James Potter and the Crimson Thread

by G. Norman Lippert

  “And what, pray tell,” he asked gruffly, “are yeh both standin’ around for? I know fer a fact that Professor Votary is expectin’ you in Ancient Runes in ‘alf an hour.”

  Rose put a hand on her hip. “You’re ‘cleaning the barn’ again, Hagrid? Really?”

  “I won’t hear nary a word about it,” the half-giant said impatiently, waving both hands about his head as if to ward off a cloud of doxies. He pushed past James and Rose toward the door. “Jus’ you both mind yer bus’ness an’ stay away from th’ barn. S’dang’rous, it is.”

  He pushed out into the cold and damp of the grounds with James and Rose following close behind. To James’ surprise, Ralph was waiting just outside, leaning against the corner of the greenhouse.

  “So what’s in the barn, Hagrid?” he asked, pushing upright as Hagrid began to stump across the unbroken snow toward his hut.

  “Empty stalls an’ potion fumes,” he called back, “Yeh’ve no idea how hard it is scrubbin’ up decades o’ hippogriff guano. Get yerselves off t’ lunch now, an’ not another word.”

  “Actually,” Ralph countered, “I think we know plenty well how hard it is to scrub the barn, considering we just did that very thing with Filch back before the holidays.”

  Hagrid scoffed. “Yar, well what Argus Filch calls clean and I calls clean are two very different things.”

  James was both annoyed and relieved that Ralph had joined them as they trudged along behind Hagrid. He still hadn’t forgiven Ralph for blabbing to Millie about the breakup, and he was sincerely dismayed about Ralph’s dueling performance against Professor Odin-

  Vann, but things just felt wrong when he and Ralph weren’t on the same side. For the moment, he decided to let everything else go.

  Trotting to catch up to Hagrid, James said, “Ralph here is Head Boy, you know. He would’ve heard about some big plan to quarantine the barn. Wouldn’t you?” He glanced at Ralph meaningfully.

  “Er, yeah,” Ralph nodded. “That’s a need-to-know kind of thing, it is. As Head Boy, I should be keeping curious younger years away from the barn. If it’s as dangerous as you say it is, of course.”

  Hagrid only chuckled to himself as he strode through the snow, his boots leaving great, slushy plow-prints. “Wellnow, I appreciate th’ offer, Mr. Head Boy, but believe it or not, I can secure a barn jus’ fine on my own. Already magically sealed th’ place up, top t’ bottom.” He paused and drew out his pink umbrella wand, brandishing it with a twinkle in his eyes. “I’ve come a long ways with my spellwork since yer parents’ day. There’s nary a soul getting’ in nor out o’ that barn until further notice.”

  Pointedly, Rose asked, “And just who might be trying to get out of the barn, Hagrid?”

  Hagrid’s face snapped shut like a mousetrap. “Not another word,” he said, stabbing a sausage-like index finger into the space between them, and then pointing it at the castle. “Back to th’ school wit’ yeh now.”

  Without waiting, he turned around and pushed through the gate, striding into the front garden of his hut.

  “This is about that dragon of yours, isn’t it?” Ralph called, following Hagrid into the yard. “About that letter you got from Grawp, talking about how Norberta’s all tetchy because she can smell that male circus dragon on the wind.”

  Rose put a hand over her eyes. “Oh, no, no, no…” she said, her suspicions rising, “Hagrid, tell us you didn’t run off and do something ridiculous without us, did you?”

  The trio followed Hagrid to his door, where he stopped and turned around again, adopting a beatific expression of innocence. With deliberate calm, he said, “The barn’s bein’ cleaned, that’s all. I can show yeh tomorrow if yeh like. Apart from a few heffalumps and a cage of wooly woozles, that barn’s jus’ as empty as Mother Carter’s larder. If I do that, will it convince yeh that there’s nothin’ t’ be suspicious about?”

  James glanced aside at Rose and Ralph, who looked unconvinced. He shrugged and suggested, “Why not show us now, Hagrid?”

  Hagrid’s eyes flicked back and forth. “Well, cuz I’m a busy perfessor, I am. An’ yeh lot have classes to get to. An’ like I said, s’not safe at th’ moment. I ain’t kiddin’ about those cleanin’ potions. Right noxious stuff, that is.”

  Ralph raised his eyebrows. “In other words, whatever is in there now will be moved by tomorrow.”

  “Gor!” Hagrid protested, dropping his façade of calm and turning back to his hut. He unlatched the door and shoved it open.

  “Blimey! In all my years I can’t say as I’ve ever met a bunch more doubtful, suspicious, or untrusting as…”

  He took a step inside his doorway and then froze in place, halting as if he’d just spied an Acromantula crouched on his dining room table. James, Ralph and Rose peered inside around the huge man, curious to see what had caught his attention. There was no Acromantula. What they saw instead was, if anything, even more surprising.

  “It’s…” Rose breathed, ticking her eyes around the shocking sight within. “It’s all so… clean!”

  It was true. For the first time in James’ memory—perhaps for the first time in forever—the interior of the hut was absolutely and utterly spotless. The wooden floor gleamed with polish. The rafters were scoured free of their customary cobwebs and layers of greasy, sooty dust. The dishes and cups were stacked and shining in the hutch. Even the ashes of the fireplace had been shoveled and swept, revealing the bare bricks beneath. Trife, Hagrid’s bullmastiff dog, sat up on the rug before the hearth, allowing his tongue to loll out in a happy, doggy grin.

  James was about to ask what had happened to the hut when the answer, such as it was, revealed itself.

  A pair of huge eyes opened beneath the table. Then, cautiously, silently, a house elf stepped out into the light. It was a female elf, and James recognized her immediately. The last time he had seen her had been in the living room of the Vandergriff’s house in Blackbrier Quoit.

  She wore the glove that her former mistress had given her. It drooped loose on her thin arm, still stained with dried pudding.

  “I’m sorry, Master Hagrid,” Heddlebun said in her thin, high voice. “I finished cleaning the barn already. So I came here instead. I do hope…” Her eyes flicked around the hut, and then worryingly back to Hagrid, “that you don’t mind?”

  Hagrid’s plan, such as it was, turned out to be just as nuanced and subtle as one might expect from a half-giant who had once hidden a man-eating spider in a school cupboard, feeding it kitchen scraps.

  “So,” Rose sighed heavily, her brow knitted as she sat at his huge table, a cup of tea long-since cooled before her, “you’re going to take your magical ship to the edge of London on the Thames, collect Norberta by night from Grawp and Prechka, bring her back in the ship’s hold, and then hide her in the barn until the circus leaves London or you can arrange a new home for her.”

  “No!” Ralph said for the umpteenth time, his face brick-red with impatient incredulity. “How many times do I have to say that this is all completely daft?!”

  Hagrid covered his eyes with both of his enormous, ham-like hands and plunked his elbows onto the table. “I knows,” he said miserably. “I knows it’s daft. But what’m I s’posed ter do?” He dropped his hands to the table and looked from Ralph to Rose to James.

  “Norberta can’t stay in the mountains! She won’t! You heard the letter, same as me! Grawp and Prechka can’t keep an eye on ‘er, not with their own tribe dealin’ with Muggles a-comin’ onto their lands and all the stress o’ stayin’ hid or getting’ ready t’ fight! B’sides, the arrangement’s already made! They’ll be there with Norberta tomorrow night, in an old abandoned wharf, at ‘alf-past one in the mornin’!”

  Rose nodded, merely confirming the details. “And you’ve got a house elf helping you for some reason, because she can…” She raised her eyebrows patiently.

  “Soothe the savage beast,” Hagrid sighed, glancing aside at Heddlebun, who stood in the corner on her chair, her shoulders hunc
hed, her bulging eyes alert, ticking from one speaker to the next.

  “Heddlebun is a beast-speaker, Miss,” the elf offered, not for the first time. “Heddlebun learned it from her father, Bedderhum, who was in charge of our former master’s stables, back when they had stables.”

  “So you can keep Norberta soothed and under control during the transfer,” Rose nodded again, considering. “Since she’ll be closer to the city, right close to the male dragon that she’s been sniffing out for the past month. You have the ability to keep a Norwegian Ridgeback, who’s in heat and smelling a male dragon, still and quiet within sight of a major Muggle city?”

  Heddlebun nodded without hesitation. “It’s an elfish talent, Miss, and Heddlebun is the best at it of her kind.”

  “Well, that certainly is convenient,” James huffed crossly, folding his arms over his chest.

  “James!” Rose scolded. “Are you accusing this poor elf of lying?”

  “No,” James sat up in his chair. “I’m accusing her of dumping a pudding all over Mrs. Vandergriff’s head, all because she lost her job to a Muggle! The lying bit is just a strong suspicion, not an accusation.”

  A high, keening sound arose in the hut as James said this. He assumed that it was Hagrid’s kettle preparing to whistle, and then realized, with some dismay, that the noise was emanating from the elf herself where she stood in the shadows. She was holding back a mounting wail of misery, but only just barely. Her lips trembled with the effort and huge, shining tears welled in her eyes, glistening in the firelight.

  “Oh, now look what yeh’ve done, James!” Hagrid reproached, reaching for the elf and patting her on one bone-thin shoulder, nearly knocking her over. “There, there, Heddlebun. He din’t mean it…”

  “Of course I meant it!” James exclaimed. “I watched it happen! I barely stopped her from blaming it on one of the Muggle servants! Not that he didn’t deserve it, being a right obnoxious wazzock.”

  “Well, maybe you should’ve let her!” Rose countered. “The poor thing had lost her whole reason for being! Whole generations of her family have served the Vandergriffs, only to be swept under the rug in favor of… of… paid help!”

  “MmmmmmWAAAAAHHHH!!” Heddlebun suddenly burst out, no longer able to hold in her wretchedness. “Heddlebun is a BAD ELF! Heddlebun ruined mistress’ dress! Heddlebun was dismissed from service because she is a horrible, terrible, nasty, AWFUL house elf!”

  To James’ increasing dismay, the elf lunged and grabbed Rose’s teacup, then smashed it over her own head. Even before the shards finished pattering off the walls, she swiped at James’ own cup and repeated the action, smashing it to bits against her forehead and spattering cold tea in every direction. She reached next for Hagrid’s stoneware mug, but Hagrid still had his fingers hooked into its handle.

  The elf only accomplished yanking herself off the chair she’d been standing on and collapsing beneath the table. James winced at the knock-tumble of her body as it hit the plank floor. A moment later, her wails resumed, only faintly muffled.

  “Heddlebun!” Rose cried, scrambling from her chair and ducking under the table. A moment later, she collected the elf into her arms, cradling the spindly body as if were a kitten, and retreated to the hearth, where she turned back, tilting a baleful, warning eye at James.

  Not another word, her gaze commanded.

  James crossed his arms again and frowned defiantly.

  The elf continued to wail. “Put Heddlebun down! Heddlebun is a horrid creature! Heddlebun deserves punishment!”

  “Wherever did she learn this?” Rose raised her voice over the elf’s wails, addressing the question to Hagrid. “Surely the Vandergriff’s never beat her?”

  James shook his head disgustedly. “It’s an act,” he answered, half to himself, although he saw that Ralph had heard him. “Got to be.

  She’s not to be trusted.”

  Ralph saw this as further evidence of his larger point. “This is all a load of cobblers! You can see that, right?”

  “There’s nothin’ t’ be done about it,” Hagrid declared, smacking the table with the flat of his hand, making the remaining dishes rattle.

  “Fer better or worse, the plan’s goin’ forward. Heddlebun an’ I leave tomorrow night at midnight. By the nex’ mornin’, we’ll either have Norberta in the barn, or I’ll be in Azkaban.”

  “Ralph,” James said seriously, looking aside at his friend, “You’re not going to… you know… go to Headmaster Merlin or anything about this, are you?”

  Ralph drew a hand down his face miserably. “I should, this time. I really should, and you bloody well know it.”

  Still holding Heddlebun’s limp, hitching body in her arms, Rose said, “But you’re not going to. Are you?”

  Ralph glared at Rose fiercely for a moment, his jaw firm, and then sank back into his chair, defeated. “Of course not. I’m no tattle-tale.”

  “Not this time,” James couldn’t resist muttering.

  “That’s good to know, Ralph,” Rose sighed, laying Heddlebun gently on the hearthrug next to Trife, who sniffed her head, and then licked her drooping, bat-wing ear. “Because if you tattle, you can’t be allowed to come along.”

  Ralph spluttered, going rigid in his chair again. “Come along!?

  I’m not coming along! None of us is!”

  “Of course we are,” Rose corrected him firmly. “We went over this when we translated the letter from Grawp. Hagrid’s like family to us. Has been since our parents were little. In fact, if James’ and my parents hadn’t helped Hagrid out with Norberta back when she was still baby Norbert burning char-marks on this very table, we wouldn’t even have this problem, now, would we? Come to think of it, we’re just finishing what they started.”

  Ralph shook his head derisively. “You’ve been reading too much of Revalvier’s books.”

  “No,” Hagrid commented with a shrug, “That part is all true.

  Perfessor Revalvier interviewed me special. There, you can still see the scorch marks from Norberta’s first flames…” He traced a finger along an old black stain and hitched a sniff.

  “Seriously,” James said, trying to inject a note of calm rationality into his voice, glancing back and forth between Rose and Ralph. “You know Hagrid’s right. If this goes all pear-shaped, we’re not talking detention. We’re looking at actual legal trouble, the kind that doesn’t get fixed by a letter from our parents.”

  “James, you and I both know that they don’t send school students to Azkaban for this sort of thing,” Rose chided, lifting her chin.

  “But they do send adult wizards who already have tetchy legal records. If Hagrid goes through with his plan alone—I’m sorry, Hagrid,” she offered the half-giant an affectionately stern look, “But you’ll get caught.

  You and Heddlebun both. You’ll go to Azkaban. And Heddlebun, I don’t know what they do to house elves that break the law, but it’s got to be even worse than losing your service. However,” she turned her gaze back to James and Ralph again, daring them to argue with her, “if we go along to help, nobody will face any consequences at all, because we won’t get caught.”

  She met James’ eyes and a ghost of a smile twitched the corners of her mouth. James tried not to smile back, but the moment he made the attempt, the task became impossible.

  Ralph glared at both of them in disbelief. “You’re enjoying this,” he exclaimed, shaking his head in dark wonderment. “Aren’t you!?

  You’re both completely off your onions!”

  Rose quelled her smile and approached Ralph. Putting her hand on the table near his, but not quite touching him, she asked, “Are you in, Ralph? We need you. We’re not a team without you.”

  Hagrid spoke up, “No, Ralph! I can’t ask yeh…” He shook himself and glanced around at the others, “I can’t ask any of yeh t’ risk— ”

  “Of course I’m in,” Ralph admitted, rolling his eyes and slumping onto his crossed elbows. “Who am I kidding? Oh, I’m the worst Head Boy
ever.”

  “Maybe you are,” Rose agreed gently, placing her hand on Ralph’s shoulder. “But that’s exactly why we love you.”

  17. – Conspiracy of the dragon

  Friday’s schedule was unforgiving under the best of conditions, and much less so, James realized, when awaiting a midnight adventure that, despite Rose’s purported confidence, could well end in monumental disaster. The morning began with a double Astronomy class in the high tower classroom. The fire had been stoked against a late winter storm, making the room almost stiflingly hot as the ancient Astronomy professor, Aurora Sinistra, droned on and on, calculating endless triangulation charts and plotting the orbits of planets, moons, and comets in her cracked, wispy voice.

  James leaned with his chin on his right hand, struggling to stay awake amidst the cloying warmth and the monotony of the lecture.

  Next to him, Ralph doodled aimlessly on his parchment, adding superfluous underlines, circles, and arrows to his halfhearted notes.

  James tried to imagine what they would find that night: Norberta hiding in an empty wharf warehouse on the edge of London, huffing the air impatiently between the nervous figures of Grawp and Prechka, who would be terrified themselves this close to the gleaming lights and noise of the city. How would the three of them get there in the first place? How would two giants (Prechka was over twenty feet tall, James knew) sneak through the outskirts of a major Muggle metropolis, especially with a forty-foot dragon in tow? The whole affair seemed preposterous from top to bottom. And yet, James had to admit, at least to himself, that it was the very preposterousness of the mission that gave it an air of tantalizing, haphazard exhilaration. It had been over two years since James had been on any adventure more risky than a midnight sneak to the kitchens for a bag of crisps. He was due. And Rose, it seemed, felt exactly the same way.

  Ralph, of course, was having none of it. He groused about the plan under his breath the entire way to lunch, and then offered every conceivable worst-case scenario he could think up as they made their way to Alchemy.