Chapter 17
The Manticore
“What are you doing here, Little Potter?”
Profiled by the light of his own Lumos charm was a dark-haired fourth-year whose black robes were trimmed in Gryffindor red, his furrowed features casting shadows across his expression.
“Maddox!” Albus was the first to acknowledge the other boy. “What are you doing here?”
Maddox’s eyebrows shot up slightly, changing the dimensions of light and shadow that played across his face. “I could ask you the exact same thing, Little Potter. What do you and your friends think you’re doing out here? As though there is ever an appropriate time to be out in the Forbidden Forest.”
From behind him, Albus could hear Rose say, “You almost sound like Dominique.”
Maddox rolled his eyes and snorted slightly. “Insults will get you nowhere today, Rose Weasley. I’m not sure if there is a greater sign that the forest is especially dangerous than if every creature in it chooses to evacuate. If this is all some sort of contest for stupidest first-year stunt, I’m fairly certain the three of you have won.”
Albus struggled to find his words. Of course there was no way Maddox could have understood. He didn’t have all the details. Albus was so overwhelmed by it all, even he barely understood what they were doing out there.
“Maddox, there is a manticore in the forest!” he finally managed to blurt out. “I know I told you all about the creatures me, Rose, and Scorpius have been fighting””
Albus could hear the duel gasps of betrayal behind him, but it only stopped him for the briefest of moments. “”and now we’ve come to the forest because we know the creature terrorizing it is a manticore. We think it lives right in this very cave. We’re…not quite sure what we’re going to do once we find it, but no one else seems to be doing anything about these creatures!”
“Just because no one has seen fit to keep three first-years in the loop does not mean that adults everywhere have been sitting on their thumbs.” Maddox said, shaking his head at what he perceived as Albus’ naivety. “Look, I promise I won’t tell any of the teachers where I found you if you’ll just leave right now. The only question is whether you’ll be willing to go back to the castle on your own, or if I have to drag you back myself.”
Albus might have protested further were it not for the fact that he could see very little way of talking himself out of this situation. Maddox was a great deal older, and definitely more powerful than any member of the Arcane ScoRA; if he did end up having to take them back to the castle, there were quite a few different ways he could go about doing it.
When Albus was just about to make an about-face for the cave entrance, he saw, out of the corner of his eye, Scorpius reach into the sleeve of his robe. Anyone else might not have seen the significance of this motion, but Albus, who had been raised among Aurors, recognized it in an instant: it was a technique of concealing ones wand so one could have the advantage in a duel. How Scorpius knew such a technique, though, Albus had no idea.
And before Albus could even react, Scorpius thrust his wand out in front of him, shouting, “Conjunctivitis!”
“Finite Incantatum!” In a perfectly fluid movement, Maddox looped his wand in an arch, causing the light shooting from Scorpius’ wand to fizzle out, now completely harmless to anyone.
Albus spun to face his friends, only to find a sight even more shocking than the one he had just turned away from. Not only was Scopius still standing, wand at-the-ready, completely prepared to fight, but so was Rose, her position a perfect mirror of Scorpius’ own stance.
“Guys!” Albus gaped.
“Albus!” Rose exclaimed, pointing back behind him with her free hand. “For Merlin’s sake, look at what he has in his hand!”
So once again, Albus turned on his heels to see what it was his cousin was referring to…an object that was half-hidden in Maddox’s hand. It was a pale, bleached wand. An aged wand, although it had none of the knots or lines Albus had come to see in the wands belonging to his family, his teachers, and his classmates.
It was then that it hit Albus…and eventually Maddox too. Scorpius had tricked Maddox into reaching for the object he had tried so hard, up until now, to keep hidden.
“So,” Maddox said, with clenched teeth, in a very slow sort of way, “who’s going to be the first to say it?”
But no one had to say it. Grasped tightly in Maddox’s hand was the infamous Wand of MacArt. Even though Albus had never seen a picture of the object, he knew this was it. It had to be it!
At first, Albus was simply dumbstruck, although it finally occurred to him to draw his wand as well…after a bit of silent prompting from Rose. Scorpius was the first to begin advancing forward, though his actions were extremely short-lived.
“I would seriously rethink your choice of actions, Mr. Malfoy,” Maddox said, stopping the boy with a menacing tone. “As it has been said, there is a dangerous monster running loose in these woods, and someone in this cave is controlling it.”
Finally, though very reluctantly, the members of the Arcane ScoRA lowered their wands. “Much better,” Maddox remarked, sounding amused at his ability to control the younger students. “Now, children, what’s say we set those wands down over there before someone accidentally gets hurt?”
Maddox gestured to a flat rock off to the side. At the insult, Scorpius nearly drew his wand again, but Maddox clucked his tongue and wagged his finger in the same manner that a parent might use when speaking towards a naughty child. “Mr. Malfoy, do you have any idea of just how fast a manticore is?” he asked. “I do. And while we wait, perhaps we can also see just how capable this wand is as a dueling instrument, as well.”
Although the expression on Maddox’s face was a mocking one, it was plain to see that the boy was completely serious about summoning the manticore if he was not obeyed. So, one by one, the members of the Arcane ScoRA set their wands on the stone, leaving themselves completely defenseless in the process.
“Good,” Maddox praised their obedience. “Now, maybe, if we can all behave, we can calmly discuss what needs to be done about all of this.”
Glancing over his shoulder, Albus could see Rose and Scorpius’ faces contort in resentment at the way Maddox was talking down to them (though Albus also couldn’t help but wonder how much of this anger was also directed at himself). Albus also could not help but feel a slight twinge of anger himself at Maddox’s tone. Every time the boy had ever spoken to Albus before, it had been almost as though he had seen Albus as a sort of equal, something Albus could have never expected from his own brother or any of his older cousins.
This new attitude made Albus wonder which one was Maddox’s true nature and what reason the fourth-year could possibly have to have manipulated Albus for so long…unless he had done it just for his own amusement.
He seemed to be doing that a lot as of late, Albus thought, judging by the way he was snickering at the now defenseless first-years in front of him.
“You all seem to be such curious little kitties here, and I bet you are all dying to have a story told to you.”
There was something very wrong about Maddox saying the word ‘dying’ at this particular moment in time. No one said so, of course, but Rose’s tone did seem to convey a certain tone of…agitation.
“JUST WHAT THE BLOODY HELL DO YOU HOPE TO ACCOMPLISH THROUGH ALL OF THIS?” she shrieked at a decibel that made stones shake within the cave. “Do you think our parents won’t miss us? Do you think you can just keep hiding out in your little forest clubhouse forever? Do you think the best investigative minds in Britain won’t eventually find something that will tie our deaths to””
“Hold on, Miss Weasley, hold on,” Maddox said, holding up his hands. “Let’s not get carried away. There’s no reason to believe that everyone in this cave won’t be able to leave with all their limbs intact…provided we can all come to a certain understanding.”
Scorpius spoke up. “What makes you think that if you do let us go, we won’t just go and tell everyone what we’ve seen?” Albus cringed, thinking that now was not probably the best time to be giving Maddox ideas.
“Oh, I have a feeling that the constant fear of waking up to see a creature much more fearsome than a manticore staring you down in your bed could prove to be very persuasive.” Maddox said this with a tone of laughter in his voice. “The truth is, the last thing I want is for anyone to get hurt here tonight.”
At this, Albus was confused. In the back of his mind, he knew this had to be some sort of trick. Every instinct in him told him this was a trick. This was not how the stories were supposed to go!
Rose rolled her eyes. “Some great villain this idiot turned out to be!” she griped. “He doesn’t even have it in him to know he needs to finish us off. What a wonderfully anticlimactic end to this story!”
Albus became tense as he turned back to face the older boy. But instead of appearing insulted by Rose’s words, Maddox looked as though he were amused.
“You know, you have some smart friends there, Little Potter,” Maddox remarked, pointing the bone wand at Scorpius and Rose. “It would have probably done you a world of good if you had listened to what they said.”
Maddox elaborated further, twirling the wand in his hand. “Miss Weasley is right in that this doesn’t have to be some sort of showdown between good and evil, where someone has to die for the sake of it. There is no ‘bad guy’ here, and if we can all just play by a few certain rules, there is no reason all of us can’t go back to the castle with nothing more than the memory of a very bad evening.”
Scorpius and Rose were both listening intently, but Albus found himself stuttering like a simpleton. “But…uh….”
Maddox sighed, putting his fingers to his temple as he attempted, once, again to state his point. “Albus, there is something you should learn from this night, about the aspects of good and evil,” he said in a silky voice. “You won’t know it for very long, but I’m going to tell you anyway.”
He made his way closer to the three first-years. “In all those stories I bet your parents always tell you about the war back in the day, I’ll bet it is always the same. There is probably a very stark comparison between the two sides. The ‘bad side’ is pure evil, without a doubt. There can be no redeeming, or even neutral quality found among them. They are just bad, bad, bad!”
Maddox tilted his head. “Then, there is the side of good. Pure and righteous, just like in the stories of old. But there are several reasons why this logic doesn’t work in this particular situation, and it is also the main reason why your little…club serves very little purpose in all of this.”
“Let’s start by looking at your Slytherin friend here. Maddox moved on to circle Scorpius. “Death Eater father, Death Eater grandfather, pureblood tendencies and all its sentiments going back for generations. And he’s in Slytherin too, just like every member of his family before him. Little Malfoy here has everything going for him to make him a Dark wizard.”
Maddox stepped backwards and continued. “Yet only one of us has committed the actions necessary for one to be considered such. Tell me, Little Potter, who is the dangerous one in this cavern?”
Albus gulped. “You?”
“Correct!” the older boy exclaimed. “You see, Albus, you’re seeing everything as though you’re living in one of your dad’s bedtime stories from his childhood. There is no ultimate showdown between good and evil here, no light verses dark. It’s just four kids and a wand; nothing more.”
“And a monster!” Rose brought up once again.
Maddox chucked in a way that seemed completely inappropriate for this particular moment in time. “Well, that still remains to be seen,” he told her. “But I suppose I can’t expect any of you to cooperate unless I give you at least something of what you came for. You’re all going to want a story, I trust.”
Maddox began pacing slowly as he relayed the tale. “The complete truth is that this wand just fell into my lap,” he confessed. “Over the summer holidays, my family went to Ireland over the summer holidays. You see, my mother works in the Ministry Office of Invaluable Wizarding Artifacts. We didn’t go out there searching for the Wand of MacArt, mind you. It was actually some rather dull office affairs that apparently no one but my mother could properly handle. It was actually quite dull to begin with.
“One of my only sources of amusement was to wander the countryside and the surrounding forest near where we were staying.” The corners of Maddox’s mouth turned up into a smile. “Finding the wand was rather unspectacular. I was climbing along a wall of crumbling stones, and when I looked down, I could see something white sticking out from all the dark. When I climbed down, I pulled at it, and found this little wand in my grasp.”
He held the wand up so that Albus and his friends could have a better look. “And from the moment I held it, I could tell this wand was different. That it was special. Of course, I wasn’t about to risk expulsion from Hogwarts by having anyone find out this wand existed. So, in the meantime, I supplemented my interest by browsing the Irish archives hoping I might come across something useful. I did, and you three must already know what that was.”
“So when you came to Hogwarts, you decided to see if you really had the real thing?” Scorpius ventured to guess. “With the Chizpurfles that took over the Potions classroom?”
“Oh, well that was a simple test to see what the wand could do,” Maddox said, laughing. “I always wondered what it would take for Professor Vhartan to cancel class, and now I know for the future. That fact that your cousin and his Potions partner got a free afternoon out of it was just a happy coincidence.”
“I don’t think everything that came after that could possibly be called happy!” Rose said curtly. “Nearly being eaten alive, and then a swarm of Doxies going after the student body!”
Maddox was still laughing. “Well, the Erkling was something of a joke, I suppose. The teachers are always going on and on about how no students are to be out in the corridors after bedtime, but I can’t think of one person who has never done it before. But, if there was a child-eating monster wandering the halls at night, and everyone knew it, that would solve the problem quick-smart, don’t you think?”
“And the Doxies? I remember hearing how you were banned from playing that game. If you can’t play, nobody could. Don’t you think that was a bit petty?”
“Petty?” the older boy gaped. “Surely you must know by now that the swarm of Doxies was just a very miniscule example of what this wand is capable of. Besides, it turned out in the end. Gryffindor won, even though I was nowhere near the field, and Jocelyn Dale did look hilarious with those giant purple welts all over her face. She had to walk the corridors with them for a week!”
At this point, Scorpius was looking positively furious. Jocelyn Dale might have sat like poisoned licorice in the mouths of everyone else in the school, but she was still Scorpius’ cousin, and Albus knew that they cared for one another a great deal.
“What about the Quintaped?” Rose asked, distracting Albus attention. “Where was the fun and games in that?”
“Ah, now that was a creature that was meant to do you in,” Maddox replied. “It was actually right after Albus told me about your little club, and invited me to join. Of, course, I couldn’t very well join an organization devoted to stopping myself, so, Albus, now you have a better idea of why I said no to you.”
Rose crossed her arms over her chest. “So you intended to have us killed that night, so that we couldn’t find out it was you who was responsible for everything?”
“I wouldn’t say there was intent,” Maddox old them, twirling the wand as though it were a toy. “More that once I had the creature in the castle, I would wait until Little Potter was stupid enough to go out monster-hunting”” Albus received two identical glares from Rose and Scorpius. “”then I would look the other way and let whatever happened happen.”
“But what if someone other than us had come across the Quintaped?” Albus had to ask.
Maddox shrugged his shoulders indifferently. “Whatever happened would have happened.”
It was this cold comment that caused Rose’s face to start turning that famous shade of Weasley red associated with anger, but her words seemed to keep getting caught in her throat. A problem that Scorpius, on the other hand, did not seem to share.
“How could you say something like that?” Scorpius exclaimed, disgusted. “You talk down to me about my Death Eater family, but with all that you’ve done with that wand, you’re just as bad as they are. In fact, you’re worse! At least they believed what they were doing had a purpose. You’ve just been doing what you have been doing for no other reason that you could!”
Scorpius’ reasoning seemed to annoy Maddox, but, for some reason, the fourth-year decided not to further attack the blond boy’s family. “Don’t tell me it is that difficult to understand having a tool of great magic and wanting to use it. Like Little Potter’s brother and his precious Marauder’s Map. That is, until it mysteriously went missing.”
Albus watched Scorpius’ eyes widen ever-so-slightly and his hand drift down to his right trouser pocket, as though feeling suddenly very protective of its contents.
“From the first day that boy brought that thing to Hogwarts, he was obsessed with using it to carry out as much mayhem and chaos as he possibly could: from pilfering food from the kitchens to midnight ‘decorating’ in Professor Hardarse’s office.” Maddox’s eyes became shifty as his gaze settled on Rose’s book bag. “And, of course, he talked constantly about his father’s famous Invisibility Cloak, the one that Harry Potter had to hide away, lest it fall into the hands of his first-born. But you can believe that everyone in Gryffindor has heard about Mr. Potter’s boyhood tales of mischief and adventure through the use of that particular device.”
When Albus turned around, he finally saw what it was that was attracting the older boy’s attention. Poking out from under the flap of Rose’s book bag was a slip of silvery material: the hem of the Invisibility Cloak! As soon as Rose noticed this, she shifted the bag to hide it behind her back, doing her best to appear strong and defiant as she did so.
“But I don’t suppose there is anymore to know than that,” Maddox said. “Like I told all of you, I think it would do for just all of us go back to the castle and all stay very, very quiet about everything that has happened tonight.”
Whatever Albus’ own opinions might have been on the matter, he imagined he would have very little say in what he and his friends did for the rest of the night. When he turned to face Scorpius again, he could see the expression of raw anger at Maddox’s words towards his cousin was still clearly painted on his face.
“We’re not going anywhere!” he growled. In a way, it was almost funny, like a lapdog thinking it could take on a Gringotts dragon. If it were happening to someone else, it probably would have been a lot funnier, though.
With Maddox, however, it seemed to work. His expression appeared troubled, and even upset, as though he had no idea what he would do if he was disobeyed by the children in front of him. Of all the answers he had expected to get, the one that Scorpius had given him had clearly not been one of them.
“Mr. Malfoy, I really don’t think you understand just how serious the situation is here,” Maddox said to the boy, failing to keep his voice level.
“What about you?” Rose spoke up. “You’re still a kid too, and you’re the one who is actually summoning these creatures. You can honestly expect us to believe a mere three years makes it all perfectly alright as far as everything’s concerned?”
“Have I ever mentioned how very much I dislike you, Miss Weasley?”
The older boy was clearly doing his best to appear menacing and domineering, but it wasn’t working in the least. It was clear that Maddox was nervous. He did not want to kill Albus and his friends; even Albus could see that. And there was only one of Maddox and three of them. If they were able to put together an effective attack strategy, they might just be able to take him down themselves and be able to leave the forest without even having to see the monster.
But Albus was never given a chance to test this theory. Almost immediately after he had come up with it, he could feel warm bursts of hair pushing down his back and a low sort of rumble that that seemed almost surreal. All at the same time, the three members of the Arcane ScoRA turned around to meet their fate with as much dignity as they could muster while each being on the verge of wetting themselves.
The creature before them was so much more massive than the pictures in Rose’s book might have led them to believe. In fact, to see the creature in real life, a person might not believe this creature and the one depicted in the book were the same animal. It was about as long as a house, and Albus was beginning to believe that if he, Rose, and Scorpius stood on each others’ shoulders, they still wouldn’t be as tall as this creature. Its face held remarkably human features, and its mouth held disturbingly sharp teeth, while beyond the mane, its feline body bulged with bulky muscles. But what seemed to be drawing most of Albus’ attention was the tall, erect scorpion tail on the creature’s rear-end, the curved stinger easily as long as a human arm.
“Uh oh,” Maddox remarked without any sincere distress. “It looks like your time is up.” The boy attempted to appear straight and stoic as he made his way backwards. “Maybe this could have proved to be a valuable lesson for all of you…if there were any chance of you living through this, that is.”
As bold and graceful as Maddox tried to make his exit, it was plain to be seen that he was running away; maybe not from the beast itself, but from having to watch what the beast was about to do to the three bite-sized children in front of it. This was something that Rose was able to see through without any effort.
“Ladies and gentlemen, the great and noble House of Gryffindor, where dwell the brave of””
“Rose!” Scorpius hissed through his teeth, his stance becoming rigid. “Perhaps it isn’t the best idea to be shouting at this particular point in time.”
But in spite of the warning, Rose was not ready to stop ranting. She just continued to do so at a much lower volume.
“Alright, Albus, just how difficult is it to understand that a secret organization needs to be kept a secret? Scorpius and I both seemed to manage to understand this. As far as I know, neither of us have gone to our upperclassmen, running our mouths about the Arcane ScoRA. Honestly, Albus, do you need me to hold your hand? I would have thought….”
After a while, though, her voice seemed to fade into the background as the three first-years began paying more attention to the manticore in front of them. A soft crooning sound was beginning to slip through its lips and it began shifting from one foot to the other, almost as though running in place.
“Why isn’t that thing eating us yet?” Scorpius finally had to ask.
“It’s staring us down,” Rose replied, taking a brief break from berating her cousin. “It’s common predator behavior once it’s been spotted by its prey.”
Scorpius nodded slowly, though he did break eye contact with the monster. “So what are we supposed to do, then?”
Then, as though the monster understood English it finally began making its way towards the children, showing off those impressive teeth of its.
“Scatter!” Rose shrieked at the top of her lungs.
As the members of the Arcane ScoRA bolted off in three different directions, only one thought was present in Albus’ mind, even amidst the screaming split evenly between them. I could have thought of that!
From behind him, Albus could hear the sound of long claws scraping against stone, and the pounding of children’s shoes racing in every which way, though he didn’t dare look. It almost embarrassed him to admit this to himself, though.
But Albus quickly learned the dangers of thinking to oneself while moving at top speeds as he found himself falling over a short ledge in the cavern and landing rather painfully on his backside. A quick glance around his new surroundings, however, offered him a bit of relief, as there was no manticore in his immediate vicinity. From above the ledge, on the other hand, a great deal of panic and general chaos could be heard quite well. With every new terrifying sound introduced, though, Albus found himself pushing himself further and further back against the stone ledge.
With his eyes barely peeking up over the edge, Albus looked out, only to be struck with horror with what he saw. There was Rose, trapped beneath the creature’s paw, its claws mere inches from piercing her flesh. Its tail was held high, the stinger dripping venom.
“Rose!” Scorpius shouted, while Rose whimpered beneath the monster’s grasp in a helpless manner that seemed completely wrong on the girl.
Albus wanted to climb up over the ledge and help his friends. Fear wasn’t even something that factored into the decision. The choice, however, was soon taken out of his hands as a rush of sliding rocks threatening to crush his puny head came sliding his way. Pushing back as far against the wall as he could and hugging his knees against his chest, Albus was able to avoid certain crushing death, though a few smaller bits of rock did fall against the very tips of his toes.
But up above him, he could still hear the sounds of his friends struggling against the beast, the scraping of claws and paws against the surface of the cave, and a mirage of desperate spell casting. And, of course, there was the sound of still more stones falling of the ledge, leaving Albus trapped.
“Scorpius!” he heard Rose shout, her voice cracking with terror.
Over the sound of all the rocks crashing down around him, Albus could hear the sounds of conflict echoing between his friends and the beast above him. When he was finally sure he was no longer being pelted with stones, he looked up over the ledge once again. The manticore was still very much where Albus had last seen it, though it seemed that Rose had managed to get free, her head of bright red hair poking out from a small crack between the cave wall and a large boulder.
But Scorpius was nowhere in sight. Albus’ eye raced from side to side as he scanned over the scene in front of him. There was no fresh blood, no new bones, and no blond corpses, but Albus found himself wondering if a manticore was capable of devouring a human child in one bite. Scorpius really wasn’t all that big, after all….
Then came a very loud interruption. “Impedimenta!”
The voice shouting the hex resounded through the cave as profoundly as the spell itself, probably because it was a voice that Albus had never known to shout under any sort of circumstance. From behind the ledge, Albus peeked up to see a determined woman with straggly blond hair and a bulging belly beneath her bright blue robes.
Albus had to rub his eyes in order to believe what they were telling him. It was Luna Scamander; wand held high, her expression holding a fierceness that Albus would have never believed the woman was capable of. Her wand continued to swish from left to right as she uttered a combination of both verbal and non-verbal spells accompanied by bright lights directed at the manticore before her.
And probably what was most surprising was that Luna actually seemed to be overpowering the monstrous beast from the way it seemed frozen where it stood, beginning to cringe.
Of course, Albus had known that Luna could duel and defend herself with the best of them. She had her place within his father’s war stories, right alongside Uncle Ron, Aunt Hermione, and Professor Longbottom, but it was one thing to hear that Loony was a highly capable fighter, and quite another to see it for oneself.
Coming out of the shadows and flanking Luna on either side were the figures of two much taller wizards. A flicker of light gleamed off the spectacles of the man at her right, and Albus recognized the man in an instant: it was his father.
“Ron! Watch Luna’s right flank; it’s where she’s most vulnerable!”
And, were it not for that, the burst of light that illuminated the second wizard’s bright red hair would have signaled the presence of Albus’ uncle, Ron, without a word being said.
While Uncle Ron seem to be primarily serving as Luna’s guard, Albus could see that his own father was attempting to push his way forward, past the manticore, and presumably towards the one who was directing its movements. When Albus looked to his right, he could see Maddox flailing the bone wand wildly as desperation began to take its hold
“No, no, NO!” Albus could hear Maddox shouting up into the upper cavern. “Don’t go on the defensive! You don’t even have to kill them! Just show some teeth and claws, flash the stinger, and you can drive them back out of the cave!”
When Albus looked to his side, he could see Maddox was also crouched down behind the ledge of the cave, waving the Wand of MacArt and shouting orders. Maddox wasn’t yelling terribly loudly, though Albus assumed it was out of an effort not to have the adult wizards have their attention directed his way, in the direction of the person actually controlling the beast.
Then, Maddox said at more of a whisper, so much so that Albus was sure there no way the creature could have heard him. “And then you can finish up that supper of yours!”
As much as the boy attempted to appear domineering, crouching behind the ledge the way he was, his head barely poking up over the edge, it was obvious to be seen that he was hardly any sort of powerful Dark wizard bent on destroying anything that stood in his way, no matter how many times he said so. He was just a kid in over his head with powers that he barely understood, really making him no different from the members of the Arcane ScoRA.
Suddenly, though, Maddox did see Albus’ dad approaching and he ducked down low, his face turning pale. From his crouched position, he raised the Wand of MacArt and pointed it at Albus’ father. No spell seemed to come from the tip of the wand, but almost instantaneously, the manticore turned its head and rested its gaze on the dark-haired Auror creeping behind it.
But, even from its position against the ground, its head was still turned and locked on Albus’ dad, who had momentarily abandoned his own explorations to aid in subduing the beast.
The older Gryffindor kept his eyes on the beast, the wand tightly grasped in his hand. It was then that Albus realized that Maddox Dugan was not only willing to kill the members of the Arcane ScoRA to keep his secret, but he had also shown he would have been more than willing to kill Albus’ own father along with them.
It was at that moment that Albus felt something profound inside him rip. Maybe it was a culmination of finding out Maddox was the one behind everything that Hogwarts’ students had been going through, the fact that the older boy seemed to be so indifferent as to whether Albus and his friends lived or died, or the idea that he was now completely intent on killing Albus’ father, along with everyone else, but before Albus knew what he was doing, he found himself with his knees on Maddox’s chest, the older boy tackled to the ground, an expression of dazed pain and confusion on the boy’s face as Albus alternated between punching Maddox in the face and stomach, and throwing the boy’s arms back against the ground whenever Maddox did try to fight back.
“Little Potter! Just what”” Maddox managed to get out before Albus managed to land a rather respectable punch to the boy’s nose. Blood came pouring out like a faucet as Maddox reached up, groaning, with his left hand to cover it.
“Albus!” he heard Rose shout at him through all of it. “What are you waiting for? Get the wand away from him! You might not get another chance!”
When Albus looked down to Maddox’s wand hand, he could see the Wand of MacArt still firmly grasped in the boy’s fingers. Somehow, through all that punishment, he had still managed to hold onto it.
“Get it!” she screamed again, though Albus still could not see his cousin.
Needing no further prompting, Albus grabbed at the wand, but even through all the pain Maddox must have been feeling, his fingers still held tight to the wand. Suddenly recalling a certain persuasive technique he had learned from Luna’s twins, Lorcan and Lysander, Albus grabbed the boy’s wrist and bit down hard against the tender skin. After a very loud yelp, Maddox’s fingers spread open and the Wand of MacArt found itself in Albus Potter’s possession.
While Maddox was still moaning in pain, Albus took the time to look over than wand that had caused him and his friends so much grief. It was odd; aside from the strange material the wand was made from, Albus had a difficult time seeing what made this wand so different from any other. There was no profound warmth or energy emanating from the tool like Albus had been expecting, and he certainly wasn’t overcome with the desire to enslave magical creatures to do his bidding. Then, he recalled what he had been told when he had gotten his own wand at Ollivander’s; how it was the wand that chose its master. Maybe, in some twisted sort of way, the Wand of MacArt had chosen Maddox Dugan to carry out the chaos the Gryffindor had visited on Hogwarts.
Albus wasn’t allowed very much time to contemplate this, however, as he felt the flourish of a cloak over his head and a pulling at the back of his robes, and Albus soon found himself being dragged backwards across the stone floor on his bum. Before it even occurred to him to wonder who was grabbing at him, a hand clasped tightly over his mouth and several strands of long red hair dangled in front of his face. It was Rose, of course.
It didn’t take very long for Albus to see why his cousin had seen so fit to be in such a hurry. Coming over the ledge they had been using for hiding were Albus’ father and Uncle Ron. Luna was absent from the party, presumably because, with her still-growing belly, she did not have the balance necessary to make the climb.
“Maddox Dugan.” Albus watched his father crouch down beside the boy sprawled out on the ground. “Maddox Dugan, is that you, my boy?”
It had never before occurred to Albus that his father might already know Maddox, even though he was apparently good friends with James, and in good standing with all the other Gryffindors. But in his current state of mind, he had trouble figuring out just how it could possibly be.
From beneath the cloak, Albus and Rose watched as their fathers waved their wands over the boy’s form, and eventually help Maddox to his feet, the fourth-year looking to be in much better shape than Albus had left him in.
“What are you doing here, Mr. Dugan?” Uncle Ron asked has he helped steady the boy’s stance. “I can’t imagine Hogwarts has relaxed its curfew enough that it is acceptable for you to be out here at this time of night.”
Uncle Ron chuckled at his own words, but Albus’ father was slightly more serious. “Do you have any idea how dangerous it is out here? I suppose I don’t need to tell you what Mr. Weasley and I just finished fighting.”
Maddox just shook his head and grumbled as he made an effort to speak. “N-no, sir. Yes, sir. Thank you for helping me, sir.”
No, Dad, no! Albus thought to himself as he watched his father continue to help the boy walk. Don’t believe him, Dad! Don’t let him get away! You didn’t become head of the Auror Office by being so gullible!
Then, as though able to read her cousin’s thoughts, Rose shook Albus’ shoulder violently. “Albus! What are you still doing holding that thing?”
Albus looked down to his hand to see the Wand of MacArt still firmly in his grasp. He had nearly forgotten it was there.
“Get rid of it!” Rose ordered as best she could, keeping her voice low so as not to be heard from the commotion off to the side.
“How?” Albus asked on reflex.
Rose rolled her eyes. “They can’t see us. Just set it on the ground, we’ll walk away, and then they’ll see it.”
Albus was completely terrified that his father somehow knew they were there, but he still allowed his cousin the drag him as she tried to shuffle as quietly as she possibly could.
“Mr. Dugan, what is this?”
Maddox’s eyes went wide as he appeared to do his best to appear confused and sincere. But as Albus found himself led up over the edge, he could better see the look on his father’s face. It was an expression of stone and soberness; one that looked as though it would not tolerate any falsehood that might have been spinning around inside the boys head. Albus breathed a deep sigh, feeling confident that all of this was finally over.
“Mr. Dugan, I think we both know that there is no answer you can give, truthful or otherwise, that could….”
As Albus and Rose moved backwards, the voice of Albus’ father began to fade. By the time they were back out in the fresh night air, the familiar sound was completely gone. When Rose removed the cloak from their heads and stuffed it back into her book bag she grabbed Albus by the crook of his arm and proceeded leading him further away.
“Walking, Albus,” Rose said to him once he began lagging. “Walking, walking, just keep walking before our dads see us.”
“B-but…,” Albus muttered as he consented to being led further into the forest, “are we forgetting something? What happened to””
But Albus was never given the opportunity to finish his sentence as a rush of air and a very solid being appeared directly in front of them. It was Scorpius: alive and quite well, aside from a few minor-looking scraps. And, as he began folding the Invisibility Cloak under his arm, a smile was spreading wider and wider across his face, and he began snickering under his breath.
Albus’ eyes went round as Sickles. “You’re alright!”
“Of course he’s alright, Albus,” Rose said to him. “What? Did you think he was eaten?”
“People, I think we have a more immediate problem right now,” Scorpius brought up. “If Maddox is going down for this, he is probably going to at least try to take us down with him. Right now, he is probably telling your fathers all about how we were down in the cave with him. If he has half a brain, he might even try to pin the whole thing on us.”
Rose placed her index finger against her chin as she looked Scorpius in the eye. “Well, we couldn’t possibly have had anything to do with all of this if we have been fast asleep in our beds all night.All we have to do is come up with a somewhat-acceptable alibi.”
Standing between the two of them, Albus couldn’t help but feel as though the two of them knew something he didn’t. But before he could ask what this could possibly be, Scorpius answered the question for him.
“Race to the castle!” Scorpius remarked in a tone that seemed much too excited for Albus’ comfort.
The other two children seemed very excited, but Albus still felt left out of the loop, not knowing quite how this was all going to work. “Just how are we supposed to do that?”
It was with that that Scorpius reached in to Rose’s book bag and extracted a broom: the same broom they had been trying to hide in the Potions classroom when they encountered the Quintaped. Albus was so distracted by yet another problem that was presenting itself, he didn’t even think to ponder how the broom had managed to fit into a small bag. “But we can’t carry three people on one broom.”
Now Albus did take the time to ponder the physics of how two brooms could fit into one book bag.
“It was just laying there under a pile of…magazines.” Rose said the last word with something of a shudder. “And, where Maddox is going, he most certainly won’t be using it.”
Albus was dumbfounded, even after everything that had happened that night. “Since when do you fly?”
Rose smiled broadly. “As soon as the Ravenclaw Quidditch team found out they officially had a Weasley among their ranks, they made it a House project to see that Rose Weasley would be made a superb flyer by the time she was old enough to try out for the team.”
With a pull at his hood and a stumble over the broom handle, the three members of the Arcane ScoRA were soaring through the night sky, racing against a clock that may not have even existed. All the same, those three children raced towards Hogwarts castle as though their very lives depended on it.
Miniscule fragments in the wind smacked against Albus’ face as Rose flew faster and faster through the dense, dark air, gaining on Scorpius’ tail. The two of them were even laughing as they raced, as though this last leg of the journey were just the end of some magnificent game. Albus himself did not join in, but he did allow himself to feel some amount of joy. Bringing himself to the level as Rose and Scorpius were, however, seemed to work, not with just having come so close to meeting his maker and not with seeing one of his housemates one the other side of the full wrath of the Ministry, whatever that might turn out to be.
The two brooms flew low against the water, their shoes skimming against the surface of the Black Lake. Then, almost as though deciding to do so on a whim, Scorpius’ broom pierced the surface of the water, and he did not come back up. Albus began to worry as to whether Scorpius planned on getting to the Slytherin dormitories or if he had crashed and was now drowning, but Rose didn’t look as though she would be willing to stop and make sure. Her eyes were completely focused on the target in front of her, a set of duel towers reaching up in between low and wispy clouds.
Before Albus could even attempt to properly prepare himself, he found himself being tossed through the window through sheer velocity, completing a perfect summersault once he hit the ground, and coming to an upright, seated position right at the edge of the dormitory rug. And Albus did not even have enough time to look over his shoulder before Rose disappeared to race for Ravenclaw Tower.
She’ll probably see well enough to give herself a softer landing! he thought to himself as he hobbled his way to his bed, nursing a sore bum. The soft bed and warm covers did wonders for Albus’ aching body, more so than any potion could have ever done; nor could any potion have done as well at quieting his mind. And even though he had no idea just what was going to be done with Maddox Dugan, Albus could feel his blood pressure drop significantly just from knowing it was no longer something that he needed to worry about.
Just when he had settled himself into bed, the door to the dormitory swung wide opon, the flash of light stopping Albus’ beating heart.
The Arcane ScoRA and the Wand of MacArt by OliveOil_Med
Chapter Notes: The three members of the Arcane ScoRA come face to face with the manticore and the one who is controlling it.
Thanks once again to Apruva, my loveliest of lovely betas!