ZODIAC: 02 - A Place To Be
Title: ZODIAC
Rating: PG (for now)
Pairing: Albus Severus/Scorpius (in the future)
Words: 4,120
Warnings: Impending Slash, Deathly Hallow Spoilers, un-beta'd
Previous Chapters: 01 - House Unity
‘Expelliarmus,’ Professor Shacklebolt cried, pointing his wand at the wooden mannequin that stood at the other end of the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom. The makeshift wand that had been placed in the mannequin’s branch-twig hand shot up in the air, spinning to the side and landing with a clatter on the stone floor over two metres away from the mannequin’s pedestal.
‘That, pupils,’ Shacklebolt said in his deep and slow voice, ‘is the disarming spell.’ He walked across the room and picked the mannequin’s fake wand up off the floor, twirling it around his lithe fingers in a subconscious manner. Although Shacklebolt had left his career as an Auror to pursue a more relaxed vocation (Albus knew this because it was now his dad who was head of the Auror Department at the Ministry of Magic), the wizard still had a lot of energy in him yet.
‘The spell was used a great deal in the war and was, undoubtedly, one of the fore fronting spells that helped win it for us.’ Shacklebolt had said the word ‘us’ as if he were referring to the entire class, as if the group of prepubescent first year Gryffindors and Slytherins before him had been fighting at his side in the frontline of battle. Albus couldn’t help but squirm uncomfortably on his chair, feeling like he was being talked to by an army drill sergeant. Beside him he felt Scorpius do the same and the two boys shared a momentary look.
‘Now take out your wands and stand up,’ Shacklebolt said and the whole class got to their feet, pulling their wands out of the pockets of their black school robes. With a flick of his own wand Shacklebolt magically pushed the chairs and tables to the corner of the classroom. The students sidestepped and scuffled out of the way of the moving furniture and began to gather in the middle of the classroom, Albus and Scorpius gathering along with the rest.
Once the classroom was cleared Shacklebolt sorted the class into an orderly line and began to direct them in pronunciation and wand movements for the spell. When he was satisfied with their progress he asked them to get into pairs and practise using the disarming spell on each other. Unlike Professor Longbottom, Shacklebolt did not care either way about the unity of houses, letting his pupils choose their own partners; his only direction being was for them to ‘be quick with it.’
Albus felt a tugging on his sleeve. Scorpius, who had been standing next to him practising the spell’s wand movements silently, was now looking at him and he could see a question playing on the blonde boy’s lips.
‘Uh, do you wanna pair up?’ Albus asked, saving Scorpius the hassle of doing so himself.
‘Oh I suppose,’ Scorpius replied. He shrugged but Albus could see the shadow of a smile on his face.
‘Come on,’ Albus said, elbowing Scorpius lightly in the side. He moved to an emptier part of the classroom. ‘Show me what you got, Malfoy.’
‘Malfoy is my family name. Call me Scorpius.’
‘Scorp?’ Albus asked, grinning.
Scorpius stared at him before shaking his head, making the once neatly combed blonde wisps of his hair fall in front of his silver blue eyes. ‘Oh you’re dead Albus,’ he said and the shadow of a smile that had been on face turn into a true grin.
Albus smiled. ‘Albus is the name of Headmaster and a plant,’ he retorted. ‘Call me Al.’
‘Okay Al,’ Scorpius said, and before Albus could prepare himself the blonde boy had shouted, ‘Expelliarmus.’
Albus’s wand flew out of his hand and he watch fly into the air, unable to hide his surprise that the other boy had managed to disarm him on only his first try at the spell.
‘Hey, no fair,’ he said, waiting for the wand to drop before going to collect it. ‘I wasn’t ready.’ However Scorpius was laughing too hard to hear him and after a while Albus found it difficult to keep the laughter from infecting him as well.
¤
Herbology and Defence Against the Darks Arts were quickly becoming Albus’s favourite lessons. Each Herbology lesson Professor Longbottom praised him and Scorpius for their fast progress in practical assignments and their ability to work as a team, unlike the rest of the class. Albus had no idea why he found it so easy-and even enjoyable-to work with Scorpius whilst the other pairs in Herbology were brewing up miniature storms of inter-house hatred.
Stephanie Flint had already managed to singe off both of Martin Finch-Fletchley’s eyebrows after an argument they had had about whose turn it was to feed the class Venus flytrap, Mortimus; and Daniel Coote was convinced that, not only was Septimus Avery pure evil, but the spawn of Satan himself after he had set a Filibuster Firework off in the face of a curly-haired Gryffindor girl Albus couldn’t quite remember the name of, sending the poor girl crying to the infirmary. However it wasn’t always Slytherin at fault, Cassie Thomas had succeeding in giving her Herbology partner an almost flawless Bat Bogey Hex when he had borrowed her quill from her without asking first.
It was no wonder Albus and Scorpius got their work done faster than anybody else; they had both silently agreed to ignore everything going around on them, situating themselves at a desk as far from the rest of the class as possible each lesson. They had even made it their unofficial duty to earn back any house points lost during the hubbub to prevent both Slytherin and Gryffindor going into negatives numbers. It was all very distressing, that is if Albus hadn’t found it so very entertaining.
Defence Against the Dark Arts, unlike Herbology, was a lesson that pretty much every student liked. Sometimes when they were doing theory Professor Shacklebolt would tell the class about his various escapades throughout his Auror years, stories that were always interesting to hear, but it was the practical lessons that Albus looked forward to the most.
‘You know, I’ve always wanted to be an Auror,’ Scorpius said from the seat next to him. He was poking absentmindedly at the motionless practice doll in front of him with the tip of his wand.
Shacklebolt had given each pair a charmed practice doll to perform the stunning spell on. According to the Defence Against the Dark Arts professor, the practice dolls, which were charmed to walk back and forth along the desktop and had approximately the same level of difficulty to stun as a human child, were more economical to practise upon than practising the spell on each other. He had told the class that two years ago a certain pupil called James Potter (Albus had blushed at the mention of his older brother’s name) and his friend Sam Jordon had cost the school infirmary its entire supply of reviving potions when they went crazy with their wand and stunned every pupil in the class, include themselves. The use of practice dolls greatly minimised the risk of the same thing happening again.
‘An Auror?’ Albus asked. ‘But with Voldemort gone there isn’t really much left to… um… aur.’
‘Aur?’ Scorpius turned to him, amusement obvious in his ice blue eyes. ‘The verb for what an Auror does isn’t ‘to aur’. It’s not like…’ He waved his free hand in the air as he thought. Albus had noticed over the time they’d spent together in lessons that Scorpius had a tendency to use his hands a lot in conversation. ‘It’s not like I aur, or you aur, or he, she, it aurs.’
Albus stuck out his tongue. ‘What is it then, oh mighty knowledgeable one?’ he asked.
‘Well I don’t know, do I? All I know is that it isn’t aur because aur isn’t even a word.’
The practice doll sprung back to life, as it was charmed to do after it had been stunned for a certain period of time. Scorpius shot another stunning spell at it and it flopped back down into stillness.
‘And what do you mean there isn’t much left to aur-I mean, do-when you’re an Auror?’ Scorpius continued, disregarding Albus’s smirk at his slip-up. ‘Isn’t your father an Auror?’
‘Yeah but he doesn’t do any exciting things like Shacklebolt did,’ Albus said. ‘He’s more like a policeman now.’
‘Poh-lees-man? Are you making up more words now, Al?’
Albus had forgotten how little Scorpius knew of the muggle world and so he went on to explain the basics of what a policeman did. His dad had told him a couple things about the muggles, making Albus, at least in his own opinion, quite well informed on the subject. He knew all about telephones and televisions, though his dad had always been vague on exactly how they worked (‘Something called electricity,’ his dad had told him. ‘Due to wires and stuff,’ he would add whenever Albus pressed him for more information). He also knew doctors were the muggle version of Healers and policeman were the muggle version of Aurors, except more boring.
‘I don’t know,’ Scorpius said after hearing Albus’s explanation. ‘Just because Voldemort’s gone doesn’t mean nothing bad’s going to happen ever agai-ow!’
Something had hit Scorpius on the back of the head. Looking around, Albus saw a tiny plastic hand lying on the floor. He picked it up and inspected it; it looked like it had been pulled off the arm of one of the practice dolls. Behind him he could hear muffled laughter and he glanced over his shoulder to see that the laughter Septimus Avery and another Slytherin boy he recognised but didn’t know the name of. Avery was making his practice doll wave its handless arm whilst the other Slytherin boy threw a badly folded paper aeroplane, aiming it at Scorpius’s head, which it missed and dropped on the desk instead.
Albus reached over to take a hold of it when Scorpius beat him to it, unfolding the aeroplane so that whatever was written inside of it was out of Albus’s line of sight.
‘What was that about?’ Albus asked, watching with curiosity and concern as Scorpius ripped the paper up into tiny fragments.
‘Nothing,’ Scorpius said. ‘It doesn’t matter.’ He picked up their practice doll and dropped it unceremoniously in front of Albus. A second later it stood up and began to walk, albeit quite wobbly, around in a circle. ‘Your turn to practise stunning spells now.’
‘Are you okay?’ Albus asked further, taking no notice of the practice doll.
‘Don’t forget to keep your hand steady when you cast the spell so you’ll be less likely to miss,’ Scorpius muttered, taking no notice of Albus’s question.
¤
‘You’re friends with a Malfoy? Didn’t you listen to a thing Uncle Ron said?’ James Potter had caught Albus studying in the Gryffindor Common Room and had decided to pester his little brother on his associations.
Albus had been worrying about the moment when James would find out about his partial friendship with Scorpius. His older brother was stubborn in the fact that when he had chosen not to like something, he continued not to like it until the end of time; for example the Slytherin House and the Malfoy family.
‘Scorpius is nice,’ Albus defended lamely. ‘Who told you anyway?’
‘Nobody with a crappy name like Scorpius could be nice,’ James said. ‘And Rose told me. She’s an honest relative. Unlike some.’ He looked accusingly at Albus.
‘Uh… who told her?’ Albus was in a different house to his cousin Rose, who was a Ravenclaw, and because the Slytherins and Gryffindors shared lessons that year he barely ever saw her except at random times in the Great Hall. He had no idea how she found out that he and Scorpius were friends.
‘She told me you’d ask that,’ James said smugly. ‘And she also told me to tell you that you’re an idiot if you didn’t realise that being a Potter and being friends with a Malfoy is cause for gossip.’ Then, as an afterthought, he added, ‘and I’m telling you that I agree with her. You are an idiot.’
Albus let out a groan. It was at times like these, with his brother towering over him as he attempted to do his homework, that Albus wished he wasn’t in Gryffindor if only to be free of James.
‘You know,’ James said, leaning languidly against Albus’s armchair and inspecting his fingernails. ‘I don’t see why you’re friends that Malfoy brat, even the Slytherins want nothing to do with him.’
Albus looked up from his Transfiguration essay to stare at his brother. ‘Huh?’
‘Yeah…. poor guy,’ James continued. He placed his hand on his heart and looked down at the floor, attempting to feign sympathy. ‘My good friend Sam saw Malfoy being pushed around by a bunch of fifth year Slytherins in the corridors not long ago.’
‘What? Why?’ The incomplete Transfiguration essay lay forgotten on the clattered side table beside the armchair. Albus was now sat bolt upright.
‘How should I know?’ James said, shrugging his broad shoulders. ‘Fifth year Slytherins, Al. It’s not like Sam could really go up and ask, for fear of his life. That Malfoy probably had what was coming to him. Relax already.’
But Albus didn’t relax. He waited, staying silent in the armchair, until James got bored and walked away. As soon as he was sure his older brother’s attention was elsewhere, Albus stood up and hurriedly began to shove his Transfiguration essay and textbook into his school bag. Then, trying to look as casual as possible, he rushed to the stairs that led up Gryffindor tower and to the boys’ dormitories. It wasn’t his own dormitory he was heading for, which he had past two doors ago; he was heading for the third year’s dormitory, James’s dormitory.
The Marauder’s Map was buried deep inside James’s school trunk, hidden in between the folds of a burgundy jumper emblazoned with the letter ‘J’, courtesy of Grandma Weasley. Taking out his wand, Albus pressed the tip of it to the blank parchment of the map, muttering under his breath, ‘I solemnly swear I am up to no good.’
Instantly the map burst to life. Black ink swirled across the yellowing parchment, meeting here and there to form the rooms, towers and hidden passageways that made up the Hogwarts School grounds. In the corner of the map, written in a tiny and barely legible scrawl were the words, ‘Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs’. Prongs. Albus smiled. That was his grandfather’s nickname. To think he became an Animagus and made such an intricate map when he was still only at school, truly amazing. However, to reminisce on the grandfather he had never known was not the reason why he was here.
Albus’s emerald eyes began to search the map and the tiny dots that symbolised people on it. He squinted to read the names above the dots, searching for the one he wanted. It took quite a while to find, and Albus’s hands had begun to shake with the fear of being caught, but it finally saw the name he wanted, along with the miniscule black dot that went with it. Except, oddly, the dot wasn’t in a specific room or a corridor the castle. Lifting the map so close to his face that his nose almost touched the parchment, Albus stared harder at the bobbing dot, although there was no denying its position: Scorpius Malfoy was in between walls.
How could that be possible? Maybe Scorpius was sat in an alcove obscured by a tapestry or painting, that was possible, right? Albus looked at Scorpius’s dot again; he was on the seventh floor of the castle. He pointed his wand at the parchment, not exactly knowing what he was doing, and whispered, ‘is there a tapestry or painting here?’
He hadn’t honestly expected the map to respond until he saw the words begin to form as if written by an invisible quill. Tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy attempting to teach trolls to dance the ballet. Then written after those words in scruffier handwriting and in brackets, (definitely Barmy, everyone knows trolls can never get the pirouette sorted - Padfoot). An arrow appeared going from the words to a spot on the opposite wall to where Scorpius’s dot was, obviously indicating that Scorpius wasn’t hiding behind a tapestry after all.
Albus decided that the only thing to do was to go to the place where the map said Scorpius was and see if he was actually there.
Clearing the map, Albus hid it back in James’s trunk and scurried out the door. Scorpius was on the seventh floor opposite the portrait of Barnabas the Barmy and, somehow, in between the corridor walls.
In all honesty Albus didn’t really know what he was looking for Scorpius or what he would do when he found him. Maybe it was all some extravagant form of procrastination so he didn’t have to finish off the Transfiguration essay yet that was due for next week. He wasn’t even sure whether Scorpius was a friend. Yeah they had fun in the two lessons they sat next to each other in but apart from that there really wasn’t much else. Would he do the same for Daniel Coote or Martin Finch-Fletchley? Yes, yes, of course he would. They were friends too.
The corridors of Hogwarts were pretty empty. It was Friday afternoon and most of the students were making their way down to the Great Hall for dinner. Albus asked a nearby portrait of a milkmaid where the entrance to the seventh floor was and she kindly pointed him in the direction of a moving staircase.
‘Get off on the second landing, not the first,’ she had told him and Albus had done as she said.
It hadn’t taken him long to find the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy. Woven trolls in pink tutus tended to stand out quite obviously on grey stone. Opposite the tapestry, however, was a plain blank wall. Albus walked over to it and pressed his hand against the stone brick and swore to himself. Why had he been so stupid? He should have taken the map with him so he could check whether Scorpius had left already. Or he should’ve asked the map if there was a secret room behind the wall and how to get into it instead of asking about silly tapestries. He wanted to find Scorpius and he was never going to at this rate.
Then he heard a rumbling. Beneath his fingers Albus could feel the wall begin to vibrate. For an instant he thought that it was the beginning of an earthquake until he realised that it was only the wall that was shaking and not the floor, that and the fact earthquakes weren’t prone to happen in England. He stepped back, wide eyed, as the wall began to judder more vigorously. The stone bricks were beginning to change shape, turning browner in colour and starting to look no longer like stone but like wood. Soon Albus found himself staring, not at a blank wall, but an old wooden door, a door that was slowly opening.
Scorpius Malfoy stepped through the doorway, one hand on the brass door handle and the other rubbing eyes that looked red and sore. Albus was rooted to the spot, his mouth opening and closing like a fish as he tried to say something but couldn’t think of anything to say nor could he find his voice to say anything with.
Finally, when Scorpius closed the door behind him, letting it melt and disappear back into the wall, and removed his hands a fraction from his eyes, did Albus find his voice.
‘Ugh.’ Even though Albus had found his voice it had taken him a while longer to find words for it. ‘Hello Scorpius.’
Scorpius seemed to jump about a foot in the air, his hands frantically scrambling behind searching him for the door handle to a door that wasn’t that.
‘What are you doing here?’ he said, his voice hoarse and strained. Albus then knew why Scorpius’s eyes were so bloodshot and puffy, the boy had been crying.
‘Um, I wanted a walk,’ Albus lied.
Scorpius looked at him suspiciously. ‘You’re lying,’ he accused.
‘No, I’m not,’ Albus lied further.
‘Yes you are,’ Scorpius said, looking at Albus pointedly. ‘You are lying. You’re here because of the Room of Requirements.’
‘The Room of Requirements…? OH!’ A memory hit Albus as hard and as fast as a Bludger to the head. His dad had told him about the Room of Requirements and how it only appeared when a person was in desperate need of it. Albus cursed his bad memory. ‘How did you know about the Room of Requirements?’
‘My father told me about it,’ Scorpius replied. He sniffed, and then hastily tried to cover it up with a light cough. ‘He told me how to find it and told me to use it whenever I needed somewhere to… be. So I asked the room to give me somewhere to be.’
‘Is that all?’ Albus said, unable to help himself. It was no wonder he had still been able to Scorpius’s dot on the Marauder’s Map if all Scorpius had asked for was a place to be. Albus remembered his dad saying that the Room of Requirements gave only exactly what it was required to give. If Scorpius had asked to be hidden then Albus wouldn’t have been surprised if his dot had been hidden to. But all he had asked was for somewhere to be.
‘What do you mean ‘Is that all’?’ Scorpius asked, looking affronted. ‘I got what I wanted right?’
Well yeah,’ Albus said. ‘But you could do so much more with the room. Here.’ He grabbed a hold of Scorpius’s hand, much to the other boy’s astonishment, and began to walk back and forth along the corridor, tugging Scorpius along with him. He passed the bare wall a total of three times before letting go.
‘What are you doing?’ Scorpius asked but his question was answered when another door materialised. It wasn’t a door like the one before. This one was huge and made of white marble carved elaborately with swirls and patterns.
Reaching towards what seemed like a solid gold door handle, Albus pushed the door open, motioning for Scorpius to follow him.
The Room of Requirements barely looked like a room at all but more like the inside of a coliseum that had undergone a series of drastic changes. The place was entirely circular and dotted with stone pillars entwined with ivy. The walls and floor were made of marble that, when touched, felt warm against the skin. There was an exceptionally comfy looking sofa by one of the stone pillars and by another there was placed a very fancy chess table with two very fancy chairs. In the exact centre of the coliseum room were two swinging hammocks suspended by nothing at all. Everything was illuminated by the silver glow of moonlight, as-instead of a ceiling-there was a night sky dotted with stars.
‘What do you think?’ Albus asked after he had given Scorpius a moment to take it all in. ‘Pretty cool, huh?’
‘Yeah, pretty cool,’ Scorpius said, smiling, his eyes less puffy and red. He ran over to one of the hammocks in the centre and jumped into it, making it swing from side to side. Albus hoisted himself into the other hammock and leant back into the folds of cloth, staring up at the Room’s version of the sky. They lay there without speaking, relishing in the magic of the Room, until the silence was broken by the low grumble of hunger from both Albus’s and Scorpius’s stomach.
‘Why isn’t the room making food?’ Albus whined, clutching his stomach and wishing for food with all his might.
‘I don’t think the Room can do that,’ Scorpius said, and with a sigh he swung out of his hammock. ‘We better go to the Great Hall before dinner finishes.’
Albus slid off his own hammock and walked with Scorpius back to the door.
‘You know,’ he said as they made their way back to the seventh floor corridor, the entrance of the Room of Requirements vanishing behind them, ‘it’s nearly the end of dinner so there’s probably no one left around. I bet you could sit on the Gryffindor table with me.’
‘Only if you sit at the Slytherin table with me at dinner tomorrow.’
‘…Deal.’
( Next Chapter )
EDIT: The wonderful tilian3 drew a lovely picture of my Albus here. Go check it out.
Rating: PG (for now)
Pairing: Albus Severus/Scorpius (in the future)
Words: 4,120
Warnings: Impending Slash, Deathly Hallow Spoilers, un-beta'd
Previous Chapters: 01 - House Unity
‘Expelliarmus,’ Professor Shacklebolt cried, pointing his wand at the wooden mannequin that stood at the other end of the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom. The makeshift wand that had been placed in the mannequin’s branch-twig hand shot up in the air, spinning to the side and landing with a clatter on the stone floor over two metres away from the mannequin’s pedestal.
‘That, pupils,’ Shacklebolt said in his deep and slow voice, ‘is the disarming spell.’ He walked across the room and picked the mannequin’s fake wand up off the floor, twirling it around his lithe fingers in a subconscious manner. Although Shacklebolt had left his career as an Auror to pursue a more relaxed vocation (Albus knew this because it was now his dad who was head of the Auror Department at the Ministry of Magic), the wizard still had a lot of energy in him yet.
‘The spell was used a great deal in the war and was, undoubtedly, one of the fore fronting spells that helped win it for us.’ Shacklebolt had said the word ‘us’ as if he were referring to the entire class, as if the group of prepubescent first year Gryffindors and Slytherins before him had been fighting at his side in the frontline of battle. Albus couldn’t help but squirm uncomfortably on his chair, feeling like he was being talked to by an army drill sergeant. Beside him he felt Scorpius do the same and the two boys shared a momentary look.
‘Now take out your wands and stand up,’ Shacklebolt said and the whole class got to their feet, pulling their wands out of the pockets of their black school robes. With a flick of his own wand Shacklebolt magically pushed the chairs and tables to the corner of the classroom. The students sidestepped and scuffled out of the way of the moving furniture and began to gather in the middle of the classroom, Albus and Scorpius gathering along with the rest.
Once the classroom was cleared Shacklebolt sorted the class into an orderly line and began to direct them in pronunciation and wand movements for the spell. When he was satisfied with their progress he asked them to get into pairs and practise using the disarming spell on each other. Unlike Professor Longbottom, Shacklebolt did not care either way about the unity of houses, letting his pupils choose their own partners; his only direction being was for them to ‘be quick with it.’
Albus felt a tugging on his sleeve. Scorpius, who had been standing next to him practising the spell’s wand movements silently, was now looking at him and he could see a question playing on the blonde boy’s lips.
‘Uh, do you wanna pair up?’ Albus asked, saving Scorpius the hassle of doing so himself.
‘Oh I suppose,’ Scorpius replied. He shrugged but Albus could see the shadow of a smile on his face.
‘Come on,’ Albus said, elbowing Scorpius lightly in the side. He moved to an emptier part of the classroom. ‘Show me what you got, Malfoy.’
‘Malfoy is my family name. Call me Scorpius.’
‘Scorp?’ Albus asked, grinning.
Scorpius stared at him before shaking his head, making the once neatly combed blonde wisps of his hair fall in front of his silver blue eyes. ‘Oh you’re dead Albus,’ he said and the shadow of a smile that had been on face turn into a true grin.
Albus smiled. ‘Albus is the name of Headmaster and a plant,’ he retorted. ‘Call me Al.’
‘Okay Al,’ Scorpius said, and before Albus could prepare himself the blonde boy had shouted, ‘Expelliarmus.’
Albus’s wand flew out of his hand and he watch fly into the air, unable to hide his surprise that the other boy had managed to disarm him on only his first try at the spell.
‘Hey, no fair,’ he said, waiting for the wand to drop before going to collect it. ‘I wasn’t ready.’ However Scorpius was laughing too hard to hear him and after a while Albus found it difficult to keep the laughter from infecting him as well.
¤
Herbology and Defence Against the Darks Arts were quickly becoming Albus’s favourite lessons. Each Herbology lesson Professor Longbottom praised him and Scorpius for their fast progress in practical assignments and their ability to work as a team, unlike the rest of the class. Albus had no idea why he found it so easy-and even enjoyable-to work with Scorpius whilst the other pairs in Herbology were brewing up miniature storms of inter-house hatred.
Stephanie Flint had already managed to singe off both of Martin Finch-Fletchley’s eyebrows after an argument they had had about whose turn it was to feed the class Venus flytrap, Mortimus; and Daniel Coote was convinced that, not only was Septimus Avery pure evil, but the spawn of Satan himself after he had set a Filibuster Firework off in the face of a curly-haired Gryffindor girl Albus couldn’t quite remember the name of, sending the poor girl crying to the infirmary. However it wasn’t always Slytherin at fault, Cassie Thomas had succeeding in giving her Herbology partner an almost flawless Bat Bogey Hex when he had borrowed her quill from her without asking first.
It was no wonder Albus and Scorpius got their work done faster than anybody else; they had both silently agreed to ignore everything going around on them, situating themselves at a desk as far from the rest of the class as possible each lesson. They had even made it their unofficial duty to earn back any house points lost during the hubbub to prevent both Slytherin and Gryffindor going into negatives numbers. It was all very distressing, that is if Albus hadn’t found it so very entertaining.
Defence Against the Dark Arts, unlike Herbology, was a lesson that pretty much every student liked. Sometimes when they were doing theory Professor Shacklebolt would tell the class about his various escapades throughout his Auror years, stories that were always interesting to hear, but it was the practical lessons that Albus looked forward to the most.
‘You know, I’ve always wanted to be an Auror,’ Scorpius said from the seat next to him. He was poking absentmindedly at the motionless practice doll in front of him with the tip of his wand.
Shacklebolt had given each pair a charmed practice doll to perform the stunning spell on. According to the Defence Against the Dark Arts professor, the practice dolls, which were charmed to walk back and forth along the desktop and had approximately the same level of difficulty to stun as a human child, were more economical to practise upon than practising the spell on each other. He had told the class that two years ago a certain pupil called James Potter (Albus had blushed at the mention of his older brother’s name) and his friend Sam Jordon had cost the school infirmary its entire supply of reviving potions when they went crazy with their wand and stunned every pupil in the class, include themselves. The use of practice dolls greatly minimised the risk of the same thing happening again.
‘An Auror?’ Albus asked. ‘But with Voldemort gone there isn’t really much left to… um… aur.’
‘Aur?’ Scorpius turned to him, amusement obvious in his ice blue eyes. ‘The verb for what an Auror does isn’t ‘to aur’. It’s not like…’ He waved his free hand in the air as he thought. Albus had noticed over the time they’d spent together in lessons that Scorpius had a tendency to use his hands a lot in conversation. ‘It’s not like I aur, or you aur, or he, she, it aurs.’
Albus stuck out his tongue. ‘What is it then, oh mighty knowledgeable one?’ he asked.
‘Well I don’t know, do I? All I know is that it isn’t aur because aur isn’t even a word.’
The practice doll sprung back to life, as it was charmed to do after it had been stunned for a certain period of time. Scorpius shot another stunning spell at it and it flopped back down into stillness.
‘And what do you mean there isn’t much left to aur-I mean, do-when you’re an Auror?’ Scorpius continued, disregarding Albus’s smirk at his slip-up. ‘Isn’t your father an Auror?’
‘Yeah but he doesn’t do any exciting things like Shacklebolt did,’ Albus said. ‘He’s more like a policeman now.’
‘Poh-lees-man? Are you making up more words now, Al?’
Albus had forgotten how little Scorpius knew of the muggle world and so he went on to explain the basics of what a policeman did. His dad had told him a couple things about the muggles, making Albus, at least in his own opinion, quite well informed on the subject. He knew all about telephones and televisions, though his dad had always been vague on exactly how they worked (‘Something called electricity,’ his dad had told him. ‘Due to wires and stuff,’ he would add whenever Albus pressed him for more information). He also knew doctors were the muggle version of Healers and policeman were the muggle version of Aurors, except more boring.
‘I don’t know,’ Scorpius said after hearing Albus’s explanation. ‘Just because Voldemort’s gone doesn’t mean nothing bad’s going to happen ever agai-ow!’
Something had hit Scorpius on the back of the head. Looking around, Albus saw a tiny plastic hand lying on the floor. He picked it up and inspected it; it looked like it had been pulled off the arm of one of the practice dolls. Behind him he could hear muffled laughter and he glanced over his shoulder to see that the laughter Septimus Avery and another Slytherin boy he recognised but didn’t know the name of. Avery was making his practice doll wave its handless arm whilst the other Slytherin boy threw a badly folded paper aeroplane, aiming it at Scorpius’s head, which it missed and dropped on the desk instead.
Albus reached over to take a hold of it when Scorpius beat him to it, unfolding the aeroplane so that whatever was written inside of it was out of Albus’s line of sight.
‘What was that about?’ Albus asked, watching with curiosity and concern as Scorpius ripped the paper up into tiny fragments.
‘Nothing,’ Scorpius said. ‘It doesn’t matter.’ He picked up their practice doll and dropped it unceremoniously in front of Albus. A second later it stood up and began to walk, albeit quite wobbly, around in a circle. ‘Your turn to practise stunning spells now.’
‘Are you okay?’ Albus asked further, taking no notice of the practice doll.
‘Don’t forget to keep your hand steady when you cast the spell so you’ll be less likely to miss,’ Scorpius muttered, taking no notice of Albus’s question.
¤
‘You’re friends with a Malfoy? Didn’t you listen to a thing Uncle Ron said?’ James Potter had caught Albus studying in the Gryffindor Common Room and had decided to pester his little brother on his associations.
Albus had been worrying about the moment when James would find out about his partial friendship with Scorpius. His older brother was stubborn in the fact that when he had chosen not to like something, he continued not to like it until the end of time; for example the Slytherin House and the Malfoy family.
‘Scorpius is nice,’ Albus defended lamely. ‘Who told you anyway?’
‘Nobody with a crappy name like Scorpius could be nice,’ James said. ‘And Rose told me. She’s an honest relative. Unlike some.’ He looked accusingly at Albus.
‘Uh… who told her?’ Albus was in a different house to his cousin Rose, who was a Ravenclaw, and because the Slytherins and Gryffindors shared lessons that year he barely ever saw her except at random times in the Great Hall. He had no idea how she found out that he and Scorpius were friends.
‘She told me you’d ask that,’ James said smugly. ‘And she also told me to tell you that you’re an idiot if you didn’t realise that being a Potter and being friends with a Malfoy is cause for gossip.’ Then, as an afterthought, he added, ‘and I’m telling you that I agree with her. You are an idiot.’
Albus let out a groan. It was at times like these, with his brother towering over him as he attempted to do his homework, that Albus wished he wasn’t in Gryffindor if only to be free of James.
‘You know,’ James said, leaning languidly against Albus’s armchair and inspecting his fingernails. ‘I don’t see why you’re friends that Malfoy brat, even the Slytherins want nothing to do with him.’
Albus looked up from his Transfiguration essay to stare at his brother. ‘Huh?’
‘Yeah…. poor guy,’ James continued. He placed his hand on his heart and looked down at the floor, attempting to feign sympathy. ‘My good friend Sam saw Malfoy being pushed around by a bunch of fifth year Slytherins in the corridors not long ago.’
‘What? Why?’ The incomplete Transfiguration essay lay forgotten on the clattered side table beside the armchair. Albus was now sat bolt upright.
‘How should I know?’ James said, shrugging his broad shoulders. ‘Fifth year Slytherins, Al. It’s not like Sam could really go up and ask, for fear of his life. That Malfoy probably had what was coming to him. Relax already.’
But Albus didn’t relax. He waited, staying silent in the armchair, until James got bored and walked away. As soon as he was sure his older brother’s attention was elsewhere, Albus stood up and hurriedly began to shove his Transfiguration essay and textbook into his school bag. Then, trying to look as casual as possible, he rushed to the stairs that led up Gryffindor tower and to the boys’ dormitories. It wasn’t his own dormitory he was heading for, which he had past two doors ago; he was heading for the third year’s dormitory, James’s dormitory.
The Marauder’s Map was buried deep inside James’s school trunk, hidden in between the folds of a burgundy jumper emblazoned with the letter ‘J’, courtesy of Grandma Weasley. Taking out his wand, Albus pressed the tip of it to the blank parchment of the map, muttering under his breath, ‘I solemnly swear I am up to no good.’
Instantly the map burst to life. Black ink swirled across the yellowing parchment, meeting here and there to form the rooms, towers and hidden passageways that made up the Hogwarts School grounds. In the corner of the map, written in a tiny and barely legible scrawl were the words, ‘Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs’. Prongs. Albus smiled. That was his grandfather’s nickname. To think he became an Animagus and made such an intricate map when he was still only at school, truly amazing. However, to reminisce on the grandfather he had never known was not the reason why he was here.
Albus’s emerald eyes began to search the map and the tiny dots that symbolised people on it. He squinted to read the names above the dots, searching for the one he wanted. It took quite a while to find, and Albus’s hands had begun to shake with the fear of being caught, but it finally saw the name he wanted, along with the miniscule black dot that went with it. Except, oddly, the dot wasn’t in a specific room or a corridor the castle. Lifting the map so close to his face that his nose almost touched the parchment, Albus stared harder at the bobbing dot, although there was no denying its position: Scorpius Malfoy was in between walls.
How could that be possible? Maybe Scorpius was sat in an alcove obscured by a tapestry or painting, that was possible, right? Albus looked at Scorpius’s dot again; he was on the seventh floor of the castle. He pointed his wand at the parchment, not exactly knowing what he was doing, and whispered, ‘is there a tapestry or painting here?’
He hadn’t honestly expected the map to respond until he saw the words begin to form as if written by an invisible quill. Tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy attempting to teach trolls to dance the ballet. Then written after those words in scruffier handwriting and in brackets, (definitely Barmy, everyone knows trolls can never get the pirouette sorted - Padfoot). An arrow appeared going from the words to a spot on the opposite wall to where Scorpius’s dot was, obviously indicating that Scorpius wasn’t hiding behind a tapestry after all.
Albus decided that the only thing to do was to go to the place where the map said Scorpius was and see if he was actually there.
Clearing the map, Albus hid it back in James’s trunk and scurried out the door. Scorpius was on the seventh floor opposite the portrait of Barnabas the Barmy and, somehow, in between the corridor walls.
In all honesty Albus didn’t really know what he was looking for Scorpius or what he would do when he found him. Maybe it was all some extravagant form of procrastination so he didn’t have to finish off the Transfiguration essay yet that was due for next week. He wasn’t even sure whether Scorpius was a friend. Yeah they had fun in the two lessons they sat next to each other in but apart from that there really wasn’t much else. Would he do the same for Daniel Coote or Martin Finch-Fletchley? Yes, yes, of course he would. They were friends too.
The corridors of Hogwarts were pretty empty. It was Friday afternoon and most of the students were making their way down to the Great Hall for dinner. Albus asked a nearby portrait of a milkmaid where the entrance to the seventh floor was and she kindly pointed him in the direction of a moving staircase.
‘Get off on the second landing, not the first,’ she had told him and Albus had done as she said.
It hadn’t taken him long to find the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy. Woven trolls in pink tutus tended to stand out quite obviously on grey stone. Opposite the tapestry, however, was a plain blank wall. Albus walked over to it and pressed his hand against the stone brick and swore to himself. Why had he been so stupid? He should have taken the map with him so he could check whether Scorpius had left already. Or he should’ve asked the map if there was a secret room behind the wall and how to get into it instead of asking about silly tapestries. He wanted to find Scorpius and he was never going to at this rate.
Then he heard a rumbling. Beneath his fingers Albus could feel the wall begin to vibrate. For an instant he thought that it was the beginning of an earthquake until he realised that it was only the wall that was shaking and not the floor, that and the fact earthquakes weren’t prone to happen in England. He stepped back, wide eyed, as the wall began to judder more vigorously. The stone bricks were beginning to change shape, turning browner in colour and starting to look no longer like stone but like wood. Soon Albus found himself staring, not at a blank wall, but an old wooden door, a door that was slowly opening.
Scorpius Malfoy stepped through the doorway, one hand on the brass door handle and the other rubbing eyes that looked red and sore. Albus was rooted to the spot, his mouth opening and closing like a fish as he tried to say something but couldn’t think of anything to say nor could he find his voice to say anything with.
Finally, when Scorpius closed the door behind him, letting it melt and disappear back into the wall, and removed his hands a fraction from his eyes, did Albus find his voice.
‘Ugh.’ Even though Albus had found his voice it had taken him a while longer to find words for it. ‘Hello Scorpius.’
Scorpius seemed to jump about a foot in the air, his hands frantically scrambling behind searching him for the door handle to a door that wasn’t that.
‘What are you doing here?’ he said, his voice hoarse and strained. Albus then knew why Scorpius’s eyes were so bloodshot and puffy, the boy had been crying.
‘Um, I wanted a walk,’ Albus lied.
Scorpius looked at him suspiciously. ‘You’re lying,’ he accused.
‘No, I’m not,’ Albus lied further.
‘Yes you are,’ Scorpius said, looking at Albus pointedly. ‘You are lying. You’re here because of the Room of Requirements.’
‘The Room of Requirements…? OH!’ A memory hit Albus as hard and as fast as a Bludger to the head. His dad had told him about the Room of Requirements and how it only appeared when a person was in desperate need of it. Albus cursed his bad memory. ‘How did you know about the Room of Requirements?’
‘My father told me about it,’ Scorpius replied. He sniffed, and then hastily tried to cover it up with a light cough. ‘He told me how to find it and told me to use it whenever I needed somewhere to… be. So I asked the room to give me somewhere to be.’
‘Is that all?’ Albus said, unable to help himself. It was no wonder he had still been able to Scorpius’s dot on the Marauder’s Map if all Scorpius had asked for was a place to be. Albus remembered his dad saying that the Room of Requirements gave only exactly what it was required to give. If Scorpius had asked to be hidden then Albus wouldn’t have been surprised if his dot had been hidden to. But all he had asked was for somewhere to be.
‘What do you mean ‘Is that all’?’ Scorpius asked, looking affronted. ‘I got what I wanted right?’
Well yeah,’ Albus said. ‘But you could do so much more with the room. Here.’ He grabbed a hold of Scorpius’s hand, much to the other boy’s astonishment, and began to walk back and forth along the corridor, tugging Scorpius along with him. He passed the bare wall a total of three times before letting go.
‘What are you doing?’ Scorpius asked but his question was answered when another door materialised. It wasn’t a door like the one before. This one was huge and made of white marble carved elaborately with swirls and patterns.
Reaching towards what seemed like a solid gold door handle, Albus pushed the door open, motioning for Scorpius to follow him.
The Room of Requirements barely looked like a room at all but more like the inside of a coliseum that had undergone a series of drastic changes. The place was entirely circular and dotted with stone pillars entwined with ivy. The walls and floor were made of marble that, when touched, felt warm against the skin. There was an exceptionally comfy looking sofa by one of the stone pillars and by another there was placed a very fancy chess table with two very fancy chairs. In the exact centre of the coliseum room were two swinging hammocks suspended by nothing at all. Everything was illuminated by the silver glow of moonlight, as-instead of a ceiling-there was a night sky dotted with stars.
‘What do you think?’ Albus asked after he had given Scorpius a moment to take it all in. ‘Pretty cool, huh?’
‘Yeah, pretty cool,’ Scorpius said, smiling, his eyes less puffy and red. He ran over to one of the hammocks in the centre and jumped into it, making it swing from side to side. Albus hoisted himself into the other hammock and leant back into the folds of cloth, staring up at the Room’s version of the sky. They lay there without speaking, relishing in the magic of the Room, until the silence was broken by the low grumble of hunger from both Albus’s and Scorpius’s stomach.
‘Why isn’t the room making food?’ Albus whined, clutching his stomach and wishing for food with all his might.
‘I don’t think the Room can do that,’ Scorpius said, and with a sigh he swung out of his hammock. ‘We better go to the Great Hall before dinner finishes.’
Albus slid off his own hammock and walked with Scorpius back to the door.
‘You know,’ he said as they made their way back to the seventh floor corridor, the entrance of the Room of Requirements vanishing behind them, ‘it’s nearly the end of dinner so there’s probably no one left around. I bet you could sit on the Gryffindor table with me.’
‘Only if you sit at the Slytherin table with me at dinner tomorrow.’
‘…Deal.’
( Next Chapter )
EDIT: The wonderful tilian3 drew a lovely picture of my Albus here. Go check it out.