Harry, still leaning against the front of the desk, chuckled drily. "I never leave my chair facing the window. I figured it was either you or Albus. Frankly, I was betting on the latter."
"Nice counter-spell on the lockbox," James said, swiveling the chair to face his father. "I wasn't trying to nick the cloak and map, you know. I was just… checking on them."
Harry nodded, looking back at his son over his shoulder. With a sigh, he turned around and plopped onto one of the visitor's chairs.
"So, what do you think, James?" he asked. "Is this whole investigation a lost cause?"
"Why would they think you were involved with the same bad guys that you're trying to catch?" James exclaimed incredulously. "I mean, it doesn't make any sense!"
"It makes sense from their viewpoint," Harry said sadly. "You were at Neville's assembly, so you heard how a lot of people around here think. Many of them truly believe that the Ministry of Magic would indeed stoop to creating shadow villains, from Voldemort to the W.U.L.F., just to keep the magical world under their thumb. If that was true, then it would make perfect sense that I'd be in on it, and might even be one of the masterminds of the scheme."
"That's what Ralph said, too," James acknowledged reluctantly. "But none of it's true! How can they believe such a bunch of drivel?"
Harry frowned thoughtfully. "Once you abandon the concept of truth, James, everything becomes merely a matter of perspective. For the Progressive Element, there is no right or wrong; there are only sides. When one of those sides defeats another, they don't see it as a triumph of good over evil or evil over good. They view it merely as one side exerting unfair power over the other. Without truth—without any belief in right and wrong—the best one can hope for in life is a sort of lukewarm concept of fairness, where both sides in any fight simply choose to live and let live. They think that what we call 'good' should just learn to tolerate what we call 'evil' since good and evil are really just equally valid philosophies of life."
"But," James began, screwing up his face in an effort to understand. "But, that's obviously crazy. This isn't like disagreeing over whether flying carpets should be legal or not. Voldemort was a bloodthirsty villain who killed people just for the sake of his own power. Stopping him was the only way to save countless other lives, wasn't it?"
"Not according to the Progressive Element," Harry replied, shaking his head. "They think that if only we'd stopped fighting him, laid down our weapons, and given him his right to live the way he wanted to, then we'd all have just lived in peace, somehow."
James considered this for a moment, his eyes narrowed, and then shrugged. "But then he'd just have killed every last one of you."
Harry nodded. "Probably. Voldemort wasn't a 'live and let live' sort of wizard, especially considering the prophecy. One of us had to die for the other to survive. But really, prophecy or not, that's how it is in every corner of the world, in every struggle between evil and good, between power and love. The two cannot compromise because they cancel each other out. There will always be a struggle between them until one prevails over the other. There is no alternative."
"So, all these Progressive Element types are complete nutters, then?" James said, throwing up his hands.
"Not all of them," Harry replied with a sigh. "They are right that a lot of awful things have been done throughout the ages in the name of good. Merlin himself tells of battles that occurred between the magical and non-magical peoples of his day, not over right and wrong, as they pretended to be, but over mere prejudice and fear, intolerance and hatred. These are the things we must always be wary of at all costs. And yet, to deny that some struggles are, indeed, worthy of the fight—that evil and good are always alive and in enmity against one another, like fire and water—is to turn a pragmatic truth into a dangerous delusion. This, James, is what the Progressive Element is guilty of. Most of them are not bad, and most of them are very well-meaning. But that does not mean that their philosophy is not, in the end, thoroughly deadly."
James thought on this for a long moment. Finally, he asked, "So who do you think ratted you all out?"
Harry shook his head again, his face growing dark. "I don't know. Hardly anyone knew about the raid. But I suspect that Espinosa and Price are right. Whoever warned them about us also killed their leader, Tarrantus, and left his body for us to find. The W.U.L.F. has a new leader now, someone who may well know a lot more about us and how we plan to stop them than Tarrantus ever did. I suspect that the first order of business is to find out who that person is. Then, perhaps we will know how to proceed."
"But who could it have been, Dad?" James asked earnestly, leaning forward over the desk. "I mean, Mum knew, and maybe Lil…"
"Even if they did tell someone else," Harry replied, narrowing his eyes, "nobody sent any messages out of the flat, either via Floo or even through the Shard. I've set up hexes to alert me anytime there is any communication between the flat and the outside world, just to make sure that no one is spying on us. If any message had gone out, I'd have known about it." Suddenly, Harry looked up at his son, his eyes sharp. "James, did any of you come or go over the last few hours? Besides Percy, I mean. After the time you arrived, did anyone go out? Even for a little stroll around the neighborhood?"
"No, Dad," James said, but then he paused. Unbidden, he found himself thinking of Petra's empty bed upstairs when he had gone to look for her. He'd searched through all of the upstairs rooms, but hadn't seen any sign of her. And yet, some time later, she had come downstairs, as if she'd been up in her bedroom all along. James was still shaking his head, but his thoughts spun onward, turning cold and fearful. Petra would have known about the raid. But surely she wouldn't have warned the villains even if she could have somehow Disapparated from the flat without anyone noticing. Would she?
"Well, I don't know, then," Harry said, leaning back in his chair again. "But I'll find out. Whoever it was that leaked the information about the raid and killed Tarrantus, I'll find them. And when I do, they'll be sorry they ever took over for him. I'll make very sure of that."
James nodded, but inside he felt numb and deeply frightened.
I am the Princess of Chaos, he thought, remembering the dream-vision of Morgan, the shadowy figure that had spoken with Petra's voice. I… am the Sorceress Queen…
Christmas at the flat seemed to go by in a rather hectic rush, juggled between the much shorter Alma Aleron holiday break, Harry and Percy's constant work demands, and James' spinning thoughts about Petra, the W.U.L.F., Professor Ignatius Magnussen, and the Magical Integration Bureau.
Christmas Day was the only somewhat relaxing day of the break, during which time the family opened their presents and visited with Grandma Weasley, Uncle Ron, Aunt Hermione, and the rest via Floo. From his mother, James did indeed get a box of new underpants as well as a new winter cloak. His father, however, had purchased James a brand new pair of Clutchcudgel gauntlets from a wizarding sporting goods store in New Amsterdam. The gloves were leather, coloured Bigfoot orange and blue, with a chamois-lined wand sleeve in the left wrist. Denniston Dolohov had gotten Ralph a new wizard chess set with enchanted pieces that could, if desired, play themselves. The pieces had been especially hexed by a famed wizard chess champion so that Ralph could practice the game alone whenever he couldn't find a suitable opponent. Petra, to James' surprise, had managed to procure Izzy a new dollhouse and china doll, which Izzy had immediately christened Victoria Penelope.
"But never Vicky Penny," she warned, peering sternly at James, to which James nodded solemnly in agreement.
Petra, of course, having no surviving parents or grandparents, received no gift whatsoever. Ginny had confided in James that the girl had insisted they not buy her anything either.
"She says it's more than enough that we're letting her live with us during the investigation," she said as they dried dishes near the kitchen sink. "I respected her wishes, but it seems so depressing not to have any gifts to open at Christmas. Especially since she lost that bro
och of hers on the voyage. She downplays it, but I think that brooch had special significance to her. She says it was a gift from her father for her first Christmas. Did you know that?"
James had not, and admitted that he'd never seen her wear it until earlier that summer. He assumed that the brooch had come in the box of Petra's father's things, sent to her by the Ministry of Magic upon her coming of age.
Having made no such Christmas deal with Petra himself, however, James slipped outside late Christmas evening and found a bunch of dry weeds rooted behind some dumpsters. These he transfigured into a very satisfactory display of roses and tulips, which he encased in a simple Timeloop Charm, preventing them from wilting. He carried the flowers back up to the flat and bound them with a length of leftover Christmas ribbon. Finally, while everyone else was gathered around the fire downstairs, he sneaked into Petra's room and left the bouquet on her dresser along with a small note which read, simply, 'Happy Christmas Petra'.
Content with his handiwork, James went to bed that night and fell almost immediately to sleep. He dreamed of Clutchcudgel with his new gauntlets, and zombie Professor Straidthwait's hollow chuckle, and the mysterious riddle of the halls of Erebus Castle, complete with a ghostly figure of Professor Magnussen stalking warningly in the dimness, his eyes like chips of mica. Finally, in the deepest chasm of the night, James dreamed of the flat island surrounded by crashing surf and low, iron clouds. He dreamed of the black castle, both ancient and steadfast, and the figure watching from the balcony, her gaze heavy and hot, watching, waiting. Was it she that had alerted the members of the W.U.L.F. of the impending raid? Had Morgan somehow killed Tarrantus, leaving Petra, her alter ego, to take the blame? In the pit of the night, wrapped in the guileless lucidity of dreams, James thought it was entirely possible.
He wouldn't remember any of it the next morning, but his dreaming self tried to send out the message, tried to warn his subconscious of what was to come. My job isn't to save Petra from Keynes the arbiter, he realized as he wafted through the dreaming vision of the island, gazing up at the shadowy balcony. My job is to save Petra from Morgan.
My job, he thought from the depths of sleep, is to save Petra from herself.
17. The Ballad of the Rider
Where the holiday break seemed to come and go like a flash of lightning, the spring semester unrolled before James like an interminable carpet with no end in sight. Albus, in particular, seemed to return to school with a rather bitter disposition.
"I thought we were going to be quit of this dump by now," he grumped as they stalked across the campus toward their morning's classes. A frigid wind scoured the mall beneath low, hulking clouds, making the boys' cloaks flap like sails.
"Hey," Zane said, his own typically cheerful disposition dampened by the arctic weather, "that's the Aleron you're talking about. I get why you might hate all your Wolfy pals back at Ares Mansion, but that's just them. Hate the player, don't hate the game."
"I'll hate whatever I bloody well want," Albus muttered darkly.
"I'm surprised," Ralph commented. "I thought you'd be fitting in just fine with the Werewolves. They don't seem that far removed from our mates back in Slytherin."
Albus scoffed humorlessly. "Hah. I'll take Tabitha Corsica over Olivia Jones any day. Tabitha may have turned out to be a little off her broom in the end, but at least she hated people on principle. These gits just hate anyone whose great-great-great-great grandparents didn't have the good fortune to have been on some stupid boat that landed at Plymouth bloody Rock."
James was surprised at his brother's sudden openness. He knew it would probably evaporate once he'd had a chance to settle into the routine of school again, but for now he took advantage of it. "You mean," he said as evenly as possible, "that they give you a hard time just because you aren't an American?"
Albus pressed his lips together tightly and shook his head. "They're fine with the fact that I'm not an American, so long as I don't want to play Clutch or take part in the Morning Calisthenics Preparedness Corps or join their precious Salem-Dirgus Free Militia. Not that I want to do any of those things, mind you, but still, it gets a little old being constantly reminded that I'm shut out, whether I want in or not."
"What's old Stonewall say about it?" Zane asked, hefting his backpack against the icy wind.
"Oh, he talks a big game about how Werewolf House, like America in general, is the great melting pot, 'welcoming all into the arms of liberty, vigilance, and civil service', but the students are another cauldron of newts entirely. I suppose if I pressed the issue with Jackson, he'd make sure I got into whatever club or team I wanted, but then I'd just have to live with the Werewolves who'd tried to freeze me out to begin with. It's easier just to lay low and wait to get back home to Slytherin."
"Blimey," Ralph commented. "After your performance on the clock tower during the flag switch escapade, I'd have thought you'd be the Werewolves' golden boy."
"Yeah," Albus agreed sourly. "That impressed them all right. They said I showed a lot of promise 'for a Cornelius'."
"Hmm," James nodded, reticent to say anything more. Some small, petty part of him was meanly glad that Albus was having difficulties with his house. Serves him right for always siding with whatever group seems the most dodgy and evil, he thought. First the Slytherins, and now these daft, nationalistic Werewolf stump-heads. Still, seeing how unhappy Albus apparently was, James' spite was short-lived.
"Maybe you can come hang out with us at Apollo Mansion," he offered. "We have a pretty decent game room and Yeats makes a mean pizza, if you can talk him into it."
"Yeah, that's just what I want," Albus replied, rolling his eyes. "To start hanging out with the campus losers' club. Thanks but no thanks. Werewolf House may be a bunch of narrow-minded grunts, but they excel at house pride. And at least there I can look forward to a Clutchcudgel trophy this year. You guys will be lucky if you get a single win."
"He's got you there, James," Zane agreed unhelpfully. James was too cold to argue the issue and the boys trudged the rest of the way to class in silence.
Within the first week of school, James realized that he had entirely forgotten to ask Lucy about taking him, Ralph, and Zane on a tour of Erebus Castle so that they could try to solve the riddle of Magnussen's dimensional key.
Zane rolled his eyes as the three boys huddled around a table in the library near the top of the Tower of Art. "It's easy," he whispered. "You just ask Lucy to be your date to the Valentine's dance. Then, she'll have to say yes when you tack on that you want her to show us around the Vampires' castle."
James shook his head. "It's Lucy," he said. "I don't need to trick her or anything. I'll just ask her. Of course she'll say yes."
Zane shrugged and leaned back in his chair. "Have it your way. Me, I'd want a little insurance. I hear she was pretty put off by all the touchy-feely that went down between you and Petra over Christmas."
James' face heated with mingled embarrassment and surprise. "What? That's ridiculous! Nothing happened at all!"
Ralph grimaced uncomfortably. "I saw the two of you holding hands in the parlor," he admitted. "So did Lucy. She pretended not to be bothered by it, but she hid in her room for awhile afterwards."
It wasn't like that," James sighed. "We were just talking. In fact, we were talking about how we're going to try to clear her name."
"Seems to me you should have been talking to Lucy about that," Zane chided. "She's the one whose go-ahead we need to get into Erebus Castle."
"Look, Lucy isn't Cheshire Chatterly and I'm not you," James said, throwing a look at Zane. "I can't trick her like that."
"There weren't any tricks involved with me and Cheshire," Zane replied a bit defensively. "I got us the key to the Archive and Cheshire got to dance with me at the Halloween Ball. It was a win-win for everyone."
James crossed his arms on the library table and rested his chin on them. "It's different for you. Cheshire wasn't… sweet on you to begin with."
Zane frowned t
houghtfully. "She was afterwards," he replied with a shrug.
"Maybe Ralph can do it," James offered, sitting up again. "How could anyone say no to that face?"
Ralph glanced from Zane to James, his brow knitted.
Zane shook his head. "It's your ballgame, James. Unless you know any real-life vampires, Lucy's our only in. Do it however you want, but you'd better do it quick-like. That Keynes guy won't take forever to make his judgment about Petra."
James knew that Zane was right. He also knew that they were probably making a much bigger deal out of the task than it deserved. Lucy was his cousin, after all. Still, her apparent infatuation with him tended to complicate matters in ways he couldn't predict. To be safe, he determined he would ask her after the next Clutchcudgel match. Team Bigfoot was scheduled to face off against Vampire House again and the odds were that despite James' best efforts, the Vamps would win handily. This would put Lucy in a good mood, rendering her more receptive to James' request. Having decided this, James dismissed the matter for the time being.
Friday evening rolled around and James made his way to Pepperpock Down. There, he suited up in his Clutchcudgel gear alongside Jazmine, Gobbins, Wentworth, and the rest of Team Bigfoot.
"Nice new gauntlets," Jazmine said appreciatively. "Christmas present?"
James nodded proudly. "Yeah, from my dad."
"All I got was a bunch of hair potions and a box set of Remora's awful novels," Jazmine said, frowning. "My mother is just crazy about them. She was hoping that I'd end up in Vampire House, or even Pixie. She says Bigfoot isn't very 'Veela-like'."
James didn't know how to respond to that. "One of my aunts is part-Veela," he ventured. "For what it's worth, I prefer you to her most days."
Jazmine smiled at him as she strapped on her shin pads.
"Let's go, team," Wood called from partway up the gantry stairs. "I hope you all wore your long underwear. It's right frigid up there tonight."