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ppettigrew
Fic: Escaping Wonderland (Peter, PG)
Written for the ithurtsmybrain gen challenge. Only about two weeks late.
Title: Escaping Wonderland
Characters: Peter Pettigrew, Louise Pettigrew, Dumbledore, Bellatrix, Snape, various Slytherins, McGonagall, Poppy Pomfrey…and Alice in Wonderland, from Through the Looking Glass.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 8,505
Warnings: GENFIC. Gen gen gen. If this gets any genner, I'll be drummed off of LJ. Also, if you're worried about spoilers...there aren't any.
Disclaimer: These characters are the property of J.K. Rowling - likewise the profits.
Author's Note: Done for the ithurtsmybrain gen challenge on LJ. Mine was 38. Peter Pettigrew (HP) and Alice (Alice in Wonderland). And for thistlerose, for whom I promised a story involving a Marauder-era male kitten some time ago.
Summary:...which do you pick:
Where you're safe, out of sight,
And yourself, but where everything's wrong?
Or where everything's right
And you know that you'll never belong?
And whichever you pick,
Do it quick...
--Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, "On the Steps of the Palace," Into the Woods
***
Peter Pettigrew had been at Hogwarts for a month, and he hated it.
Furthermore, he had a deep dark suspicion that he was always going to hate it.
It isn't that there's anything wrong with Hogwarts, he thought as he lay on his bed in Gryffindor Tower petting Nathan, his grey kitten-familiar who was sleeping on his chest. At least, not as far as anyone else is concerned. I don't know how the other Muggleborn kids do it.
Peter had had high hopes of Hogwarts at first. The delivery of his Hogwarts letter on his eleventh birthday had been a welcome surprise, at least to him. His mother and his grown-up sisters had felt quite differently, but then witchcraft equalled wickedness in his mother's mind, and always had. As for his sisters...well, Mildred had thought he had sent the letter to himself to show off, and Rose had thought that someone was playing a nasty joke on him. Judith had been the only one who had made a practical suggestion: send the owl back to this "Albus Dumbledore" with a very cold, correct note. "Nine chances out of ten, Mum," Judith had said, "that'll be the end of it, and you'll have at least expressed your displeasure."
To Peter's everlasting humiliation--it was a nice letter, even if the wizarding school business was completely impossible--his mother had done just that.
Three days later, Albus Dumbledore arrived at their door, to explain a few things.
Once he'd walked in (and Peter still couldn't remember his mother inviting Dumbledore to do so), he started asking questions. "Well, Peter," he said, looking down on Peter from what seemed to be an immense height, "how old were you when strange things started happening around you?"
Peter had gaped at him. "S-seven," he managed to stammer out at last through nearly paralysed lips. "I was seven."
"Ah," Dumbledore had said, sounding immensely pleased. "And what, precisely, did happen?"
"Fires," snapped Louise Pettigrew, gripping Peter by the shoulders "Fires flaring up every time he gets angry or upset. Glasses bursting. Windows exploding. For four years now. I couldn't tell you how many times I've had to replace things he's broken. I'm surprised we've even got a lease, considering how much damage he's done!"
Peter hung his head. "I don't mean to, Mum," he said softly. "It just...happens."
His mother regarded him sternly. "Animals can't control themselves. People can."
"That's not fair!" Peter protested, scowling. "I try to control it. I do."
"Don't pout, Peter. You're far too old for that. Children pout. Very little children."
"Fires and explosions are quite common manifestations of power among wizarding children," Dumbledore interrupted, beaming genially at both of them.
Louise Pettigrew snorted. "Except he's not a wizarding child, then, is he? Peter's just an ordinary boy--with a few powers he shouldn't have. And he'd be much happier without, I can tell you. The priests and nuns at his primary were scared of him--not that I blame them, really. What do you do with a boy who makes the blackboard crack or who starts fires on the ceiling whenever he gets angry?"
"What about his friends?"
"Oh, well. He gets on fine with them--"
"I don't have any friends," said Peter miserably.
"Nonsense!" said Louise Pettigrew. "There are boys you play with, I've seen you!"
Peter looked up at his mother. The expression in his eyes was centuries old. "They aren't my friends," he said quietly. "We play together because they're afraid of what I might do if we didn't. They don't want to end up being turned into toads or something. But they don't like me, and they don't trust me. They think I'm a mutant or an alien or a freak. And I guess they're right, if I'm a wizard. There's no way that being a wizard is normal."
"How would you like to meet some children just like yourself?" asked Dumbledore, his eyes gleaming. "Magically gifted children? A whole school of them?"
"And what's the point of that, then?" demanded Peter's mother as she crossed her arms. "Put all of them together so that they can burn the school down?"
"We teach them how to use their powers responsibly," Dumbledore replied in a forbidding tone. "We cannot ignore their abilities; as you have noted yourself, such powers are dangerous when left alone and uncontrolled. Hogwarts teaches its students how to use their powers in beneficial ways, rather than…well, setting fires and the like. Do you think you'd like that, Peter?"
"Yes," Peter said. "Not the doing-magic part. But learning how not to do magic would be cool." He smiled wistfully. "I'd like to be normal."
Louise Pettigrew glanced doubtfully at Dumbledore and shook her head. "I don't think they'll teach you that, Peter."
"Why don't you believe it?" said Dumbledore genially.
"Because it's not reasonable! Who'd send children to a school for wizards to make sure that they didn't become wizards? No one sensible, I'll tell you that for nothing. It'd be foolish, and I don't believe you're a fool." She shook her head. "No, Peter. You're not setting a foot in that place."
Peter's face fell. "But wouldn't it be better if I knew how not to set fires and blow things up?"
"It certainly would be better for the boy to get control of his powers," Dumbledore interposed. "And safer for those around him, too."
Louise Pettigrew looked frightened. "No," she said, her voice trembling. "If you take him off to that school, you'll be teaching him how to use those powers of his, not how not to use them. And that's wrong. He doesn't need powers that'll make him feel stronger and better and finer than those around him."
Dumbledore's eyebrows escalated almost to his hairline. His face took on the expression of an indulgent father humouring a stubborn child's folly. "You don't want him to be a good wizard?"
"I'd rather he were a good man."
"The two are not mutually exclusive."
She shook her head. "I read stories about wizards and witches when I was little. They were always transforming people into flowers and toads, and cursing whole towns, and placing princesses in enchanted sleep."
A puzzled glance. "Well, yes, that's fairly accurate--"
"Who gave them the right to put people to sleep for hundreds of years, or curse an entire town because they were that mad at one person? Or turn people into things? Yes, they had the power to do that--but it wasn't fair, casting spells on people who couldn't fight back! And what's worse is, they felt as they were entitled to do it." She shivered. "It's wrong. It's evil. I won't have it, and I won't have my boy taught to think that way."
"Mrs. Pettigrew...don't you trust your son to behave as honourably as you've taught him to do?"
"I wouldn't trust an angel to behave honourably if he were told that he could do anything and no one would tell him no."
"Surely some Muggles--non-magical people, pardon me--also believe this."
"That's not the point," she retorted. "Normal people have limits--money, position, influence. And that's bad enough. You're talking about magic. And with magic you can do absolutely anything. Far too much power, and far too much temptation. No. The answer is no."
"Your son's magic will not go away simply because you don't want him to possess it," said Dumbledore, and Peter puzzled over the sympathy in the man's voice. "If he is not taught, it will simply spiral further out of control. He needs the training. Without it..." A deep sigh. "He hasn't a hope of a normal life."
Peter envisioned himself in rags as he picked through rubbish bins in search of something to eat while a black cloud of magic encircled him like a tornado, exploding buildings and slaughtering anyone who came near him. All because he couldn't control what he did. "Maybe you could remove the magic with a spell?" he asked.
Dumbledore shook his head gravely. "I fear not. That would involve tampering with your basic metabolic structure. I couldn't do that--not and have you remain human, at least."
Peter shuddered.
"Well," said his mother, shuddering as well, "I thank you for your time and trouble, Mr Dumbledore, but I don't think we'll take you up on your offer. It'll be much better for Peter if he grows up a normal boy, and learns to control this--this unfortunate magic of his, rather than giving in and letting the power take him over. I daresay it won't be easy, but he'll do it."
"What about you, Peter?" Dumbledore asked, smiling as if it were an effort. "Do you want to learn magic?"
Peter shook his head. "No. I already told you, I want to learn how NOT to do it. I want to be like everyone else."
"Not a high ambition," murmured Dumbledore. "There is nothing wrong with being different."
Peter said nothing. This was evidently another lie that grownups liked to tell themselves. Of course there was something wrong with being different from everyone else. His mother didn't want him to be different. His teachers didn't want him to be different. The kids with whom he'd attended primary school hated the difference. He'd never met a single person--well, not a real person, wizards didn't count--who had thought that magic was all right. Even he didn't think so, and it was his magic.
Dumbledore sighed, and adopted another tack. "Suppose you could learn how not to set fires and how not to make things explode. Would you be willing to attend Hogwarts then?"
Peter studied the old man's expression. "Could I go home once I knew those things?"
"Once you have complete control of your powers, you may indeed go home. And," he added, turning to Peter's mother, "neither the building nor the students or staff will be at risk. There are any number of protection spells at Hogwarts. Your son's magic will not do any damage."
Peter's mother hesitated. "Well..."
And that had been when things had become a bit blurry. Peter didn't remember what Dumbledore had said next, but he did recall that the man's words had made complete sense. He also remembered his mother nodding in agreement to virtually everything that Dumbledore said--even things that he could have sworn that she had vehemently disagreed with earlier. Before he knew what had happened, his mother had agreed to send him to Hogwarts--with the proviso that once he had complete control over his magic, he could go home.
It had been fascinating--at first. He'd liked Diagon Alley, and the Hogwarts Express and the boat ride. It had been a brand-new world that he'd never dreamt existed, and he'd loved it all without reservation.
One month later, he'd come to the grim conclusion that the wizarding world was a great place to visit, but he didn't want to live here. Small, idiotic things--things that didn't bother those who had been raised in the wizarding world--kept turning into enormous stumbling blocks.
Take pens. Peter couldn't understand what the wizarding world had against pens. What was so holy about a quill, anyway? Quills were pretty, of course, and soft, and felt nice. But a plume from the tail feather of a peacock didn't come close to a ballpoint pen. Quills snapped. The nibs of quills broke, and then you had to carve a new nib before you could write with the quill again. And you had to grind the ink you used. God help you if you thinned it too much or not enough, for in that case you had blackish water or a lumpy black fluid, neither of which were legible. A ballpoint pen was easier. It ran better. It didn't leak or break at every opportunity. And they could be ordered wholesale from factories. Heck, the school could probably do a profitable business selling pens--not to mention pencils and rubbers.
The same went for mass-produced paper instead of parchment (which, half the time, still had hairs stuck to it) and notebooks instead of scrolls. Paper and notebooks worked better, and were easier to get hold of than parchment and scrolls. Why did the wizarding world keep clinging to the past?
And light. Peter hated the lighting in the castle. Candles. Torches. Firelight. He had a hard time reading by flickering light, and the light itself was so dim that it made his eyes ache from strain. How he missed electric light! Of course, his teachers had told him that nothing electrical worked at Hogwarts. They hadn't been able to explain why Hogwarts didn't use kerosene lamps or gaslight, however.
The robes were horrible, too. Peter couldn't abide the robes. For his money, they were nothing but long black dresses, and he felt like a sissy wearing them...even though he wasn't the only one wearing the damned things. Girls wore dresses, after all. Not boys. He was supposed to be in long trousers by now, not traipsing around in a black bathrobe with sleeves that caught on things and knocked them over, and with a hem that he tripped over fifteen times a day.
Outside of class, he stubbornly wore the three pairs of long trousers that his mother had bought in addition to the robes. He might have to wear the robes for classes, since they were school uniforms, but he wasn't going to wear them any other time, not if he could help it. He was still standing firm on that, despite the fact that every time McGonagall or Azoth or Flitwick caught him wearing trousers instead of robes, Gryffindor House lost points--much to the exasperation of his roommates. Peter told himself he didn't care. There was a principle involved. He wasn't going to pretend that all wizarding stuff was wonderful or that all Muggle ideas were bad. And he wasn't going to forswear where he came from, either.
Though, to be honest, that would have been simpler. Certainly a lot of people would have liked him better for it. His roommates, for one.
There were three of them, and only one had a sane, normal name--James Potter. The other two, who were clearly the victims of evil parents, were named Sirius and Remus. However, having an ordinary name was the only thing that James and he had in common. In fact, it was practically the only thing he had in common with any of them. James and Sirius were purebloods--the aristocrats of the wizarding world--while Remus was a halfblood, the son of a pureblood wizard and a Muggleborn witch. All three had grown up thinking of magic as normal and everyday; talking to them was difficult, at least if he wanted to say more than "Hello, how are you, how's the weather?"
Remus seemed to be a nice enough fellow--a bit quiet and sickly, but all right. James was a perpetual motion machine, always running, jumping, flying or fighting with Sirius. Peter knew already that he would never keep up with James, for James was one of those designated by fate to be perfect. James was good at the only sport that mattered at Hogwarts, though, since he was a first year, he wasn't allowed to play for a school team yet. James was brilliant in class. James had scads of charm, and was liked by everyone. He was funny, brave, imaginative. Peter had the feeling that destiny had sent James to Hogwarts to give the rest of the students something to aspire to.
And then, of course, there was Sirius. Who was, not to put too fine a point on it, a bit of a problem.
The problem was that Sirius was the eldest son of a rich and powerful wizarding family, and he acted the part. Snobbish, arrogant, proud, far better educated than Peter and infinitely better versed in class issues--he was pure Sloane Ranger, right down to the elitist, prep school attitude. He fought constantly with James--largely because their parents didn't like each other much. Something to do with politics. He treated Remus with an indifference that bordered on contempt. And as for Peter himself…well, Peter had heard every comment known to wizards about the ugliness, ignorance, stupidity, cowardice and general loathsomeness of Mudbloods.
"I can't help being a Mudblood," he'd protested at first, before he'd known that "Mudblood" was a racial slur. "I was born that way, same as you were born a pureblood. You didn't pick and neither did I. It's just random."
Sirius had thrashed him for that.
Peter had tried a couple of more times before deciding that Sirius was impervious to reason. Nowadays, he just tried to stay out of Sirius's way and kept silent when Sirius started making racist remarks. James and Remus kept looking at him, as if they expected him to say something or do something, the way a bold, brave Gryffindor should. But what would be the point? Protesting just got him beat up. And he couldn't fight Sirius; at least, he couldn't fight Sirius and win. Sirius was bigger--and stronger.
It would have been bad enough if Sirius had been the only one twitting him about his ancestry. But he wasn't. A large gang of Slytherins--the youngest of them an eleven-year-old first year named Severus Snape, and the oldest a fourteen-year-old called Rodolphus Lestrange--had made it their mission to show Peter and all the other Muggleborns in the school just how unwanted they were here.
Peter knew about bullies; he'd suffered taunting at his old school because of his magic. But the Slytherins went beyond normal bullying; they hated Muggleborns with an adult ferocity.
Peter dreaded being caught in the corridors between or after classes, for that was when the Slytherins were likely to attack. He'd been hit with Confundus Curses that addled him for days.They stole his wand as a matter of routine, and constantly threatened to snap it or burn it if he didn't do what they said. He'd been cursed with boils, had his legs locked together, been frozen in the Full-Body Bind while Bellatrix Black set fire to the cuffs and collar of his robes. Once they had nearly drowned him in a toilet. And there were blank spots in his memory now. He suspected they'd been using Memory Charms on him. The fact that they could and would use magic to reshape his mind frightened him most of all.
He'd become a frequent visitor to the infirmary. Poppy Pomfrey unravelled the curses and healed the burns.
But she never asked him who had done this. Not that he could tell--Peter knew perfectly well that any tattling would have him praying for the mercy of death the next time--but he would have expected a staff member to want to know who was responsible.
And no one--prefect or staff--ever, ever tried to stop it.
They'll kill me one of these days, he thought, and knew that his assessment was completely accurate.
If only he could go home. It wasn't perfect, but it was real. It made sense. He could even understand his mother hating magic. He did, by now.
Now he could see why Dorothy had longed so fiercely to escape from Oz, and return to the dull, grey Kansas she'd always known.
A sudden, startling thought occurred to him: Why not go home?
The more he thought about it, the more reasonable it sounded. Why not go home? Dumbledore had said that he could leave once he knew how not to set fires or blow things up, and that hadn't happened for nearly a month now. That was the longest time he'd ever gone without causing a disaster. Well, since he was seven, anyway.
There had to be someone he could ask about this. Not Dumbledore. Dumbledore made him nervous. McGonagall, maybe. After all, she was his head of house. For now, anyway.
Peter sat up, ignoring the squalling of Nathan as he did so. Putting his kitten on his bed, he stood up, grabbed his wand from the night table and headed for the stairs leading to the common room. Better to go and talk to McGonagall now, while his roommates weren't around to ask where he was going and what he was going to do once he got there.
He was just about to start down the stairs when a streak of grey leaped from Peter's bed and barrelled to the top of the staircase. Nathan sat down in front of Peter, glaring defiantly, as if to say that Peter had better not try running out on this kitten again.
Peter gazed helplessly at his familiar. "But, Nathan...I can't take you with me. I can't carry you; I've got to keep my wand arm free in case I run into the Slytherins."
Nathan yawned.
"They're nothing to yawn about," Peter snapped. Then he shivered. "They scare me. They scare me a lot."
Nathan ostentatiously began to wash his front paws, as if to express his total indifference to the human race in general and to bullies in particular.
Peter heaved a sigh that was at least two sizes too big for him. "Fine," he said, scooping up the kitten. "But you're going to stay in the pocket of my robes, all right? No jumping out or scratching or anything." So saying, he scooped Nathan up, carefully placed the kitten in his pocket and starting searching for the quickest route to McGonagall's office.
***
Inevitably, he got lost.
It wasn't his fault. He simply didn't know all of the movements for the staircases; which ones required hopping, or dancing a jig, or skipping the seventh step from the bottom on alternate Tuesdays. More than one staircase began moving while he was still on it, forcing him to cling to the banister with both hands. As he clung, he struggled not to think about what would happen if he fell God-alone-knew how many hundreds of feet onto cold hard flagstones before the staircase grounded itself on a landing once more.
After this happened several times, Peter--without quite realising he was doing so--began searching for alternatives to staircases. He walked down miles of corridors, dodged around shady corners and searched for portals through tapestries and behind statues. Anything was better than being on a staircase that was moving and not connected to anything.
He tried very hard to ignore the fact that his location was looking more and more unfamiliar each second.
I'm not lost. I'm...exploring. Yes, that's it.
He shoved away the portion of his mind that was demanding to know exactly where he was exploring, and how he was going to get back to Gryffindor Tower, and kept walking.
He saw some odd things as he walked along.
At the end of one corridor was an alcove with a window seat. A chessboard holding a half-finished chess game was resting on the window seat. Something on the chessboard...or maybe the chessboard itself...was snoring. The snoring made Peter deeply uneasy, and he hurried away.
One room had a small door through which Peter could barely squeeze, though he was anything but a large child. Once in, he found himself in an alien forest, filled with cool shade, dappled sunlight filtered through green leaves, and enormous trees that seemed to stretch to infinity.
It was fortunate, perhaps, that Peter was a city boy; thoughts of exploring this wilderness simply did not occur to him. He hung back, staring at the trees, wondering what they were and where they were...and what he was, too, for that matter.
The sudden loss of his name didn't frighten Peter as much as it annoyed him. Have to go back the way I came, he thought. I know that I had a name before I came in here.
Nevertheless, it took a fair bit of time. Even after he turned around to leave, Peter could not remember what a door was, or how a doorknob worked. That he got out at all was an accident; he simply pushed too hard on the door and ended up falling flat on his face in the corridor. He lay there for a few moments as his memory flooded back. Then slowly he stood up on nervous and tottering legs, stared very hard at the green light shining in the forest within the room--and bolted.
Shortly after that, he came upon a hallway containing nothing but a mirror. He approached it cautiously; he didn't think any harm could come from a mirror, but doubtless Snow White's stepmother had once thought the same way.
It looked like a mirror, but it didn't reflect anything in the hallway. Most assuredly it did not reflect him. Instead, it seemed to be a window, and through that window Peter could see a railway carriage. On the left side of the compartment was a bearded man, all dressed in white paper and reading a newspaper. Beside him was a goat clad in formal man-about-town clothes. Across from the man and the goat was a little girl with long fair hair. She was clad in the kind of clothes Peter had seen in E. Nesbit's fairy tales about Victorian children: a porkpie hat with a feather, a skirt with a row of tucks round the bottom, a muff, striped stockings and pointed black shoes. She looked no more than seven or eight years old, and appeared to be half asleep.
The weird thing about the scene--aside from the fact that it was in a mirror at all--was that the compartment appeared to be going sideways. It made Peter feel rather dizzy.
"But...you're travelling the wrong way," he said at last in a helpless voice, as if this, on top of all the other bizarre things that had happened since he came to Hogwarts, was really too much.
The little girl turned to him and stared, a puzzled expression sweeping across her face.
A frisson of fear ran up Peter's spine. She heard me. She's somewhere else, some other time, some other world...but she heard me.
And then a sound like a window being slammed shut reverberated from the mirror--and the compartment vanished, and the mirror was only a mirror once more.
Peter gulped, and stared at the mirror. He didn't particularly want to stare at the mirror. He was just afraid of what it might do if he looked away. He was already trapped in one magical world, and he couldn't bear the idea of being pulled into another.
"An ickle Mudblood wandering around where it isn't supposed to be," said a gloating, unpleasant voice from down the hallway. "Stupid little Mudbloods should know better. Could get in terrible trouble.
Slowly, dreading what he was about to see, Peter turned toward the voice--and nearly received a hex in the face. Only a swift dodge to the right saved him.
The speaker was Evan Rosier, a tall, arrogantly handsome blond boy of fourteen or so who was regarding Peter with a contemptuous smile. Beside Rosier was his constant shadow, Theophilus Wilkes, a dark stocky boy with a perpetually mulish scowl. Behind Wilkes was Carlisle Avery, who had once promised to kill Peter's whole family. "They'd be safe if you hadn't shoved your way in where you didn't belong," he'd added, with the air of a judge handing down a sentence. "It'll be your fault when they die screaming in agony. Maybe I'll even let you watch."
In the centre of the group was Bellatrix Black, a tall, elegant girl of thirteen with long, Victorian-style, sausage-shaped black curls and pale eyes. Bellatrix specialised in charming adults into thinking she was sweet, and she was very good at it. Peter couldn't understand how she managed to do it. All any grownup had to do was look her in the eyes. Those cold, emotionless, stone-dead eyes.
Bringing up the rear, of course, was Severus Snape, a gangly, greasy-haired, sallow-skinned first year, who cursed and hexed much as other people breathed--automatically and unthinkingly.
It wasn't the whole gang--Rodolphus Lestrange was missing, as was his younger brother Rabastan, the only Hufflepuff who ran with this crowd--and a goodly number of their hangers-on weren't present either...but Peter felt that the ones who were present were more than sufficient.
"Leave me alone," he said, hating the fact that his voice seemed to be about two octaves higher than usual. "I haven't done anything to you. So leave me alone."
"You have, really," said Rosier in a thoughtful tone. "Your mere existence is an offence against nature."
"Isn't it marvellous how it squeaks?" said Bellatrix, her tone dripping with sugar. "Like a little mouse, just before the cat breaks its back."
Peter wondered if he dared turn his back on them and bolt down the hall. He suspected that might be a very bad idea. Before he could come to a conclusion, however, he heard someone say, "Locomotor Mortis!"
His legs snapped together and he toppled to the floor, frozen from the waist down.
"Should have made it the Full-Body Bind, Avery," said Snape critically. "He can still use his wand."
"I rather fancy it this way," said Bellatrix. "It's far more maddening--the creature can use its wand, yes, but it doesn't have the faintest idea of how to fight properly."
"So what should we do with it?" said Avery, surveying his handiwork critically.
"Kill it, what else?" grunted Wilkes. "No one would guess if it had an accident."
Peter flattened himself against the flagstones. No. Please, no.
An indignant meow came from Peter's right-hand pocket.
Peter flinched. Oh, no, Nathan, not now. Keep quiet, and we might still have a chance to get out of this.
He really didn't think the kitten would keep quiet. Nathan was being squashed, and Nathan most emphatically didn't like it, for the meow escalated to very loud squalling.
Bellatrix glanced toward him. "Stop that noise," she commanded.
"It's not me!" Peter protested over the yowling.
"I told you to be quiet. And if you're not going to be quiet, I'll give you something to scream about." And Bellatrix strode over to where Peter was lying, rolled him over on his back, and pointed her wand at his face. "Incen--"
Nathan exploded out of Peter's pocket like a claymore mine, biting, scratching and clawing Bellatrix's hands.
Bellatrix shrieked, grabbed the kitten by the scruff of his neck and flung him against the stone wall.
Nathan screamed.
And then there was a terrible silence.
Bellatrix smiled. "Good. That's one beast dead. And now for the other."
Peter stared up at her. "You murdered him!"
Bellatrix glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. "Why yes," she said, grinning broadly. "I do believe I did."
She raised her wand.
It didn't occur to Peter to draw his own wand. And with his legs frozen, kicking her or running away couldn't happen.
But there was nothing stopping Peter from using his fists, teeth and nails against her, and that was precisely what he did. Most of his blows went wild, either not hitting Bellatrix at all or only glancing off of her, but he made up for inefficiency with quantity.
"I hate you," he gasped as he swung at her with all his might. "I hate you, you bitch, I wish you were dead--"
Bellatrix stepped backward. "You touched me. You vile, despicable little insect." She glared at the other Slytherins. "What are you just standing there for?"
"Waiting for you to defeat him, of course," drawled Snape. "Surely a Black in her third year can defeat a Mudblood in his first without requiring any help."
Peter rocked back and forth a bit. Bella was just a few feet away from him…if he could just get up enough momentum…
He didn't roll into Bellatrix quite as hard as he would have liked to. She didn't fall. But he did knock into her hard enough to make her lose her balance...and drop her wand.
He flung it at the mirror, hoping that whatever world lay beyond that glass would swallow it. No such luck. It bounced off the mirror and rolled into a shady corner.
Her pale eyes narrowed as she turned to look at him.
There was nothing very different in her expression; that was as calm as ever. But her eyes--
A stray line from a poem he'd had to memorise scurried across his mind: And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon that is dreaming.
Oh dear God, she's crazy. And she's going to kill me.
And then she reached for him, and clawed at his eyes.
***
For the next few minutes (which lasted for an eternity, as far as Peter was concerned), Peter fought to keep his head and his eyes away from Bellatrix's strong hands and sharp nails. As if from a distance, he heard spells raining down on him: the Babbling Curse, which would have kept him from casting spells if he'd been using his wand; the Knee-Reversing Hex; Rictusempra, which made him laugh uncontrollably to the point that he had trouble breathing.
He had just rolled away from an Entrail-Expelling Curse when he heard footsteps coming down the hall. Moments later, a familiar voice was demanding, "What in Merlin's name is going on here?"
McGonagall. Thank God.
"Professor! Oh, thank goodness you're here!" With tears in her eyes, Bellatrix glanced up at the Transfiguration professor.
"Miss Black," in a decidedly stiff voice. "Suppose you tell me what has transpired here."
Bellatrix's voice filled with passion. "We came by, just minding our own business, and we saw him tormenting a cat. And before we could so much as call out, he flung it against the wall. Killed it dead. Go look, if you don't believe me."
I never! Peter thought, outraged. I'd never do that, never in a million years!
As if in a dream, he heard McGonagall walking toward the wall.
"And then"--Bellatrix was actually sobbing by now--"we tried to restrain him, we tried, but he fought like a savage. He grabbed my wand and threw it away and I don't know where it is..."
"I take it that none of you checked to see how the cat was," McGonagall said dryly, interrupting what Peter considered to be an award-winning piece of performance art.
"Yes, we did," said Wilkes, sounding bewildered. "We all did, but there wasn't anything we could do--oof!"
"Really?" said McGonagall, picking up Nathan. "I think, then, that you should do a bit more studying. It might be helpful in the future if you could tell the difference between life and death. A minor detail, perhaps, but useful."
"The...the cat..." Bellatrix had turned a very delicate shade of green.
"Stunned, Miss Black," said McGonagall with what Peter thought was a trace of satisfaction. "But not dead. So you see, your...zeal...was considerably misplaced." Glancing at Peter, she winced. She shifted the kitten to her left arm, removed her wand from her robe pocket and waved it gracefully. "Finite Incantatem."
As the curses and hexes faded from his body, Peter stood up slowly on tottering legs.
McGonagall studied him for a few moments. "Are you quite all right, Mr Pettigrew?"
There was only one possible answer to that, even if it wasn't the truth. "Yes, ma'am."
"Ma'am," said Avery, and sniggered. Wilkes joined in a few seconds later. The laughter stopped abruptly when McGonagall turned a quelling eye on them.
"I thank you for your concern about etiquette," she said sternly, "but I am not offended by non-academic honorifics. Now. Follow me, please."
"Where are we going?" Bellatrix sounded both petulant and worried.
"To the Headmaster's office, of course," said McGonagall coolly. "Where else?"
***
It was astonishing how quickly McGonagall took care of matters. Swiftly, she led them all to another hallway, caught the attention of a passing prefect, and sent a message to Madam Pomfrey. In what seemed like mere seconds, Madam Pomfrey scurried into the hall and took the stunned bundle of kitten from McGonagall.
Madam Pomfrey shook her head and looked very sombre. "How did this happen?" she asked.
Bellatrix opened her mouth. McGonagall gave her a measuring look until she shut it again. Then McGonagall turned to Madam Pomfrey. "We don't know yet," she said in a forbidding voice. "Though I intend to find out."
Once Madam Pomfrey had headed off to the infirmary with Nathan, McGonagall guided the children to Dumbledore's tower office.
It was a small, circular room filled with overflowing bookshelves, odd mechanical devices that might have been toys, tools or weapons, a crystal ball and a large stone bowl graven round the rim with what looked like some sort of peculiar alphabet. The school Sorting Hat rested atop a bookcase, while a sword encrusted with gleaming rubies hung on the wall. Gazing solemnly at all of them was an immense orange-red bird that almost might have been on fire.
Of Dumbledore there was no sign.
"Figures," whispered Rosier to Avery. "All this fuss to get us here, and the old fool isn't even present."
"Old fool? Well, perhaps, Mr Rosier. On occasion, perhaps."
And there, sitting at his desk, was Dumbledore.
Peter blinked. Dumbledore must have been there all along, he decided at last. Their eyes had just been playing tricks on them.
Dumbledore gazed at the children, and for a moment an expression of dreadful sorrow filled his eyes. Then he turned to McGonagall. "Very well, Professor. What happened?"
McGonagall spoke of the scene she'd stumbled upon. Bellatrix and her friends re-told the tale of Peter's cruelty to animals. By the time they were done, Peter scarcely recognised himself in the monster-boy they'd depicted.
At last, Dumbledore spoke to Peter. "Is this true, Mister Pettigrew?"
Peter kept his head low, gazed at the floor with intense concentration, and shook his head.
"Mister Pettigrew. I want you to look at me, and to speak clearly when you do. Did you do this?"
Peter looked up, an expression of pure misery on his face. He shook his head once more, then spoke. "No. No, I didn't."
"Are you saying we're lying?" said Bellatrix in a wounded voice. As she looked at him with grief-stricken but understanding eyes, she tapped him on the wrist to attract his attention, then curled her strong hands with their long fingernails into talons.
Peter winced. All right, I obviously can't call her a liar and keep my eyes.
"No, I'm not saying you're lying," he said. "I'm saying you're mistaken. There's a difference."
"Someone hurt the cat," said Dumbledore. "It is hardly the kind of thing that could have happened by accident. Was it an accident?"
"No." Perhaps it would be wiser to pretend that Nathan's injuries were accidental, but he couldn't.
"You say you did not do this."
"I don't just say that I didn't," Peter said firmly. "I didn't."
"You also say that Bellatrix and her friends had nothing to do with the cat's injuries."
"Yes, sir." Well, it was what he was saying. It wasn't true, but he was definitely saying it.
Dumbledore frowned. "Forgive me if I'm wrong, Mister Pettigrew, but you seem to have eliminated all possibilities. The cat did not suffer an accident. You did not harm it. They did not harm it. What, pray tell, is left?"
Peter thought for a minute. "Attempted suicide?" he offered, in a weak voice.
Dumbledore gazed at him in exasperation. "How could a cat attempt suicide?"
He chose to come with me, thought Peter bitterly.
"You would be amazed," murmured McGonagall. She glanced at Peter. "What were you doing down that hallway?"
At least he could answer this question honestly. "I was looking for your office. I needed to talk to you."
"May I ask what you wished to speak to the Professor about?" inquired Dumbledore in a tone that made it perfectly clear that he expected, nay, demanded an answer.
Peter glanced at the avid eyes of his schoolmates and decided that nothing could be more hazardous to his health than admitting, in their hearing, that he hated magic and the entire wizarding world. He shook his head.
"No, sir," he said politely. "You may not ask, and I won't answer--not in their hearing, anyway." So saying, he nodded toward the Slytherins. He bit his lower lip, suddenly looking terribly young. "And please don't insist that I do so. I can't. I just can't."
In a perfect world, that would have been the end of it.
This was not a perfect world.
Dumbledore was insistent that Peter state why he'd been looking for Professor McGonagall, and that he come up with a proper story about who had injured Nathan. Peter was equally determined not to say a word.
As if they were riding a roundabout at a fun fair, the two travelled in circles for quite some time before McGonagall interrupted, addressing the Slytherins. "As young Mister Pettigrew is reluctant to speak, perhaps an examination of wands--yours and his--would be in order. Of course, there is no assurance that he was necessarily using magic to torment the cat, but if you were indeed trying to restrain him, I would expect to find some Binding Charms. Does this meet with your approval, Headmaster?"
"It does indeed," said Dumbledore, and Peter was surprised by how grimly pleased the Headmaster seemed to be.
McGonagall examined Peter's wand first. Few spells emerged from it, and even fewer were recent ones. The Slytherin wands, on the other hand, were a dead give-away.
"Professor," said Rosier, visibly sweating. "We can explain--"
"I think," said Dumbledore in a soft voice, "that you have all said more than enough. I cannot tell you how disappointed I am in each of you. I shall speak to each of you tomorrow after classes. Individually."
"And I," added McGonagall sternly, "shall be speaking to your Head of House. I shall be recommending that, since you show such proficiency in wand use, he might wish to teach you about how to perform tasks without them."
"You may return to your common room now," Dumbledore concluded. His voice said that they had best not go anywhere else.
The Slytherins filed out, shooting Peter poisonous glares as they did so. Peter gazed up at them, his whole face begging.
I didn't tell. They figured it out for themselves. Don't blame me...
It was all true, and yet he knew that they would blame him. They would always blame him.
He sighed as the last one--Severus Snape--exited.
"Now that they have gone," Dumbledore said, "would you be so kind as to tell us why you were looking for Professor McGonagall's office?" The words were gentle; the eyes were blue steel.
"I-I wanted to ask her something."
"Which was?" prompted McGonagall.
The words came out in a rush. "Please can I go home?"
"Home?" repeated McGonagall as she stared at him over her glasses. "You've only just got here."
"I know," Peter said, "but I don't have to stay here. I haven't set anything on fire by being angry or broken any windows since I arrived. I've learned not to do magic. I'm safe now. So please, when may I go home?"
"Peter," said the Headmaster in a terrible and gentle voice, "you haven't learnt anything of the kind. The protective spells of the castle keep you from having accidents."
Well, that was a setback. But not an insurmountable one.
"How soon can I start learning how not to do magic?"
McGonagall blinked. "Mister Pettigrew--don't you want to be a wizard?"
"God, no!" Peter blurted out, and then clapped his hands over his mouth. He'd just blasphemed against God and the wizarding world, and he wasn't sure which crime would be punished more severely.
McGonagall, for her part, seemed to be in shock. "'No'? But--why?"
There were a thousand reasons, but Peter couldn't put them all into words. And some of his previous attempts to explain problems, such as the lack of Muggle inventions or the sensation he had of living a thousand years in the past, had failed miserably. He fumbled for something halfway explicable. "The other day in Transfiguration, we were turning beetles into buttons."
"Yes," said Professor McGonagall in a puzzled tone. "It's a standard first year lesson."
"See, that's one of the things I don't like."
"You could become better at Transfiguration--"
Peter shook his head. "That's not what I mean. It's--it's not fair. It's a cruel thing to do. It's like a bully pouring boiling water in an anthill to see what will happen. If I haven't got any buttons, wouldn't it make more sense to go down to the corner shop and buy some, instead of taking a bunch of living insects and turning them into something that's not alive? I wouldn't like it, being turned into an un-alive thing just because someone could."
He took a deep breath. "And it's all like that--Charms and Defence Against the Dark Arts and Transfiguration. Everything's about doing something with magic that doesn't need to be done with magic--like lighting a fire, or making something fly to you instead of you walking across the room to get it--or cursing other people to hurt them or spells to protect other people from hurting you..."
He chewed on his lower lip and snuffled. "And there's more--a lot more--but I don't know how to say it all. Just--please may I go home? I won't tell anyone about Hogwarts, I won't, I swear!"
"There must be something you like about Hogwarts," said Dumbledore.
Peter considered. He couldn't think of a thing. At last he shook his head.
"Not even Quidditch?" hinted McGonagall.
"No. Not even Quidditch."
"And there is nothing you like about the wizarding world, either? " Dumbledore inquired.
"No, sir."
Dumbledore sighed, sat back in his chair and steepled his fingers, regarding Peter with perplexity. "You would truly return to the Muggle world, never to practice magic again?"
For a moment, Peter could almost see his family flat, could almost hear automobiles and buses rushing down Birmingham streets. He could smell the curry from the Pakistani takeaway nearby, and the scent of fresh bread and cookies from the bakery where his mother worked. He could feel the thud of his trainers against a football.
Then it was gone, and he was back in the magical world that was holding him prisoner.
The contrast was so great that it nearly made him sick.
There must be a signpost showing the exit to the Twilight Zone, he thought bleakly. There must be a door out of Narnia, a way back to Kansas.
"Peter," said Dumbledore--and the pity in his voice was enough to set Peter's teeth on edge--"it is as I told you. Your powers must be trained. If they are not, you will remain a danger to yourself and others. They will not be fully trained for some time to come."
Peter looked at him, dreading the answer to the question he must ask. "How long will it be before I am trained?"
"Not long," Dumbledore said genially. "No more than seven years."
"Seven YEARS!" Practically my whole lifetime.
And what he would be like after serving a seven-year-sentence in Elfland, he didn't want to know.
Dumbledore rambled on for some time. Struggle, control, need for proper training, it's for your own good, Peter.
Peter didn't bother listening. He couldn't. Three sentences in his mind kept beating to the rataplan of a drum, drowning out Dumbledore's words: You lied. You lied to me, to get me trapped here. And I hate you for that.
At last Dumbledore finished his monologue. "Now, Peter," he said. "Do you understand?"
Not for worlds or galaxies could Peter have answered yes to this.
"No, sir," he said dully. "I don't understand. And I don't think I'm ever going to. Excuse me." He walked over to the office door, then paused.
"It really would be better for everyone," he said in a high, trembling, desperate voice, "if you'd just let me go home."
***
On his way back to the Gryffindor dorms, Peter stopped off at the infirmary. Madam Pomfrey was there, looking a bit more cheerful than she had a few hours before.
"Peter! About your cat..."
Here, away from the Slytherins and the deceptively confusing Headmaster, Peter could admit the truth. "I didn't hurt him. I swear I didn't."
Poppy Pomfrey made a sound that, in a lesser woman, would have been a snort. "Bless you, Peter, I didn't think you'd hurt Nathan. Some children are beasts, and that's all there is to it."
She leaned down and patted a bundle of blankets in a box. "He's just a bit woozy and his muscles ache. I'll give him a bit of Blood-Replenishing Potion and some Invigorating Solution, and he'll be fine."
Peter stood stock-still for a moment. "You mean there's actual magical medicine?" he said at last. "Because when I come here, what you generally do is remove curses."
"Of course there's magical medicine," said Madam Pomfrey, staring at the boy. "Healers and mediwitches couldn't get on without it. I was just about to start making some for Nathan. Would you like to help?"
Peter looked dazed. "You mean there's actually some magic that's good?"
Madam Pomfrey looked sad as she smiled, and Peter couldn't fathom why. "Yes, lad," she said, tousling his hair. "There really is."
"I'm not much good at magic," Peter said at last. "It scares me."
Madam Pomfrey looked exasperated. "Of course you're not very good at it. You've only been here a month."
"I'll ruin your ingredients. I'll-I'll poison Nathan or something."
Madam Pomfrey shook her head. "I don't think you will. And they're my ingredients. I'll take the chance on their being ruined."
Peter took a step forward. "Well..."
"Do you want to try?"
A nod. A hesitant nod, but still...a nod.
"Good. Then come over here." She guided him to a counter, rummaged about till she found a stool for him to stand on, and a knife and a chopping block to use. Then she opened a jar, and removed a handful of what looked like dark brown commas.
"Chop these peeled shrivelfigs very evenly and very fine. Otherwise the Invigorating Solution won't work. I'll check when you're done, all right?"
Peter nodded, and began earnestly chopping shrivelfigs.
He still didn't trust magic. And he really didn't like the fact that he'd been tricked into coming to Hogwarts.
But maybe, just maybe, if he could use his magic to help instead of hurt, to make people and animals better instead of turning them into things...
Well, maybe attending school in Narnia-Oz-Elfland might be bearable after all.
***
Title: Escaping Wonderland
Characters: Peter Pettigrew, Louise Pettigrew, Dumbledore, Bellatrix, Snape, various Slytherins, McGonagall, Poppy Pomfrey…and Alice in Wonderland, from Through the Looking Glass.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 8,505
Warnings: GENFIC. Gen gen gen. If this gets any genner, I'll be drummed off of LJ. Also, if you're worried about spoilers...there aren't any.
Disclaimer: These characters are the property of J.K. Rowling - likewise the profits.
Author's Note: Done for the ithurtsmybrain gen challenge on LJ. Mine was 38. Peter Pettigrew (HP) and Alice (Alice in Wonderland). And for thistlerose, for whom I promised a story involving a Marauder-era male kitten some time ago.
Summary:...which do you pick:
Where you're safe, out of sight,
And yourself, but where everything's wrong?
Or where everything's right
And you know that you'll never belong?
And whichever you pick,
Do it quick...
--Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, "On the Steps of the Palace," Into the Woods
***
Peter Pettigrew had been at Hogwarts for a month, and he hated it.
Furthermore, he had a deep dark suspicion that he was always going to hate it.
It isn't that there's anything wrong with Hogwarts, he thought as he lay on his bed in Gryffindor Tower petting Nathan, his grey kitten-familiar who was sleeping on his chest. At least, not as far as anyone else is concerned. I don't know how the other Muggleborn kids do it.
Peter had had high hopes of Hogwarts at first. The delivery of his Hogwarts letter on his eleventh birthday had been a welcome surprise, at least to him. His mother and his grown-up sisters had felt quite differently, but then witchcraft equalled wickedness in his mother's mind, and always had. As for his sisters...well, Mildred had thought he had sent the letter to himself to show off, and Rose had thought that someone was playing a nasty joke on him. Judith had been the only one who had made a practical suggestion: send the owl back to this "Albus Dumbledore" with a very cold, correct note. "Nine chances out of ten, Mum," Judith had said, "that'll be the end of it, and you'll have at least expressed your displeasure."
To Peter's everlasting humiliation--it was a nice letter, even if the wizarding school business was completely impossible--his mother had done just that.
Three days later, Albus Dumbledore arrived at their door, to explain a few things.
Once he'd walked in (and Peter still couldn't remember his mother inviting Dumbledore to do so), he started asking questions. "Well, Peter," he said, looking down on Peter from what seemed to be an immense height, "how old were you when strange things started happening around you?"
Peter had gaped at him. "S-seven," he managed to stammer out at last through nearly paralysed lips. "I was seven."
"Ah," Dumbledore had said, sounding immensely pleased. "And what, precisely, did happen?"
"Fires," snapped Louise Pettigrew, gripping Peter by the shoulders "Fires flaring up every time he gets angry or upset. Glasses bursting. Windows exploding. For four years now. I couldn't tell you how many times I've had to replace things he's broken. I'm surprised we've even got a lease, considering how much damage he's done!"
Peter hung his head. "I don't mean to, Mum," he said softly. "It just...happens."
His mother regarded him sternly. "Animals can't control themselves. People can."
"That's not fair!" Peter protested, scowling. "I try to control it. I do."
"Don't pout, Peter. You're far too old for that. Children pout. Very little children."
"Fires and explosions are quite common manifestations of power among wizarding children," Dumbledore interrupted, beaming genially at both of them.
Louise Pettigrew snorted. "Except he's not a wizarding child, then, is he? Peter's just an ordinary boy--with a few powers he shouldn't have. And he'd be much happier without, I can tell you. The priests and nuns at his primary were scared of him--not that I blame them, really. What do you do with a boy who makes the blackboard crack or who starts fires on the ceiling whenever he gets angry?"
"What about his friends?"
"Oh, well. He gets on fine with them--"
"I don't have any friends," said Peter miserably.
"Nonsense!" said Louise Pettigrew. "There are boys you play with, I've seen you!"
Peter looked up at his mother. The expression in his eyes was centuries old. "They aren't my friends," he said quietly. "We play together because they're afraid of what I might do if we didn't. They don't want to end up being turned into toads or something. But they don't like me, and they don't trust me. They think I'm a mutant or an alien or a freak. And I guess they're right, if I'm a wizard. There's no way that being a wizard is normal."
"How would you like to meet some children just like yourself?" asked Dumbledore, his eyes gleaming. "Magically gifted children? A whole school of them?"
"And what's the point of that, then?" demanded Peter's mother as she crossed her arms. "Put all of them together so that they can burn the school down?"
"We teach them how to use their powers responsibly," Dumbledore replied in a forbidding tone. "We cannot ignore their abilities; as you have noted yourself, such powers are dangerous when left alone and uncontrolled. Hogwarts teaches its students how to use their powers in beneficial ways, rather than…well, setting fires and the like. Do you think you'd like that, Peter?"
"Yes," Peter said. "Not the doing-magic part. But learning how not to do magic would be cool." He smiled wistfully. "I'd like to be normal."
Louise Pettigrew glanced doubtfully at Dumbledore and shook her head. "I don't think they'll teach you that, Peter."
"Why don't you believe it?" said Dumbledore genially.
"Because it's not reasonable! Who'd send children to a school for wizards to make sure that they didn't become wizards? No one sensible, I'll tell you that for nothing. It'd be foolish, and I don't believe you're a fool." She shook her head. "No, Peter. You're not setting a foot in that place."
Peter's face fell. "But wouldn't it be better if I knew how not to set fires and blow things up?"
"It certainly would be better for the boy to get control of his powers," Dumbledore interposed. "And safer for those around him, too."
Louise Pettigrew looked frightened. "No," she said, her voice trembling. "If you take him off to that school, you'll be teaching him how to use those powers of his, not how not to use them. And that's wrong. He doesn't need powers that'll make him feel stronger and better and finer than those around him."
Dumbledore's eyebrows escalated almost to his hairline. His face took on the expression of an indulgent father humouring a stubborn child's folly. "You don't want him to be a good wizard?"
"I'd rather he were a good man."
"The two are not mutually exclusive."
She shook her head. "I read stories about wizards and witches when I was little. They were always transforming people into flowers and toads, and cursing whole towns, and placing princesses in enchanted sleep."
A puzzled glance. "Well, yes, that's fairly accurate--"
"Who gave them the right to put people to sleep for hundreds of years, or curse an entire town because they were that mad at one person? Or turn people into things? Yes, they had the power to do that--but it wasn't fair, casting spells on people who couldn't fight back! And what's worse is, they felt as they were entitled to do it." She shivered. "It's wrong. It's evil. I won't have it, and I won't have my boy taught to think that way."
"Mrs. Pettigrew...don't you trust your son to behave as honourably as you've taught him to do?"
"I wouldn't trust an angel to behave honourably if he were told that he could do anything and no one would tell him no."
"Surely some Muggles--non-magical people, pardon me--also believe this."
"That's not the point," she retorted. "Normal people have limits--money, position, influence. And that's bad enough. You're talking about magic. And with magic you can do absolutely anything. Far too much power, and far too much temptation. No. The answer is no."
"Your son's magic will not go away simply because you don't want him to possess it," said Dumbledore, and Peter puzzled over the sympathy in the man's voice. "If he is not taught, it will simply spiral further out of control. He needs the training. Without it..." A deep sigh. "He hasn't a hope of a normal life."
Peter envisioned himself in rags as he picked through rubbish bins in search of something to eat while a black cloud of magic encircled him like a tornado, exploding buildings and slaughtering anyone who came near him. All because he couldn't control what he did. "Maybe you could remove the magic with a spell?" he asked.
Dumbledore shook his head gravely. "I fear not. That would involve tampering with your basic metabolic structure. I couldn't do that--not and have you remain human, at least."
Peter shuddered.
"Well," said his mother, shuddering as well, "I thank you for your time and trouble, Mr Dumbledore, but I don't think we'll take you up on your offer. It'll be much better for Peter if he grows up a normal boy, and learns to control this--this unfortunate magic of his, rather than giving in and letting the power take him over. I daresay it won't be easy, but he'll do it."
"What about you, Peter?" Dumbledore asked, smiling as if it were an effort. "Do you want to learn magic?"
Peter shook his head. "No. I already told you, I want to learn how NOT to do it. I want to be like everyone else."
"Not a high ambition," murmured Dumbledore. "There is nothing wrong with being different."
Peter said nothing. This was evidently another lie that grownups liked to tell themselves. Of course there was something wrong with being different from everyone else. His mother didn't want him to be different. His teachers didn't want him to be different. The kids with whom he'd attended primary school hated the difference. He'd never met a single person--well, not a real person, wizards didn't count--who had thought that magic was all right. Even he didn't think so, and it was his magic.
Dumbledore sighed, and adopted another tack. "Suppose you could learn how not to set fires and how not to make things explode. Would you be willing to attend Hogwarts then?"
Peter studied the old man's expression. "Could I go home once I knew those things?"
"Once you have complete control of your powers, you may indeed go home. And," he added, turning to Peter's mother, "neither the building nor the students or staff will be at risk. There are any number of protection spells at Hogwarts. Your son's magic will not do any damage."
Peter's mother hesitated. "Well..."
And that had been when things had become a bit blurry. Peter didn't remember what Dumbledore had said next, but he did recall that the man's words had made complete sense. He also remembered his mother nodding in agreement to virtually everything that Dumbledore said--even things that he could have sworn that she had vehemently disagreed with earlier. Before he knew what had happened, his mother had agreed to send him to Hogwarts--with the proviso that once he had complete control over his magic, he could go home.
It had been fascinating--at first. He'd liked Diagon Alley, and the Hogwarts Express and the boat ride. It had been a brand-new world that he'd never dreamt existed, and he'd loved it all without reservation.
One month later, he'd come to the grim conclusion that the wizarding world was a great place to visit, but he didn't want to live here. Small, idiotic things--things that didn't bother those who had been raised in the wizarding world--kept turning into enormous stumbling blocks.
Take pens. Peter couldn't understand what the wizarding world had against pens. What was so holy about a quill, anyway? Quills were pretty, of course, and soft, and felt nice. But a plume from the tail feather of a peacock didn't come close to a ballpoint pen. Quills snapped. The nibs of quills broke, and then you had to carve a new nib before you could write with the quill again. And you had to grind the ink you used. God help you if you thinned it too much or not enough, for in that case you had blackish water or a lumpy black fluid, neither of which were legible. A ballpoint pen was easier. It ran better. It didn't leak or break at every opportunity. And they could be ordered wholesale from factories. Heck, the school could probably do a profitable business selling pens--not to mention pencils and rubbers.
The same went for mass-produced paper instead of parchment (which, half the time, still had hairs stuck to it) and notebooks instead of scrolls. Paper and notebooks worked better, and were easier to get hold of than parchment and scrolls. Why did the wizarding world keep clinging to the past?
And light. Peter hated the lighting in the castle. Candles. Torches. Firelight. He had a hard time reading by flickering light, and the light itself was so dim that it made his eyes ache from strain. How he missed electric light! Of course, his teachers had told him that nothing electrical worked at Hogwarts. They hadn't been able to explain why Hogwarts didn't use kerosene lamps or gaslight, however.
The robes were horrible, too. Peter couldn't abide the robes. For his money, they were nothing but long black dresses, and he felt like a sissy wearing them...even though he wasn't the only one wearing the damned things. Girls wore dresses, after all. Not boys. He was supposed to be in long trousers by now, not traipsing around in a black bathrobe with sleeves that caught on things and knocked them over, and with a hem that he tripped over fifteen times a day.
Outside of class, he stubbornly wore the three pairs of long trousers that his mother had bought in addition to the robes. He might have to wear the robes for classes, since they were school uniforms, but he wasn't going to wear them any other time, not if he could help it. He was still standing firm on that, despite the fact that every time McGonagall or Azoth or Flitwick caught him wearing trousers instead of robes, Gryffindor House lost points--much to the exasperation of his roommates. Peter told himself he didn't care. There was a principle involved. He wasn't going to pretend that all wizarding stuff was wonderful or that all Muggle ideas were bad. And he wasn't going to forswear where he came from, either.
Though, to be honest, that would have been simpler. Certainly a lot of people would have liked him better for it. His roommates, for one.
There were three of them, and only one had a sane, normal name--James Potter. The other two, who were clearly the victims of evil parents, were named Sirius and Remus. However, having an ordinary name was the only thing that James and he had in common. In fact, it was practically the only thing he had in common with any of them. James and Sirius were purebloods--the aristocrats of the wizarding world--while Remus was a halfblood, the son of a pureblood wizard and a Muggleborn witch. All three had grown up thinking of magic as normal and everyday; talking to them was difficult, at least if he wanted to say more than "Hello, how are you, how's the weather?"
Remus seemed to be a nice enough fellow--a bit quiet and sickly, but all right. James was a perpetual motion machine, always running, jumping, flying or fighting with Sirius. Peter knew already that he would never keep up with James, for James was one of those designated by fate to be perfect. James was good at the only sport that mattered at Hogwarts, though, since he was a first year, he wasn't allowed to play for a school team yet. James was brilliant in class. James had scads of charm, and was liked by everyone. He was funny, brave, imaginative. Peter had the feeling that destiny had sent James to Hogwarts to give the rest of the students something to aspire to.
And then, of course, there was Sirius. Who was, not to put too fine a point on it, a bit of a problem.
The problem was that Sirius was the eldest son of a rich and powerful wizarding family, and he acted the part. Snobbish, arrogant, proud, far better educated than Peter and infinitely better versed in class issues--he was pure Sloane Ranger, right down to the elitist, prep school attitude. He fought constantly with James--largely because their parents didn't like each other much. Something to do with politics. He treated Remus with an indifference that bordered on contempt. And as for Peter himself…well, Peter had heard every comment known to wizards about the ugliness, ignorance, stupidity, cowardice and general loathsomeness of Mudbloods.
"I can't help being a Mudblood," he'd protested at first, before he'd known that "Mudblood" was a racial slur. "I was born that way, same as you were born a pureblood. You didn't pick and neither did I. It's just random."
Sirius had thrashed him for that.
Peter had tried a couple of more times before deciding that Sirius was impervious to reason. Nowadays, he just tried to stay out of Sirius's way and kept silent when Sirius started making racist remarks. James and Remus kept looking at him, as if they expected him to say something or do something, the way a bold, brave Gryffindor should. But what would be the point? Protesting just got him beat up. And he couldn't fight Sirius; at least, he couldn't fight Sirius and win. Sirius was bigger--and stronger.
It would have been bad enough if Sirius had been the only one twitting him about his ancestry. But he wasn't. A large gang of Slytherins--the youngest of them an eleven-year-old first year named Severus Snape, and the oldest a fourteen-year-old called Rodolphus Lestrange--had made it their mission to show Peter and all the other Muggleborns in the school just how unwanted they were here.
Peter knew about bullies; he'd suffered taunting at his old school because of his magic. But the Slytherins went beyond normal bullying; they hated Muggleborns with an adult ferocity.
Peter dreaded being caught in the corridors between or after classes, for that was when the Slytherins were likely to attack. He'd been hit with Confundus Curses that addled him for days.They stole his wand as a matter of routine, and constantly threatened to snap it or burn it if he didn't do what they said. He'd been cursed with boils, had his legs locked together, been frozen in the Full-Body Bind while Bellatrix Black set fire to the cuffs and collar of his robes. Once they had nearly drowned him in a toilet. And there were blank spots in his memory now. He suspected they'd been using Memory Charms on him. The fact that they could and would use magic to reshape his mind frightened him most of all.
He'd become a frequent visitor to the infirmary. Poppy Pomfrey unravelled the curses and healed the burns.
But she never asked him who had done this. Not that he could tell--Peter knew perfectly well that any tattling would have him praying for the mercy of death the next time--but he would have expected a staff member to want to know who was responsible.
And no one--prefect or staff--ever, ever tried to stop it.
They'll kill me one of these days, he thought, and knew that his assessment was completely accurate.
If only he could go home. It wasn't perfect, but it was real. It made sense. He could even understand his mother hating magic. He did, by now.
Now he could see why Dorothy had longed so fiercely to escape from Oz, and return to the dull, grey Kansas she'd always known.
A sudden, startling thought occurred to him: Why not go home?
The more he thought about it, the more reasonable it sounded. Why not go home? Dumbledore had said that he could leave once he knew how not to set fires or blow things up, and that hadn't happened for nearly a month now. That was the longest time he'd ever gone without causing a disaster. Well, since he was seven, anyway.
There had to be someone he could ask about this. Not Dumbledore. Dumbledore made him nervous. McGonagall, maybe. After all, she was his head of house. For now, anyway.
Peter sat up, ignoring the squalling of Nathan as he did so. Putting his kitten on his bed, he stood up, grabbed his wand from the night table and headed for the stairs leading to the common room. Better to go and talk to McGonagall now, while his roommates weren't around to ask where he was going and what he was going to do once he got there.
He was just about to start down the stairs when a streak of grey leaped from Peter's bed and barrelled to the top of the staircase. Nathan sat down in front of Peter, glaring defiantly, as if to say that Peter had better not try running out on this kitten again.
Peter gazed helplessly at his familiar. "But, Nathan...I can't take you with me. I can't carry you; I've got to keep my wand arm free in case I run into the Slytherins."
Nathan yawned.
"They're nothing to yawn about," Peter snapped. Then he shivered. "They scare me. They scare me a lot."
Nathan ostentatiously began to wash his front paws, as if to express his total indifference to the human race in general and to bullies in particular.
Peter heaved a sigh that was at least two sizes too big for him. "Fine," he said, scooping up the kitten. "But you're going to stay in the pocket of my robes, all right? No jumping out or scratching or anything." So saying, he scooped Nathan up, carefully placed the kitten in his pocket and starting searching for the quickest route to McGonagall's office.
***
Inevitably, he got lost.
It wasn't his fault. He simply didn't know all of the movements for the staircases; which ones required hopping, or dancing a jig, or skipping the seventh step from the bottom on alternate Tuesdays. More than one staircase began moving while he was still on it, forcing him to cling to the banister with both hands. As he clung, he struggled not to think about what would happen if he fell God-alone-knew how many hundreds of feet onto cold hard flagstones before the staircase grounded itself on a landing once more.
After this happened several times, Peter--without quite realising he was doing so--began searching for alternatives to staircases. He walked down miles of corridors, dodged around shady corners and searched for portals through tapestries and behind statues. Anything was better than being on a staircase that was moving and not connected to anything.
He tried very hard to ignore the fact that his location was looking more and more unfamiliar each second.
I'm not lost. I'm...exploring. Yes, that's it.
He shoved away the portion of his mind that was demanding to know exactly where he was exploring, and how he was going to get back to Gryffindor Tower, and kept walking.
He saw some odd things as he walked along.
At the end of one corridor was an alcove with a window seat. A chessboard holding a half-finished chess game was resting on the window seat. Something on the chessboard...or maybe the chessboard itself...was snoring. The snoring made Peter deeply uneasy, and he hurried away.
One room had a small door through which Peter could barely squeeze, though he was anything but a large child. Once in, he found himself in an alien forest, filled with cool shade, dappled sunlight filtered through green leaves, and enormous trees that seemed to stretch to infinity.
It was fortunate, perhaps, that Peter was a city boy; thoughts of exploring this wilderness simply did not occur to him. He hung back, staring at the trees, wondering what they were and where they were...and what he was, too, for that matter.
The sudden loss of his name didn't frighten Peter as much as it annoyed him. Have to go back the way I came, he thought. I know that I had a name before I came in here.
Nevertheless, it took a fair bit of time. Even after he turned around to leave, Peter could not remember what a door was, or how a doorknob worked. That he got out at all was an accident; he simply pushed too hard on the door and ended up falling flat on his face in the corridor. He lay there for a few moments as his memory flooded back. Then slowly he stood up on nervous and tottering legs, stared very hard at the green light shining in the forest within the room--and bolted.
Shortly after that, he came upon a hallway containing nothing but a mirror. He approached it cautiously; he didn't think any harm could come from a mirror, but doubtless Snow White's stepmother had once thought the same way.
It looked like a mirror, but it didn't reflect anything in the hallway. Most assuredly it did not reflect him. Instead, it seemed to be a window, and through that window Peter could see a railway carriage. On the left side of the compartment was a bearded man, all dressed in white paper and reading a newspaper. Beside him was a goat clad in formal man-about-town clothes. Across from the man and the goat was a little girl with long fair hair. She was clad in the kind of clothes Peter had seen in E. Nesbit's fairy tales about Victorian children: a porkpie hat with a feather, a skirt with a row of tucks round the bottom, a muff, striped stockings and pointed black shoes. She looked no more than seven or eight years old, and appeared to be half asleep.
The weird thing about the scene--aside from the fact that it was in a mirror at all--was that the compartment appeared to be going sideways. It made Peter feel rather dizzy.
"But...you're travelling the wrong way," he said at last in a helpless voice, as if this, on top of all the other bizarre things that had happened since he came to Hogwarts, was really too much.
The little girl turned to him and stared, a puzzled expression sweeping across her face.
A frisson of fear ran up Peter's spine. She heard me. She's somewhere else, some other time, some other world...but she heard me.
And then a sound like a window being slammed shut reverberated from the mirror--and the compartment vanished, and the mirror was only a mirror once more.
Peter gulped, and stared at the mirror. He didn't particularly want to stare at the mirror. He was just afraid of what it might do if he looked away. He was already trapped in one magical world, and he couldn't bear the idea of being pulled into another.
"An ickle Mudblood wandering around where it isn't supposed to be," said a gloating, unpleasant voice from down the hallway. "Stupid little Mudbloods should know better. Could get in terrible trouble.
Slowly, dreading what he was about to see, Peter turned toward the voice--and nearly received a hex in the face. Only a swift dodge to the right saved him.
The speaker was Evan Rosier, a tall, arrogantly handsome blond boy of fourteen or so who was regarding Peter with a contemptuous smile. Beside Rosier was his constant shadow, Theophilus Wilkes, a dark stocky boy with a perpetually mulish scowl. Behind Wilkes was Carlisle Avery, who had once promised to kill Peter's whole family. "They'd be safe if you hadn't shoved your way in where you didn't belong," he'd added, with the air of a judge handing down a sentence. "It'll be your fault when they die screaming in agony. Maybe I'll even let you watch."
In the centre of the group was Bellatrix Black, a tall, elegant girl of thirteen with long, Victorian-style, sausage-shaped black curls and pale eyes. Bellatrix specialised in charming adults into thinking she was sweet, and she was very good at it. Peter couldn't understand how she managed to do it. All any grownup had to do was look her in the eyes. Those cold, emotionless, stone-dead eyes.
Bringing up the rear, of course, was Severus Snape, a gangly, greasy-haired, sallow-skinned first year, who cursed and hexed much as other people breathed--automatically and unthinkingly.
It wasn't the whole gang--Rodolphus Lestrange was missing, as was his younger brother Rabastan, the only Hufflepuff who ran with this crowd--and a goodly number of their hangers-on weren't present either...but Peter felt that the ones who were present were more than sufficient.
"Leave me alone," he said, hating the fact that his voice seemed to be about two octaves higher than usual. "I haven't done anything to you. So leave me alone."
"You have, really," said Rosier in a thoughtful tone. "Your mere existence is an offence against nature."
"Isn't it marvellous how it squeaks?" said Bellatrix, her tone dripping with sugar. "Like a little mouse, just before the cat breaks its back."
Peter wondered if he dared turn his back on them and bolt down the hall. He suspected that might be a very bad idea. Before he could come to a conclusion, however, he heard someone say, "Locomotor Mortis!"
His legs snapped together and he toppled to the floor, frozen from the waist down.
"Should have made it the Full-Body Bind, Avery," said Snape critically. "He can still use his wand."
"I rather fancy it this way," said Bellatrix. "It's far more maddening--the creature can use its wand, yes, but it doesn't have the faintest idea of how to fight properly."
"So what should we do with it?" said Avery, surveying his handiwork critically.
"Kill it, what else?" grunted Wilkes. "No one would guess if it had an accident."
Peter flattened himself against the flagstones. No. Please, no.
An indignant meow came from Peter's right-hand pocket.
Peter flinched. Oh, no, Nathan, not now. Keep quiet, and we might still have a chance to get out of this.
He really didn't think the kitten would keep quiet. Nathan was being squashed, and Nathan most emphatically didn't like it, for the meow escalated to very loud squalling.
Bellatrix glanced toward him. "Stop that noise," she commanded.
"It's not me!" Peter protested over the yowling.
"I told you to be quiet. And if you're not going to be quiet, I'll give you something to scream about." And Bellatrix strode over to where Peter was lying, rolled him over on his back, and pointed her wand at his face. "Incen--"
Nathan exploded out of Peter's pocket like a claymore mine, biting, scratching and clawing Bellatrix's hands.
Bellatrix shrieked, grabbed the kitten by the scruff of his neck and flung him against the stone wall.
Nathan screamed.
And then there was a terrible silence.
Bellatrix smiled. "Good. That's one beast dead. And now for the other."
Peter stared up at her. "You murdered him!"
Bellatrix glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. "Why yes," she said, grinning broadly. "I do believe I did."
She raised her wand.
It didn't occur to Peter to draw his own wand. And with his legs frozen, kicking her or running away couldn't happen.
But there was nothing stopping Peter from using his fists, teeth and nails against her, and that was precisely what he did. Most of his blows went wild, either not hitting Bellatrix at all or only glancing off of her, but he made up for inefficiency with quantity.
"I hate you," he gasped as he swung at her with all his might. "I hate you, you bitch, I wish you were dead--"
Bellatrix stepped backward. "You touched me. You vile, despicable little insect." She glared at the other Slytherins. "What are you just standing there for?"
"Waiting for you to defeat him, of course," drawled Snape. "Surely a Black in her third year can defeat a Mudblood in his first without requiring any help."
Peter rocked back and forth a bit. Bella was just a few feet away from him…if he could just get up enough momentum…
He didn't roll into Bellatrix quite as hard as he would have liked to. She didn't fall. But he did knock into her hard enough to make her lose her balance...and drop her wand.
He flung it at the mirror, hoping that whatever world lay beyond that glass would swallow it. No such luck. It bounced off the mirror and rolled into a shady corner.
Her pale eyes narrowed as she turned to look at him.
There was nothing very different in her expression; that was as calm as ever. But her eyes--
A stray line from a poem he'd had to memorise scurried across his mind: And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon that is dreaming.
Oh dear God, she's crazy. And she's going to kill me.
And then she reached for him, and clawed at his eyes.
***
For the next few minutes (which lasted for an eternity, as far as Peter was concerned), Peter fought to keep his head and his eyes away from Bellatrix's strong hands and sharp nails. As if from a distance, he heard spells raining down on him: the Babbling Curse, which would have kept him from casting spells if he'd been using his wand; the Knee-Reversing Hex; Rictusempra, which made him laugh uncontrollably to the point that he had trouble breathing.
He had just rolled away from an Entrail-Expelling Curse when he heard footsteps coming down the hall. Moments later, a familiar voice was demanding, "What in Merlin's name is going on here?"
McGonagall. Thank God.
"Professor! Oh, thank goodness you're here!" With tears in her eyes, Bellatrix glanced up at the Transfiguration professor.
"Miss Black," in a decidedly stiff voice. "Suppose you tell me what has transpired here."
Bellatrix's voice filled with passion. "We came by, just minding our own business, and we saw him tormenting a cat. And before we could so much as call out, he flung it against the wall. Killed it dead. Go look, if you don't believe me."
I never! Peter thought, outraged. I'd never do that, never in a million years!
As if in a dream, he heard McGonagall walking toward the wall.
"And then"--Bellatrix was actually sobbing by now--"we tried to restrain him, we tried, but he fought like a savage. He grabbed my wand and threw it away and I don't know where it is..."
"I take it that none of you checked to see how the cat was," McGonagall said dryly, interrupting what Peter considered to be an award-winning piece of performance art.
"Yes, we did," said Wilkes, sounding bewildered. "We all did, but there wasn't anything we could do--oof!"
"Really?" said McGonagall, picking up Nathan. "I think, then, that you should do a bit more studying. It might be helpful in the future if you could tell the difference between life and death. A minor detail, perhaps, but useful."
"The...the cat..." Bellatrix had turned a very delicate shade of green.
"Stunned, Miss Black," said McGonagall with what Peter thought was a trace of satisfaction. "But not dead. So you see, your...zeal...was considerably misplaced." Glancing at Peter, she winced. She shifted the kitten to her left arm, removed her wand from her robe pocket and waved it gracefully. "Finite Incantatem."
As the curses and hexes faded from his body, Peter stood up slowly on tottering legs.
McGonagall studied him for a few moments. "Are you quite all right, Mr Pettigrew?"
There was only one possible answer to that, even if it wasn't the truth. "Yes, ma'am."
"Ma'am," said Avery, and sniggered. Wilkes joined in a few seconds later. The laughter stopped abruptly when McGonagall turned a quelling eye on them.
"I thank you for your concern about etiquette," she said sternly, "but I am not offended by non-academic honorifics. Now. Follow me, please."
"Where are we going?" Bellatrix sounded both petulant and worried.
"To the Headmaster's office, of course," said McGonagall coolly. "Where else?"
***
It was astonishing how quickly McGonagall took care of matters. Swiftly, she led them all to another hallway, caught the attention of a passing prefect, and sent a message to Madam Pomfrey. In what seemed like mere seconds, Madam Pomfrey scurried into the hall and took the stunned bundle of kitten from McGonagall.
Madam Pomfrey shook her head and looked very sombre. "How did this happen?" she asked.
Bellatrix opened her mouth. McGonagall gave her a measuring look until she shut it again. Then McGonagall turned to Madam Pomfrey. "We don't know yet," she said in a forbidding voice. "Though I intend to find out."
Once Madam Pomfrey had headed off to the infirmary with Nathan, McGonagall guided the children to Dumbledore's tower office.
It was a small, circular room filled with overflowing bookshelves, odd mechanical devices that might have been toys, tools or weapons, a crystal ball and a large stone bowl graven round the rim with what looked like some sort of peculiar alphabet. The school Sorting Hat rested atop a bookcase, while a sword encrusted with gleaming rubies hung on the wall. Gazing solemnly at all of them was an immense orange-red bird that almost might have been on fire.
Of Dumbledore there was no sign.
"Figures," whispered Rosier to Avery. "All this fuss to get us here, and the old fool isn't even present."
"Old fool? Well, perhaps, Mr Rosier. On occasion, perhaps."
And there, sitting at his desk, was Dumbledore.
Peter blinked. Dumbledore must have been there all along, he decided at last. Their eyes had just been playing tricks on them.
Dumbledore gazed at the children, and for a moment an expression of dreadful sorrow filled his eyes. Then he turned to McGonagall. "Very well, Professor. What happened?"
McGonagall spoke of the scene she'd stumbled upon. Bellatrix and her friends re-told the tale of Peter's cruelty to animals. By the time they were done, Peter scarcely recognised himself in the monster-boy they'd depicted.
At last, Dumbledore spoke to Peter. "Is this true, Mister Pettigrew?"
Peter kept his head low, gazed at the floor with intense concentration, and shook his head.
"Mister Pettigrew. I want you to look at me, and to speak clearly when you do. Did you do this?"
Peter looked up, an expression of pure misery on his face. He shook his head once more, then spoke. "No. No, I didn't."
"Are you saying we're lying?" said Bellatrix in a wounded voice. As she looked at him with grief-stricken but understanding eyes, she tapped him on the wrist to attract his attention, then curled her strong hands with their long fingernails into talons.
Peter winced. All right, I obviously can't call her a liar and keep my eyes.
"No, I'm not saying you're lying," he said. "I'm saying you're mistaken. There's a difference."
"Someone hurt the cat," said Dumbledore. "It is hardly the kind of thing that could have happened by accident. Was it an accident?"
"No." Perhaps it would be wiser to pretend that Nathan's injuries were accidental, but he couldn't.
"You say you did not do this."
"I don't just say that I didn't," Peter said firmly. "I didn't."
"You also say that Bellatrix and her friends had nothing to do with the cat's injuries."
"Yes, sir." Well, it was what he was saying. It wasn't true, but he was definitely saying it.
Dumbledore frowned. "Forgive me if I'm wrong, Mister Pettigrew, but you seem to have eliminated all possibilities. The cat did not suffer an accident. You did not harm it. They did not harm it. What, pray tell, is left?"
Peter thought for a minute. "Attempted suicide?" he offered, in a weak voice.
Dumbledore gazed at him in exasperation. "How could a cat attempt suicide?"
He chose to come with me, thought Peter bitterly.
"You would be amazed," murmured McGonagall. She glanced at Peter. "What were you doing down that hallway?"
At least he could answer this question honestly. "I was looking for your office. I needed to talk to you."
"May I ask what you wished to speak to the Professor about?" inquired Dumbledore in a tone that made it perfectly clear that he expected, nay, demanded an answer.
Peter glanced at the avid eyes of his schoolmates and decided that nothing could be more hazardous to his health than admitting, in their hearing, that he hated magic and the entire wizarding world. He shook his head.
"No, sir," he said politely. "You may not ask, and I won't answer--not in their hearing, anyway." So saying, he nodded toward the Slytherins. He bit his lower lip, suddenly looking terribly young. "And please don't insist that I do so. I can't. I just can't."
In a perfect world, that would have been the end of it.
This was not a perfect world.
Dumbledore was insistent that Peter state why he'd been looking for Professor McGonagall, and that he come up with a proper story about who had injured Nathan. Peter was equally determined not to say a word.
As if they were riding a roundabout at a fun fair, the two travelled in circles for quite some time before McGonagall interrupted, addressing the Slytherins. "As young Mister Pettigrew is reluctant to speak, perhaps an examination of wands--yours and his--would be in order. Of course, there is no assurance that he was necessarily using magic to torment the cat, but if you were indeed trying to restrain him, I would expect to find some Binding Charms. Does this meet with your approval, Headmaster?"
"It does indeed," said Dumbledore, and Peter was surprised by how grimly pleased the Headmaster seemed to be.
McGonagall examined Peter's wand first. Few spells emerged from it, and even fewer were recent ones. The Slytherin wands, on the other hand, were a dead give-away.
"Professor," said Rosier, visibly sweating. "We can explain--"
"I think," said Dumbledore in a soft voice, "that you have all said more than enough. I cannot tell you how disappointed I am in each of you. I shall speak to each of you tomorrow after classes. Individually."
"And I," added McGonagall sternly, "shall be speaking to your Head of House. I shall be recommending that, since you show such proficiency in wand use, he might wish to teach you about how to perform tasks without them."
"You may return to your common room now," Dumbledore concluded. His voice said that they had best not go anywhere else.
The Slytherins filed out, shooting Peter poisonous glares as they did so. Peter gazed up at them, his whole face begging.
I didn't tell. They figured it out for themselves. Don't blame me...
It was all true, and yet he knew that they would blame him. They would always blame him.
He sighed as the last one--Severus Snape--exited.
"Now that they have gone," Dumbledore said, "would you be so kind as to tell us why you were looking for Professor McGonagall's office?" The words were gentle; the eyes were blue steel.
"I-I wanted to ask her something."
"Which was?" prompted McGonagall.
The words came out in a rush. "Please can I go home?"
"Home?" repeated McGonagall as she stared at him over her glasses. "You've only just got here."
"I know," Peter said, "but I don't have to stay here. I haven't set anything on fire by being angry or broken any windows since I arrived. I've learned not to do magic. I'm safe now. So please, when may I go home?"
"Peter," said the Headmaster in a terrible and gentle voice, "you haven't learnt anything of the kind. The protective spells of the castle keep you from having accidents."
Well, that was a setback. But not an insurmountable one.
"How soon can I start learning how not to do magic?"
McGonagall blinked. "Mister Pettigrew--don't you want to be a wizard?"
"God, no!" Peter blurted out, and then clapped his hands over his mouth. He'd just blasphemed against God and the wizarding world, and he wasn't sure which crime would be punished more severely.
McGonagall, for her part, seemed to be in shock. "'No'? But--why?"
There were a thousand reasons, but Peter couldn't put them all into words. And some of his previous attempts to explain problems, such as the lack of Muggle inventions or the sensation he had of living a thousand years in the past, had failed miserably. He fumbled for something halfway explicable. "The other day in Transfiguration, we were turning beetles into buttons."
"Yes," said Professor McGonagall in a puzzled tone. "It's a standard first year lesson."
"See, that's one of the things I don't like."
"You could become better at Transfiguration--"
Peter shook his head. "That's not what I mean. It's--it's not fair. It's a cruel thing to do. It's like a bully pouring boiling water in an anthill to see what will happen. If I haven't got any buttons, wouldn't it make more sense to go down to the corner shop and buy some, instead of taking a bunch of living insects and turning them into something that's not alive? I wouldn't like it, being turned into an un-alive thing just because someone could."
He took a deep breath. "And it's all like that--Charms and Defence Against the Dark Arts and Transfiguration. Everything's about doing something with magic that doesn't need to be done with magic--like lighting a fire, or making something fly to you instead of you walking across the room to get it--or cursing other people to hurt them or spells to protect other people from hurting you..."
He chewed on his lower lip and snuffled. "And there's more--a lot more--but I don't know how to say it all. Just--please may I go home? I won't tell anyone about Hogwarts, I won't, I swear!"
"There must be something you like about Hogwarts," said Dumbledore.
Peter considered. He couldn't think of a thing. At last he shook his head.
"Not even Quidditch?" hinted McGonagall.
"No. Not even Quidditch."
"And there is nothing you like about the wizarding world, either? " Dumbledore inquired.
"No, sir."
Dumbledore sighed, sat back in his chair and steepled his fingers, regarding Peter with perplexity. "You would truly return to the Muggle world, never to practice magic again?"
For a moment, Peter could almost see his family flat, could almost hear automobiles and buses rushing down Birmingham streets. He could smell the curry from the Pakistani takeaway nearby, and the scent of fresh bread and cookies from the bakery where his mother worked. He could feel the thud of his trainers against a football.
Then it was gone, and he was back in the magical world that was holding him prisoner.
The contrast was so great that it nearly made him sick.
There must be a signpost showing the exit to the Twilight Zone, he thought bleakly. There must be a door out of Narnia, a way back to Kansas.
"Peter," said Dumbledore--and the pity in his voice was enough to set Peter's teeth on edge--"it is as I told you. Your powers must be trained. If they are not, you will remain a danger to yourself and others. They will not be fully trained for some time to come."
Peter looked at him, dreading the answer to the question he must ask. "How long will it be before I am trained?"
"Not long," Dumbledore said genially. "No more than seven years."
"Seven YEARS!" Practically my whole lifetime.
And what he would be like after serving a seven-year-sentence in Elfland, he didn't want to know.
Dumbledore rambled on for some time. Struggle, control, need for proper training, it's for your own good, Peter.
Peter didn't bother listening. He couldn't. Three sentences in his mind kept beating to the rataplan of a drum, drowning out Dumbledore's words: You lied. You lied to me, to get me trapped here. And I hate you for that.
At last Dumbledore finished his monologue. "Now, Peter," he said. "Do you understand?"
Not for worlds or galaxies could Peter have answered yes to this.
"No, sir," he said dully. "I don't understand. And I don't think I'm ever going to. Excuse me." He walked over to the office door, then paused.
"It really would be better for everyone," he said in a high, trembling, desperate voice, "if you'd just let me go home."
***
On his way back to the Gryffindor dorms, Peter stopped off at the infirmary. Madam Pomfrey was there, looking a bit more cheerful than she had a few hours before.
"Peter! About your cat..."
Here, away from the Slytherins and the deceptively confusing Headmaster, Peter could admit the truth. "I didn't hurt him. I swear I didn't."
Poppy Pomfrey made a sound that, in a lesser woman, would have been a snort. "Bless you, Peter, I didn't think you'd hurt Nathan. Some children are beasts, and that's all there is to it."
She leaned down and patted a bundle of blankets in a box. "He's just a bit woozy and his muscles ache. I'll give him a bit of Blood-Replenishing Potion and some Invigorating Solution, and he'll be fine."
Peter stood stock-still for a moment. "You mean there's actual magical medicine?" he said at last. "Because when I come here, what you generally do is remove curses."
"Of course there's magical medicine," said Madam Pomfrey, staring at the boy. "Healers and mediwitches couldn't get on without it. I was just about to start making some for Nathan. Would you like to help?"
Peter looked dazed. "You mean there's actually some magic that's good?"
Madam Pomfrey looked sad as she smiled, and Peter couldn't fathom why. "Yes, lad," she said, tousling his hair. "There really is."
"I'm not much good at magic," Peter said at last. "It scares me."
Madam Pomfrey looked exasperated. "Of course you're not very good at it. You've only been here a month."
"I'll ruin your ingredients. I'll-I'll poison Nathan or something."
Madam Pomfrey shook her head. "I don't think you will. And they're my ingredients. I'll take the chance on their being ruined."
Peter took a step forward. "Well..."
"Do you want to try?"
A nod. A hesitant nod, but still...a nod.
"Good. Then come over here." She guided him to a counter, rummaged about till she found a stool for him to stand on, and a knife and a chopping block to use. Then she opened a jar, and removed a handful of what looked like dark brown commas.
"Chop these peeled shrivelfigs very evenly and very fine. Otherwise the Invigorating Solution won't work. I'll check when you're done, all right?"
Peter nodded, and began earnestly chopping shrivelfigs.
He still didn't trust magic. And he really didn't like the fact that he'd been tricked into coming to Hogwarts.
But maybe, just maybe, if he could use his magic to help instead of hurt, to make people and animals better instead of turning them into things...
Well, maybe attending school in Narnia-Oz-Elfland might be bearable after all.
***