“Here,” Ralph said, crossing the room. He opened and closed the window, then stood back. “Try it on the window latch. You don’t need that open, anyway. It’s dead cold out there.”
Zane shrugged, and then pointed his wand at the window. “Colloportus.” The window lock clacked shut.
“Well, it works, all right,” Ralph observed. “Now try to open it.”
Zane, wand still raised, said, “Alohomora.” The lock jiggled once, but remained locked. Zane pocketed his wand. “You try it, James. It’s your window, isn’t it?”
James used the same spell on the window lock. The lock unhinged neatly and the window swung open.
“See?” Zane grinned. “Spells are smart. I bet old Stonewall could tell us how that works, but I’m not going to be asking him any more questions, I’ll tell you that.”
James closed his trunk with Jackson’s case inside and Zane performed the Locking Spell on it.
On the way back down to their classrooms, Ralph asked, “Won’t somebody else notice that Jackson’s carrying a different briefcase? What if one of the other teachers asks him about it?”
“Not going to happen, Ralphinator,” Zane said confidently. “He’s been carrying that thing long enough that everyone expects to see him with it. As long as they expect to see his case in his hand, the Visumineptio charm will make sure that is what they see. We’re the only ones that’ll see that it’s your buddy’s old rockhound bag.”
Ralph still seemed worried. “Will the charm wear off over time? Or will it work as long as people think that the fake case is the real one?”
Neither James nor Zane knew the answer to that. “We just have to hope it lasts long enough,” James said.
13. Revelation of the Robe
That evening after dinner, the three boys ran up to the Gryffindor sleeping quarters again, pausing only when James noticed the staring woman in the background of a painting of some maidens milking a pair of ridiculously plump cows. He berated the tall and ugly woman, who was dressed like a nun, demanding to know what she was looking at. After half a minute, Zane and Ralph got impatient and each grabbed one of James’ elbows, dragging him away. In the sleeping quarters, they clustered around James’ trunk while James unlocked it and pulled out Jackson’s case. He set it on the edge of his bed and the three of them stared at it.
“Do we have to open it?” Ralph asked.
James nodded. “We have to know we have the robe, don’t we? It’s been driving me crazy all day. What if I was wrong and the thing in there is just some of Jackson’s laundry? I can’t help thinking that he’s the sort that’d carry around a totally meaningless briefcase just to get people talking about it. You should’ve seen how he was this morning when he thought he’d caught Zane and me. He was right mad.”
Zane plopped onto the bed. “What if we can’t even open it?”
“Can’t be that much of a lock if it popped open that day in D.A.D.A,” James reasoned.
Ralph stood back, giving James room. “Let’s get it over with then. Try and open it.”
James approached the case and tried the lock. He’d expected it not to work and was prepared to try the assortment of Opening and Unlocking Spells the three had collected. Instead, the brass catch on top of the case popped open easily. So easily, in fact, that James was momentarily sure it had clicked open a split second before he’d actually touched it. He froze, but neither of the other two boys seemed to have noticed.
“Well?” Ralph whispered. Zane leaned over the case. The mouth of it had come open slightly.
“Can’t see anything in there,” Zane said. “It’s too dark. Open the rotten thing, James. It’s yours more than either of ours.”
James touched the case, grasped the handles, and used them to pull it open. He could see the folds of black cloth. A vague, musty smell wafted from the open case. James thought it smelled like the inside of a jack-o’-lantern a week after Halloween. He remembered Luna saying that the robe had once been used to cover the body of a dead king and he shuddered.
Zane’s voice was low and slightly hoarse. “Is that it? I can’t tell what it is.”
“Don’t,” Ralph warned, but James had already reached into the case. He pulled the robe out. The cloth unfolded smoothly, spotlessly black and clean. There seemed to be acres of it. Ralph backed further away as James let the robe pool on the floor at his feet. The last of it came out of the case and James realized he was holding the hood of it. It was a large hood, with golden braids at the throat.
Zane nodded, his face pale and serious. “That’s it, no doubt. What are we gonna do with it?”
“Nothing,” Ralph answered firmly. “Stick it back in the case, James. That thing’s scary. You can feel the magic of it, can’t you? I bet Jackson put some kind of Shield Charm or something on the case to contain it. Otherwise, somebody would’ve felt it. Go on, put it away. I don’t want to touch it.”
“Hold on,” James said vaguely. He could indeed feel the magic of the cloak, just as Ralph had said, but it didn’t feel scary. It was powerful, but curious. The smell of the robe had changed as James pulled it out. What had at first smelled faintly rotten now smelled merely earthy, like fallen leaves and wet moss, wild, even exciting. Holding the robe in his hands, James had the most unusual sensation. It was as if he could feel, in the deepest pit of his being, the very air in the room, filling the space like water, streaming through cracks in the frame of the window, cold, like ice-blue vapor. The sensation expanded and he sensed the wind moving around the turret that housed the sleeping quarters. It was alive, swirling over the conical roof, channeling into missing shingles and exposed rafters. James faintly remembered children’s stories about how Merlin was a master of nature, how he felt it and used it, and how it obeyed his whims. James knew he was tapping into that power somehow, as if it was embedded in the very fabric of the relic robe. The sensation grew and spiraled. Now James felt the creatures of the deepening evening: the pattering heartbeats of mice in the attics, the blood-purple world of the bats in the forest, the dreaming haze of a hibernating bear, even the dormant life of the trees and grass, their roots like hands clutched in the earth, clinging to life in the dead of winter.
James knew what he was doing, but didn’t seem to be oper
ating his own arms. He raised the hood, turning himself into it. The robe slid over his shoulders, and just as the hood settled over his head, hiding his eyes, James heard the alarmed and warning cries of Zane and Ralph. They were fading, as if down a long, sleepy tunnel. They were gone.
He was walking. Leaves crunched under his feet, which were large and shoeless, tough with calluses. He breathed in, filling his lungs, and his chest expanded like a barrel. Big, he was. Tall, with muscled arms that felt like coiled pythons and legs as thick and sturdy as tree trunks. The earth was quiet around him, but alive. He felt it through the soles of his feet when he walked. The vibrancy of the forest streamed into him, strengthening him. But there was less of it than there should be. The world had changed, and was still changing. It was being tamed, losing its feral wildness and strength. Alongside it, his power was dimming as well. He was still unmatched, but there were blind spots in his communion with the earth, and those blind spots were growing, shutting him off bit by bit, reducing him. The realms of men were expanding, scouring the earth, parsing it into meaningless plots and fields, breaking up the magic polarities of the wilderness. It angered him. He had moved among the growing kingdoms of men, advised and assisted them, always for a price, but he hadn’t foreseen this result. His magical brothers and sisters were no help. Their magic was different than his. That which made him so powerful, his connection to the earth, was also becoming his only weakness. In a cold rage, he walked. As he passed, the trees spoke to him, but even the woodsy voices of the naiads and the dryads was dimming. Their echo was confused and broken, divided.
Ahead of him, revealed only in the moonlight, a clearing opened, surrounding a stony depression in the earth. He descended into the center of the depression and looked up. The glittering night sky poured into the bowl-shaped clearing, painting everything bone white. His shadow pooled beneath him as if it were noonday. There was no place for him in this world anymore. He would leave the society of men. But he would return when things were different, when circumstances had changed, when the world was again ripe for his power. Then he would reawaken the earth, revive the trees and their spirits, refresh their power, and his with it. Then would be a time of reckoning. It might be decades, or even centuries. It might even be eternity. It didn’t matter. He could stay in this time no longer.
There was a noise, a scuffle of clumsy footsteps nearby. Someone else was there, in the clearing with him: someone he hated, but whom he needed. He spoke to this person, and as he did, the world began to dim, to darken, to fade.
“Instruct those that follow. Keep my vestments, station, and talisman at the ready. I will await. At the Hall of Elders’ Crossing, when my time of returning is come, assemble them again and I will know. I have chosen you to safeguard this mission, Austramaddux, for as my last apprentice, your soul is in my hand. You are bound to this task until it is complete. Vow to me your oath.”
Out of the descending darkness, the voice spoke only once. “It is my will and my honor, Master.”
There was no answer. He was gone. His robes dropped to the earth, empty. His staff balanced for a moment, then fell forward and was caught in an eerily white hand, the hand of Austramaddux, before it could hit the rocky ground. Then even that scene vanished. The darkness compressed to a dwindling point. The universe leapt up, monstrous and spinning, and there was only oblivion.
James forced his eyes open and gasped. His lungs felt flattened, as if he hadn’t had breath in them for several minutes. Hands grasped him, yanking the hood back and pulling the robe off his shoulders. Weakness stole over James and he began to collapse. Zane and Ralph caught him awkwardly and heaved him onto his bed.
“What happened?” James asked, still dragging in great gulps of air.
“You tell us!” Ralph said, his voice high and frightened.
Zane was stuffing the robe roughly back into the briefcase. “You put this crazy thing on and then pop! Off you went. Not what I’d have called a wise choice, you know.”
“I blacked out?” James asked, recovering enough to get his elbows beneath him.
Ralph said, “Blacked out nothing. You up and disappeared. Poof.”
“It’s true,” Zane nodded, seeing James stunned expression. “You were clean gone for three or four minutes. Then he showed up,” Zane indicated the corner behind James’ bed with a worried nod. James turned and there was the semi-transparent form of Cedric Diggory. The ghost looked down at him, then smiled and shrugged. Cedric seemed rather more solid than the last few times James had seen him.
Zane went on, “He just appeared through the wall, as if he had come looking for you. Ralph here shrieked like—well, I’d say like he’d just seen a ghost, but considering we have breakfast with ghosts most mornings and a History class with one every Tuesday, the phrase doesn’t seem all that impressive anymore.”
Ralph spoke up. “He took one look at us, then the briefcase, and then he just, sort of, thinned out. Next thing we know, you’re back, just where’d you been, looking white as a statue.”
James turned back to the ghost of Cedric. “What did you do?”
Cedric opened his mouth to speak, tentatively and carefully. As if from a long way off, his voice seeped into the room. James couldn’t tell if he was hearing it with his ears or his mind.
You were in danger. I was sent. I saw what was happening when I got here.
“What was it?” James asked. The experience was murky in his memory, but he sensed he’d remember more when the magic of it wore off.
A Threshold Marker. A powerful bit of magic. It opens a dimensional gateway, designed to communicate a message or a secret over great time or distance. But its strength is careless. It almost swallowed you up.
James knew that was true. He had felt it. In the end, the darkness had been consuming, seamless. He swallowed past a hard lump in his throat and asked, “How did I get back?”
I found you, Cedric said simply. I dipped into the ether, where I have spent so much time since my death. You were there, but you were far-off. You were going. I chased you and returned with you.
“Cedric,” James said, feeling stupid for putting on the robe, and terrified at what had almost happened. “Thanks for bringing me back.”
I owed you that. I owed your father that. He brought me back, once.
“Hey,” James said suddenly, brightening. “You can talk now!”
Cedric smiled, and it was the first genuine smile James had seen on the ghostly face. I feel��� different. Stronger. More��� here, somehow.
“Wait,” Ralph said, raising a hand. “This is the ghost you told us about, isn’t it? The one that chased the intruder off the grounds a few months ago?”
“Oh, yeah,” James said. “Zane and Ralph, this is Cedric Diggory. Cedric, these are my friends. So what do you think is happening to you? What’s making you more here?”
Cedric shrugged again. For what seemed like a long time, I felt like I was in a sort of dream. I moved through the castle, but it was empty. I never got hungry, or thirsty, or cold, or needed to rest. I knew I was dead, but that was all. Everything was dark and silent, and there didn’t seem to be any days or seasons. No passage of time at all. Then things began to happen.
Cedric turned and sat on the bed, making no mark on the blankets. James, who was closest, could feel a distinct chill emanating from Cedric’s form. The ghost continued.
For periods of time, I started to feel more aware. I began to see people in the halls, but they were like smoke. I couldn’t hear them. I came to realize that these periods of activity happened in the hours of the day right after my time of death. Each night, I’d feel myself awaken. I noticed the time, because that was the thing that meant the most, the sense of minutes and hours passing. I searched out a clock, the one just outside the Great Hall, and watched the time go by. I was most awake throughout the night, but by each morning, I’d begin to fade. Then, one morning, just as I was thinning, losing touch, I saw him.
James sat up straight
. “The intruder?”
Cedric nodded. I knew he wasn’t supposed to be here, and somehow I knew that if I tried, I could make him see me. I scared him away.
Cedric grinned again, and James thought he could see in that grin the strong and likeable boy that his dad had known.
“But he came back,” James said. Cedric’s grin turned into a scowl of frustration.
He came back, yes. I saw him, and I scared him off again. I started to watch for him in the mornings. And then, one night, he broke in through a window. I was stronger then, but I decided someone else needed to know he was inside the castle. So I came to you, James. You had seen me, and I knew who you were. I knew you’d help.
“That was the night you broke the stainedglass window,” Zane said, smiling. “Kicked that guy through it like Bruce Lee. Nice.”
“Who was he?” James asked, but Cedric merely shook his head. He didn’t know.
“So it’s almost seven o’clock, now,” Ralph pointed out. “How are you making us see you? Isn’t this your weakest time?”
Cedric seemed to think about it. I’m getting more solid. I’m still just a ghost, but I seem to be becoming, sort of, more of a ghost. I can talk more now. And there is less and less of that strange nothing time. I think that this is just how ghosts are made.
“But why?” James couldn’t help asking. “What makes a ghost happen? Why didn’t you just, you know, move on?”
Cedric looked at him closely, and James sensed that Cedric himself didn’t know the answer to that question, or at least, not very clearly. He shook his head slightly. I wasn’t done yet. I had so much to live for. It happened so fast, so suddenly. I just��� wasn’t done.
Ralph picked up Professor Jackson’s case and threw it back into James’ trunk. “So where did you go when you popped off, James?” he said, heaving himself onto the end of the bed.
James took a deep breath, collecting his memories of the strange journey. He described the initial feeling of holding the cloak, how it seemed to allow him to sense the air and the wind, then even the animals and the trees. Then he told them about the vision he’d had, of being inside Merlin’s body, in his very thoughts. He shuddered, remembering the anger and bitterness, and the voice of the servant, Austramaddux, who vowed his oath to serve until the time of reckoning was come. He recalled it vividly as he spoke, finishing by describing how the blackness of the night had wrapped around him like a cocoon, shrinking and turning to nothingness.
James Potter and the Hall of the Elders' Crossing Page 33