For the first time, Merlin’s face showed emotion. He closed his eyes and pressed his lips together. His beard glistened with what James assumed was some sort of oil. Occasionally, the scent of it, wild and spicy, wafted in the breeze of the tower’s top. “Austramaddux deserved the fate I dealt him, and perhaps a hundredfold, for returning me to this time.” He opened his eyes again, and looked around at the assembly. “I approach a castle of the most solid construction I’ve ever witnessed, filled with glittering eyes of hardened sunlight, and yet I find no sentry, no vanguard, not so much as a servant to fill my bath or demand protocol. You meet me with no recognition of my status and no blessing upon my head, wearing the clothes of jesters and field boys, and yet you are surrounded by tables of plenty, on plates as round and smooth as the planets. The Pendragon herself is not revered or waited upon, but dresses like her minions in shapeless bags of tenting. And then, above all, my honor and allegiance is challenged, when I myself only refrain from demanding tribute out of respect for a foreign age. Truly, my mission has become as dust. There is no age ripe for me.”
“Selfish Austramaddux may have been,” McGonagall agreed, leaning slightly forward, “but it may not be a mistake that you were returned to this time, Merlinus. It was thought that you would lead the rebellion against the Muggle world, but if your claims are true, then you may have been brought here by an even greater providence so that you might aid us in preventing just such a tragedy. Even now, the powers of chaos have set in motion events that will lead to that end. This very day, a man resides among us, a Muggle man. He has been led here by agents of disorder, and he has bypassed our greatest defenses using a form of unmagic called ‘technology’. He has access to an engine called ‘the press’ by which he can make known the secrets of the magical world to the rest of humanity. It is only by maintaining that secret for the past millennium that the balance of powers has existed. If this man and his secret plotters succeed, they will abuse the recombination of the magical and Muggle world. They will plot divisions, seek power, and eventually, they will spawn a war. You, more than anyone, know what the result of such a scheme would be. You must help us. Those who plot chaos are expecting you. Let them eat the fire they intended to turn upon the world, Merlinus. Aid us.”
Merlin sat perfectly still for almost a minute, his beard glistening in the sun. The animals fidgeted slightly, noses twitching and feathers ruffling. Finally, Merlin stood, and it was like watching a mountain rise from its foundation. He moved with slow, massive grace until he was fully erect, his staff held upright next to him, his piercing blue eyes settling on the Headmistress.
“You are correct, Madam,” Merlin said, his voice flat and undeniable. “It was my selfish aim to leave my own age only to find a time when my power would be restored in fullness. Arrogance is my iniquity, and it has undone me. I have returned now only to find my power cut to pieces, far more than it was in my own time. I beg your forgiveness, as a man of honor, but I am both unable and unwilling to rise to the post you have described for me. This is no longer my world. Perhaps you will prevail without me. Perhaps not. I cannot see any future in this time apart from knowing that the sun will arise tomorrow and travel across the heavens as it has done for the thousand years of my absence. Whether it shines down on war or peace, truth or lies, I know not, but I do know this: it will shine upon a world that knows me not, nor I it. I take my leave of you now, Madam. I bid all of you: fare thee well.”
Merlin raised his arms, holding his staff aloft. As one, the birds on the railings and benches launched from their perches. There was a thunderous sound as hundreds of wings beat the air. When the mass of birds broke apart, streaming from the top of the tower in all directions, there was no sign of Merlin.
James stared hard at the space where the great wizard had been standing. It was over. There was nothing left. Harry turned James around and folded him into his arms. “It’s all right, son,” he said. James didn’t believe anything was all right, but he was glad for the words anyway. He hugged his dad back.
“I wonder if he’s really gone for good,” Neville mused out loud.
“I’ve no doubt he means for us to believe that,” the Headmistress replied, arising from her chair on the tower platform. “But the fact of the matter is that he has nowhere to go. His servant, Austramaddux, has apparently been banished to the netherworld, thus Merlinus has no apprentice in this age to arrange for his reappearance if he should choose to step out of time again. I fear we must assume that Merlinus is with us, for better or worse. Mr. Potter, can he be tracked?”
Harry thought for a moment. “Difficult, but not impossible. He will probably retreat to the protection of the woodlands, where his power is strongest. No doubt, he has many methods of surviving and hiding there, but a wizard of such abilities will always leave a detectable magical wake. I believe we can locate him, given a team of Aurors and enough time. The question is: what do we do with him when we find him?”
“We must secure his intent,” Franklyn said somberly, slowly approaching the chair Merlin had occupied. “Merlinus is a creature of mystery and confusion. Despite his words, I sense that he himself does not trust his own allegiances. Things were much clearer in his time. Did you sense it as well? He is unsure in this age. He doesn’t know who to trust, whose aims most reflect his own. This is made worse by the fact that, as you pointed out, Headmistress, Merlin’s own morality is ambiguous at best. He retreats now in order to examine his own heart as much as to study the factions of this age.”
“Do you really believe that, Professor?” Harry asked.
Franklyn had produced the same brass device he’d used to examine James’ broken arm on the Quidditch pitch. He was peering through it, studying the chair Merlin had occupied. He nodded slowly. “I do. Merlin admitted to us that pride is his greatest weakness. He cannot allow us to see his own lack of surety. But there is no doubt of it. He doesn’t know where he stands in this age because he doesn’t know where he stands in his own heart, and only now does he realize it.”
“That doubt won’t last forever, though,” Neville said, stepping down the terraces toward the wooden floor. “We can hardly sit back and wait until he decides whose side to join. His power may be diminished, but I’d wager he is still unmatched by any single wizard alive today. We have to assume he is with our enemies until he determines he is our ally.”
Harry was shaking his head. “I agree that he may be unsure in this time, but I don’t think he’s evil. Or at least, not willfully evil.”
“What do you mean?” Zane interjected. “He’s been sought after by the most evil wizards for the past thousand years or so, hasn’t he?”
“Not the most evil wizards,” McGonagall said pointedly.
“That’s true,” Harry agreed. “Only those who were confused or warped enough to believe their aims were good, somehow. Those who knew their hearts were evil, whose eyes were open to their own wickedness and embraced it, they never sought him. At least, as far as we know.”
“Let us repair to our offices for now,” McGonagall said, sighing. “Our day has barely begun and we already have far more to manage than we rightly know how. Besides, I wish to alleviate myself of this unbearable costume as soon as possible.”
Franklyn heaved the trapdoor open and the group began to file down the steps. The animals that had gathered on the tower platform threaded down as well, scampering and hopping around the groups’ feet. Slughorn and the rest of the professors gathered below greeted them with worried faces and a flurry of questions. Ignoring them, James followed his dad down the spiral steps toward the far distant floor.
“How’d you get here so fast, Dad?” he asked. “Merlin didn’t get here until the middle of the night. How’d McGonagall get hold of you so quickly?”
“It wasn’t the Headmistress that brought me here, James,” Harry replied, glancing over his shoulder at his son. “It was your letter. Nobby delivered it this morning, and I came as soon as I read it. The Headmistress was as s
urprised as anyone when I showed up in her office fireplace.”
“But Sacarhina said you were off on some special assignment and weren’t to be bothered!”
Harry laughed humorlessly. “It was that detail in your letter that proved I needed to get here right away, James. I’m doing nothing but desk work this week. If Sacarhina says I’m on assignment, that’s just because she wants to make sure I’m not here.”
“Yeah,” James nodded. “The portrait of Snape told us Sacarhina and Recreant are both no good. They’re in on all this Progressive Element stuff.”
Harry stopped on the stairs, turning back to James, Ralph, and Zane. “Be careful who you mention that to,” he said, lowering his voice. “The Ministry is riddled with people like Recreant and Sacarhina these days, although for most of them, it’s just a way to appear a little daring and trendy. Hermione does what she can to fight the propaganda and weed out the instigators, but it’s complicated. Recreant is only a tool, but Sacarhina is dangerous. I think she’s the mastermind behind the return of Merlin, in fact.”
“What?” James said, dropping his voice to match his dad’s. “That can’t be. It was Madame Delacroix in the grotto last night.”
“Yeah, Sacarhina didn’t even arrive until yesterday evening,” Zane added.
Harry’s expression was grave. “Sacarhina isn’t the kind of person to get her hands dirty with any of the actual work. She needed Delacroix for that, and Delacroix herself couldn’t have gotten the Merlin throne out of the Ministry without Sacarhina on the inside, helping her. Recreant and Sacarhina are only here now because they claim to be escorting an ‘expert in Muggle-magical relations’ to deal with this Prescott person. There is no such expert. They were expecting to produce Merlin himself, and pass him off as that expert.”
“So they never intended to stop Prescott from revealing the magical world to the Muggle press!” Ralph said, his face white. “Sacarhina and Merlin were supposed to work together to make sure Prescott got his story out, weren’t they?”
Harry nodded. “That’s what I think. This is all no coincidence. It’s exactly the sort of thing people like Sacarhina have been hoping for all along. The recombination of the Muggle and magical world is essential to their final plan for all-out war.”
“But Merlin turned out to be on nobody’s side but his own, after all,” James said. “Does that ruin their plan?”
“I don’t know,” Harry sighed. “Things have been put in motion that will be very hard to stop now. Sacarhina may no longer need Merlin for this part of the plan.”
Zane asked, “So how are you planning to stop Prescott?”
“Stop him? I’m not even supposed to be here, remember? Sacarhina is in charge.”
“But she’s evil!” James exclaimed. “You can’t just let her run the show!” “We won’t, James,” Harry said, putting a hand on James’ shoulder, but hardening his voice. “But we have to be very careful. Sacarhina has a lot of influence in the Ministry. I can’t just defy her. She’s hoping that I’ll do something rash, something she can use against me. She wants the Auror Department shut down entirely. Keeping that from happening is of utmost importance. Even more so than protecting the secrecy of the magical world.”
“So Sacarhina and Delacroix win?” James said, looking his dad in the eye.
“In the short run, perhaps. But don’t lose hope, any of you. Neville, the Headmistress, and I have a few tricks up our sleeves. We will survive the day, no matter what happens with Prescott. The only question now is who led him here in the first place?”
“Well, it would’ve been Sacarhina, wouldn’t it?” Zane suggested.
“No, couldn’t be,” James sighed. “She’s signed the Vow of Secrecy, just like every other witch and wizard. If she’d tried to tell Prescott anything, even through a letter, the vow would have stopped her somehow. Besides, she wouldn’t know anything about how a GameDeck worked or how it could be used to lead somebody to Hogwarts.”
Voices and footsteps echoed from the spiral of stairs above them. The Headmistress and the professors were descending behind them. Harry gestured for the boys to follow him the rest of the way down.
“That’s the only part of this that really baffles me,” Harry said as he tromped down the stairs. “Every witch and wizard is bound by the Vow of Secrecy. Any Muggle parent of a student is bound by their own contract of non-disclosure. That means no one who knows about the magical world would be capable of spreading the secret. And yet someone obviously did. I intend to find out who.”
By the time they neared the last curve of the staircase, the Headmistress, Neville, and the rest of the professors had caught up to them. McGonagall called down to the students who were waiting below.
“Ladies and gentlemen, as you can see, we are all returning to you whole and well.” She stopped and regarded the assembly from above. “In order to dispel rumors and quell any fears, I intend to be quite forthright about what has been, and still is, occurring here today. Two men have found their ways rather unexpectedly into these halls over the course of the last two days. The first is still here. His name is Martin Prescott and he is a Muggle. His intentions are quite questionable, but I can assure you that we, your faculty, are prepared to--”
“Thank you, Minerva,” a high, ringing voice interrupted. “I have, in fact, already briefed the students on today’s events. I appreciate your thoroughness, however. Do join us, won’t you?” Sacarhina and Recreant stepped out of the crowd of students and moved to the head of the staircase. Sacarhina’s smile was large and glinting in the dusty light of the tower floor. McGonagall stared down at her for a long moment, and then turned to address the students again. “In that case, I expect you all have classes to attend to. Your professors shall kindly lead you to your classrooms. Let us make what we can with the rest of the day, shall we?”
“Do you really believe it is necessary for classes to go forward today, Minerva?” Sacarhina said when the Headmistress and the rest of the troupe reached the bottom of the steps. “This is rather an unusual day.”
“Unusual days are the best days for classes, Miss Sacarhina,” McGonagall replied, stepping past the woman. “Reminds everyone why we are here in the first place. If you’ll excuse me.”
“Harry,” Mr. Recreant said, smiling a bit too enthusiastically. “I admit, Brenda and I hadn’t expected to see you here today. Family occasion, is it?” He turned his grin on James, and then flashed it over Ralph and Zane as well.
Harry smiled stiffly. “I’m equally surprised to see the two of you here. I didn’t see any paperwork about a return trip to meet with the Alma Alerons. And I’ve been doing an awful lot of paperwork, as you know.”
Sacarhina took Harry’s arm, and he allowed her to lead him out of the tower, following the last of the students. “Very unexpected, this is,” she said in a confidential tone of voice. “Dreadful situation. Surely Minerva told you about it? Martin Prescott, a Muggle reporter, right here on the grounds. Still, the Ministry feels it is inevitable, really.”
“Does it?” Harry said, stopping near the door and facing Sacarhina. “So Loquatious Knapp knows about this?”
“The Minister is aware of the general direction events have been leading,” Recreant interjected. “We hadn’t chosen to bother him with the particulars, per se.”
“So he doesn’t, in fact, know you are here?” Harry said, dropping his thin smile.
“Harry,” Sacarhina said silkily, “the fact is that this sort of scenario is exactly the purview of the Department of Ambassadorial Relations. You, of course, do not require the signature of the Minister for every little maneuver of the Auror Department. Nor do we require his approval when dealing with the execution of our daily duties. Do you intend to stay for the day?”
“I believe so, Brenda,” Harry answered calmly. “I am curious to see what the Department of Ambassadorial Relations does to execute its daily duties in such a situation. Besides, surely you’d agree that an outside, objective witness might
prove helpful in case of any… inquiries?”
“Suit yourself, Mr. Potter,” Sacarhina said, her smile snapping shut like a jewelry box. “It will all be over by four o’clock this afternoon. Prescott’s crew will arrive and they will get their tour. There is hardly any way to prevent it, after all, considering Mr. Prescott’s very ingenious fail-safes. You may accompany us, but please do not attempt to interfere. It would not go well for you. But I am sure I do not need to tell you that, do I?”
“Did you have a nice snooze down there by the front doors?” Zane said lightly as Sacarhina turned away. She stopped, and then very slowly turned back toward Zane.
“Whatever could you mean, young man?” she asked. Harry was looking at Zane with a mixture of curiosity and amusement.
Zane went on, “You two were both down there to meet Merlin when he made his grand entrance last night, but he was apparently looking for bigger fish than you, wasn’t he? He gave you both the old evil eye and froze you on the spot. Come on, now, that’s gotta hurt.”
Sacarhina’s smile eased back onto her face, as if it was the default expression at times when her brain was working hard on something else. Her eyes moved back to Harry. “I simply don’t know what you’ve been filling these poor children’s heads with, Mr. Potter, but it really doesn’t do for Ministry officials to tell such stories. Merlin, of all things.” She shook her head vaguely, then turned and walked through the archway with Mr. Recreant following nervously.
“You sure have a way with people, Zane,” Harry said, grinning and ruffling the boy’s hair.
“My dad says it’s a gift,” Zane agreed. “My mom says it’s a curse. Who can tell?”
“It looked like Miss Sacarhina was more confused than angry,” Ralph mused as they walked through the archway, leaving the Sylvven Tower.