Chapter 31
The castle had been like a second home to Draco. He’d seen it decked out for two coronations. He’d seen it fortified in war and scorched from war’s defeat. He’d seen elaborate parties and terrifying tribunals. He had thought he had seen the castle every way there was. Until he walked in on the fall equinox and saw how King Harry had transformed it.
The floor of the great entrance was covered in roiling blue cloth, tangled and twisted to resemble ocean waves. All the artwork that had hung on the walls for centuries had been removed. They were replaced with all manner of paintings depicting the ocean, from battles at sea to tranquil beach views. At the edge of the room, from a doorway to another hall, a giant tentacle crept out and up a wall, wrapping around a picture of a fishing boat. Guests were invited to travel through it all by walking upon a wooden pier with rickety planks, so uneven if discouraged guests from lingering too long to admire the room lest a board give out and everyone tumble over. The path led to a great doorway decorated to look like the gangway to board a ship.
Draco had entered right in the middle of the crowd that was led in precisely at 7:00 pm, minutes after sunset. He had wanted to stay reserved, but the eagerness of the crowd was infectious and Draco couldn’t resist the excitement that built every time a guest spotted a new delightful detail. It was better that so many had not even heard of the equinox ball. It made each discovery more thrilling and heightened the suspense of what could possibly be next.
Guards at the door slowly let guests through the door. It led into a darkened hallway, with black sheets hanging over anything that might offer in light. By controlling the amount who could enter at once, the tunnel never got too crowded. But the suspense built, and the tunnel stretched on just long enough to put butterflies in Draco’s stomach. Until he reached the end, and like everyone who came before him, he pushed through hanging cords of rope until he wiggled his way out to the other side and found himself on the deck of a ginormous, enchanting ship.
It was the ballroom, it had to have been the ballroom, but again the room was transformed into something other. The floor was entirely wood, with bulwark built up the side of the walls to resemble the edges of the ship. Two masts had been assembled in the middle of the room, leaving space between them for a polished dance floor. The ceiling and walls were the blue of a perfectly sunny day, with facsimiles of fluffy clouds and seagulls hanging from the ceiling. The boat rose up at either end of the long room, replicating different tiers of decks upon a ship. At the furthest end, at what was clearly intended as the quarterdeck, was the throne of the king. He was too far to see well, but clearly King Harry was dressed as an admiral. Draco couldn’t see the mask beyond the colors of gold and white.
The crowd poured into the room and Draco was pulled forward with it, as if pulled forward by a strong tide. Once he had the space, Draco spun around and did his best to take it all in. He couldn’t help but grin at the illusion that had been created.
There were too many bodies for the room, but more still came. Masked guests were pushed up against each other to make way for more. Some people climbed up on the foc'sle, the forward deck of the imagined ship. They crowded in with the chamber orchestra dressed up as sailors as they played jaunty music. To make more space, guards let only a few attendees up on the quarter deck with the king. Only when they’d fit in as many as they could and everyone stood packed together like sardines, the king rose to his feet. The orchestra stopped playing and the crowd’s murmur dropped to nothing.
“Honored guests,” the king’s voice boomed. It sounded odd from this distance and in so large a space. “Welcome this evening to the fall equinox ball!” He lifted his hands to indicate the decorated space they shared and despite the tight fit everyone still made room to cheer. The cheers echoed into a roar and Draco covered his ears until the king lifted his hands further to silence everyone. “In being here, each of you have joined my crew and set off on a perilous adventure. Imagine not that we have this one night, but that we have traveled at sea for months. We set out in search of glory but find ourselves well and truly lost. We recognize no landmarks, not even the night sky.” At those words the king paused and let the silence linger.
Then there was noise, a rasping, grinding noise. Something mechanical began to crank, and before their very eyes the sky above them moved. Draco looked up like everyone else and saw the beautiful blue sky pulled away, replaced with a dark cloth. At the same time, the strings that hung the clouds and birds were also pulled along. In their place came bright, shinny bulbs of light. When the noise stopped only the darkness and lights remained. They sparkled in front of the black ceiling like stars in the sky. Awed silence hung in the air for a breath, then again the crowd was cheering.
It took longer for the king to silence them, but when the crowd had once again settled the king continued his story. “I implore each of you to help me solve this puzzle and success will not go unrewarded. Whosoever is able to bring me a clue will have the honor to dance with me, your captain. And to assist you with your efforts, I welcome you into the ship to make merry and nourish yourselves on our humble previsions.” At that, two doors were pulled open under the decks at either side of the room. Bright light shown out, illuminating the pathways through to doors that must lead to other rooms. The king bowed to the crowd, and a final cheer rang out, before the crowd began to shift again, rushing out to explore the other spaces the king had prepared for his game.
Draco watched the costumed guests run past. People moved too fast to make out more than the color of their mask and the vague notion of an outfit. He saw stars, planets, foreign fashion, kaleidoscopic colors, and even religious imagery. There was an entire evening ahead of him to discover all the ways the theme had been interpreted. He grinned from ear to ear, but didn’t join in the zealous exploration. At least not yet.
Draco had memorized both invitations by now, but still he pulled one out to read it again. He had thought and thought about it. The King had announced this was a puzzle to everyone, but Draco knew the invitations had to be additional clues. That was the lever to tell those who knew what an equinox ball meant how they were supposed to gain access to the even deeper puzzle underneath.
Draco took a deep breath. Both invitations said it begins at the stroke of seven. He decided to take them at their word. He needed to find a clock.
Draco wasn’t alone in staying in the ballroom, nor was he alone in examining the pieces of the ship. When Draco had explored everywhere but the quarterdeck, which was thoroughly guarded to keep anyone without the coveted clue out, it became apparent there was nothing on deck that matched the description. Draco entered the doorway under the quarter deck instead.
They’d crafted a fine room to resemble the captain’s quarters of a ship under their pretend deck. The actual room was cordoned off, but Draco could see a meeting table, and to the side a desk covered in nautical instruments. Draco glanced behind him. No guards were watching. So he hopped over the cord and walked straight to the desk.
There, at the edge of the desk, was a marine chronometer. The sort they would use to tell time at sea. The face of the clock was stopped right at 7pm. Draco’s grin was interrupted by the inevitable noise of people coming. He dropped to his knees to hide behind the desk. Whoever saw him would either report him for stepping out of bounds or want to know what he had discovered, and Draco wasn’t keen on either of those outcomes. Unfortunately, once people started walking by they didn’t really stop. Draco was trapped there, waiting.
Perhaps it was for the best, because he was right at eye level with the drawer under the chronometer. The drawer had the double spiral of the fall equinox etched into it. Draco’s eyes lit up at the discovery and, as silently as he could, he opened the drawer as far as it could go until he was able to pull it out of the desk entirely. He sat it on the floor and looked inside.
There was a strange metal box inside. Draco pulled it out and looked at the contraption. He saw he could open it, and inside it looked like some sort of stamp. He examined everything more thoroughly and found a few words on the metal contraption. One was on the side, marking that direction as “top”. Then on what Draco supposed was the front, it was labeled “map maker.”
Draco bit a lip, but supposed he had an invitation to lose if this went poorly. He put in one of the invitations, which appeared to be just the right size for the metal box, lining up the top with the label. Then he closed the box down over it. He held it a few seconds, unsure if there were other steps, then opened it to see what had occurred.
It was a stamp! Blue ink left behind just part of a picture. Draco squinted to see it clearly. Was that a tentacle winding across the page? He grinned again, then swiftly pulled out his second invitation and repeated the motions so both held the start of the map.
Draco tried to pack everything silently away when he was through. He then waited for a break in the traffic. He worried it would never come and took the first moment that was even nearly offered. He knew he’d been seen when he heard shouting behind him, voices asking him to stop and tell them what he’d found.
Draco laughed as he ran, committed to gaining a head start over whoever was behind him. He wasted no time navigating through the ropes and back into the dark cavern to the great entrance hall. The guards watched him run back out to the pier where he spotted the tentacle before. However, when Draco tried to step off the pier and go after it the guard held him back.
Draco held up his borrowed invitation, displaying the clue on the map. The observatory message was tucked away in his chest pocket behind his handkerchief. “I have the map, I need to go over there like it tells me.”
“Let me see that,” the guard said, motioning for Draco to turn it over. The guard nodded at what he saw. “Looks like you need two more people if you want to go through.”
Draco gaped at him, wondering what on the page said that. Then he remembered, the Gallery had the number “two” written out, unlike observatory which listed the word “one”. It was a headache now to go back and find someone, but at least Draco would be able to rub in Percy’s face that yes, the numbers had absolutely mattered!
“Right then,” Draco said with a nod, then he charged back into the cave. He grabbed the first two people he saw on the other side. “I have a clue, but I need your help to get to it.”
One was a younger woman with fiery red hair pulled back from her face. Her mask was bright orange and didn’t hide her freckles. Like Luna, she wore trousers instead of a dress. Her clothes were a dusty red, almost rust colored. “Not interested, we’re not playing the game,” she grumbled.
The other was a man older than Draco but still in his prime. He didn’t look like he’d dressed up at all. He was wearing hardly more than workman’s clothes and his plain black mask barely covered any of his broad, good-natured face. His skin was weather-beaten and so freckly that he looked almost tanned. Despite it all, he was striking, in a tall, lean, chiseled sort of way. “Sorry mate, neither of us want to be forced to dance with his majesty,” said the man.
“Like hell would I dance with him. I just want to win the game,” Draco snarked, holding up his invitation to show the clue he had discovered. It started a chortle out of the woman and Draco could tell he had a chance. “Just come with me. I’ll show you the real puzzle and if you hate it you can ditch me once we get there.”
The two exchanged glances. They were playing at curmudgeons but both must have a playful streak. It was the older man who smirked. “All right then, navigator. Show us what you got.”