The Night Culmination

Gerard had already had plenty of lessons with Tristram Cailloux, but never bothered to check whether the Professor looked sad, or like he had some sort of emotional baggage.

It wasn't out of some sort of disrespect, it was just that the idea had never crossed his mind. One day, however, while Cailloux was teaching Transfiguration, Gerard stopped to take a look at the Professor and noticed he had bags under his eyes, looking very tired, and his mouth was a thin line that never smiled. Gerard became curious as to what the Professor's weakness could be -- was it a matter of health? It surely wasn't wealth or family drama. Cailloux was the son of the headmaster, after all, a very powerful and wise man and, while Gerard had never exactly seen the two hanging out together, it was either way known that they had a relationship that was decent at the very least.

"Professor Cailloux is so handsome," Jeanne commented, distracting Gerard from his thoughts. "I'd like to have a boyfriend like that."

"Isn't he a bit too old?" he decided to ask. The only time Gerard had ever had a crush on someone, it was on Madeline, a girl from evening school, and it didn't mean anything, for she laughed at him with all of her friends once he'd tried to kiss her. Since he had a much more promising future -- getting away from his grandparents and becoming an Auror -- he'd decided not to focus on love for some time. However, the idea that a young, bright and beautiful girl like Jeanne could fall for an older Professor didn't seem very wise.

Gerard asked himself briefly whether he liked one of the twins, or Inès, that sort of way, but it seemed too soon to know. He wouldn't ask any of them out on a date, that much was sure.

"Please, class," Professor Cailloux said, rubbing his eyes like one who didn't get much sleep, "Focus on the exercise I gave you, and try to turn the teapot into a mouse. No, sorry, the other way around. Turn the pet of your choice into a teapot."

Filibert giggled, but he got a sour look from Inès. Most of the students had mice, because it was considered tradition for a wizard or a witch to have a familiar, and mice were the cheapest animal you could find out of the ones on the list. Some had tried capturing stray cats, like Inès, whose pet was a small and slender black cat. Both Filibert and Gerard had mice.

Anatole, who always had to catch attention, had, quite obviously, a very well trained King Charles Spaniel.

"What if I turn my mouse into a teacup and then I can't change it back?" Gerard asked Filibert.

"This is the easiest Transfiguration spell," his friend replied. "The Professor probably only wants us to start over again. You should have done it plenty of times during the evening classes before."

But Gerard hadn't, because his grandparents wouldn't let him keep animals, and the school he'd gone to hadn't been really excellent. His mouse was a small white thing and he didn't have a name yet -- the boy had captured it on the first day of school, when he'd noticed most of his friends had familiars.

"Do you know that the legends agree that a familiar could also be an imp?" Inès asked, to no one in particular. "Of course, if imps existed, I would think it very unfair to let them work for us. And Joan of Arc already gives me too much trouble." As she was saying that, she scratched Joan, her cat, between her ears.

The scene made Gerard feel the hollow sensation that he'd never get along with his unnamed pet for long enough to let him (or her?) become his familiar. If another white mouse had entered the room, he would have never been able to understand which one was his and which one wasn't.

Luckily, the spell was turning out quite alright, and every time he changed his pet into a teacup, he was also able to change it back. The lesson continued in a similar manner, until he heard the sound of a chair moving, and felt the presence of someone sitting in the empty place next to him.

Since Gerard was new, even though he got along with a few students already, and Filibert always sat next to Inès (his hopeless crush couldn't go unnoticed), the seat next to Gerard's was almost always empty. Except for that day, when someone had apparently decided to switch places and move next to him.

Gerard raised his eyes, but he had already figured it out. Of course, the person who always messed with his privacy and personal space was Anatole Morin.

"How is the spell turning out?" the Prefect asked. "I can't believe the headmaster said your votes weren't great. You're just as good at this as anybody else."

"Gee, thanks," Gerard couldn't help but reply.

"I mean, you're average. Many people don't want to be," Anatole insisted. "But I think it's a nice thing. It shouldn't be a bad word. You're not great, but not bad either. Average is what everyone should inspire to be, a little bit of white, a little bit of black. It's like... gray."

Gerard looked at Anatole like he was stupid. The Prefect was, in fact, tongue-tied for some reason.

"I don't believe for a second you'd rather be average than great, Morin," Gerard replied. "So if this is your way to say that, after all that has happened to me, I can feel proud that I'm average at most things, keep it to yourself. There's a reason nobody wants to be. Of course you can't understand -- we're not all born lucky."

"B-born lucky?" Anatole was uncharacteristically out of words. "What do you mean? What do you know about me that would possibly..."

"Besides," he added after a short while. "You're Gerard Touchard. You weren't born lucky, but, well, almost."

This enraged Gerard to no end. "That witch killed my parents, amongst the other Guards! It was a terrible thing to do. She betrayed everyone who was working with her, my parents included. Do you really think I was lucky just because when she tried to kill me, I survived? But what is my existence for, if, like you said, I am only average?"

"People don't live to be great," Anatole said, like one who was calming a child who was having a very strange tantrum.

But Gerard's reaction was overdue -- he'd had it bottled up too long. "Maybe you, because you are already born great. The youngest prefect, excellent votes, of sound mind and perfect body. But other people have to work their way to the top, and they are surrounded by people who can't help but tell them how much of a failure they are. Now everyone knows me, and they know who my parents were. If I don't end up like my father, people will be disappointed."

His grandparents, he knew for sure, would be.

Anatole raised an eyebrow. "Is that the reason you decided to go to Auror training?"

Before Gerard could reply that no, in all honesty, he'd also always wanted to learn the way of the sword, and that the only wizards who practiced it were Aurors, the door of the classroom opened.

A young maid entered, and whispered something to Professor Cailloux. He looked like he'd woken up from a deep sleep, and addressed the classroom, "Try your best to look tidy, and change all of the animals into teapots so they don't make a sound! The Queen is coming!"

Even though the Queen had been chosen for her worth as a witch, and she was not of royal lineage, but simply a woman called Sylvaine Larousse, people gave her the credit she was due. The idea of meeting her would make a lot of brave men and women cower in fear that they would do or say the wrong thing.

Gerard wasn't any different. However, when the Queen entered the room, he noticed she was a gorgeous woman in her early forties, with long black hair and lilac eyes. She had a sweet and determined smile on her face, as if she had kindness enough for the whole Wizarding World but at the same time, she hid stories of war hidden in her eyes. She was the one who'd banished Madame Nuit.

In that moment, however, the smile must have been fake, because it crumbled as soon as the Queen took a look at her future Aurors. "I have terrible news to share," she confided. "My confidants didn't want me to tell you, but I decided my future Aurors needed to know. There has been a sighting of Madame Nuit in the city."

"What does she mean about the sighting of Madame Nuit? She's not the full moon," Jeanne whispered to Charline.

"Maybe she's a werewolf," her twin replied.

"Shut up, the two of you," Filibert hissed. "It's the Queen you're making fun of!"

"We don't know for sure that she's going to try and kill people," the Queen said, almost sheepishly. "Because back then, she just killed the other Aurors. There has never been a sign she would go for the people next. But this is why I decided to tell you -- whatever her reasons were, you will become Aurors. The very same category she targeted the last time. I think you need to be warned."

"Maybe the reason she killed those people didn't have anything to do with the fact that they were Aurors," Gerard couldn't help but say. He'd spent the last fourteen years of his life trying to solve his parents' murder. He hadn't come up with any solid conclusion, but most of his leads told him that the fact that the seven innocent people were Aurors was not an indication of what Madame Nuit was after.

"That's an interesting theory, Touchard," the Professor said sharply. "It doesn't change that Madame Nuit is a killer, and she might be loose in the capital as we're speaking. Professor Ardouin and I might leave the school from time to time to check on her, and join the other Aurors."

In fact, the two Professors were also Queen's Guards.

But when Professor Cailloux said this last sentence, he looked at the Queen for longer than it was necessary, with longing in his eyes. Gerard was not the brightest in matters of love, but he understood at once what the gaze meant.

This was why his Professor always looked like that -- he was suffering for unrequited love! It wasn't hard to see he loved the Queen with a sincere feeling that went beyond the usual worshipness.

"We're having a meeting of the Aurors now," Queen Sylvaine told the Professor. "You should join us, Tristram."

The Professor looked at his classroom, but after what he'd understood, Gerard knew he would never say no to his Queen. "Students," he only said. "Retreat to your dorms and don't do anything stupid when I'm gone. My father will probably know -- he has ways."

Gerard couldn't doubt that -- the headmaster was simply too powerful to be questioned.

When the Professor left, he turned to look at his two friends, sitting behind him. "We need to go into the city and see for ourselves if the person they'd seen is Madame Nuit," he said, in a rush. "I read so much about the murder, I would recognize her for sure."

"Are you out of your mind?" Inès cried. "This is not something for the students to take care of!"

"No, but think about it," Gerard explained. "I survived when she tried to kill me. Maybe she'd spared me. After all, while looking through my parents' things, I found this."

Gerard gave Inès a piece of paper written in his father's handwriting. It said, 'look for M.N.' and it was addressed to his son.

"How could he..." Filibert choked. "He wasn't dead yet!"

"Exactly, there's something fishy," Gerard said. "Now, does anyone have a way we can reach the capital?"

"Well, my family lives near here, and my father was working on something..." Filibert started to explain.

"Hold your horses, so to speak," Anatole interrupted the group. After all, he'd heard everything. "I'm a prefect. I can't pretend I haven't heard of your plan before."

"So," he added, before Gerard could say anything. "I'm coming with you."