She whispered

by Lucas Chesterton

The house was as crooked and lopsided as only a wizarding house could be. It was located in a narrow cobbled road verging off Diagon Alley, with the infamous Knockturn Alley right around the corner, wedged in between two other buildings of a similar kind, and on one of the wooden balconies that looked as if they might come down any moment, a witch with scraggly grey hair and a nose that rivalled Jack Daysen’s peered down at Elena with a look of blatant disgust.

  ‘Is this number sixty-six?’ Elena called up to her uncertainly as it was hard to believe that this obviously run-down house could be the place where an institution as conscious of appearances as the Crowley Academy obviously was (judging from the brochures, anyway, and from the Crowley lifestyle) carried out its assessments. She had checked the address ��� sent to her only the day before along with the time at which she was to present herself ��� numerous times and was actually quite certain that she’d got it right. Carcass Lane was the name of this road, which sounded horrible but had really something to do with a slaughterhouse that had had its quarters here over a century ago (a detail Cassie had supplied her with). Number sixty-six was peculiar because Elena wasn’t sure whether the narrow road even held that many houses, but she knew by now that house numbering in the wizarding world didn’t always follow rational rules; in fact, most buildings didn’t even sport a number.

  ‘Madam?’ she tried again as the big-nosed witch on the balcony hadn’t replied. ‘Do you hear me? Is this number sixty-six?’

  The woman’s mouth worked, formed a spout. The next moment, a spray of spit and mucus came down and Elena was only just able to dodge the projectile. ‘What the ���!?’

  ‘Piss off, bloody Mudblood!’ the old banshee screeched and dove out of sight before Elena could whip out her wand. However, a cackling laughter could be heard.

  ‘Choke on your venom, bitch!’ Elena ranted. While being called ‘Mudblood’ was something that happened every now and then, she was no longer prepared to just swallow it. However, it made her feel even more insecure. Did she really look like a Muggle so much? Especially today she had taken extra care with her clothes ��� no denims, no synthetics ��� because she had thought long and hard about the kind of image she wanted to convey to the Crowley Academy. And yet all it took was a bitchy witch with cataracts to tell exactly what she was!

  Elena sighed dejectedly and then decided that the only way to find out whether she was in the right place was to knock, which she did, forcing herself not to be timid. It took an awfully long time before anyone responded, and she was just about to knock again when the door was drawn open.

  She knew at once that the face was familiar. Watery eyes, light-brown hair tied back in a ponytail and a slightly beaky nose. Yet, it took her a few seconds to place it. ‘Mr Periwinkle ���’

  Periwinkle the Younger, to be precise.

  ‘Ms Horwath. I’m pleased you remember me.’

  Something about him had changed. The last time Elena had seen him ��� ‘His name’s Waldemar’, she recalled now ��� he’d been nervous, with beads of sweat on his forehead, and obviously daunted by the presence of Periwinkle the Elder. Now, however, he exuded the self-assured benevolence of a host. He stepped back gallantly. ‘Please come in.’

  Elena stepped over the threshold into a very narrow and cramped hallway that smelt of age-old dust and cat piss. At first she thought that small gauze curtains hung from the ceiling, but they were really gigantic cobwebs with myriads of flies neatly wrapped up in them. ��� Yes, she was still a Muggle. Walking into a hallway such as this made her body hair stand on edge. She wasn’t tidy, far from it, but this ��� well, it was much, much worse than even Jack’ house had been before the arrival of Gilly, the house-elf.

  ‘Is this ��� an outpost of the Academy?’ she asked incredulously.

  Waldemar Periwinkle’s cheeks coloured. For a moment, he looked like his old nervous self. ‘I’m very sorry about this. ��� You’re right, this house is a bad representative of the Academy. We use differing locations to carry out our assessments, and we can’t always choose.’

  Elena took careful note of the ‘we’. The young Periwinkle appeared to consider himself an integral part of the Academy, and Elena wondered what his father’s ��� grandfather’s? anyway, Ansgard Periwinkle’s ��� take was on that. ‘Why don’t you do them at your academy?’ she asked.

  Waldemar Periwinkle gave her a twitchy smile .‘We like to be private’, he said, then led the way through the hallway. ‘I’m afraid, Ms Horwath, you will have to wait a little while. We had a small ��� delay and are still getting ready upstairs. ��� Will you be so kind and take a seat in here?’

  He was trying to be smooth and charming, Elena noted, maybe a little too much. With a gesture too flamboyant to fit the location (or the occasion, for that matter), he opened a door at the end way of the hallway, leading into a dusty small sitting room that held no more than a faded pink chintz sofa, a rickety chair for a coffee table and a dead fireplace. There were cracks all over the ceiling and a cold draught came through cracks in the windows that were as dirty as those of the Hog’s Head. Elena entered the room hesitantly. A shiver of disgust went down her spine.

  ‘Would you like anything while you’re waiting? Tea, perhaps?’

  ‘No’, she said, shaking her head ferociously and only just able to keep herself from saying ‘In this dump, are you kidding?’ Gingerly, she sat down on the edge of the chintz sofa.

  ‘We’ll make it quick’, Waldemar Periwinkle assured her, suddenly fidgeting. ‘Thank you for your patience.’

  A few seconds later, Elena was alone in the cramped sitting room, working hard to breathe evenly. It was difficult because she was nervous, more so than she had expected. She forced herself to remember Jack’ words to her, spoken only a week ago. ‘You have to own it; believe it. You’re a witch in sore need of education, nothing more. Focus on the parts of your story that are true!’ In theory, this was all very well. However, sitting here in this depressingly dirty place, completely out of her comfort zone, it was difficult to take courage in theory. What was more, she didn’t know what was coming, what form the assessment would take and whether she would be able to deal with it. Granted, in the past week she had practiced Occlumency almost every day, mostly with Draco who’d come by faithfully. Certainly she was as well prepared as she could be, but would it help her?

  She sighed, wanted to lean back, but the sofa wasn’t very inviting. From overhead, voices and footsteps could be heard. Chairs were drawn over the floor with a screeching sound. Elena began to ask herself whether all this was a scheme to unsettle her and put her at a disadvantage. The more she thought about it, the more likely it appeared. She had to occupy her mind, not think about what might be coming or what could happen. She had to think positive thoughts. And so she turned to her last meeting with Jack ���

  It had taken place in Komarek’s Mercedes, a few hours after she’d got the invitation to the assessment. Elena had gone there immediately after receiving a very late owl and had renewed the Obscuring and Repelling charms on the car to ensure a private conversation in its dimly lit interior. Daysen had arrived about ten minutes later, smelling of snow and with melting flakes on his shoulders that told Elena that winter had come back to Scotland.

  ‘So it’s on’, he’d said instead of a ‘Hello’, slipping into the passenger seat beside her.

  ‘Yeah, it’s on’, she’d murmured, not knowing what else to say.

  He’d scrutinized her. ‘Second thoughts?’, but Elena had waved it away.

  ‘You could still say no’, Daysen suggested with unusual gentleness.

  ‘No, I couldn’t. Not now. It’d be chickening out.’ She gave him a testy side-glance. ‘Plus, you’ve made sure that I might have a bodyguard. ��� Sorry, bodyguard-slash-boyfriend.’

  He gave her a dry grin. ‘Thought that you wouldn’t like that much.’

  ‘Oh, I’m fine’, she claimed, although she
looked miffed, ‘you won’t like it!’

  He raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh yeah?’

  ‘Yes, and I’ll tell you why: people will think that Draco cuckolded you!’

  A strange glimmer in his eyes told her that he hadn’t thought of that. ‘I don’t care what people say’, he growled eventually.

  ‘Oh yes, you do! I know hardly anyone who is so touchy about being ridiculed!’ Even in the dim light of the car her eyes looked ablaze.

  Daysen did his utmost to set a stony face and shrugged. ‘I’ve had worse.’

  Again, she glanced at him and tried to read what he was thinking or feeling ��� did ‘I’ve had worse’ mean ‘I don’t care’? ��� but of course it was futile. ‘I’m a little worried about the assessment, though’, she confessed in a small voice.

  ‘So am I’, he replied.

  ‘Assess my magical propensities, what’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘I have no idea’, he admitted. ‘Such procedures do exist, of course. We have one at Hogwarts, the Sorting Hat. However, it doesn’t so much assess the layout of magical talent, but rather the temperament of each individual student.’

  ‘And it only sorts into four categories, doesn’t it, the four Houses. I don’t think that this is what the assessment is about.’

  ‘Probably not.’

  ‘I mean, it sounds reasonable in a way that they would want to know where to start teaching me, where my strengths and weaknesses are ���’

  ‘I don’t object to that’, Daysen broke in, ‘I am worried about something else.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Your prescience.’

  Elena looked at him curiously, asking him to elaborate.

  ‘I wouldn’t want people like that to know about this very specific talent of yours. ��� Seers are rare, as you know, and hence they are also precious. And frequently abused. Just think of the fate of most seers that you have ever heard of. Cassandra of Troy. Morgan le Fey. Or the Roman Sybils that were forced to sit on stools all day in the midst of mind-numbing fumes supposed to suppress their conscious thought and make their visions more vivid, hardly given any food and no comfort at all. Most Sybils were old women by the time they were forty, exhausted and on the verge of madness ���’

  ‘I’m not going to be a Sybil’, Elena said reasonably. ‘Those times are over.’

  But he scoffed. ‘As per usual, you’re underestimating this. Anyone with a desire for power who can get their hands on a true seer will not rest until they do so, by one scheme or another. A person who is able to predict the future represents an immense advantage to anyone seeking power. I need not explain why, just think about it. ��� Hence, I fear that if the Academy finds out about your divinatory talent, they will do everything to not only develop and school it, but also to make use of it.’

  ‘They can’t do that without my permission!’

  ‘They might not ask’, Jack held against.

  She swallowed and looked glum. What he’d said made perfect sense in a perverted way. ‘What should I do?’

  ‘Practice Occlumency. Any chance you get. And hope you can shield your prescience so they don’t find out about it.’ He shrugged once more to signal that there wasn’t much else that she could do.

  ‘I did practice today’, she piped up like a good girl, but that was only because she felt very insecure all of a sudden, ‘with Draco.’

  ‘Good. Give it another go tomorrow. And the day after that. And ���’

  ‘I get it.’

  They were silent then, staring out of the windshield into a dark night where the swings, slides and climbing frames of the nearby playground looked like the meagre skeletons of out-worldly beings. It was Daysen who spoke first. ‘What’s happening there, anyway? Have you had any visions lately?’

  She shook her head. ‘Nothing. Absolutely nothing since the Leshnikov thing. It’s a little bit as if I’ve lost that connection.’

  Daysen taxed her thoughtfully. ‘Probably a good sign’, he murmured.

  ‘Why do you think so?’

  ‘Last time, your visions became more forceful the closer danger came, didn’t they? The fact that you don’t have any now probably means that there is no immediate reason for concern.’

  That, at least, cheered her up a bit. ‘I wish I could control it better’, she sighed.

  ‘Yes. That’s mostly my fault. I should have found you a Divination instructor a long time ago, to teach you how to handle it and give you the possibility of deciding what you’d want to do with it. ��� Problem is, I only know one ��� like I said, seers are rare ��� but she’s a bundle of nerves and I’d hate her teaching you ���’ He broke off and shook his head with determination.

  ‘Tell me how to be a spy then’, she demanded, ‘you know, tricks of the trade and all that.’

  The expression on his face changed from thoughtful to self-important. And so, in the middle of the night and sitting in a vintage Mercedes, Jack Daysen began to instruct her on spy work. He started with a few basic rules, specifically how to give herself a back story and believe it, too. Most of it was really common sense; nonetheless she found it both informative and thrilling (in more ways than one) to listen to his silky voice telling her to be ever observant and get people to give her the information that she wanted.

  ‘You have to remember’, he explained, ‘that what people like best is talking about themselves. Believe me, it’s like an addiction: given the opportunity, they won’t let go. It’s the best way to get them to let down their guard and give you what you want to know. By diverting their attention to themselves, you will also make sure that they don’t wonder about you too much. And by feigning interest in their sorry lives, you’ll make sure they trust you.’

  ‘Mollycoddle them, in other words.’

  ‘Yes, but careful! Not everybody’s open to that. Some people thrive on attention, others on well-dosed resistance. But since you’re so proud of your intuition, you will surely know the difference.’

  She thought about it. ‘Who taught you to be a spy, anyway?’

  ‘I taught myself. I guess you could say I’m a natural.’ He did sound arrogant when he said it like this, but Elena knew that he didn’t mean it that way. ‘Dumbledore helped with a few tricks, though’, he added a little hastily.

  ‘Why do you think you’re so good at it?’

  ‘Lots of sneaking around when I was a kid’, he responded sourly.

  The reference to his childhood reminded her of Eileen Prince, which gave her a reason to change the subject. ‘Your mother still around?’

  ‘Yes’, he said gloomily, ‘as was to be expected.’

  ‘Do you mind?’

  ‘Yes, I do. But then, I really live at Hogwarts, so I can stay out of her way. ��� Plus, she did a really good job with this.’ He pointed to his neck. Only now did Elena notice the crisp clean bandages that, unlike before, had not a spot of blood or pus on them. ‘You can say what you want about her, but whenever she concocts something, the effect is ��� thorough.’

  Elena understood the allusion and bit her lip. Jack, in turn, gave her a crooked grin. It was a little bit as if they shared a running gag.

  They remained seated in the car for a while longer, talking lazily about this and that; questions were asked, advice given, but it was really nothing that desperately needed to be discussed. Actually, the reason why they stayed was not a conscious one. Had they made any effort to discover it, they would have found that it was their bodies that demanded to stay close to each other and that their nether selves weren’t as shy as their rational ones. As it was, they simply felt a reluctance to get moving, leave the comfort of the leather seats and venture out into the cold; hence, they put it off.

  Eventually, however, Elena looked at the clock on the car’s dashboard. It showed almost 2 a.m.

  ‘Gee, that late?’ She looked at Jack with a gentle look of pity. ‘When do you have to get up?’

  ‘Six o’clock
.’

  ‘Oh! I’m sorry, I didn’t realize ���’

  He held up his hand. ‘Don’t apologize to an insomniac for not letting him sleep. This was more important. But you’ll have to continue with Draco now.’

  She grinned crookedly. ‘My new boyfriend ���’

  He scowled at first, but then saw her expression develop into a genuine smile. ‘I’d thought you’d be mad’, he remarked.

  She tilted her head. ‘And I thought you wouldn’t care about that.’

  Feeling caught, he stared out of the windshield again. ‘First and foremost, I’m thinking about your safety.’

  ‘I know. ��� And just for the record, I was mad. Because you didn’t tell me personally.’

  ‘What, you think I was afraid of telling you?’ He glared at her challengingly.

  ‘God forbid, the great Jack Daysen ��� afraid?’ The irony in her words was heavy, but before he could react with outrage she gave him her most radiant smile which ��� as always ��� stunted him a little. It also made him think of something else.

  ‘It’s a good thing to have Draco as an ally’, he assured her. ‘It’s not only that he’s capable, he also comes from a well-connected family. That might help us in things to come. It’s important to have allies, especially as a spy.’

  She said nothing, but continued to smile, her eyes seeking his. The atmosphere changed, became laden with meaning; there was an underlying tension that made Jack struggle for words that wouldn’t come, and so he latched on to the next best thing. ‘Speaking of the Malfoys ���’, he started, then clamped his mouth shut.

  ‘Yes?’ Elena sensed something, the need to coax the words out of him, and also she had a feeling that what he was going to say would be significant. Again, she smiled warmly to encourage him, thinking that sometimes getting him to talk was like coaxing a frightened kitten out from under the sofa.

  ‘There’s ��� I’ve received an owl.’

  ‘Really?’ She made it sound as if it was the most extraordinary thing.

  ‘From Draco’s mother. An invitation to dinner.’ He didn’t go on and Elena felt that it had been hard enough for him to get these words out.