The Second Curse
Liam, Michael and Fortney went out into the hallway and up the stairs to the Entrance Hall. The castle was silent and still, a silence that was eerie and foreboding. Liam did not wish to be away from Lara when she received whatever sign she was waiting for, but there were things to do, and he was the one to do it.
First, he checked the front door. Professor DeVere had put a charm on it, not to prevent someone from leaving, but to signal and record any entrance or exiting. Liam waved his wand, revealing the charm and the current status: no one had entered the castle or left it since McGonagall and the others departed for the banquet.
The three boys climbed the Grand Staircase to the library and checked in with Philip. “After the ruckus with Dennison and the prefects,” said Philip, “it’s been quiet. How is Lara?”
“She’s still acting spooky. She says we’re waiting for a sign. I guess we’ll know it when we see it.”
“I suppose you’re right,” said Philip. “We’re closing up at nine, but there’s quite a bit of ‘end of the month’ stuff to do. There’s still a large stack of books to put away. Madam Pince wants to show us how she reconciles the register. We’ll be sending out overdue notices as well. Hopefully, we’re out of here by ten.”
“Be on your guard,” warned Liam. “Walk your girl to her common room and then get back to the Den.”
“She’s not my girl,” said Philip, blushing. “But I’ll take your advice.”
The next stop was the practice room on the second floor. Predictably, it was empty. “I’m trusting the Gryffindors to keep a handle on my brother,” he told the others. “Let’s check on this chess tournament.”
They walked to Ravenclaw tower. There were two large study rooms in the common area at the lower end of the tower, and there were chess games going on in each room. The other Hufflepuffs came to Liam’s side as soon as they saw them.
“Is anyone still playing?” asked Liam.
Roderick, a Fifth Year, the eldest of the players, shook his head no. “Ava here lasted the longest of all of us, but she was just eliminated.”
“I had to play three Seventh Year boys in a row!” said Ava. “The last one got me.”
“Yeah, but you sent two of those Seventh Years packing,” said Roderick. “She beat Mageford and then Ellsworth.”
“Good job,” said Liam, and he gave the young girl a pat on the back. “I want to check in with DeVere, and then I want all of you back in the Den.”
Professor DeVere was in the second room. Umberto Calais was battling Arnold Brent while two Ravenclaws faced off at another table. DeVere went over to Liam, and they spoke out in the hallway.
“The Slytherin prefects were watching Dennison and company,” said Liam, “but Dennison threw Peruvian Darkness Powder at Quillan and he slipped the net.”
DeVere nodded. “How are things up at Gryffindor tower?”
“Loud and rowdy,” said Liam, “but the prefects are watching the door. And my brother is having too good a time to come down and rumble with the Slytherins. I’m taking my group back to the den.”
“You have strong Hufflepuff instincts,” said DeVere. “I’m reminded of something that happened here during the war. A group of Death Eaters attacked the castle one night. Ernie MacMillan gathered all the Hufflepuffs to their common room and secured it against attack before venturing out to help Potter repel the invaders.”
“That’s exactly what I intend to do, sir,” said Liam.
“Hopefully, we will see each other at breakfast after a good night’s sleep.” It was a nice sentiment, but even then, Liam doubted it would play out that way.
As they left, Liam asked, “Who was that bloke DeVere was talking about?”
“Oh, Ernie MacMillan,” said Michael. “He was a Hufflepuff during the Potter years. Fought during the battle of Hogwarts.”
“Not as famous as Cedric Diggory?”
“No,” admitted Michael. “But he’s still alive, which is a point in his favour.”
Back in the common room, Liam sent the younger students to bed. “Read a book or stay up and talk,” he told them, “but stay put. We’re still expecting some trouble tonight. Fifth and Sixth Years,” he repeated, “I want you ready to go at a moment’s notice.”
In a corner of the front room sat Belladonna. She had changed from her skirt into trousers and swapped her school shoes for athletic trainers. Her wand was in her lap. Despite his instruction that she go to bed, Bell looked ready to follow Liam into battle.
Her brother Benedict watched her from the shadows of the hall leading to the boys’ dormitories. He saw the expression on his sister’s face, noted her change of clothes and shoes and knew what she intended to do. If she goes, I had better go with her, he told himself. He went back to his room to change his shoes.
At nine o’clock, the library closed. Madam Pince asked the girls from Ravenclaw, who were still in the study room talking, to return to their common room. Philip and Pauline put away the last of the books that had been turned in that day. They spent the next forty-five minutes reconciling the registers and sending out over-due notices.
At ten minutes to ten, Pince let them go. Pauline stopped at the girl’s restroom. When she came out, she was surprised to find Philip waiting for her. “You could have left,” she said. “It’s been a long night.”
“Yes, it has,” said Philip. “I’d like to walk you to your common room, if it’s alright with you.”
“It’s too far out of your way,” protested Pauline. “Nothing is going to happen.”
They walked together down the Grand Staircase to the Entrance Hall. There, Pauline opened the door to the straight stairs. The stairwell was completely black.
“Why is it so dark?” asked Philip, alarmed. “Those torches should be lit!”
“It’s no big deal,” said Pauline. “Just a dumb prank.” She relit the torches with her wand.
“I should walk you to your common room,” said Philip.
“Hark, it’s fine. My common room is barely one hundred meters from this spot. You’re being sweet, but I’m really fine.” She gave him a hug and then began to descend the staircase.
Philip’s sense of alarm, of dread, and impending doom, did not diminish. It only grew with each step she took. When she reached the archway at the bottom of the stairs, he drew his wand and followed her.
It had been great fun, ditching Q and Jim. Aiden wasn’t worried about Q – he knew that Peruvian Darkness Powder would not hurt her, that it was an easy enough thing to dispel. Of all the things Reginald Dennison could have done to her, Darkness Powder was fairly harmless.
The boys ran up the Grand Staircase to the third floor. There, Dennison stopped and pulled from the pocket of his cloak a handful of black masks. They looked like ski masks, but the fabric was cool and silky. “What are these for?” asked Aiden. “They’re going to know it’s us.”
“The masks have anti-tracking charms on them,” said Dennison. “Put them on.” He pulled one over his own head, and the others followed suit.
They kept off the Grand Staircase from there on out, using the older, narrower ones in the castle corners to make their ascent all the way to the Fifth Floor. There was no one up that at that time of night. The Fifth Floor had mostly offices for the professors. It was Friday night, and everyone had gone home or to the banquet honouring McGonagall.
After a half hour meandering along the hallways past darkened offices, they took another stairwell all the way down to the dungeons. There, they lingered in the dark, for Dennison was going around, shutting off torches. Aiden thought this was foolish. It’s only going to tell the prefects where we’ve been.
It was in that next half hour that Aiden truly began to doubt that the fight with the Gryffindors would really happen. The prefects know the place where the duel is to take place. As soon as we show up there, they will take us by the ears and put us to bed.
He gazed at Dennison, who was so quiet and still, he seemed to be meditating. What are you up to? Aiden wondered. Why are we here?
As if in answer to his question, Dennison asked, “Time, Thompson?”
Aiden checked his watch. “It’s almost nine.”
“We need to relocate.” Dennison brought them to the vicinity of the Slytherin common room, but not all the way inside. It was near the place where they had ambushed Ben Took, only to be foiled by Alyssa’s charm.
Another slow wait followed, in which no one said a word and no other student passed by. Finally, there were some voices. It was Reid Mageford, Blake Ellsworth and Arnold Brent coming home from the chess tournament. Brent was talking. “I did alright. I held my own, which is more than you two could say. I don’t get as much practice as those Ravenclaw boys get.”
From those brief words, Aiden inferred that Brent had done better than the other two in the tournament, but a Ravenclaw had bested him in the end.
After the Seventh Years passed, Dennison got up and put out the torches on the straight stairwell.
In the silence, Aiden pondered their position and tried to guess Dennison’s next move. One thing was finally clear to him. “We’re not dueling the Gryffs tonight, are we.”
“You disappoint me, Thompson,” said Reginald. “You are supposed to be the smart one. The challenge to the Gryffindors was a feint. It gave the prefects something to do, something to focus on. They made a plan, and they executed it perfectly. They are smug now in their certainty that they have stopped me, but Patrick Wren was not my target. Not tonight, at any rate.”
Dennison’s taunts burned in Aiden’s gut, but he pushed away his anger and focused on the problem at hand. Who is the target, if not Patrick Wren? Who is still out there? Who would come this way?
And then, he knew. My God. Pauline!
“You’re not going after Langlet, are you?” asked Aiden.
Dennison’s tight-lipped smile was creepy and snakelike. “That Mudblood has been a stain on our House for too long. It’s time we taught her a lesson.”
“Are you mad?” said Aiden. “We can barely handle the Little Coven. You want to challenge Morwena Felwich?”
“Whatever Felwich does,” said Dennison, “it will be too late.”
“No!” said Aiden. He pulled off his mask. “I’m not doing this. I don’t want any part of it.” Terrill pulled his mask off, too.
Dennison, in the dark, had already drawn his wand. He made two quick strikes. “Stupify! Stupify!” Aiden and Terrill collapsed to the floor.
“Get these two out of my sight,” said Dennison coldly. “And then, get ready. She is coming.”
Carter and Jones dragged Thompson and Reese to an unused storage room that was nearby. To keep them from interfering any further, Carter added Petrificus Totalus. Then, they rushed back to where Dennison waited in the dark, staring at the darkened archway.
It wasn’t long before they heard voices at the top of the stairs. The torches were relit, and then Pauline Langlet appeared in the archway.
Dennison moved quickly to block her path to the common room. “You think you can fool me with your creepy mask, Dennison?” she asked. “I know it’s you.”
“You have been a stain, and embarrassment to our House all these years. You represent a corruption of Slytherin ideals. It’s time someone did something about it.”
“It’s been a very long day, Dennison,” said Pauline. “I don’t have time for this. Get out of my way.”
Right behind her, a tall shadow loomed in the archway, backlit by the torches, and a deep voice called out, “Leave her be!”
“It’s Wren!” cried Dennison. “Get him!” He was wrong, but no one corrected him.
Carter darted quickly to his right, but with a flick of his wand, Philip knocked him down with a perfect, silent Petrificus Totalus. Dennison and Jones sent hexes at Philip, but he dismissed them with quick slashes of his wand. Philip’s counterattack sent the younger boys scrambling for cover. Jones retreated in the direction of the Slytherin common room. Dennison tried to use Pauline as a shield from Philip’s attacks while continuing to block her path forward.
Pauline, though, was not defenseless. She drew her own wand and sent a jet of scalding water at Dennison, burning his hands and the skin exposed by his open collar. “You bitch!” he cried.
And then, it happened. He pointed his wand at Pauline and uttered an incantation. What he said, none present could later recall, for it was in an unknown tongue. Yet, the sound of it would haunt their darkest dreams for years to come. Even Aiden and Terrill, stunned and frozen, tucked away in the storage room, heard its echo and despaired.
Pauline collapsed to the floor.
Dennison stood over her and gloated, while Philip and Jones were momentarily stunned. Philip was the first to react. With two quick twirls of his wand, he conjured a dozen yellow birds and hurled them down upon Dennison and Jones. The birds, shrieking with rage, rent the boys’ masks and slashes their hands with razor sharp claws. Hard beaks pounded down upon their heads. The boys fled in terror.
Philip rushed to Pauline’s side. She lay where she had fallen, in an awkward, unnatural posture. “You’re no Healing Arts student,” he told himself. “Get help.”
He quickly conjured another six birds. “I need Liam and Lara, now!” he told them. They shot off like fighter jets towards the Hufflepuff common room.
He knelt beside Pauline and straightened her neck, back and legs. His fingers slipped gently through her hair. Philip longed to look into her green eyes, but her lashes stayed closed. Her chest was hardly moving at all. Is she dying? he wondered.
“Please don’t die,” he whispered. “I’ve loved you for so long. I’m sorry that I never had the courage to tell you. You can’t die now. I haven’t even got to kiss you properly.”
As soon as the word crossed his lips, the thought became a compulsion, a desire too strong to withstand. He bent over her and, taking her chin gently between his fingers, he pressed a kiss into her lips.
Pauline pulled in a breath; the first deep breath she had taken since the curse hit her. But otherwise, she did not move, and her eyes stayed closed.