A Road of Shattered Glass by Ennalee
Chapter Notes: As you can see, I'm following up on my promise to post more quickly from now on. Thanks as always to my wonderful beta, hermionedancr.
“It’s almost midnight,” said the dark-haired man with a scowl.
“Hurry, then,” growled his companion, continuing to levitate boxes down the cliff. “The boat is leaving at one, with all the cargo. They’re so busy patrolling the Floo network and Apparation points “ they’ll never expect us to do it the Muggle way.”
“What about the girl?”
Gwendolyn froze, still crouching behind the bush. Had she been seen?
“Never mind her. She’s just a kid. If she comes poking around, do whatever you need to.”
The hook-nosed man laughed nastily. “Fine, then. It’ll teach her to be so nosy! There, that’s the last of the boxes.”
Mounting their brooms, the two men flew down the cliff to the boat waiting below. Behind the bush, Gwendolyn grasped her wand. They were about to escape with all of the jewels, and she was the only one who could stop them! The wind whipped her long strawberry-blonde hair into her face, but she ignored it, looking around for ideas. There! Lying under a nearby tree was her broom. They must have forgotten about it when they left.
With a sigh, Tonks closed her book. Usually she would have been enthralled by the conclusion of the harrowing mystery, but today she found it oddly depressing. Despite the certainty of all her friends that absolutely nothing was amiss, Gwendolyn had not only discovered that Lady Auburn’s jewels were missing but tracked the thieves as they made their getaway. In the final two chapters, she would single-handedly capture the thieves and be praised by all for her level-headed thinking. Tonks knew, because she had read the summary of the next book, in which Gwendolyn McBane was invited to Lady Auburn’s Swiss Chalet, and how likely was that if she was murdered by jewel thieves?
Flipping ahead to the last chapter, Tonks skimmed quickly over the page.
“Gwendolyn!” exclaimed Wesley. “You’re safe! And you caught them!”
Beaming, Lady Auburn rushed towards her. “You saved my jewels!”
“I couldn’t let them get away with it,” said Gwendolyn modestly. “I know how much they mean to you.”
Opening one of the cases, Lady Auburn pulled out an emerald ring. “Not all of them,” she said. “But this one “ this was the last thing my Antonio gave me, before he disappeared. Oh, my dear! I cannot thank you enough!”
Tonks scowled. It looked like Gwendolyn would be finding Antonio in the next book, and then would again be lavished with praise. The books always began with everyone criticizing Gwendolyn for her suspicions, but in the end she was always proved right and showered with congratulations. Being showered in congratulations, Tonks thought, must be an awfully nice feeling.
Unfortunately, her own personal mystery seemed to be stuck in a rut. Though she was sure that the girl in the greenhouse “ Miss Rosier, Professor Snith had called her “ was involved in an attempt to steal the Founder’s Ring from where it had been lost in the tunnels, Charlie and Kevin were adamant in their refusal to be concerned “ to the point where Kevin had taken to pointedly twiddling his thumbs pointedly every time she brought up the subject.
Nevertheless, Tonks was certain that something was wrong, and who knew what would happen were the thief to get hold of the Founder’s Ring? She refused to let her friends’ criticism daunt her, promising herself that they would come around once she was proved right. Instead, she had focused on trying to identify the potential thief. However, this proved as difficult as convincing her friends that there was a thief to be identified in the first place.
Where Gwendolyn was always finding suspicious footprints, or over-hearing midnight conversations, or being mistaken for someone else and being asked to relate cryptic messages, Tonks had found no such convenient clues. She had even done her best to disguise herself as the mysterious Miss Rosier for a few hours, wandering around the castle and waiting for the mysterious thief to talk to her, to no avail. Then again, her representation had not been good; copying someone’s appearance out of a picture was hard enough, much less working from memory.
She was about to return to her book when she heard familiar voices coming from the staircase to the boy’s dormitory. Watching Kevin and Charlie descend, she felt a surprising pang in the pit of her stomach. As unreasonable as she knew it was, she found herself suddenly jealous of all the time they spent together without her. It hurt, sometimes, being the third wheel in both of her groups of friends.
“Full of Muggles, of course,” Charlie was saying. “And Mum takes one look at them and turns us all right back around again! And one of them says, ‘Only fancy! An orphanage!’ Mum gets this look “ you know, the look “ on her face, but keeps on walking. Then we get outside, and she realizes that Dad isn’t there anymore “ he was inside, asking them all questions about escapators and levators.”
Kevin was wheezing with laughter. Tonks frowned, feeling left out. Charlie’s stories about his large family were always enjoyable, and Kevin had certainly heard a great deal more than she had. He was, after all, Charlie’s best friend; she was just their second choice.
Charlie looked up and saw her staring at them. “Hey, Tonks,” he said brightly. “Kevin and I were going to go exploring. Want to come with?”
‘Going exploring’ had become their code term for excursions to the tunnels. Tonks, liking the intrigue, had suggested ‘looking for my lost sock,’ but the boys had laughed her down. She paused a moment as the boys looked at her expectantly, debating within herself. It bothered her that they had planned to go without asking her ahead of time, and she considered turning them down to prove that she did not need to do everything they did “ she was tired of being the tag-a-long. On the other hand, if she refused they would just go without her. Also, there was always the possibility that Bill would go along. She nodded. “One moment. Let me put my book away.”
“Hurry!” called Kevin, as she sprinted up the stairs to the girl’s dormitory.
As usual, there was no sign of Ninette. Noting her absence, Tonks filed it away as a mystery to be investigated once the ring thieves had been found. Marianne and Justine, however, were curled up on the window seat, looking through old pictures and laughing. Tonks gave them a wistful glance but comforted herself with the thought that they knew nothing about the tunnels.
“Is Bill coming?” she asked as casually as possible as she clambered out of the portrait hole after Kevin and Charlie.
“He’s meeting us down there.” Charlie looked slightly disgruntled. “He made us promise not to go down without him.”
“Oh?” said Tonks, repressing her smile. Something about Bill’s presence always made exploring more fun.
“He says he’s afraid we’ll get lost and it’ll be his fault,” complained Charlie. “I think he just doesn’t want us to find anything exciting without him.”
“Well, he was the one to tell us about the tunnels,” remarked Tonks. “He didn’t have to do that.”
“It’s not like he didn’t explore them by himself when he was a first year,” Charlie retorted. “And he goes down with Chesney all the time. Why shouldn’t we go down by ourselves?”
“He does?” demanded Tonks, who had not known this, wondering why she had thought that Bill would share his knowledge of the tunnels with no one other than a few first years.
“Yeah,” answered Charlie. “He said they found a tomb, once “ had a big stone coffin in it.”
“Think you could deal with finding bones?” teased Kevin.
“Yes,” snapped Tonks. “Could you?”
“We didn’t see any bones,” came Bill’s voice from behind them. Tonks whirled around in surprise. “The lid of the sarcophagus was really heavy “ we didn’t even try and move it.”
“How very boring of you,” Kevin said.
“Hey, I’m not going to be responsible for smashing the lid of someone’s sarcophagus,” answered Bill with a smile. “How’d you like your bones left out in the open air?”
“I wouldn’t care much if I was dead,” muttered Kevin.
“Anyway, it was covered in carvings,” Bill continued. “Heavy things are hard to levitate precisely, and we didn’t want to ruin it. For all we know, those carvings could be long-lost spells, or forgotten histories!”
“How exciting!”
Bill cuffed Kevin lightly on the shoulder. “Should I leave you behind?”
“Who put you in charge?” asked Charlie. Tonks blinked at the unusual tone of his voice.
“Myself,” answered Bill lightly. “But I assure you, I am a benevolent dictator.”
Tonks giggled and nearly walked into a passing suit of armor. Jokes at her expense carried them to the tunnel entrance, but she did not mind. They were friendly jokes, and it was rather nice to be the center of attention, even if it was focused on her propensity to trip.
“I was thinking,” announced Bill, as Tonks closed her eyes and breathed in the familiar damp cave-smell, “that we should start exploring that section with the paintings of the star charts. Remember? If we’re still looking for Dumbledore’s room, that is. D’you still want to?”
“Yes!” exclaimed Tonks, before anyone else could answer. She was now more certain than ever that Dumbledore’s mysterious package had contained the Founder’s Ring, and that it was up to them to find it before the thieves did.
“I wouldn’t mind seeing that tomb,” began Kevin, but the others over-ruled him, and they set out towards the section Bill had indicated. They were beginning to know parts of the tunnels quite well, but they still wound the string out behind them; Charlie had been designated to carry it for this excursion.
The passage Bill was speaking of was painted with what looked for all the world like star charts, though all the writing carved into the walls was in Latin. Bill was the only one who had any knowledge of Latin besides that used in basic spells, and even he could not make out the inscriptions. He paused several times in their journey to examine the walls, and every time Tonks hung back with him. She enjoyed listening to him talk, and especially sharing exasperated looks with him whenever the others demanded that they hurry up.
Their wanderings took them past the star charts and into a sequence of passages that were completely unfamiliar, though fascinating nonetheless. Dumbledore’s hidden room, however, was nowhere to be found. They did find a room with walls of burnished metal, and one that tossed back echoes in a curious cacophony of sound. They came upon Tonks’ favorite room when Kevin was in the lead; he ventured through the dark doorway, wand held out before him, only to recoil with a cry of horror.
“What is it?” Tonks demanded, while Bill sprang forward to look inside. She and Charlie crowded after him, eager to see what could have elicited such a response. The room was long, fading away into darkness beyond the light of their wands, and was lined with bones. There were no skeletons, which would have been rather more disturbing, Tonks thought “ these bones were stacked in neat rows from floor to ceiling.
“I wasn’t scared,” insisted Kevin, the entire journey back. “I was just surprised.”
Tonks grinned, a smug, knowing grin that renewed his protestations. “Remember that first time, when you told me I shouldn’t come with because there might be bones?” she teased. “Just because I’m a girl doesn’t mean bones scare me.”
“They don’t scare me either,” repeated Kevin, scowling.
Tonks smiled, feeling that she had proved herself. “It’s alright, Kevin,” she said sweetly. “Plenty of people are scared of harmless things. My cousin won’t get anywhere near spiders. And Ninette won’t touch the beetle eyes in Potions “ she’s terrified of them, and they’re not even alive anymore! Of course, neither are bones. I bet she would have been terrified by that room.”
She was rather proud of herself, putting Kevin in his place after all his teasing by comparing him to Ninette, but Charlie surprised her. “What do you have against that girl?” he asked. “You’re always complaining about her.”
“She’s always so stiff and proper and perfect,” exclaimed Tonks, with a vehemence that surprised even herself. “She never talks to anyone and she doesn’t care if people hate her. And she lines her shoes up perfectly straight under her bed!”
There was a moment of silence, save for the sounds of their footsteps, and then Bill spoke. “Don’t you think that you’re being a bit hard on her?” he asked, and Tonks flushed. She had not meant to say all that at loud, and now people were defending Ninette. The warm feeling she had been feeling since they started exploring was suddenly gone, and she let the conversation go on without her, walking in silence the rest of the way back.
To make matters worse, she tripped on the stairs leading out of the tunnels, knocking against Kevin and landing hard on the stone.
“Tonks!” exclaimed Kevin in annoyance, then looked at her and stopped.
Blinking back tears of pain, Tonks was determined not to cry as she stood up, her shins stinging.
“Are you alright?” asked Kevin, and Bill and Charlie turned around looking concerned.
“I’m fine,” snapped Tonks, humiliated and still angry that they had defended Ninette. She did her best not to limp as they continued up the stairs. She was trailing behind the others on their way back to the Gryffindor tower when she heard footsteps coming towards them. To her excitement, the person who came into view was the long-haired girl from the mysterious meeting. Attempting to restrain her smile, she waited until the girl had passed to run forward and catch up with the others.
“That was her!” she whispered. “That was her!”
“Who was that?” Kevin gave her a wry look.
“That’s the girl who was talking about the tunnels! Don’t you think it’s suspicious that she’s down here?”
“Tonks,” said Kevin, shaking his head at her, “we’re down here. Is that suspicious?”
“We are not trying to steal anything!” exclaimed Tonks, feeling her temper rising.
“What’s wrong?” asked Bill, turning to look at them. “Who’s trying to steal what?”
“Tonks overheard this girl talking to somebody,” explained Kevin before Tonks could say a word. “Now she’s convinced that there’s a plot to steal the Founder’s Ring, which you oh-so-coincidentally happened to tell us about right before she heard this conversation.”
Three pairs of skeptical eyes turned to look at her.
“It sounds silly when you say it like that!” she exclaimed. “You didn’t hear them. I know something is going on. I know they’re trying to steal something from the tunnels.”
“Good luck finding something to steal,” laughed Bill. “We’re certainly not having very much luck.”
“Unless they want bones,” suggested Kevin unhelpfully.
“What about Dumbledore’s package?” demanded Tonks. “Maybe it’s not the Founder’s Ring, but Dumbledore put something valuable down there, and she’s trying to steal it!”
Bill gave her a smile that could only be described as placating. “Maybe you’re right,” he said. “We’re already doing our best to find Dumbledore’s room. We can start keeping an eye out for the girl when we’re around the tunnels.”
That was the most she could get out of them, and the look on Bill’s face was enough to keep her from pressing harder. She would show them when she had solved the mystery on her own.
In her effort to do just this, Tonks spent the next day wandering around the castle looking for the elusive girl. She finally saw her at dinner, sitting at the Ravenclaw table. Turning to an older student sitting nearby, Tonks pointed out her quarry. “Who is that?”
“Mavis Rosier. Seventh year. Prefect. Really good at Arithmancy,” responded the boy, sounding bored. “Why?”
“Nothing. Just curious.”
Her classes the next day seemed to stretch on forever, even though her Friday afternoons were free. The moment Professor McGonagall released her she made a beeline for the Ravenclaw common room. She lurked near the entrance attempting to look busy, but a Ravenclaw prefect was beginning to give her suspicious looks by the time Mavis appeared, a stack of books in hand. However, Tonks’ chase merely led her to the library, where she spent several hours pretending to work on her Potions essay while being disgusted by the diligence with which Mavis attacked her own homework.
At half past six, when hunger was close to convincing Tonks to abandon her mission, Mavis finally got up, put her books away, and left the library. Practically skipping with excitement, Tonks followed.
Mavis walked quickly down two staircases and up another, deftly skipped the treacherous vanishing step, and entered the office of Professor Greggens, who taught Defense Against the Dark Arts.
Tonks, who had been trailing at a fair distance behind so as to avoid notice, missed the beginning of their conversation, but busied herself pretending to tie her shoe next to the door.
“What about the Saeculas Ring?” Mavis was asking.
“It’s not sufficient,” responded Professor Greggens in her usual soothing voice, much to Tonks’ disappointment. “The energy created is quite powerful, but it’s bound up in an irrevocable circle, constantly re-supplying itself. There’s no way to channel it to other uses.”
“But wouldn’t that cause the two objects to become bound together?”
Professor Greggens laughed, low and warm. “That’s exactly the point! The constant flow of energy between the two objects means neither can be removed from the other. It’s the whole principle of mirror magic “ constantly reflecting something onto itself, an everlasting circle.”
“But if you wanted to harness the energy, you could break the ring, right? Some sort of Discerpum spell would probably do it.”
“Goodness, no! Breaking the ring would just cause a surge of power “ probably kill anyone within a wide radius, depending on how much energy was involved. No, that’s what I keep telling you “ you can’t harness the energy. The Saeculas Ring is completely useless for that sort of thing.”
“But then, if you want to separate the two objects, how do you do that? Isn’t there anyway to break the ring without causing the explosion of energy?”
“The thing about the Saeculas Ring “ and most mirror magic “ is that it’s incantation specific; it can be initiated by many incantations, and requires a spell based on that same incantation to end it without the backlash. Which, of course, creates a problem if the incantation is forgotten, in which case the two objects may very well be permanently connected. In fact, the modern-day Permanent Sticking Spell “ which, of course is not really permanent if you can find the right release words “ is a simplified form of the Saeculas Ring.”
There was a long pause. “Thank you, professor,” said Mavis at last, and Tonks scrambled up quickly and began walking away. After a moment or two Mavis passed her, long hair swinging back and forth as she stalked away.
Tonks sat down by the nearby statue of Emelda the Empty-Headed and tried to make sense of the conversation she had overheard. She knew very little of magical theory, but thought that the conversation was exceedingly odd. There had certainly been mention of a ring, though not the Founder’s Ring. But then again, maybe it was another name, or they were talking in code. Was Professor Greggens involved, or had Mavis just been trying to get information? Tonks was still contemplating when she saw the very disapproving Ravenclaw prefect who had been surveying her that morning heading her way.
Leaning back against the statue, she smirked. She hadn’t even done anything against the school rules today, and yet he was staring at her like she was about to start setting off fireworks in the corridor. Before he was within questioning distance, she stood up and started down the hallway.
The moment she rounded the corner she scrunched up her face in concentration. The hair was simple; it took very little effort to make it bushy and red. Her nose was next: long, with a distinctive splattering of freckles. Making herself taller was more difficult “ she could only manage an inch or two, and she knew she wouldn’t be able to sustain it for very long, but it would be enough to serve her purposes.
Hardly ten seconds later she turned in the hallway to face the astonished prefect, robbed of his quarry. As he looked around in confusion she slipped past him, back around the corner, and into the secret passage hidden behind the statue. She was leaning against the wall, giggling, when she came face to face with Kevin and Charlie, both of whom were grinning.
Still annoyed at their failure to take her seriously, she found herself even more irritated by the fact that they were having fun without her. She scowled at them. They looked so content by themselves.
“Having fun?” she asked nastily.
Charlie looked up in surprise, noticing her for the first time. “I’m sorry?” he asked. His tone was friendly but reserved, as if he was talking to a stranger.
“Do we know you?” asked Kevin, looking at her strangely.
Tonks felt blood rushing into her face as she realized that she had not yet changed back her appearance. “You know what? Forget I said anything,” she said.
“Odd,” Kevin said as she fled down the passageway.
Once she was sure they were out of site she relaxed and let her face return to its usual form. Berating herself for her own stupidity she hurried back to her dormitory. She had meant to tell them about Mavis, but now she reconsidered. Whenever she saw her friends together they were having fun. She had thought that they enjoyed her friendship, but was she really anything more than a tag-a-long?
Suddenly, all their teasing appeared in a new light. They didn’t want her, not really. They probably let her tag along to amuse themselves, and then laughed at her behind her back. Deep in the back of her mind she knew that she was being completely illogical, that Charlie and Kevin were not the type of people to do something like that. Nevertheless, imagining cruel things about Charlie and Kevin and placing herself as the ill-used heroine was much more satisfying than musing on her status as a third wheel.
When she was with them, she found it easy to pretend that she belonged; it was easy to become one of the threesome and act as if they were always together. She found that she did not like to think about the fact that Kevin and Charlie could have just as much fun without her around. Suddenly she felt superfluous and unwanted.
Stepping through the opening into the common room, she quickly located Marianne’s blond head and Justine’s dark one. They were sitting by themselves in the corner, heads close together, whispering over something. As she stared at them, Marianne looked up, caught her eye, and waved. Normally Tonks would have gone over and joined them immediately, but now she could not work up the courage. Nagging doubt lingered; perhaps they did not really want her either. They had been friends forever “ what had made her think that they wanted a third person in their perfect friendship? She lingered by the entrance, hoping that one of them would call out to her or wave her over. Marianne smiled at her again, and then looked back to Justine. Tonks climbed the steps to her room feeling bitterly vindicated.
In the dormitory, she was assailed with the mess that she had left in her hurry to tail Mavis that morning. The curtains on her bed were hanging open; somehow she had managed to fling one over the bar that held them. Her blankets were wildly askew, slipping off the bed onto the floor. The books and parchment on the floor were even more disarranged than usual, and as she headed for her bed she tripped over the stack of clothes that she had meant to clean up over the weekend, but had somehow never gotten around to.
She swore as she picked herself up from the floor, reveling in her rebellion. Untangling herself from one of her robes, she threw it at the open door of her wardrobe; she did not feel in the least remorseful when it knocked down one of Ninette’s perfectly hung robes.
She flung herself down onto her bed, gave her pillow an angry thump, and made a resolution. If they didn’t want her, then she didn’t want them. She could stand being by herself, and then maybe they would realize that they did need her after all. By then, she would have proved to everyone that she was absolutely fine by herself. She would make them beg to have her back.
Lying on her back, she formulated a fantasy in which Marianne and Justine found themselves desperately in need of her company, and Bill and Charlie and Kevin discovered that without her, the tunnels lost a great deal of their allure. She had just reached the part when she was graciously saving the boys, who had managed to get lost in the tunnels, when she was interrupted by the door swinging open.
It was Ninette. It was invariably Ninette when Tonks was feeling cross and rumpled and absolutely unloved. She stepped gracefully through the doorway and shut it behind her, and just as gracefully navigated around the piles of clothes and books. She paused before she reached her bed, and looked at Tonks. “Is something wrong?” she asked softly.
Tonks felt her cheeks burning and shook her head with a wordless glare. Silently, Ninette turned away and went to the wardrobe. After she had hung up the robe which Tonks had knocked down, she picked up Tonks’ robe and moved to hang it up as well, and Tonks lost control.
“Can’t you leave my stuff alone?” she demanded, red-faced with rage, her breath coming in angry gasps. “It’s not enough for you to keep your own stuff perfect “ you have to clean up my stuff too? You’re always trying to prove to us how good you are. Well, I’m tired of hearing it, so will you please go off and be perfect somewhere else?”
Ninette froze, her face white, Tonks’ robe limp in her hand.
Scarcely believing her own actions, Tonks crossed the room and yanked the robe out of Ninette’s grasp. They faced each other without moving for a moment. Tonks wanted nothing more than to scream at her, or perhaps throw something, but all the things which she wanted to say were caught up together in her throat, and if she threw something it would only go to further prove Ninette’s superiority. She hated Ninette in that moment, truly hated her, for being calm and dignified even when she was being yelled at, for keeping her room immaculate, for always being perfect. For neither noticing nor caring that she had no friends. For being able to be her own person, untouched by the people around her.
She felt the prickling behind her eyes that signified the beginning of tears. Turning sharply on her heel, she marched back across the room, successfully avoiding the entangling traps of clothes, and threw herself onto her bed once more, yanking the curtains closed behind her. She was still holding the crumpled up robe that she had torn from Ninette’s hands.
She lay there for several minutes, not moving, waiting to hear what Ninette would do. There was no sound. At last, she steeled herself and poked her head out of the curtains to see. Ninette was gone.