James Potter and the Hall of the Elders' Crossing

by G. Norman Lippert

  “Oh, Theodore, must you prolong dis?” Delacroix sighed. She swung her arm toward him and performed a complicated gesture with her fingers. Jackson’s wand flicked out of his hand as if on a string. He grabbed for it, but it darted up and away. Delacroix made another gesture with her hand, and the wand snapped in midair, as if broken over a knee. Jackson’s face didn’t change, but he slowly lowered his hand, staring hard at the two pieces of his hickory wand. Then he turned back to Delacroix, his face white with fury, and began to pace toward her. Delacroix’s hand moved like lightning, darting into the folds of her clothing and coming out with her horrible graperoot wand between her fingers.

  “Dis may only be a representation of de real thing,” she said playfully, “conjured from the dirt of dis place, just like dis version of myself, but I assure you, Theodore, it is exactly as powerful as I think it is. Don’t make me destroy you.”

  Jackson stopped in his tracks, but his face didn’t change. “I can’t let you go through with this, Delacroix. You know that.”

  “Oh, but you already have!” she cackled gleefully. She pointed the wand at Jackson and flicked it. A bolt of ugly orange light shot from it, sending Jackson flying violently backwards. He landed hard on the upper stone steps, grunting in pain. He struggled to get up, and Delacroix rolled her eyes. “Heroes,” she said disdainfully, and flicked her wand again. Jackson flew off the ground and rammed against another of the treepillars lining the grotto. He hung there, apparently knocked unconscious.

  “And now,” she said, lazily pointing her wand in the direction of James and Ralph, “please, join me.”

  The two boys were lifted from the ground and transported down the rest of the steps. They dropped clumsily to their feet in the grassy space at the bottom of the grotto, directly in front of the wraith of Madame Delacroix. Her eyes were emerald green and piercing. “Give me de robe. And please, don’t make me harm either of you. I only ask de one time.”

  The book bag slipped off James’ shoulder and struck the ground at his feet. He looked down at it, feeling dazed and completely hopeless. “Please,” Delacroix said, and flicked her wand. James fell to his knees as if something extraordinarily heavy had landed on his shoulders. His hand plunged into the bag, clutched the robe, and pulled it out. Ralph struggled to grab it, but he seemed locked in place, unable to move more than a few inches in any direction. “Don’t, James!”

  “I’m not,” he said hopelessly.

  Delacroix’s eyes sparkled greedily. She reached out a hand and delicately took the robe from James. “Free will is highly overrated,” she said airily.

  “You won’t win,” James said angrily. “You don’t have all the relics.”

  Delacroix looked up from the robe, meeting James’ eyes with an expression of polite surprise. “Don’t I, Mr. Potter?”

  “No!” James said, gritting his teeth. “We didn’t get the broomstick. Tabitha still has it. I’m not even sure if she knows what it is, but I don’t see her bringing it to you now, either way.” He hoped he was right as he said it. He didn’t see the broomstick anywhere in sight, and Tabitha certainly didn’t seem to be present, unless she was hiding, like they had been.

  Delacroix laughed lightly, as if James had just made a very witty remark at a party. “Dat was de perfect hiding place, wasn’t it, Mr. Potter? And Miss Corsica is such the perfect individual to harbor it for me. Why, it’s so perfect, in fact, that you never stood a chance of learning that it was, in fact, a clever lie. Interesting as it may be, Miss Corsica’s broomstick is nothing more than a convenient ruse. No, like de robe, de Merlin staff has also found its way to me tonight, regardless of what you might think. It has been cared for very well, in fact.”

  The rather beautiful wraith of Madame Delacroix turned to Ralph and held out her hand. “Your wand, please, Mr. Deedle.”

  “N-no,” Ralph protested, his voice almost a moan. He tried to back away.

  “Don’t make me insist, please, Ralph,” Delacroix said, raising her own wand toward him.

  Ralph’s hand jerked up and went to his back pocket. Trembling, he produced his ridiculously huge wand. For the first time, James saw it for what it was. It wasn’t just unusually thick, whittled to a point at one end. It was part of something that was, at one time, much larger, worn down with age, but still, as had been repeatedly shown, extremely and inexplicably powerful. Delacroix reached out and, almost daintily, plucked the Merlin staff from Ralph’s hand.

  “Dere was no point in my risking my own capture by smuggling such a thing onto the grounds. Surely someone would have detected it, had it been in my possession. Thus, I arranged for it to be sold to you and your charming father, Mr. Deedle. I was your salesman, in fact, though in a different guise. I do hope you enjoyed the use of the staff. Quite powerful, wasn’t it? Oh, but now I see,” she added, turning almost apologetic, “you thought that it was you who was de powerful one, didn’t you? I’m so sorry, Mr. Deedle. Did you really think you’d have been allowed to enter the Keep if you hadn’t had de staff of Merlin with you? Surely even you can see de humor in dat, can’t you? You, a Muggleborn. Please, forgive me.” She laughed again, lightly, maliciously.

  She turned then, and very carefully began to arrange the relics on the throne. James and Ralph looked at each other miserably, and then James tried to look back at Zane, who was still stuck to the treepillar behind them, but the darkness was too thick.

  Madame Delacroix stepped back from the throne, breathing in a great, long breath of anticipation. She positioned herself between Ralph and James, as if they were compatriots. “Dere we go. Oh, I am so pleased. I do hate to say it, but everything has worked out exactly as I had planned. Enjoy the spectacle, my young friends. I cannot guarantee dat Merlinus will not destroy you with his arrival, but surely you do not think dat too high a price to pay to observe such a thing.”

  “It’ll be worth it if it destroys you, too,” James said through gritted teeth.

  “Such venom,” Delacroix replied, smiling. “No wonder you made such a good apprentice.”

  The robe of Merlin had been draped across the back of the throne, as if Merlin would simply shrug into it when he appeared. The last bit of Merlin’s staff leaned against the front of the throne. The beam of combined moon and starlight had become very bright, drawing a dim line through the darkness from the hole in the domed ceiling to the center of the grassy area below. The three relics glowed in the shimmering, silvery light. The time of the Hall of Elders’ Crossing had come.

  James heard something. He knew Madame Delacroix and Ralph had heard it, too. All three turned their heads, trying to locate the source of the noise. It was low and whispering, coming from all directions at once. It was tremulous and distant, almost like a low note on a hundred far-off flutes, but it was growing louder. Madame Delacroix glanced about, her face a mask of glee, and yet James was sure that, wraith or not, there was a hint of fear on her face as well. She suddenly gripped both boys’ arms in her steely hands. “Look!” she breathed.

  Tendrils of mist were pouring in between the pillars of the grotto, bringing the sound with them. James glanced around. The tendrils were seeping in between the branches of the domed ceiling as well. They were as insubstantial as smoke, but moved intelligently, with growing speed. They snaked toward the throne, and there they began to collect. As the tendrils combined, they writhed and collapsed, forming only hazy shapes at first, and then hardening, coming into focus. A line of slightly curved, horizontal bars coalesced in the center of the throne. With an involuntary shudder, James saw that they were the ribs of a skeleton. A spine grew from them, both up and down, connecting to two more shapes, the skull and the pelvis. This, James realized, was an Apparition happening in extreme slow motion. The atoms of Merlin were streaming back together, fighting the collected inertia of the centuries. The sound that accompanied the Apparition was growing both in volume and pitch, rising through the octaves and becoming almost human.

  “Hey, voodoo queen,” a voice immed
iately behind James suddenly said, making all three of them jump. “Dodge this.”

  A length of log slammed down onto Delacroix’s head, disintegrating it into a hundred clods of wet dirt. Instantly, the Body-Bind Curse on both James and Ralph fell away. James spun and saw Zane holding the end of the log, pulling it back out of the mess of Delacroix’s wraith, which was struggling to rebuild itself. From the shoulders up, Delacroix seemed to be made entirely of broken dirt, writhing roots and worms. The wraith’s hands scrabbled at the ruined neck, trying to push the clods back into shape.

  “She forgot about me when Merlin started forming!” Zane shouted, yanking the log free and hoisting it back over his shoulder. “I fell off the pillar and just grabbed the closest heavy thing I could find. Get the robe and the staff!” Zane swung the log like a baseball bat, taking off one of Delacroix’s arms at the shoulder. It hit the ground and shattered into a mess of dirt and worms.

  James jumped forward and snatched a handful of Merlin’s robe, reaching his left hand through the forming shape of the wizard. He pulled, but the robe fought back, struggling to maintain its position. Digging his heels into the soft earth, James yanked as hard as he could. The robe wrung from the back of the throne, coming through the skeletal shape seated on it. The shape gripped the arms of the throne and seemed to scream, bringing the pitch of the haunting drone up another octave. Ralph lunged and grabbed at the staff, which was growing in length even as the figure on the throne gained solidity. He jumped back with it, holding it high over his head.

  The wraith of Madame Delacroix seemed caught between trying to reform itself and trying to get the robe and the staff back into place. It waved its remaining arm wildly at Ralph, then clawed at the robe in James’ hands. Zane danced behind the wraith, the log held high, then brought it down again, burying it almost waist deep in the disintegrating figure. James glanced toward the Merlin throne and saw that the figure there, which had formed to a full skeleton with ghostly musculature clinging to it like moss, was writhing horribly, beginning to melt again into mist. The sound of Merlin’s Apparition had become a keening shriek.

  And then, as if out of nowhere, another figure was among them. It resolved from the darkness beyond the Grotto Keep, moving with terrible speed. It was the dryad with the horribly long, blue fingernails, but only just barely. There was something else moving within the shape, as if the dryad was merely a costume. A new voice joined the keening wail of the half formed Merlin.

  Master! No! I will not fail you! Your time has come at last!

  The figure split somehow, completely abandoning the form of the dryad. It became simply two enormous, black talons. They lunged simultaneously at James and Ralph, snatching the robe and the staff back and sending the two boys sprawling to the stone steps. The talons spun, placing the relics back into their positions, and then retracted, falling into dust, as if exhausted.

  The figure on the throne shuddered violently, drawing itself back together, and the tendrils of mist roared toward it, solidifying now with terrible speed. The bones grew muscles, layer upon layer. Organs bloomed inside the chest and abdomen, forming from the veins out. The body filled the robe, and the robe took shape over it. Skin collected on the body like dew, first as a filmy membrane, but thickening, growing ruddy and tan. The fingers clutched the staff, which had grown to a length of six feet, tapered gently at the bottom and with a heavy, knobbed end. Runes ran up and down the staff, pulsing with a faint green light. The noise of Merlin’s return resolved into a long scream, and the wizard finally ran out of breath, his head thrown back, the chords of his neck drawn taut as wire. After a long moment, he drew his first breath in a thousand years, filling his huge chest, and lowered his head.

  Master! a ghostly voice cried out. James looked from the figure on the throne to the shape that had resolved out of the awful talons. It was a small man, almost invisible. He panted, his bald head glistening in the faint moonlight. You have returned! My work is complete! I am released!

  “I have returned,” the voice of Merlin agreed. The face was stony, the eyes locked onto the ghost. “But what time is this you have returned me to, Austramaddux?”

  Th-the world is made ready for you, Master! the ghost stammered, its voice high and frightened. I��� I waited until the perfect time for your coming! The balance of the magicked and the magicless is ripe for your hand, Master! The time��� the time is come!

  Merlin stared at the ghost, utterly unmoving.

  Please, Master! Austramaddux screamed, falling to his ghostly knees. I have watched for centuries! My duty��� my duty was more than I could bear! I waited as long as I could. I only helped a little! I found a woman, Master! Her heart was open to me! She shared our goals, so I��� I encouraged her! I helped, but only a little! A little!”

  Merlin’s gaze moved from Austramaddux to the wraith of Madame Delacroix, which had mostly reconstituted itself. It flung itself to its knees, and when it spoke, the voice sounded as if it came through a mouthful of dirt. “I am your servant, Merlinus. I have summoned you to fulfill your destiny, to lead us against de Muggle worms. We are prepared for you. The world is ripe for you.”

  “This puppet of filth is to be my muse?” Merlin said, his voice low but nearly thundering with intensity. “Let us see her as she is, then, not as she wishes to be seen.”

  Delacroix straightened herself and began to speak, but nothing came out. Her jaw worked, almost mechanically, and then, chillingly, deep choking sounds began to emerge from her throat. The wraith’s hands floated upwards, rising to clutch at the neck, then to scrabble at it, digging in with long fingernails so that strips of muddy flesh began to peel away. The throat bulged, almost like that of a bullfrog, and the wraith suddenly bent at the waist, as if it was going to be sick. Merlin’s eyes blazed at the wraith and his staff glowed softly, the runes rippling with their inner light. Finally, violently, Madame Delacroix’s wraith heaved and the jaw split wide open, far past its logical limits. Something ripped forth from the yawning, horrible mouth. It poured out onto the ground before it. The wraith’s body shrunk as the mess poured from its mouth. It was almost as if the wraith turned inside out, emptying itself out of its own mouth, until all that was left was the thing lying prone on the ground, writhing and awful. It was Madame Delacroix as she really was, somehow transported from her remote place of safety and vomited from her puppet form. She wracked against the floor as if in great pain, her shape emaciated and bony, her eyes blank grey orbs, staring blindly at the ceiling.

  “Austramaddux, you have brought me to a dead time,” Merlin said, his low voice filling the grotto like the roar of a thousand deeps. He turned away from the pathetic shape of Madame Delacroix, returning his gaze to the cowering ghost. “The trees have awakened for me, but their voice is nearly mute. Even the earth sleeps the sleep of centuries. You have returned me to suit yourself and yourself alone. You were a faulty servant when I agreed to apprentice you, and I have returned only to realize the depth of that mistake. I discharge you from my service. Begone.”

  Merlin raised his free hand and held it, palm out, toward the ghost of Austramaddux. The ghost paled even further and shrank away, raising its hands as if to deflect a blow. No! No, I was faithful! Please! Do not discharge me! I fulfilled my duty! I was faithful! Nooo!

  The last word elongated and rose in pitch, climbing the scale as the ghost seemed to shrink. For a moment, it assumed the form of the blue dryad, cringing and desperate, then it began to lose its shape entirely. It dwindled, and James saw that it contracted in the same proportion as Merlin’s closing hand, as if the wizard were squeezing Austramaddux in his outstretched fist. The ghost’s last word bled into a wail of horror, diminishing even as the ghost collapsed into a bright, flickering point of light. Merlin squeezed his fist, and then opened his hand with a roll of the fingers. The ghost popped, vanished, leaving only the echo of its final scream.

  Finally, as if noticing them for the first time, Merlin turned his attention to James
, Ralph, and Zane. James moved forward, not sure what he would do, but knowing in his heart he had to do something. Merlin raised his hand again, this time towards James. James felt the world soften around him, darkening. He fought it, tried to shout out against the descending oblivion, but it was no use. He could fight the power of Merlin as much as a gnat might fight a gale. The world streamed away, funneling down to a point, and at the center of the point was the upraised hand of Merlin, pulling him in. There was an eye in the center of the hand, blue like ice. The eye closed, and Merlin’s voice said one word, a word that seemed to fill the blackness where the world had once been, and that word was ‘sleep’.

  18. The Tower Assembly

  Dawn was a faint pink line on the rim of the horizon when James opened his eyes. He was lying uncomfortably on the grass at the bottom of the Grotto Keep, and he was cold to the bone. Moaning, he rolled to a sitting position and took stock of his surroundings. The first thing he noticed was that the Merlin throne was gone. There wasn’t as much as a depression in the grass where it had stood. The second thing James noticed as he raised his head and looked around was that the Grotto Keep was no longer a magical place. In the absence of the Merlin throne, the island was quickly returning to its wild, random nature. The sense of haunting, gothic architecture was slipping away. Birds sang in the thatch of tree branches overhead.

  “Oh-hh,” a voice nearby groaned. “Where am I? Somehow, I have the terrible feeling that a cup of coffee and a fireplace is not about to appear before my eyes.”

  “Zane,” James said, getting shakily to his feet. “Are you all right? Where’s Ralph?”

  “I’m here,” Ralph muttered. “I’m just taking inventory of all my bones and major bodily functions. So far, nothing alarming, except that I need a bathroom even more than St. Lokimagus.”