The Curse of the GateKeeper (James Potter #2) (22 page)

"Maybe it's just the wind," Rose said uncertainly. "Come on, let's—"

Two more lanterns blinked out in quick succession. James glanced at Rose, then Ralph, his eyes wide. Suddenly, much stronger than before, a cold wind tore down the corridor, streaming through their robes and whipping their hair. It blew the rest of the lanterns out, throwing the corridor into murky darkness.

"Look!" Rose cried breathlessly, her voice unnaturally high. James and Ralph followed her shaking, pointing hand. There was a figure moving down the corridor. It floated above the floor, its head lowered, obscuring the face. It drifted toward them swiftly and silently. James grabbed Ralph and Rose's sleeves, pulling them as he attempted to back away, but his legs felt frozen. The figure was moving too quickly. It was nearly upon them. Suddenly, just as it heaved directly in front of them, it raised its head.

Ralph gasped. Rose uttered a little scream. James blinked.

"Cedric?" he exclaimed, his heart pounding. "What are you doing?!"

The ghost of Cedric Diggory straightened and grinned at them. "I've been practicing," he said in his distant, ghostly voice.

"Y-you know him?" Rose stammered, recovering a little.

"Yeah, we know him," Ralph replied. "That wasn't right, Ced. What was that all about anyway?"

Cedric looked taken aback. "I'm the 'Specter of Silence'. I've been practicing over the summer, trying to create a little mystique. What, was it too much?"

James nodded, his eyes wide. "Yeah, I'd say it was a bit much! Can you, you know, fix the lights?"

The ghost glanced back at the snuffed lanterns. "Actually, they're a lot easier to put out than to relight. Hold on."

Cedric closed his eyes and screwed up his face. After a moment, two of the lanterns flickered back alight.

"That's a bit better," Rose sighed. "But still. Don't do that again, all right? At least not to me."

Cedric smiled. "You must be Hermione's daughter. You have her hair, although it's a bit redder."

"I prefer the term 'auburn'," Rose said. "Anyway, yes. Nice to meet you, er, Cedric. I remember hearing about you. Care to accompany us to dinner?"

Cedric looked thoughtful. "I don't think so. It's not good for the mystique, hanging about in the Great Hall with everyone there."

"All the other ghosts do it," Ralph commented. "The Bloody Baron's down there nearly every meal, waving his sword around and teaching the first-years bad words."

"Yeah…," Cedric agreed doubtfully. "That's fine for him. He's been around since forever…"

James narrowed his eyes. "How many people have seen you, Cedric? I mean, not counting us?"

The ghost floated nervously. "Besides you? Er… does the portrait of Snape count?"

James shook his head.

"What about the Muggle intruder?"

"No."

"Well," Cedric admitted, "that's pretty much it, then."

"Wait a minute," Rose said, raising her hand. "You're a shy ghost?"

Cedric grimaced. "Not 'shy'. I was never shy. I've just been… busy."

"Busy learning how to blow out lanterns and practicing being the 'Specter of Silence'?" James clarified, tilting his head.

"Look, it's just different, that's all," the ghost said. "I haven't been down to a dinner in the Great Hall since the night I died, over twenty years ago."

Ralph spoke up, "So? Not much has changed, I'm guessing. From the looks of things down there, they've been running it pretty much the same since the founders themselves. Come on, it'll be fun even if you can't exactly eat the food."

Cedric shook his head sadly. "I can't. Not yet." He heaved a ghostly sigh. "Last time I was there, I sat with my friends. I was on my way out to what I hoped would be a victory in the final challenge of the Triwizard Tournament. Everybody toasted me with their pumpkin juice and wished me good luck. I promised them I'd tell them all about my adventure the next day at dinner, with or without the victory cup…" Cedric's ghostly eyes had gone thoughtful. "Cho Chang met me by the door on the way out of the hall. She wished me luck in the maze. I wanted to kiss her, but I didn't, not right there in the entrance to the Great Hall with everyone looking. I promised myself I would kiss her afterwards. Actually, I think I cared even more about that than I did about winning the cup. Kissing Cho was going to be the real prize…" Cedric paused, and then blinked, shaking himself. He glanced at James, Rose, and Ralph, as if remembering they were there. "But that never happened, of course. It feels like it was yesterday. It feels like if I went down to dinner now, Cho would be there, watching for me. There would be Stebbins, and Cadwallader, and Muriel, all anxious for me to regale them with the details of my trip through the maze. That's how it feels to me, but it's not true. They wouldn't be down there. Not really. They've all grown and moved on. I'm just a distant memory. Instead, my old table would be full of people I don't know. They'd not even recognize me." He shook his head again. "Maybe someday I'll be able to come down. But not yet. I can't."

Rose reached out to pat Cedric's arm, but her hand went right through it. "I'm so sorry, Cedric," she said. "You can come with us whenever you want to. Your old friends won't be there, but there might be some new friends waiting."

Cedric nodded and smiled, but James didn't think the ghost believed Rose's words.

"Will we be seeing you around?" James asked him.

"Sure," Cedric agreed. "Maybe the whole 'Specter of Silence' thing is a bit too much. Next time, I'll tone it down."

The three students turned and made their way back along the corridor. As they rounded the corner, James glanced back. There was no sign of Cedric's ghost, but James had a sense that he was still there anyway. James waved goodbye, then caught up to Ralph and Rose.

As they passed the great open doorway looking out over the courtyard, James stopped. In the blue evening gloom, a small group of students was gathered near the gate. James noticed they were all Slytherins, and Albus was standing in the center of them. With a start, James realized it was Wednesday night, the night Tabitha Corsica had planned to 'make arrangements' with Albus.

"Hold up," James said quietly, stopping Ralph and Rose. As casually as he could, he sauntered over to the door and slipped into the shadows, watching the group of Slytherins.

"What's going on out there?" Rose asked, joining James. James shushed her.

Tabitha was talking to Albus, smiling prettily, nodding her head. Philia Goyle and Tom Squallus hovered nearby along with a few other Slytherins whom James didn't know. James couldn't hear what they were saying. As the crowd shifted, James saw that Tabitha Corsica was holding something tall and thin, wrapped in a black sleeve.

"That's most of the Slytherin Quidditch team," Ralph explained in a low voice. "There's Beetlebrick. He's the Keeper. Fiera and Havelock are Beaters."

James narrowed his eyes. "One guess what Corsica has in that black cover."

The Slytherins suddenly turned and began to walk out of the courtyard. Albus was leading, laughing, and gesturing happily. James slipped through the doorway, following.

"Where are you going?" Ralph asked.

"What's it look like? I'm going to follow them. Corsica is planning to put Al on that flying curse of hers."

Ralph grimaced. "What are you planning to do, stop them?"

"I know you can't help me, Ralph," James said quickly, "since they're your housemates and all. But I'm going to go see what they're planning, at least."

"It's not that," Ralph replied. "I just think it's Albus' choice. I sort of think maybe… you shouldn't get involved."

"I'll take that into consideration," James muttered darkly. He jumped out into the quickly darkening courtyard. A moment later, he heard footsteps as someone followed him.

"You don't have to come, Rose," James said, stopping at the courtyard gate.

"What kind of a thing is that to say?" she whispered harshly. "I was going to spy on them whether you did or not."

James smiled at her. Together, they hunkered down and slunk around the edge of the gate, watching for the departing Slytherins. The gloom of the approaching night made it difficult to see. After a moment, Rose pointed. James followed her direction and saw the robed figures cresting a hill a hundred yards away. They were heading for the Quidditch pitch, of course. Keeping as low as they could, Rose and James followed.

As they neared the pitch, James motioned for Rose to follow him. He led her in a curving path around the side of the Gryffindor grandstand. As quietly as they could, they crept up the wooden staircase to the lowest level. There, they crouched before the guardrail and peered down into the dark pitch.

The group of Slytherins stood on the centerline. James could hear their voices indistinctly. Tabitha seemed to be the one speaking. There was some motion as the figures moved about, and James silently cursed himself for leaving his glasses in his bag.

"What's going on?" he whispered helplessly. "I can barely see who is who."

"Tabitha just took the cover off of a broom," Rose whispered back. "She seems to be explaining how it works to Albus. He looks pretty anxious to fly it. He can barely stand still. Looks like he has to go to the loo."

James could see what happened next. Tabitha held the broom out to Albus. He took it in both hands and looked at it, then looked back up at her. James couldn't see his face, but he knew Albus was grinning that infectious, reckless grin of his. Finally, the other Slytherins stepped back away from him, leaving him in the center of a rough circle. Albus hefted the broom with one hand, as if testing its weight and balance on his palm. Then, deftly, he tossed it into the air. It came down and bobbed next to him at hip height. James struggled with the urge to shout out, to warn Albus. James had ridden that broom once, and it had been a dreadful disaster. There was something extremely unusual about the magic of it. It had fought James and very nearly killed him. When Tabitha rode it during Quidditch matches, it seemed to exercise a very suspicious influence over the brooms around it, and even, James suspected, the Snitch itself. Rose hooked her hand into James' collar and pulled him down. James hadn't realized he'd begun to stand, preparing to call a warning to his brother. He glanced at her, his eyes wide.

"Don't," she mouthed, shaking her head.

James looked back down at the pitch. Albus reached out and wrapped his hand around the handle of the floating broom. Quickly, as if purposely not thinking about it, he swung a leg over it, straddled it, and kicked off. The broom shot straight up, spinning slowly and carrying Albus high into the deepening night. It reached the top level of the grandstands and stopped gently. Albus was merely a black shape outlined against the dusky sky. As James watched, he crouched low over the broomstick. It shot forward, perfectly in control. Distantly, Albus ballyhooed happily, his voice echoing over the nearby hills.

Rose leaned toward James. "I had flying lessons with Albus on Tuesday," she whispered. "He couldn't fly like that then."

James pressed his lips into a thin line. He glared down at the assembly of Slytherins on the field but couldn't make anything out. If any of them were directly influencing Albus' flight with their wands, he couldn't tell it.

In the silence of the descending night, James could hear the swish and flap of his brother's inaugural flight. Albus flickered and swooped over the pitch and the nearby hills, whooping with delight. Finally, after a few minutes of random soaring, he dipped into a long, curving bank over all four of the house grandstands, picking up speed. James and Rose crouched as low as they could as Albus swept in over the Gryffindor gangway. He turned the broomstick easily and pulled it to a hovering stop near the flags that topped the grandstand. James held his breath, hoping that the shadow of the seats was enough to hide him and Rose. Albus took a deep breath, aimed the broom back down toward the pitch, and suddenly stopped. He seemed to be looking directly at James, but in the darkness, it was very hard to tell. He was probably looking past James, down to the Slytherins standing in the center of the pitch below. Finally, Albus leaned forward. The broomstick pitched into a steep dive, sweeping over the rows of seats. James crouched as low as he could, fearing Albus might actually graze him when he passed over the guardrail. As James ducked, a hand reached down and tousled his hair, fleetingly. The wind of Albus' passing subsided, and James heard his brother laughing as he swooped into the darkness of the pitch.

"That little prat!" James rasped. Rose shushed him.

Albus descended in a tightening circle, finally bringing the broom to a landing as gentle as a dandelion seed. The Slytherins applauded and collapsed around Albus, congratulating him.

"A natural," Tabitha's voice rang out on the breeze. "Just like your father."

"'Natural' nothing!" James hissed under his breath. Rose tugged at his robes, pulling him down into the shadows again. Together, they watched the group of Slytherins walk back across the pitch, their voices lost in the rising wind. As James watched, he saw Albus glance up at him and grin.

After a minute, James and Rose climbed down from the grandstand and retraced their steps back to the castle.

"You saw the way he operated that broom," James exclaimed, struggling to keep his voice low. "Or to be perfectly accurate, the way it operated him!"

Rose answered thoughtfully, "I admit it looked a little suspicious. But you said yourself you could barely control a broom until you got your Thunderstreak. Maybe Albus just needed to get on the right sort of broom to show his stuff."

James shook his head, exasperated. "You don't understand. I tried to ride that broom myself, once. It about murdered me!"

"Well, you weren't supposed to be riding it, then, were you? Some new brooms are smart that way. Even yours has the 'Extra-Gestural Enhancement' option, doesn't it? Once it bonded with you, anybody else who tried to ride it would have serious trouble."

"Look," James said, throwing up his hands, "you just have to trust me on this, Rose. That broom's cursed, somehow. And Tabitha is probably the one that cursed it."