He couldn’t wait to get home; he’d had a long, hard day at work, and had twisted his wrist earlier when helping some Aurors-in-training learn to duck properly by throwing random dangerous objects at them. (Of course, this particular activity had come to a halt when Hadrian Bellowes walked by and made note of the fact that Ron obviously enjoyed violence, and wouldn’t that be an interesting supplement to his case.)
Hadrian Bellowes had hated Ron ever since he was automatically promoted to the top of the Auror heap after helping to defeat Voldemort, detested Ron after he’d killed Greyback and Lucius Malfoy in an attack on Harry’s life and was hailed as a national hero, and despised him when he’d gotten to serve as Acting Head Auror during Draco Malfoy’s escape from Azkaban.
But Bellowes had really begun to loathe him that summer, when Ron had related an amusing anecdote to the Daily Prophet about a time when Bellowes had accidentally headed to a scene of crime without noticing that he’d forgotten his trousers at home. After that, most Ministry officials had stopped taking him seriously, and some even called him Bare-legged Bellowes or make comments like, “sure you’ve got those trousers on?” every time they saw him.
True, this would irk anyone, but what Bellowes was trying to do to Ron’s reputation was uncalled for. There was a huge difference between newspapers reporting that you’d gone to work trouser-free and newspapers reporting that you’d killed an innocent man over a schoolboy grudge.
It was finally Ron’s turn in line to step into the flames and return home. He tossed a handful of floo powder into the fire. “Number Nine, Griffin Circle, Godric’s Hollow,” he spoke, and was caught up in the whirl of green light and fireplaces that would transport him home.
He collapsed on a sofa.
In his schooldays, he’d had to worry constantly about Voldemort murdering his friends and family, but things had been simpler back then. Kids had it easy.
“We have it so rough!” exclaimed Emma. “I just want to get out of school and be an Auror already. My mum’s last Transfiguration class was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, I swear. Did a word of that make sense to you?”
“I understood some of it,” Ted said fairly. “Like when she said, ‘this will be a challenging course’ at the beginning, and when she said, ‘your homework’s a three-foot parchment on human transfiguration.’” He smiled sheepishly, his shaggy hair falling over his eyes.
They would be starting self-transfiguration that year, something about which they were all rather excited, although Ivy was already very experienced in this art. However, it was starting to look like it’d be a lot less fun and a lot more work than they’d anticipated, and the whole concept was particularly daunting for Emma, who typically spent Transfiguration classes passing notes and doodling. But more imminent were the meetings that everyone was required to hold with their Inter-House Unity partners after dinner.
Emma looked at her assignment card, rolling her eyes. “Nelson Blenkinsopp, fourth year Hufflepuff, meet in library.’ I guess I’m lucky it wasn’t in the Care of Magical Creatures area, or I’d be covered in slug slime by the end of the day.
“Ted where are you going to meet Roran O’ Reilly?” asked Ivy. “Tabitha and I are going to be in the Astronomy tower.
Ted glanced down at his card. “Greenhouse Two.” He pulled a face. “So I guess we won’t be able to walk together. Those are as far apart as two classrooms can be. Zabini probably did that on purpose.”
“Still, you’re lucky,” put in Jordan. “I have to go to the Divination classroom… and it’s almost certain that that ancient fraud Professor Trelawney will be hovering over my shoulder, predicting my death every five seconds.”
His twin laughed. “She’s not that bad! Maybe a little bit crazy, but Dad definitely exaggerates a lot when he talks about when he was in school”I mean, seriously, a teacher who made him write in his own blood, and another one who actually did all the Unforgivable Curses in front of the whole class? There’s no way that happened.”
She waved her card in front of her brother’s face. “Looks like we both got a bad deal, Jor-jums. I have to meet Capshaw in your smelly Muggle Studies classroom.” She stuck out her tongue at him.
“Never,” said Jordan seriously, “Call me Jor-jums. Ever. And Muggle Studies happens to be my favourite subject.”
“And Divination’s mine!”
“Yes, well you’re not exactly a top student in anything else.”
“And you’re boring! We should call you Bore-dan!”
“That’s a horrible pun! And you’re obnoxious!”
“What’s that about the Fwooper calling the Augurey feathery, Jor-jums?”
“I specifically ordered you never to call me that!”
“Well, you can’t give me orders. You’re not my Quidditch captain, baby bro.”
“Only because you’re the most dreadful flier I’ve had the misfortune to ever see.”
“Hmph.” Haley couldn’t think of a single retort she could throw back at her brother after that one. She was terrified of heights, and whenever anyone managed to force her onto a broomstick, they immediately regretted doing so. That was one of the many things about Jordan that irritated her. He was good at everything, which made it difficult in insult matches like these.
The twins took advantage of this silence to glare at one another, arms folded.
Ivy cleared her throat. “Erm,” she said, “you really shouldn’t fight like that. Especially when we have to get to our partners in about five minutes.” And as happened so often, she was the voice of reason and sanity. Ivy was quite often the mediator in twin fights, being the only one of the three sixth-year Potter siblings who was exempt from sibling rivalry, and more often than not, people listened when she had a complaint.
The five friends said their goodbyes (or in the case of the twins, made a point of saying nothing to one another) and split off their separate ways to meet up with their project partners.
Jordan drummed his foot on the ground with some irritation. He’d reached the top of the North Tower from what he could tell, but the Divination classroom was nowhere to be seen. He gave out a little snort. This was his sixth year at Hogwarts, and he couldn’t even find his way to a classroom. He checked his wristwatch. He had one minute exactly to meet up with Cecilia Longbottom, and he did not intend to be late. First impressions were lasting, and he always aimed to be punctual.
“The panel above you is a trapdoor. Flick your wand and it’ll open and a ladder will come down,” said a man’s voice from behind him.
“Oh, thank you,” replied Jordan. He drew his wand and flicked it, and sure enough, a thin, spider-webbish ladder came tumbling down toward him.
He turned around to get a look at the person who had informed him as to how to get into the tower, but he was alone. Nobody else was anywhere around. It was a portrait, he realized, rolling his at his own stupidity as he stepped onto the ladder and began to climb. He was so frazzled that he had gotten confused when the portrait spoke, and he’d slipped on the ladder once or twice, which he normally wouldn’t do. But to his relief, he made it in exactly on time, on the dot.
I can see why Haley likes this class so much, was his first thought as he surveyed the classroom with considerable distaste. The room was full of sparkly, gaudy accessories and fluffy chintz armchairs and pouffes clumped in circles, so unlike straight, neat rows of desks that Jordan was used to. A multicoloured, somewhat psychedelic-looking fire burned in the fireplace, and the air was heavily perfumed.
“Lumos,” he said flatly, craving the harsh fluorescent lighting of a normal classroom and only succeeding in partly banishing the shadowed darkness of Professor Trelawney’s lair.
His lit wand illuminated a figure seated on a nearby pouffe that he hadn’t noticed before, causing him to jump. She was a plump, sweet-faced girl a few years younger than Jordan, and she had shiny brown hair and wide, round eyes. “I’m Cecilia,” she introduced herself. “You’re Jordan Potter, right?”
“Yes, I am,” replied the boy in question, sitting down in one of the few armchairs that was not patterned with rainbow swirls and patterns. “I can’t stand this classroom. How is anyone supposed to learn in here?”
“Well, they’re not, are they?” laughed Cecilia. “I mean, it’s Divination, not a real subject.”
“Yes, exactly!” Jordan smirked as he flipped open his marbled composition book and got out a standard self-inking quill. He was rather impressed that Cecilia didn’t appear to be as spacey as her parents, though that wasn’t saying much.“We should try and brainstorm a topic for our project. It’s always best to get a head start on these things.”
Cecilia rested her chin on her hand in thought. “What about a research report on the school’s history?”
“Too broad, and too many people will be doing that sort of thing,” countered Jordan. “We have to think of something more original. How about a piece on inter-house rivalries in Quidditch?”
The girl shook her head. “That’s all based on opinion. The important thing is to stick with the facts and reliable sources.”
Jordan blinked. He always found it refreshing to meet someone whose sense of logic was as keen as his own, and even more refreshing to meet someone who didn’t make fun of his style of speech and didn’t waste time on frivolous banter. Maybe this project would be a success after all. “I suppose it’s important to think about whether we want our project to focus on current inter-house relationships or on the original founders,” he said.
“Yeah. Maybe we could sort of combine the two?” suggested Cecilia. “Both of our families go way back on both sides. It shouldn’t be too hard to find some sources.”
This was a very good idea, and Jordan rather wished that he’d come up with it. But this wish didn’t last for long, because just then, an idea came to him, a stroke of genius out of nowhere. “Let’s make a wizarding genealogy, all the way back to the founders!” He smiled, letting his idea sink in. “It’ll be a lot of work, but I’m sure we can manage if we work hard enough between now and April. And I doubt anyone else will think of doing that. It’ll be interesting, because most wizarding families really are all related. That’s Unity, if nothing else.”
Cecilia nodded enthusiastically. “I say we do it. We’ve got nothing to lose.”
These words triggered something strange in the depths of Jordan’s brain. Memories flashed before his eyes in rapid succession. A gold necklace, a bald-headed figure slumped over on the ground, a wand, the top of a building, a pair of red eyes, Cecilia’s face frozen in a silent scream, and the phrase, “We’ve got nothing to lose,” echoed through his mind.
But… these weren’t memories. They couldn’t be. He’d never spoken to Cecilia until that day, and in his so-called ‘memory,’ her intonation had been different, more serious, her expression grave. Whatever that had been, it wasn’t normal.
“Jordan? Are you all right? You’re not saying anything?” Cecilia was leaning over in her chair, her brown creased slightly with concern.
He snapped back to his senses. “I’m sorry. I’ve, er, had some trouble sleeping lately, and I’m rather tired. I must have been half asleep.”
He’d been having splitting headaches for awhile as well, and his father had assured him that it was just hormones”‘anything that happens to you is bound to be because of hormones at this age.’ Surely the dreams and the weird flashes of images that had just gone through his mind were part of the same thing.
“Well,” he said crisply, “we might as well get a head start on the project.”
Work was his panacea, his remedy for everything” if thoughts of schoolwork filled his head, there was no room left for strange dreams and random mental slideshows. He picked up his quill and began to write.
The Muggle Studies classroom was entirely empty of living things when Haley arrived, but she saw something she liked about it immediately. “Ooh, spinny chairs!” she squealed, and raced over toward one of the many swivel-chairs and plopped herself in it, twirling around several times.
Her particular chair was delightfully spinny, even more so than the one in her father’s office, and she found it odd that such a marvelous seat had been wasted on a computer chair in a Muggle Studies room. This was where Jordan kept his precious laptop, in the only room in the castle where Muggle technology didn’t go haywire, and Haley had never touched it before. She squinted at the computer’s flat, empty black screen”she really did not get these devices at all”and pushed a random button.
The computer let out a spontaneous, faintly menacing beep.
“Eek! Sorry!” squeaked Haley, and she quickly pushed another button, hoping it did not control a self-destruct mechanism.
Instantly, the screen sprung to life and filled with the image of two purple letters: hp. “Whoa, my initials! These things really are smart!” Haley exclaimed out loud. After a few minutes of goggling at the letters, they melted away to reveal a photo of the Beatles, the image covered with many small icons. At the bottom of the screen sat a flat grey box, reading, “1 UNREAD MESSAGE.”
Haley, feeling immeasurably sophisticated and technologically savvy, wiggled the mouse, which didn’t really look like a mouse (she knew computer terms so well, thanks to all of the droning she’d had to endure from her brother) and clicked on the grey box.
POOF! A letter appeared on the screen, neatly typed and signed by…
“Ooh,” Haley realized suddenly. “It’s one of Giorgi’s letters! How does she get them inside the computer screen, I wonder?”
The letter on the screen read:
To: sgtjpepper@magicworks.co.uk
From: rainbowbrite04@interwebs.co.uk
Subj: Alllooooo!!!
Hi, Jordan!!
It’s the Giorginator again! School’s good for me so far, I guess. No, I’m lying. I hate you. I wish I could go to Hogwarts, too, except not really ‘cause I’d flunk everything for not being able to do any magic. FYI, I despise Trigonometry with a burning passion.
Glad to hear it’s nice up in Och Aye Land!!! That assignment you have to do sounds kind of fun, though for some reason, I can’t really imagine you doing a group project. Slave driving? Yes. Cooperating? Nope, not really.
I like hearing about your school and your life, though really, you did not need to tell me that you’ve been having ‘disturbing dreams most likely caused by hormones,’ in your words. PLEASE talk to your dad about this, or a Human Growth and Development Teacher!! DON’T TELL A GIRL!!!! You will never get babes that way, sicko.
Oh, speaking of babes, guess what I wore to school on the first day? Pshh, you’ll never guess, so I’ll tell you. I had on a long black trenchcoat, a top hat, a cummerbund, a bow tie, ancient blue jeans covered in patches made of my old Lion King bed sheets, pink flip-flops, a lime green t-shirt shirt with Mr. Yuck on it, and earrings made of real, live, eat-able cherries. You can imagine all the looks I got for that.
I love being infamous!!!
Cheers,
GIORGI!!!!
Haley had to giggle. Giorgi was so uncool that she was cool sometimes. And as for her brother, whoa”disturbing hormonal dreams, of all things? She’d been convinced that he was immune to hormones of any kind, just like how he was immune to sounding stupid, forgetting homework, and having an imagination. And he’d honestly told this to a girl?
He may be smart, she thought to herself, but he still has a lot to learn about people.
It was then that the door banged open and a teenaged boy catapulted inside. “Sorry I’m late!” exclaimed Anatoly Capshaw, flinging himself into another spinny chair. “It completely, utterly slipped my mind. I was doing Transfiguration homework, and you know how much fun that is.”
Haley simply nodded. She wanted to at least try being a bit cordial to this boy, even if he was a Slytherin, and that meant that she could hardly say, ‘Oh, yeah, suuure, you forgot. You were doing homework. I bet.’
This was the first time she’d ever really seen Capshaw up close, and it was not exactly something she would have minded missing. He was far from good-looking, with bad posture and worse skin, and he wore rectangular wire-rimmed glasses. His teeth were encased in blue braces, which was odd”hadn’t he heard of tooth-straightening charms? Unlike bad eyes, bad teeth were magically fixable. Haley couldn’t say much about the rest of his facial features, because his distractingly, disfiguringly bad acne kept her from noticing anything in particular about them.
His blond hair fell to his shoulders, and it was clear that he was trying for a cool, rebellious look with his long hair. Unfortunately for Capshaw, however, the long curly ringlets that his hair grew into only succeeded in making him look like an overgrown Little Lord Fauntleroy. And his eyes…
Haley raised her eyebrows. Both of them. “Ummm, you, er, should probably look in the mirror, because I think you forgot to change back after you did your self-transfiguration. One of your eyes is blue, and the other one’s sort of a hazellyish colour.”
Capshaw grinned, displaying his braces. “Nope. I was born like this. And it is, in fact, called heterochromia. Surprise! Granger-Weasley’s probably never noticed, though. I wonder if I could get extra credit from her for this…” his voice trailed off. “You didn’t hear that, though, of course.” He shifted in his seat as silence buzzed around them. “Well,” he said awkwardly, “I’m Anatoly.”
“Yeah, I know,” replied Haley. “I’m Haley.”
“Yeah, I know.” More awkward silence.
Finally, Haley said, “You know, Zabini paired us up for this project just because he hates us and he wants us to fail.”
Capshaw nodded. “Does this mean we should work together, if only to prove him wrong? No offense, but you’re rather predictable. And seeing as I’d gladly eat my own legs off if I knew it would reflect badly on Zabini, I’m all too willing to cooperate, if that’s indeed what you’ve been planning.”
“Yeah, that’s probably a pretty good idea.” Haley twirled around in her spinny chair. “So, uh, Capshaw, what should we do?”
“Anatoly,” the boy corrected her. “Come on, I thought you said ‘yeah, I know,’ two seconds ago when I told you my name. Anatoly’s a much prettier name anyway, don’t you think?” He scratched his pimply chin. “Well, shall we play a happy little ‘getting to know you’ kind of game like you do on the first day of kindergarten? Then you can know how much you’ll have to pretend not to hate me.”
Haley laughed. She was pleasantly surprised that he’d agreed so quickly to at least try to work together. She’d been worried that he would declare it was below him to work with a blood traitor like her and stomp away. “Okay, well, like I said, I’m Haley””
“Hi, Haley!” chorused Anatoly sarcastically.
“”and I’m, ermm, a sugar-holic. No, um, anyway, I love to sing and play pranks and I have a dorky twin brother and I want Zabini to drop dead.”
Anatoly blinked his differently-coloured eyes. “I can’t stand Zabini,” he said quietly. “He’s a completely unfair teacher, and I have no respect at all for him.” He grinned suddenly. “Of course, I bet he practically wet his pants when I got an O on my Potions O.W.L.s!”
“I did, too!” exclaimed Haley. “I mean, I got an O on my O.W.L.s. I didn’t wet my pants. But yeah, by the end of last year, I was working a lot harder than before, so my grades were better, too, but I really had no idea that I’d get an O. I bet Zabini burst a blood vessel or two when he saw that.”
Anatoly’s face turned serious again. He slid between moods so quickly that it was almost disconcerting. “Oh, it was the opposite for me,” he said, his voice almost a growl. “I used to be the sort who tried to make up for having no friends with doing homework all the time and getting good grades. But, I mean, I got sick of being the goody-goody in my fifth year, and I just stopped respecting the people who don’t respect me.”
“What do you mean?” asked Haley, confused.
The boy tapped his braces. “Muggle-born,” he explained leisurely. “I’m the first wizard in the Capshaw clan. Let’s just say that some of the other Slytherins don’t take too kindly to that. Especially Zabini and Charybdis Nott, who in my opinion is basically evil incarnate with a little extra thrown in. But surely you’ve noticed?”
Haley’s brows furrowed. She had honestly never noticed, never guessed that there were Slytherins who didn’t hate Muggles. She thought back to the previous year and vaguely remembered Anatoly apologizing for Charybdis’s behaviour, mentioning a birthday card he’d received from Tancred Apple, always sitting alone, being singled out by Zabini all the time…
“You know, I never did notice,” she admitted. “I just thought…”
“Slytherin?” guessed Anatoly with a smile.
“Yeah, I guess.” Haley squinted. “Er, I guess this is kind of personal, but if you’re Muggle-born, then why are you, you know, in Slytherin?”
Anatoly stood and strode across the room dramatically. “Well, I am cynical, sarcastic, sly, resourceful, self-centred, overly theatrical, resourceful, cunning and crafty.” He paused. “Or maybe I just think snakes are cute, look fabulous in green, and like to sneer. I mean, seriously, have you ever heard of a Gryffindor or a Hufflepuff sneering? Yes, I didn’t think so, either.”
He sat down again, draping his legs over the back of the chair. “Nowhere in the job description does it say I have to be a prejudiced git. Plus, I didn’t know the whole Slytherin stigma when I put on the hat in my first year. I just let the hat do whatever it wanted, so long as I didn’t get lice.”
Haley was shocked. This meeting was turning out vastly different than she’d expected. She suddenly realized what it must be like to be Anatoly Capshaw. The Slytherins all hated him because he was Muggle-born, and everyone else hated him because he was a Slytherin.
“You know,” she said slowly, “I thought this whole Inter-House Unity idea was lame, but it might not be a total waste of time.”
“Yeah,” agreed Anatoly. “Too bad it’s never going to happen.”
“Well, at least we can get along, right? Or try to?” Haley exclaimed, starting to get a little bit too excited. “That’s Inter-House Unity right there, right?”
Anatoly sort of guffawed. “Well, it’s not like I have a reputation to worry about. So, let’s see. Small talk. What’s the most clichéd question I can ask? Ooh--do you like flying?”
“Can’t stand it. I’m terrified of heights.”
“Same here, unfortunately. And even more unfortunately, I found this out the day I tried out for Seeker. There’s an interesting story in there, but I’d rather tear out my innards than relate it right now.”
And somehow, no matter how unlikely, they somehow managed to chatter away, talking and goofing off and playing around with Jordan’s computer. (Anatoly managed to create a background of Zabini’s head stuck on a potato with cartoony arms and legs protruding from the sides. Haley couldn’t wait for Jordan to find it.)
They accomplished absolutely nothing on their Inter-House Unity project, but they accomplished quite a lot for Inter-House Unity.
“Nelson Blenkinsopp,” Emma proclaimed loudly at breakfast the next day, gesticulating with her fork in a rather haphazard manner, “is a disgusting little freak.”
“Shh, keep your voice down,” Ivy implored. “It would be horrible if he heard you.”
“Well, I don’t care!” roared Emma. “You wouldn’t, either, if you knew what a sick, twisted pervert he is!”
Ivy shook her head. She wasn’t surprised that Emma had not enjoyed her first Inter-House Unity meeting. After all, her cousin was nothing if not competitive, and she played Quidditch”it was only natural for her to think of people from other houses as ‘the enemy.’ And then again, there was the undeniable fact that Nelson Blenkinsopp really was creepy.
“Well, I liked working with Tabitha. She’s cool.”
Tyrone grinned. “Yeah, I know. It’s a family trait.”
Ivy and Emma exchanged glances.
Tyrone blinked endearingly.
The girls cracked up.
“I don’t know why I bother with you people,” the boy muttered. “You’re a bunch of meanies.”
“Well, anyway, it looks like Jordy’s having fun working on his project,” noted Emma, jerking her head toward her cousin. He’s sitting at the end of the table with a stack of books doing research. “On a Saturday, ew.”
She turned to look at Haley, who was usually quite adamant in her declarations of her brother’s weirdness. But her normally loquacious best friend was silent, scribbling something in her diary and glancing over periodically at the Slytherin table.
“Haley, I feel sorry for you,” mentioned Emma. “I almost forgot, you have to work with that Slytherin. That must have been horrible”I mean, he’s not just a Slytherin, he’s also the biggest loser in the school.”
“Yep,” Haley said absentmindedly, taking a sip of pumpkin juice. A glimpse of a head full of long blond curls caught her eye, and she turned to see Anatoly Capshaw walking past her, out into the hallway. He had been standing right behind her.
“Oh,” breathed Ivy. “He heard you.”
Emma shrugged. “So? He’s a Slytherin.”
Haley opened her mouth to say something, but seemed to think better of it and instead put a bite of sausage in her mouth. She had no need to say anything anyway, because just then, a boy zipped into the Great Hall, and skidded over to the Gryffindor table, panting slightly.
“Hi,” Ted greeted the group. “I know, I’m really late for breakfast. Peeves switched all of the portraits in the corridors near Gryffindor tower, and a bunch of the younger kids got lost coming down. I was running up and down the halls all morning pointing people in the right direction.” He swayed slightly on the spot.
Jordan’s head snapped up from his stack of books, and he turned to look up at Ted. “Ted,” he said suddenly, “you’re not well.”
Ted waved his hand dismissively. “I’m okay. Don’t get--”
He froze.
And suddenly, his eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed, crumpled on the ground.