Allow Me to Exaggerate A Memory or Two :: Chapter Five (5/8)
Prologue | Chapter One | Chapter Two | Chapter Three | Chapter Four | Chapter Five | Chapter Six | Chapter Seven | Chapter Eight
CHAPTER FIVE
arkin's Pincer,” Spencer said, standing back as the wall opened into the Slytherin Common Room.
A nasty fever had left Professor McGonagall in bed and the Slytherin second-years with a free period after lunch, and most of the class had remained in the Great Hall, starting up a game of Dugbog Rising with the deck of cards Snicket always carried in his back. It was a powerful deck-Spencer had almost had his eyebrows singed off last time he played Exploding Snap against Snicket-and Spencer had excused himself from the table and headed back to the Common Room, feeling that he knew where this was going. Sure enough, the first explosion had been heard all the way out into the Entrance Hall.
He was planning to use the emptiness of the dorms to pack properly for the holidays, and it was a surprise to find that he was not, in fact, the only one back in the Slytherin dungeons. Zabini was lounging in one of the sofas, flicking through the last Sunday edition of the Prophet.
“Hey,” he said, catching sight of Spencer. “Aren't you supposed to be in class?”
“I could ask you the same,” Spencer said easily, coming over to sit down in the armchair opposite. Zabini grinned at him.
“I asked first.”
“We have a free period,” Spencer said. “I thought I'd pack.” He raised his eyebrows, and Zabini laughed.
“Yours is better than mine,” he said. “I heard Professor Lupin would be doing the Hinkypunk demonstration with us today, so I'm skipping.”
“Why?”
Zabini shrugged. “I don't like Hinkypunks.”
Spencer hesitated. Although Zabini's tone had been just as casual as before, there was some inflection in it that told him not to ask any further questions.
“You don't like Professor Lupin, then?” he said instead, just for something to say.
Zabini looked surprised. “No, he's all right,” he said. “I mean, I wouldn't usually have skipped his class. I think he explains things well.” He paused, then added, “And because Potter likes him, Malfoy doesn't-and that makes me warm up to him even more.” He grinned, and Spencer did, too. Even though he and Malfoy were now more or less friends, Malfoy's likes and dislikes tended to provoke Spencer to just the sort of stubborn anti-reaction that Zabini was describing.
“So are you doing something fun over the holidays?” Zabini asked then, changing the subject radically-the way he was wont to do, as if he was bored with the previous line of conversation.
Spencer shrugged. “Just the usual Christmas things,” he said. “And there's the party at New Year's.”
He could have kicked himself as soon as he said it. The Smiths' New Year's Party was largely a pureblood event, and Zabini's family was not on the list of invites.
“Do you want to come?” he blurted out. “I can invite friends from school, and it would be fun to have you.”
Zabini gave him a long look, and Spencer felt his face heat up. Zabini always looked as though he heard not only what you said, but what you thought, as well.
“I'm afraid I'm busy already,” he said finally. “We're going to France over Christmas and New Year's.” He shifted position slightly. “Thanks, though.”
“Oh well,” Spencer said, ashamed at the small surge of relief he felt. “I was actually hoping I could get Malfoy to latch onto you for the evening. Guess I'll have to find someone else for that.”
Zabini laughed. “I like how you think, Smith,” he said, and the smile he gave Spencer now was real and amused.
ith the holidays waiting just around the corner, everyone was at their giddiest. The Common Room was even rowdier than normal, and Ryan escaped down to dinner early. It wasn't that he hated the noise as such, but after an hour or two the cool quiet of the corridor came as a welcome change.
A few other students had had the same idea as him, and he saw that Parvati Patil was sitting at the dinner table already, writing a card. She looked up when he came closer and smiled at him.
“Hello, Ryan,” she said. “Are the Weasleys being noisy again?”
“Good guess.” Ryan rolled his eyes, sitting down opposite her. She laughed.
“I thought I'd better finish my things here, rather than try the Common Room,” she said.
He looked at what she was doing. “Shouldn't you have posted those already?” he asked, pointing at the Christmas card she was writing.
“I sent the ones to my family already,” she said, nodding. “But this one's for Hermione. I'm leaving it in our dorm. She's staying here over Christmas, you know. I found a nice card when Lavender and I went shopping in Hogsmeade, and I think she'll like it.”
Ryan nodded. “So how was Hogsmeade?”
Parvati smiled. “It was great,” she said. “It's really nice and cosy at this time of the year, with the snow and everything. And there's candles in all the trees, so they glow like they're filled with fairies, only much warmer.”
“What's it like?” Ryan asked. He hadn't been very interested so far, but Ginny had looked so wistful when her brother left that morning and everyone had looked so happy when they came back, both this time and the last Hogsmeade weekend, that he had begun to wonder what it was all about. “Everyone's talking about it like it's something amazing, but isn't it pretty much like Diagon Alley or some other tuck-away street?”
Parvati put her head to one side. “I guess a little bit. But it's special because the entire village is filled with witches and wizards. No one needs to hide, not anywhere. It's nice.” She shrugged.
“We've been there before with our family, me and Padma, once when we were eight. So when I went there for the last Hogsmeade weekend, it was weird. Things were smaller. Like the post office-I remember the Owlery there like it was huge, bigger than the one at Hogwarts, but it's actually a lot smaller. But cleaner.” She smiled at him. “I think you'd love the post office. And Scrivenshaft's, they sell parchments and quills and things like that, and it's amazing. There are two shelves of ink sorted after colour; it looks as though the colours are melting into each other. Really pretty. And they have parchment sorted by thickness and labelled after what they're suited for, like Letters or Invoices or Essays.”
Ryan laughed. “Essays? Really?”
“They get a lot of Hogwarts students, I guess,” Parvati said, then looked away. “It's a shame you can't go yet. I'd love to see what you think of it.”
“I'd love to go,” Ryan said honestly, because she'd managed to make it sound a lot better than the other people he'd talked to about it (whose enthusiasm had mainly been given to Zonko's Joke Shop). Parvati laughed, ducking her head.
“I'll hold you to that,” she said, which was a bit confusing. “I hope they've caught Black by then, though,” Parvati added then, her smile fading. “If there's one thing that's bad about the Hogsmeade visits, it's going past the Dementors. They creep me out. I hate it when they do that sniffy thing, you know, when they sort of breathe in and the air goes cold. I mean. Colder.”
“I know what you mean,” Ryan said. Every encounter he'd had with the Dementors had left him feeling wretched and strangely queasy-none more so than the one during an orienteering meeting, when he'd flown too close to the Dementors and almost lost control of his broom as he veered sharply away from the hooded figures, acting solely on instinct and not making any conscious decision at all.
He shook himself out of his thoughts.
“Well, I hope you have a good Christmas,” he said. “I mean. If I don't have the chance to say so on Monday.”
Parvati smiled at him. “You too,” she said. “Merry Christmas.”
t was strange being home again, Jon thought. He'd got used to walked through halls filled with fairies and magical crackers, seeing students exchanging singing Christmas cards or try to escape one of the Movable Mistletoes Ginny's twin brothers had enchanted to follow people around. In comparison, his house seemed oddly calm and quiet-even with Mike and Bill fighting over the gingerbread house and the CD player blasting out Christmas songs at top volume.
“Jon!” his mum called. “Tom's on the phone!”
Jon all but threw himself off his chair and hurried into the living room, but he was stopped in the door by his mum, who was blocking the doorway as best she could and holding out the cordless phone to him.
“You could go and talk to him somewhere else,” she hinted, and he caught a hint of wrapping paper and glitter behind her. His parents always wrapped their gifts at the last minute.
He grinned to himself as he took the phone from her. Luna had helped him Charm his gifts for his family, and he felt sure that they would be surprising, if nothing else.
“Hey, Tom!” he said, running up the stairs towards his room. “How are you?”
“Oh, you know,” Tom said, his familiar voice making Jon grin all the more. “All Muddle and regular.”
Jon laughed. “It's Muggle,” he said. “You know that.”
“Yeah, yeah. Anyway, how are things back at the magic castle? Missing it yet?”
“I've been home for a day,” Jon replied. “Not had time yet.”
“So is Christmas over there completely weird or what?” Tom said, trying and failing at nonchalance. “Do you have real Ghosts of Christmas Past or something?”
Jon laughed again. “It's different. But a lot of things are the same.”
He thought back to last year, when Brendon had tried to explain magical Christmas traditions to him.
“-and then we take a fir tree from the forest and have it inside the house,” Brendon said. “We decorate it and fill it with fairies, and then we keep it inside until long after New Year's.”
He looked expectantly at Jon, who tried not to laugh as he said, “Yes, we do that, too. Only we don't use fairies.”
Brendon looked astonished, but Spencer snorted on the other side of the table. “That's not a strictly magical custom, Brendon. Muggles do the same thing. I've always wondered how you manage to keep the trees green, though,” he added, turning back to Jon.
“I don't know, just stick it in some water,” Jon said (directly contrasting his father, who preached the importance of sugar and stomach powder in the water if you wanted a tree that kept its needles for more than three days).
“Really? Guess I learnt that Preserving Charm for nothing.” Spencer rolled his eyes, then smiled at Jon. “I should have just gone Muggle on the thing.”
“Jon?” Tom asked. “You there?”
Jon shook himself out of his thoughts.
“Sorry,” he said. “Guess I do miss it a bit, after all.”
rendon didn't even have time to unpack properly before the Quidditch season was off again. They had a game against Ravenclaw the first weekend back, and Flint had scheduled three practice sessions in the first week.
“Ravenclaws are fast, so we'll be using the speedier line-up of Chasers,” he told them. “But they tend to scatter if intimidated and they have no teamwork to talk about, so Beaters, your job will be to keep them under heavy pressure. We don't need any refined strategies from you-just keep whacking those Bludgers as hard as you can. Matt and Derrick, I want you two for this one.”
Jennifer Bole scowled at him, and he interrupted her protest, “You'll get your turn in the Hufflepuff match, Jen. For that one we'll be needing Beaters who work as a unit.”
“Yeah, you and Derrick will be perfect together for that,” Warrington said, to general sniggers.
Draco nudged his broom closer to Brendon's. “Your first Quidditch match,” he said. “Excited?”
Brendon nodded fervently. “Can't wait.”
“Ravenclaw is a good first match,” Draco said. “They're not too hard to break if you know where to push. Lots of individual talent, but they're not really a team.”
“They managed to beat Hufflepuff though, and I thought Hufflepuff seemed really good,” Brendon said uncertainly. Draco laughed.
“Because they beat Gryffindor? A team of Puffskeins could beat Gryffindor if you could get them on brooms. Don't worry. We'll have this, no trouble.”
avenclaw in the lead, one hundred to thirty!” Jordan shouted into the magical megaphone. “And what a beautiful goal that last one was. Urquhart doesn't stand a chance against Millinger-what a display, I don't think we've seen this kind of flying from the Ravenclaw team since the Urie-Rasti-Feldt combination the year before last. Stunning! Meanwhile, the Snitch hasn't been seen yet, although both Chang and Malfoy are keeping active...”
Jon did a happy little swerve around the goal posts, punching the air. Ravenclaw had dominated the game so far, with Millinger being first on the Quaffle in the majority of toss up situations and stealing it from the Slytherins whenever he wasn't. Jon almost felt bad for Brendon. He and the other two Chasers seemed like a good unit, but Jon knew from experience how extremely unpredictable Millinger could be and he saw that Brendon and the others had difficulty dealing with him. Still, they'd managed some nice teamwork, and with one goal for himself and one assist to Vaisey, Jon thought Brendon should be proud over his first game. Jon, meanwhile, had managed to punch one of Montague's Quaffles out of the way at the very last moment and had saved three of Vaisey's, and felt good about his contribution so far. It wasn't hard being a Keeper today, of course. Despite all the Slytherin Chasers' best efforts, the Quaffle had stayed mainly on the Slytherin half of the pitch.
“And Chang is off!” Jordan shouted. “She's diving, heading for-I think she's seen it! Look at her go! And she's-oh, FOUL!”
The Beater Jon thought was called Bole had swung hard at the nearest Bludger, making it whistle close over Chang's head and causing her to swerve off track, visibly paling.
“That cheating Slytherin-” Jordan was shouting, punctuated by Professor McGonagall's sharp voice asking Mr Jordan to please get back to commenting on the game and leave the refereeing to Madam Hooch, since she at least knew the rules.
Jon realised almost too late that Savic, distracted by the close call to Chang, had lost both his focus and the Quaffle. All three Slytherin Chasers were now bearing down on the Ravenclaw goal area, tossing the Quaffle between them as they headed towards one goal hoop each-Montague the middle one, Vaisey the right and Brendon the left.
They'll have practised Vaisey, but Montague hasn't scored a goal yet, Jon thought, and he feigned darting to his left only to return to the middle goal just as Montague drew his arm back and threw.
Jon took it square in the chest, a textbook catch, and even though he was aware that it might be stupid to antagonise Montague, he couldn't stop himself from grinning.
“Another save from second-year Walker,” he heard Jordan commentate. “That makes a very solid game so far, a good find by captain Davies.”
He looked up to see Brendon giving him a very small thumbs up. “Just you wait,” Brendon called out, but it didn't come even close to sounding like a threat. Jon grinned again, and then something barrelled into him, knocking him off centre and almost sending him into a spin.
“Sorry,” said a voice, and he looked up and saw Montague take both hands off his broom in a placating gesture as Madam Hooch shouted at him, gesticulating wildly. “Sorry, misjudged the distance between us.”
“Unprovoked attack and in the goal area,” Madam Hooch shouted. “Penalty to Ravenclaw!”
Savic put that one away neatly, and one hundred and ten to thirty went some way towards soothing the pain in Jon's shoulder.
The game was starting to look like it could be a long one. Apart from the one dive from Chang, there had been no sign of the Snitch anywhere, and all the Chasers were starting to look tired. Vaisey scored another goal and then Davies and Millinger did one each, putting Ravenclaw ninety points ahead.
And then Malfoy was streaking down the pitch, flattening himself against the handle of his broom. Chang shot after him, but Malfoy's lead only increased. He rolled to avoid a Bludger and flew nimbly past Sagitov, who had appeared in an attempt to block him, and then he was hanging in the air, fist upraised and an almost impossibly pleased expression on his face.
Oh well, Jon thought. At least Montague hadn't managed a single goal.
ith winter still holding the grounds firmly in its grasp, the Herbology classes were being taught in one of the class rooms on the second floor. Spencer, arriving early for the Monday class, looked around for somewhere to sit. The class room was still pretty empty, so there were a lot of places to choose from, but he felt his eyes drawn to a bench in the middle of the class room, empty apart from one person.
He hesitated, but then made up his mind.
“Hi, Jon,” he said.
Jon looked up, startled. “Hi. Um. It's me. I mean, I'm me. Not Ryan.”
“I know,” Spencer said, shrugging off his backpack. “I saw you roll your shoulder. Is it still hurting?”
“A little,” Jon said cautiously.
“Yeah, well, Montague can be an ass. Sorry about that,” Spencer said, then laid a hand on the chair next to Jon's. “OK to sit here?”
“No, yeah, of course,” Jon said quickly. “It's fine. I wasn't holding it for anyone.”
“Cool.” Spencer sat down and pulled his Herbology book out. “I've been looking forward to today. Can't wait to see Professor Sprout's demonstration of defensive repotting.” He kept talking calmly while he unloaded parchment and quills and ink, pretending not to notice Jon's careful agreement to everything he was saying.
You couldn't really stay angry for ever.
rofessor Sprout selected a pot of yellow starthistle and set it on the floor between her and Brendon.
“Now,” she said, “what we want to do here is coax this to bloom. Like we've discussed before, the key words in this instance are unfold and open. Encourage the flower to bloom, don't make it do so. Calmly, now, you try it...”
Brendon concentrated, staring at the small yellow bud.
The bud exploded, spitting white thistledown in all directions.
“Still too much force, I'm afraid,” Professor Sprout said, as the stalk curled and withered before their eyes. Brendon folded his arms, exasperated.
“I'm terrible at this,” he said.
“A bit early to judge that, don't you think?” Professor Sprout said cheerfully.
“I can't do it,” Brendon said, unhappiness pooling in his chest like a hot weight. “I'll never be able to-”
“Everyone has an affinity for different branches of magic,” Professor Sprout interrupted. “It may just be that this isn't yours.” She tapped a finger against her lips thoughtfully. “What is your favourite subject in school?”
Brendon paused for thought. “I like Charms,” he said eventually.
“But?” Professor Sprout prompted.
“I was going to say Flying,” Brendon admitted, “but we don't have Flying as a subject any more.”
“Oh yes, of course,” Professor Sprout said. She looked considering for a moment, then said, “Let's try something. You've done introductory Weather Charms? How would you conjure a breeze?”
Brendon showed the wand movement to her.
“Very good. Now, let's try that without a wand...”
Brendon hesitated.
“What's the matter?” Professor Sprout asked.
“It's-” Brendon scowled, unsure of how to continue. He wished they weren't inside the greenhouse, where windows could crack and pots be swept off their shelves. “I might break something.”
Professor Sprout gave him a long look, then stood up. “Let's go for a walk,” she said.
They went down towards the lake, Brendon looking around him on the way. The school grounds were empty. Many students were still in class, and the weather wasn't nice enough to draw out the ones who weren't.
“Right,” Professor Sprout said. “Let's try to Charm some weather. A breeze, like we talked about. Try it now...”
Brendon concentrated, imagining the magic as it would move through a wand and then re-routing it through his hands instead. He'd never used to think about things like this before, but what his lessons with Professor Sprout had taught him so far was to latch onto the idea of the magic, find the shape and feel of it, and conduct it through different outlets. He was still having problems with control, but he conceded that he had learnt much since Professor Sprout had started coaching him. It was reminiscent of the lessons with Aunt Gwen, with the difference that he now had a lot more magic theory to fall back on. Where Aunt Gwen had told him stories and painted pictures with her words to show him what she meant, Professor Sprout was more technical and used examples from his lessons in school.
He started to form the words for creating wind, then remembered that he shouldn't need them. Instead he brought both hands in front of him, curling his fingers, and thought wind.
He saw it on the surface of the far side of the lake, first-ripples spreading across the surface.
“Very good, Mr Urie,” Professor Sprout said appreciatively. “Very-oh.”
The ripples were growing larger, and now the wind was chasing white-tipped, sharp waves before it. The breeze reached them, and as Professor Sprout pushed him down to the ground, Brendon felt it whip over his head, pulling at his hair and robes.
“Well,” Professor Sprout said when the gale had passed, standing up and brushing herself off, “I think we can work with that.”
“What?” Brendon said. “Professor, that was dangerous! If we'd still been in the greenhouse, I'd have broken the entire house!”
“Just a bit of wind,” Professor Sprout said. “I believe you may have a talent for weather charming. Yes, of course,” she said, stopping Brendon's protest before he had time to say it, “we still have some way to go, but there is potential in this.”
Brendon didn't say anything.
efence Against the Dark Arts had taken a bit of a detour, returning to the first-year curriculum for a short while. During a practical mock exam two weeks before, Professor Lupin had realised that at least half of them lacked good, practical knowledge of even rudimentary Shield Charms, and had with a frustrated expression on his usually mild features decided to dedicate one week to the subject.
Spencer had agreed to work with Brendon for today's exercises after some very legitimate hesitation. He still remembered the knock-out Shield Charm Brendon had hit him with in a practise duel last year-and that had been without even trying. Today, however, Brendon's movements were sluggish and uncertain, and Spencer disarmed him thrice in a row.
“What's the matter?” he asked. “You know how to do a Shield Charm.”
“I'm trying, OK?” Brendon snapped. He had been bad-tempered ever since the start of the lesson, red in the face with concentration and displeasure. “It isn't like I'm stupid or something. But I can't do it like I used to.” He scowled at Spencer, irritation not entirely masking his embarrassment, and Spencer realised that Brendon was talking about his Dark Magic.
“You won't use it at all?” he said softly, glancing around to make sure they weren't being overheard. “But I thought you had to-”
“I won't use it here,” Brendon interrupted. “Come on, try to disarm me again.”
Spencer was about to protest-Brendon clearly wasn't getting anything out of this exercise other than a mounting frustration-but Professor Lupin chose that moment to come up to them.
“Mr Smith, Mr Urie, how about a demonstration of your progress so far?” he said. “Mr Smith, a simple, easily reversible hex, please.”
Spencer glanced at Brendon, then gave a mental shrug and placed himself in duelling position, facing Brendon squarely. He rolled his wand in his hand, then brought it quickly up to point at Brendon, saying the incantation.
“Saetamorphus!”
Brendon's Protego was said only a fraction of a second later, but the Shield Charm was still too late and he ended up glaring at Spencer through a fringe of shocking pink hair.
“Oh, good choice of hex, Mr Smith,” Professor Lupin said, straight-faced. “Mr Urie, if you'll permit...” He placed himself right next to Brendon with his wand in duelling position, shaking back the sleeve of his robe to display his wand arm better.
“I see where you're going wrong,” he said. “Your pronunciation is good and you have very good reflexes-all that time on a broom, I imagine.” He smiled at Brendon, who smiled back without great enthusiasm. “The problem is in your wand movement, which is at the moment much too sloppy and time-consuming. In defending oneself against people who'd wish one harm, every second is of value. So instead of bringing your arm up straight like this,” he demonstrated, “try to bend your elbow, making the movement more natural and fluid. Let's try that together a few times...”
He glanced up and smiled at Spencer. “You're welcome to try as well, Mr Smith.”
Spencer resisted rolling his eyes.
“Try it now,” Professor Lupin said, watching Brendon's arm closely. “Just mime the movement.”
Brendon did so, obviously chafing at having to practise something so elementary.
“Still too slow,” Professor Lupin said, frowning thoughtfully. “Let's see if we can't find some way to make the movement easier.” He gave Brendon a considering look. “I believe your role in the Quidditch team is Chaser, Mr Urie, is that right?”
Brendon nodded.
“Then let us try a Quidditch metaphor,” Professor Lupin said. “Imagine I was throwing a Quaffle at you. How would you catch it?”
Brendon looked sceptical, but laid his wand aside and mimed catching a Quaffle in both hands.
“Good,” Professor Lupin said. “Let's work with that. Try to use that same movement when performing a Shield Charm-just the one arm, of course, but that same fluidity of movement. Mr Smith, if you could oblige us with another hex...”
Spencer once again took up duelling position, facing Brendon.
“Tarantallegra!”
“Protego!”
“Very good, Mr Urie,” Professor Lupin said as Brendon laughed shortly, looking almost surprised to find himself still standing with both feet firmly on the ground. “A marked improvement. Keep on in the same fashion and you will do very well. As you see, it does not pay to think too hard about the magic-rather, do what comes naturally.”
Brendon grinned, a genuine smile of amusement, and Spencer did, too. Professor Lupin couldn't know what that meant to Brendon, of course.
“Keep practising, both of you,” Professor Lupin said. “I will check in with you later.” He nodded at them and turned away. “Miss Claque! I notice you've managed to turn Miss McCall's nose blue.”
Spencer raised his eyebrows at Brendon and was relieved to see that Brendon's bad humour seemed to have evaporated.
“Time to switch?” he said, and Brendon laughed.
“Sure, let's see if you learned anything from that.” He shook his sleeve down from his wrist, striking a threatening duelling pose. “What shall I hit you with?”
“Before you decide that,” Spencer said, “just remember who has the power to change your hair back.”
Next chapter
CHAPTER FIVE
arkin's Pincer,” Spencer said, standing back as the wall opened into the Slytherin Common Room.
A nasty fever had left Professor McGonagall in bed and the Slytherin second-years with a free period after lunch, and most of the class had remained in the Great Hall, starting up a game of Dugbog Rising with the deck of cards Snicket always carried in his back. It was a powerful deck-Spencer had almost had his eyebrows singed off last time he played Exploding Snap against Snicket-and Spencer had excused himself from the table and headed back to the Common Room, feeling that he knew where this was going. Sure enough, the first explosion had been heard all the way out into the Entrance Hall.
He was planning to use the emptiness of the dorms to pack properly for the holidays, and it was a surprise to find that he was not, in fact, the only one back in the Slytherin dungeons. Zabini was lounging in one of the sofas, flicking through the last Sunday edition of the Prophet.
“Hey,” he said, catching sight of Spencer. “Aren't you supposed to be in class?”
“I could ask you the same,” Spencer said easily, coming over to sit down in the armchair opposite. Zabini grinned at him.
“I asked first.”
“We have a free period,” Spencer said. “I thought I'd pack.” He raised his eyebrows, and Zabini laughed.
“Yours is better than mine,” he said. “I heard Professor Lupin would be doing the Hinkypunk demonstration with us today, so I'm skipping.”
“Why?”
Zabini shrugged. “I don't like Hinkypunks.”
Spencer hesitated. Although Zabini's tone had been just as casual as before, there was some inflection in it that told him not to ask any further questions.
“You don't like Professor Lupin, then?” he said instead, just for something to say.
Zabini looked surprised. “No, he's all right,” he said. “I mean, I wouldn't usually have skipped his class. I think he explains things well.” He paused, then added, “And because Potter likes him, Malfoy doesn't-and that makes me warm up to him even more.” He grinned, and Spencer did, too. Even though he and Malfoy were now more or less friends, Malfoy's likes and dislikes tended to provoke Spencer to just the sort of stubborn anti-reaction that Zabini was describing.
“So are you doing something fun over the holidays?” Zabini asked then, changing the subject radically-the way he was wont to do, as if he was bored with the previous line of conversation.
Spencer shrugged. “Just the usual Christmas things,” he said. “And there's the party at New Year's.”
He could have kicked himself as soon as he said it. The Smiths' New Year's Party was largely a pureblood event, and Zabini's family was not on the list of invites.
“Do you want to come?” he blurted out. “I can invite friends from school, and it would be fun to have you.”
Zabini gave him a long look, and Spencer felt his face heat up. Zabini always looked as though he heard not only what you said, but what you thought, as well.
“I'm afraid I'm busy already,” he said finally. “We're going to France over Christmas and New Year's.” He shifted position slightly. “Thanks, though.”
“Oh well,” Spencer said, ashamed at the small surge of relief he felt. “I was actually hoping I could get Malfoy to latch onto you for the evening. Guess I'll have to find someone else for that.”
Zabini laughed. “I like how you think, Smith,” he said, and the smile he gave Spencer now was real and amused.
ith the holidays waiting just around the corner, everyone was at their giddiest. The Common Room was even rowdier than normal, and Ryan escaped down to dinner early. It wasn't that he hated the noise as such, but after an hour or two the cool quiet of the corridor came as a welcome change.
A few other students had had the same idea as him, and he saw that Parvati Patil was sitting at the dinner table already, writing a card. She looked up when he came closer and smiled at him.
“Hello, Ryan,” she said. “Are the Weasleys being noisy again?”
“Good guess.” Ryan rolled his eyes, sitting down opposite her. She laughed.
“I thought I'd better finish my things here, rather than try the Common Room,” she said.
He looked at what she was doing. “Shouldn't you have posted those already?” he asked, pointing at the Christmas card she was writing.
“I sent the ones to my family already,” she said, nodding. “But this one's for Hermione. I'm leaving it in our dorm. She's staying here over Christmas, you know. I found a nice card when Lavender and I went shopping in Hogsmeade, and I think she'll like it.”
Ryan nodded. “So how was Hogsmeade?”
Parvati smiled. “It was great,” she said. “It's really nice and cosy at this time of the year, with the snow and everything. And there's candles in all the trees, so they glow like they're filled with fairies, only much warmer.”
“What's it like?” Ryan asked. He hadn't been very interested so far, but Ginny had looked so wistful when her brother left that morning and everyone had looked so happy when they came back, both this time and the last Hogsmeade weekend, that he had begun to wonder what it was all about. “Everyone's talking about it like it's something amazing, but isn't it pretty much like Diagon Alley or some other tuck-away street?”
Parvati put her head to one side. “I guess a little bit. But it's special because the entire village is filled with witches and wizards. No one needs to hide, not anywhere. It's nice.” She shrugged.
“We've been there before with our family, me and Padma, once when we were eight. So when I went there for the last Hogsmeade weekend, it was weird. Things were smaller. Like the post office-I remember the Owlery there like it was huge, bigger than the one at Hogwarts, but it's actually a lot smaller. But cleaner.” She smiled at him. “I think you'd love the post office. And Scrivenshaft's, they sell parchments and quills and things like that, and it's amazing. There are two shelves of ink sorted after colour; it looks as though the colours are melting into each other. Really pretty. And they have parchment sorted by thickness and labelled after what they're suited for, like Letters or Invoices or Essays.”
Ryan laughed. “Essays? Really?”
“They get a lot of Hogwarts students, I guess,” Parvati said, then looked away. “It's a shame you can't go yet. I'd love to see what you think of it.”
“I'd love to go,” Ryan said honestly, because she'd managed to make it sound a lot better than the other people he'd talked to about it (whose enthusiasm had mainly been given to Zonko's Joke Shop). Parvati laughed, ducking her head.
“I'll hold you to that,” she said, which was a bit confusing. “I hope they've caught Black by then, though,” Parvati added then, her smile fading. “If there's one thing that's bad about the Hogsmeade visits, it's going past the Dementors. They creep me out. I hate it when they do that sniffy thing, you know, when they sort of breathe in and the air goes cold. I mean. Colder.”
“I know what you mean,” Ryan said. Every encounter he'd had with the Dementors had left him feeling wretched and strangely queasy-none more so than the one during an orienteering meeting, when he'd flown too close to the Dementors and almost lost control of his broom as he veered sharply away from the hooded figures, acting solely on instinct and not making any conscious decision at all.
He shook himself out of his thoughts.
“Well, I hope you have a good Christmas,” he said. “I mean. If I don't have the chance to say so on Monday.”
Parvati smiled at him. “You too,” she said. “Merry Christmas.”
t was strange being home again, Jon thought. He'd got used to walked through halls filled with fairies and magical crackers, seeing students exchanging singing Christmas cards or try to escape one of the Movable Mistletoes Ginny's twin brothers had enchanted to follow people around. In comparison, his house seemed oddly calm and quiet-even with Mike and Bill fighting over the gingerbread house and the CD player blasting out Christmas songs at top volume.
“Jon!” his mum called. “Tom's on the phone!”
Jon all but threw himself off his chair and hurried into the living room, but he was stopped in the door by his mum, who was blocking the doorway as best she could and holding out the cordless phone to him.
“You could go and talk to him somewhere else,” she hinted, and he caught a hint of wrapping paper and glitter behind her. His parents always wrapped their gifts at the last minute.
He grinned to himself as he took the phone from her. Luna had helped him Charm his gifts for his family, and he felt sure that they would be surprising, if nothing else.
“Hey, Tom!” he said, running up the stairs towards his room. “How are you?”
“Oh, you know,” Tom said, his familiar voice making Jon grin all the more. “All Muddle and regular.”
Jon laughed. “It's Muggle,” he said. “You know that.”
“Yeah, yeah. Anyway, how are things back at the magic castle? Missing it yet?”
“I've been home for a day,” Jon replied. “Not had time yet.”
“So is Christmas over there completely weird or what?” Tom said, trying and failing at nonchalance. “Do you have real Ghosts of Christmas Past or something?”
Jon laughed again. “It's different. But a lot of things are the same.”
He thought back to last year, when Brendon had tried to explain magical Christmas traditions to him.
“-and then we take a fir tree from the forest and have it inside the house,” Brendon said. “We decorate it and fill it with fairies, and then we keep it inside until long after New Year's.”
He looked expectantly at Jon, who tried not to laugh as he said, “Yes, we do that, too. Only we don't use fairies.”
Brendon looked astonished, but Spencer snorted on the other side of the table. “That's not a strictly magical custom, Brendon. Muggles do the same thing. I've always wondered how you manage to keep the trees green, though,” he added, turning back to Jon.
“I don't know, just stick it in some water,” Jon said (directly contrasting his father, who preached the importance of sugar and stomach powder in the water if you wanted a tree that kept its needles for more than three days).
“Really? Guess I learnt that Preserving Charm for nothing.” Spencer rolled his eyes, then smiled at Jon. “I should have just gone Muggle on the thing.”
“Jon?” Tom asked. “You there?”
Jon shook himself out of his thoughts.
“Sorry,” he said. “Guess I do miss it a bit, after all.”
rendon didn't even have time to unpack properly before the Quidditch season was off again. They had a game against Ravenclaw the first weekend back, and Flint had scheduled three practice sessions in the first week.
“Ravenclaws are fast, so we'll be using the speedier line-up of Chasers,” he told them. “But they tend to scatter if intimidated and they have no teamwork to talk about, so Beaters, your job will be to keep them under heavy pressure. We don't need any refined strategies from you-just keep whacking those Bludgers as hard as you can. Matt and Derrick, I want you two for this one.”
Jennifer Bole scowled at him, and he interrupted her protest, “You'll get your turn in the Hufflepuff match, Jen. For that one we'll be needing Beaters who work as a unit.”
“Yeah, you and Derrick will be perfect together for that,” Warrington said, to general sniggers.
Draco nudged his broom closer to Brendon's. “Your first Quidditch match,” he said. “Excited?”
Brendon nodded fervently. “Can't wait.”
“Ravenclaw is a good first match,” Draco said. “They're not too hard to break if you know where to push. Lots of individual talent, but they're not really a team.”
“They managed to beat Hufflepuff though, and I thought Hufflepuff seemed really good,” Brendon said uncertainly. Draco laughed.
“Because they beat Gryffindor? A team of Puffskeins could beat Gryffindor if you could get them on brooms. Don't worry. We'll have this, no trouble.”
avenclaw in the lead, one hundred to thirty!” Jordan shouted into the magical megaphone. “And what a beautiful goal that last one was. Urquhart doesn't stand a chance against Millinger-what a display, I don't think we've seen this kind of flying from the Ravenclaw team since the Urie-Rasti-Feldt combination the year before last. Stunning! Meanwhile, the Snitch hasn't been seen yet, although both Chang and Malfoy are keeping active...”
Jon did a happy little swerve around the goal posts, punching the air. Ravenclaw had dominated the game so far, with Millinger being first on the Quaffle in the majority of toss up situations and stealing it from the Slytherins whenever he wasn't. Jon almost felt bad for Brendon. He and the other two Chasers seemed like a good unit, but Jon knew from experience how extremely unpredictable Millinger could be and he saw that Brendon and the others had difficulty dealing with him. Still, they'd managed some nice teamwork, and with one goal for himself and one assist to Vaisey, Jon thought Brendon should be proud over his first game. Jon, meanwhile, had managed to punch one of Montague's Quaffles out of the way at the very last moment and had saved three of Vaisey's, and felt good about his contribution so far. It wasn't hard being a Keeper today, of course. Despite all the Slytherin Chasers' best efforts, the Quaffle had stayed mainly on the Slytherin half of the pitch.
“And Chang is off!” Jordan shouted. “She's diving, heading for-I think she's seen it! Look at her go! And she's-oh, FOUL!”
The Beater Jon thought was called Bole had swung hard at the nearest Bludger, making it whistle close over Chang's head and causing her to swerve off track, visibly paling.
“That cheating Slytherin-” Jordan was shouting, punctuated by Professor McGonagall's sharp voice asking Mr Jordan to please get back to commenting on the game and leave the refereeing to Madam Hooch, since she at least knew the rules.
Jon realised almost too late that Savic, distracted by the close call to Chang, had lost both his focus and the Quaffle. All three Slytherin Chasers were now bearing down on the Ravenclaw goal area, tossing the Quaffle between them as they headed towards one goal hoop each-Montague the middle one, Vaisey the right and Brendon the left.
They'll have practised Vaisey, but Montague hasn't scored a goal yet, Jon thought, and he feigned darting to his left only to return to the middle goal just as Montague drew his arm back and threw.
Jon took it square in the chest, a textbook catch, and even though he was aware that it might be stupid to antagonise Montague, he couldn't stop himself from grinning.
“Another save from second-year Walker,” he heard Jordan commentate. “That makes a very solid game so far, a good find by captain Davies.”
He looked up to see Brendon giving him a very small thumbs up. “Just you wait,” Brendon called out, but it didn't come even close to sounding like a threat. Jon grinned again, and then something barrelled into him, knocking him off centre and almost sending him into a spin.
“Sorry,” said a voice, and he looked up and saw Montague take both hands off his broom in a placating gesture as Madam Hooch shouted at him, gesticulating wildly. “Sorry, misjudged the distance between us.”
“Unprovoked attack and in the goal area,” Madam Hooch shouted. “Penalty to Ravenclaw!”
Savic put that one away neatly, and one hundred and ten to thirty went some way towards soothing the pain in Jon's shoulder.
The game was starting to look like it could be a long one. Apart from the one dive from Chang, there had been no sign of the Snitch anywhere, and all the Chasers were starting to look tired. Vaisey scored another goal and then Davies and Millinger did one each, putting Ravenclaw ninety points ahead.
And then Malfoy was streaking down the pitch, flattening himself against the handle of his broom. Chang shot after him, but Malfoy's lead only increased. He rolled to avoid a Bludger and flew nimbly past Sagitov, who had appeared in an attempt to block him, and then he was hanging in the air, fist upraised and an almost impossibly pleased expression on his face.
Oh well, Jon thought. At least Montague hadn't managed a single goal.
ith winter still holding the grounds firmly in its grasp, the Herbology classes were being taught in one of the class rooms on the second floor. Spencer, arriving early for the Monday class, looked around for somewhere to sit. The class room was still pretty empty, so there were a lot of places to choose from, but he felt his eyes drawn to a bench in the middle of the class room, empty apart from one person.
He hesitated, but then made up his mind.
“Hi, Jon,” he said.
Jon looked up, startled. “Hi. Um. It's me. I mean, I'm me. Not Ryan.”
“I know,” Spencer said, shrugging off his backpack. “I saw you roll your shoulder. Is it still hurting?”
“A little,” Jon said cautiously.
“Yeah, well, Montague can be an ass. Sorry about that,” Spencer said, then laid a hand on the chair next to Jon's. “OK to sit here?”
“No, yeah, of course,” Jon said quickly. “It's fine. I wasn't holding it for anyone.”
“Cool.” Spencer sat down and pulled his Herbology book out. “I've been looking forward to today. Can't wait to see Professor Sprout's demonstration of defensive repotting.” He kept talking calmly while he unloaded parchment and quills and ink, pretending not to notice Jon's careful agreement to everything he was saying.
You couldn't really stay angry for ever.
rofessor Sprout selected a pot of yellow starthistle and set it on the floor between her and Brendon.
“Now,” she said, “what we want to do here is coax this to bloom. Like we've discussed before, the key words in this instance are unfold and open. Encourage the flower to bloom, don't make it do so. Calmly, now, you try it...”
Brendon concentrated, staring at the small yellow bud.
The bud exploded, spitting white thistledown in all directions.
“Still too much force, I'm afraid,” Professor Sprout said, as the stalk curled and withered before their eyes. Brendon folded his arms, exasperated.
“I'm terrible at this,” he said.
“A bit early to judge that, don't you think?” Professor Sprout said cheerfully.
“I can't do it,” Brendon said, unhappiness pooling in his chest like a hot weight. “I'll never be able to-”
“Everyone has an affinity for different branches of magic,” Professor Sprout interrupted. “It may just be that this isn't yours.” She tapped a finger against her lips thoughtfully. “What is your favourite subject in school?”
Brendon paused for thought. “I like Charms,” he said eventually.
“But?” Professor Sprout prompted.
“I was going to say Flying,” Brendon admitted, “but we don't have Flying as a subject any more.”
“Oh yes, of course,” Professor Sprout said. She looked considering for a moment, then said, “Let's try something. You've done introductory Weather Charms? How would you conjure a breeze?”
Brendon showed the wand movement to her.
“Very good. Now, let's try that without a wand...”
Brendon hesitated.
“What's the matter?” Professor Sprout asked.
“It's-” Brendon scowled, unsure of how to continue. He wished they weren't inside the greenhouse, where windows could crack and pots be swept off their shelves. “I might break something.”
Professor Sprout gave him a long look, then stood up. “Let's go for a walk,” she said.
They went down towards the lake, Brendon looking around him on the way. The school grounds were empty. Many students were still in class, and the weather wasn't nice enough to draw out the ones who weren't.
“Right,” Professor Sprout said. “Let's try to Charm some weather. A breeze, like we talked about. Try it now...”
Brendon concentrated, imagining the magic as it would move through a wand and then re-routing it through his hands instead. He'd never used to think about things like this before, but what his lessons with Professor Sprout had taught him so far was to latch onto the idea of the magic, find the shape and feel of it, and conduct it through different outlets. He was still having problems with control, but he conceded that he had learnt much since Professor Sprout had started coaching him. It was reminiscent of the lessons with Aunt Gwen, with the difference that he now had a lot more magic theory to fall back on. Where Aunt Gwen had told him stories and painted pictures with her words to show him what she meant, Professor Sprout was more technical and used examples from his lessons in school.
He started to form the words for creating wind, then remembered that he shouldn't need them. Instead he brought both hands in front of him, curling his fingers, and thought wind.
He saw it on the surface of the far side of the lake, first-ripples spreading across the surface.
“Very good, Mr Urie,” Professor Sprout said appreciatively. “Very-oh.”
The ripples were growing larger, and now the wind was chasing white-tipped, sharp waves before it. The breeze reached them, and as Professor Sprout pushed him down to the ground, Brendon felt it whip over his head, pulling at his hair and robes.
“Well,” Professor Sprout said when the gale had passed, standing up and brushing herself off, “I think we can work with that.”
“What?” Brendon said. “Professor, that was dangerous! If we'd still been in the greenhouse, I'd have broken the entire house!”
“Just a bit of wind,” Professor Sprout said. “I believe you may have a talent for weather charming. Yes, of course,” she said, stopping Brendon's protest before he had time to say it, “we still have some way to go, but there is potential in this.”
Brendon didn't say anything.
efence Against the Dark Arts had taken a bit of a detour, returning to the first-year curriculum for a short while. During a practical mock exam two weeks before, Professor Lupin had realised that at least half of them lacked good, practical knowledge of even rudimentary Shield Charms, and had with a frustrated expression on his usually mild features decided to dedicate one week to the subject.
Spencer had agreed to work with Brendon for today's exercises after some very legitimate hesitation. He still remembered the knock-out Shield Charm Brendon had hit him with in a practise duel last year-and that had been without even trying. Today, however, Brendon's movements were sluggish and uncertain, and Spencer disarmed him thrice in a row.
“What's the matter?” he asked. “You know how to do a Shield Charm.”
“I'm trying, OK?” Brendon snapped. He had been bad-tempered ever since the start of the lesson, red in the face with concentration and displeasure. “It isn't like I'm stupid or something. But I can't do it like I used to.” He scowled at Spencer, irritation not entirely masking his embarrassment, and Spencer realised that Brendon was talking about his Dark Magic.
“You won't use it at all?” he said softly, glancing around to make sure they weren't being overheard. “But I thought you had to-”
“I won't use it here,” Brendon interrupted. “Come on, try to disarm me again.”
Spencer was about to protest-Brendon clearly wasn't getting anything out of this exercise other than a mounting frustration-but Professor Lupin chose that moment to come up to them.
“Mr Smith, Mr Urie, how about a demonstration of your progress so far?” he said. “Mr Smith, a simple, easily reversible hex, please.”
Spencer glanced at Brendon, then gave a mental shrug and placed himself in duelling position, facing Brendon squarely. He rolled his wand in his hand, then brought it quickly up to point at Brendon, saying the incantation.
“Saetamorphus!”
Brendon's Protego was said only a fraction of a second later, but the Shield Charm was still too late and he ended up glaring at Spencer through a fringe of shocking pink hair.
“Oh, good choice of hex, Mr Smith,” Professor Lupin said, straight-faced. “Mr Urie, if you'll permit...” He placed himself right next to Brendon with his wand in duelling position, shaking back the sleeve of his robe to display his wand arm better.
“I see where you're going wrong,” he said. “Your pronunciation is good and you have very good reflexes-all that time on a broom, I imagine.” He smiled at Brendon, who smiled back without great enthusiasm. “The problem is in your wand movement, which is at the moment much too sloppy and time-consuming. In defending oneself against people who'd wish one harm, every second is of value. So instead of bringing your arm up straight like this,” he demonstrated, “try to bend your elbow, making the movement more natural and fluid. Let's try that together a few times...”
He glanced up and smiled at Spencer. “You're welcome to try as well, Mr Smith.”
Spencer resisted rolling his eyes.
“Try it now,” Professor Lupin said, watching Brendon's arm closely. “Just mime the movement.”
Brendon did so, obviously chafing at having to practise something so elementary.
“Still too slow,” Professor Lupin said, frowning thoughtfully. “Let's see if we can't find some way to make the movement easier.” He gave Brendon a considering look. “I believe your role in the Quidditch team is Chaser, Mr Urie, is that right?”
Brendon nodded.
“Then let us try a Quidditch metaphor,” Professor Lupin said. “Imagine I was throwing a Quaffle at you. How would you catch it?”
Brendon looked sceptical, but laid his wand aside and mimed catching a Quaffle in both hands.
“Good,” Professor Lupin said. “Let's work with that. Try to use that same movement when performing a Shield Charm-just the one arm, of course, but that same fluidity of movement. Mr Smith, if you could oblige us with another hex...”
Spencer once again took up duelling position, facing Brendon.
“Tarantallegra!”
“Protego!”
“Very good, Mr Urie,” Professor Lupin said as Brendon laughed shortly, looking almost surprised to find himself still standing with both feet firmly on the ground. “A marked improvement. Keep on in the same fashion and you will do very well. As you see, it does not pay to think too hard about the magic-rather, do what comes naturally.”
Brendon grinned, a genuine smile of amusement, and Spencer did, too. Professor Lupin couldn't know what that meant to Brendon, of course.
“Keep practising, both of you,” Professor Lupin said. “I will check in with you later.” He nodded at them and turned away. “Miss Claque! I notice you've managed to turn Miss McCall's nose blue.”
Spencer raised his eyebrows at Brendon and was relieved to see that Brendon's bad humour seemed to have evaporated.
“Time to switch?” he said, and Brendon laughed.
“Sure, let's see if you learned anything from that.” He shook his sleeve down from his wrist, striking a threatening duelling pose. “What shall I hit you with?”
“Before you decide that,” Spencer said, “just remember who has the power to change your hair back.”
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