The Vault of Destinies (James Potter #3) (27 page)

Harry stood up, carrying Lily as she slept, her head on his shoulder. Ginny followed, and the group began to shuffle toward the car's doors. It was an unusually quiet group as they filed out onto the deserted platform. A cool mist hung in the air around the huge terminal nearby. In the distance, a clock tower began to toll the hour. James counted the chimes and discovered that it was ten o'clock. Slowly, led by Chancellor Franklyn and Professor Georgia Burke, the group made its way off the platform and into the huge brightly lit terminal. Tall windows framed the space on either side, showing inky black sky.

"This is the 30 Street Station," Zane announced, too tired to be particularly enthusiastic. "They were going to rename it Benjamin Franklin Station a decade or so ago, but there was some political mish-mash and it never happened. Do yourself a favor and
never
bring it up with the Chancellor."

As the group made its way through the bank of doors at the far end of the marble floor, they were met by a sweeping view of the city where it huddled on the other side of a broad river. Without stopping, Franklyn led the travelers across the street and onto a wide bridge. Cars and a few buses moved back and forth on the bridge as the travelers made their way along a footpath on the right side.

"It isn't far," Franklyn proclaimed over the noise of the traffic. "No Disapparating this close to the station, unfortunately. Not that we could anyway, with so many underage witches and wizards with us."

Ginny pulled her hair into a ponytail as she walked next to her husband. "I don't mind stretching my legs a bit, actually."

"Not the most beautiful city I've ever seen," Albus remarked. "But the river is a delightful shade of orange."

"That's just the streetlamps," Lucy sighed.

"Enjoy the view while you can," Zane instructed. "Once we get on campus, it might be months before you ever see it again."

Albus frowned. "Is it a school or a prison?"

"Yes," Zane quipped. "But the point is, there's no reason you ever really need to leave. The Aleron's got everything you need, and quite a few things you don't. I've been there a whole year already and I still haven't seen the whole campus."

Shortly, the group left the traffic bridge behind and descended into a warren of densely populated city blocks. Small businesses and gas stations eventually gave way to crowded residential areas. The houses and apartments pressed together like patrons at a bar, shouldering for room in front of the narrow streets. Cars and trucks lined the pavement, glimmering softly in the glow of the streetlights. Trees ranged along the streets as well, huge and old, their roots pushing the footpath into unruly hills and valleys. Finally, the group crossed a narrow intersection and approached a stone wall, just high enough that no one could see over it. Bits of broken glass were embedded into the mortar along the top.

"Here we are, then," Zane said, nodding approvingly.

Albus was unimpressed. "This is it, is it? I see what you mean about the size of it. You could get lost bending down to tie your shoe."

James looked back and forth along the cracked footpath. The stone wall was no longer than a Hogwarts corridor, with leaning brick pedestals at either end. Embedded in the center of each of the brick pedestals, worn almost to illegibility, was a stone block with a stylized symbol engraved onto it. The symbol appeared to be a shield with two letter 'A's on it, perched upon by an eagle with spread wings. A wrought-iron gate stood in the middle of the wall, facing the street, but the gate was so choked with vines and weeds that the view beyond was completely hidden. Franklyn approached the gate and pulled some of the vines aside, peering in.

"It is I, Flintlock," he said quietly. "Chancellor Franklyn. Our visitors have arrived."

James, Albus, and Lucy crowded through the travelers, eager for a glimpse beyond the overgrown gate.

"It's just a yard," Albus complained. "Where's this big giant campus you were talking about?"

"It's not there yet," Franklyn answered.

"The Timelock!" Ralph said suddenly, remembering. "My dad told me about it last year! Excellent!"

"In time, Mr. Deedle," Franklyn smiled. "So to speak."

James pushed the vines aside and craned to look over Albus' shoulder. Sure enough, the space inside the wall was simply an old yard, choked with weeds and bits of trash. Only two objects seemed to occupy the space. One was a rather fat and overgrown willow tree. The other was a very large jagged boulder.

"He's asleep, Chancellor," Professor Burke sighed, turning away. "Shall I toss a rock at him?"

"You know how irritable he gets when we do such things," Franklyn replied impatiently. "Nobody likes having their own genetic material chucked at them. Let me try once more." Raising his voice a bit, Franklyn cried out again, "Flintlock! It is I, your Chancellor! Do wake up! Our guests are waiting!"

From the yard came a grating snort followed by a low grinding noise. James glanced around, looking for the source of the sound, and was surprised to see the boulder moving slightly. Apparently, it wasn't one boulder, but many smaller rocks piled together, for they began to move independently, not falling apart, exactly, but shifting position, forming a shape that looked strangely, teasingly alive.

"Cool!" Albus cried out suddenly, forgetting the quiet street around him. "It's a rock troll! I've always wanted to see a rock troll!"

The stony shape stood up and began to lumber toward the gate, moving ponderously but heavily, its footsteps shaking the ground faintly.

"Meet Flintlock," Franklyn said, gesturing with one hand. "Our security chief. He's been a part of Alma Aleron ever since… well since before my time. Isn't that right, Flintlock?"

The troll fished a large key from the depths of his rocky crevices and socked it into an iron padlock. In a deep grating voice, the troll said, "I came over with the Mayflower, sir. I remember it like it was yesterday."

Professor Burke smiled wearily. "Of course, in rock troll years, it probably
was
yesterday."

As the gates swung open, squeaking noisily, Albus peered up at the stony creature. "But you must weigh a thousand tons!" he exclaimed. "How would any boat carry you?"

"It didn't carry me," Flintlock replied slowly. He leaned forward, and in what passed as a whisper, he added, "I followed it."

The others passed by Albus as he stared up at the troll, wide-eyed, considering.

"To the Tree," Zane pointed. "This is the best part. Come on!"

Franklyn stopped, allowing everyone else to pass by in front of him. "Yes, yes, as Mr. Walker says, everyone under the Tree. I am sure we are all quite ready for this journey to be over."

James, Ralph, and Lucy joined Petra, Izzy, and the rest in the moonshade of the Tree's drooping branches. James no longer felt tired. Instead, he was filled with a certain giddy excitement, fuelled partly by the misty night air, and partly by the mystery of whatever was about to happen.

"He followed the Mayflower here!" Albus rasped, stabbing a thumb over his shoulder at Flintlock. "He just walked right along the bottom of the ocean, watching the ship way up on the surface! Isn't that the coolest thing you've ever heard in your life?"

"Isn't he coming with us?" Ralph asked, peering aside as the troll stumped back toward the gate, padlock in hand.

"No!" Albus answered, grinning. "He stays here all the time! ALL… the TIME! He says that sometimes Muggle teenagers climb over the walls, glass shards or not, looking for places to get into mischief. He bops 'em to sleep and tosses them in a nearby alley with an empty bottle or two, makes them think they just fell over drunk!"

"Let's see," Franklyn said, crowding under the Tree. "I daresay, what with our visitors, Professor Remora, and her returning students, we are exceeding the legal occupancy limit of the Warping Willow."

"Please, Chancellor," Remora sighed. "Even for creatures such as myself, it has been a very long night. Let us get it over with."

Franklyn nodded and produced a complicated brass instrument from the depths of his robes. James recognized it from his previous experience with the Chancellor. It consisted of various-sized lenses held in hinged loops. He twisted two of the lenses into alignment, raised the instrument, and peered through it at the moon.

"Ah yes," he said, and then muttered to himself, apparently doing calculations in his head. Finally, he nodded and pocketed the brass instrument. A moment later, he raised his wand and touched it gently to the gnarled trunk of the Tree. In a singsong voice, he said, "Warping Willow, take us hither, days and years or all or none. Wend your way, we travel thither, home to Alma Aleron."

Next to James, Ralph shifted nervously. "I know about Whomping Willows," he whispered, "but what's a Warping Willow do?"

Zane whispered back, "Have you ever seen a square-dance?"

"No!" Ralph rasped. "We've been through this already."

Zane bobbed his head back and forth. "Think about what the
Zephyr
did with up and down," he said quietly. "And now think of the
Zephyr
as the Warping Willow, and up and down as now and then."

"It's technomancy again, right?" Ralph moaned as the Tree began to move around them, shifting mysteriously, stirring wind in its long branches. "I
hate
technomancy."

A cool breeze whistled around the Tree's twisted trunk, threading through James' hair and making the branches sway and hiss. A dull crackle emanated from the depths of the Willow, sounding like pine knots in a fireplace.

In front of James, Izzy gasped. "Look!" she cried, pointing. "The sun's coming up!"

Zane peered at the pinkish glow as it expanded on the horizon. "I may be mistaken," he said, "but I think that's the sun going down. Er, in reverse."

The pink glow spread and brightened, turning orange, and then, sure enough, the sun peeked over the stone wall of the overgrown yard. The yellow orb climbed into the sky with eerie speed, casting hard shadows inside the yard, and then swiftly shortening them. Warm air blew through the Tree and James squinted, finding himself in a sudden hot noontime. The sun began to move faster, sliding back down the sky on the other side of the Warping Willow, which sighed and shushed all around, its branches swaying like curtains.

"What's happening?" Lily asked with a note of fear in her voice.

Ginny pulled the girl up into her arms. "It's all right, Lil," she soothed. "We're still traveling, I think. Only now, we're traveling in time."

Night spread across the sky again, filled with glimmering stars. Now, the moon waltzed overhead, its bony crescent chasing the clouds. Moments later, the sun followed once again, moving so fast that it seemed to be rolling across the sky like a marble. The wind in the Tree increased, shushing the whip-like branches, and James felt movement beneath his feet. He glanced down and saw the Warping Willow's roots twisting through the earth, spreading and shifting like tentacles.

The sky dimmed to night and lightened again to noon, beginning to cycle with dizzying speed. The sun and moon chased each other across the sky, and then blurred into streaks, and then vanished into seamless, silvery arcs of spinning time. The arcs curved across the sky, and seasons began to drift past the outside of the Tree. The grass grew brown, and then grey and listless. Suddenly, snow covered it, sparkling white and piling high, forming drifts against the interior walls of the yard. The snow vanished away again, and now autumn leaves carpeted the ground. Almost immediately, the leaves evaporated, leaving the grass green and lush, peppered with white butterflies. James turned on the spot, transfixed, watching the yard all around as it cycled past seasons and into years, faster and faster, blending into a flickering tableaux of decades, even centuries. And through it all, Flintlock hunkered unmoving, looking like nothing more than a craggy boulder, through flashing eons of sunshine and snow.

Finally, the cycle began to slow, until the seasons became distinct again, and then the streaks of the sun and moon, and finally the alternating lights and darks of days. The Tree sighed and whispered, settling, until the sun lowered for the last time and the sky grew dark, flooded with stars. The moon was a high, full orb now, frosty in the darkness. It slowed, climbing, climbing, and finally crawled to a stop. The Warping Willow relaxed and went still.

In the sudden silence, Neville Longbottom exhaled a pent breath. "So…," he asked slowly, "when are we?"

Chancellor Franklyn glanced at him, and then at the watch that hung from a chain around his prodigious waist. "It's eleven twenty-one," he answered. "September fourth. Er, seventeen fifty. Give or take a few seconds. It's hard to be especially accurate about such things."

"Oh my," Petra said from behind James. He turned to glance back at her, saw the expression of rapt wonder on her face, and then turned around again, following her gaze.

Beyond the curtains of the Warping Willow's branches, the yard had grown. The gate was still visible nearby, but the wall it was set in was much wider; so wide, in fact, that James couldn't see either end. In every other direction, moonlight sifted down onto manicured lawns, sprawling colonial brick buildings, statuary, fountains, and flagstone footpaths. Flickering lampposts dotted the campus, their lights dim and entrancing under the full moon.

"Well," Percy said, and even he sounded awestruck, "it looks like we've finally made it to Alma Aleron."