Foreshadowing the Unexpected

Chapter 12 - What We Fear The Most

Life's challenges are not supposed to paralyse you; they're supposed to help you discover who you are. --Bernice Johnson Reagon

Connor sat in the Gryffindor common room resting his chin on his hands and staring down at the essay he had just written for Defence Against the Dark Arts. The essay itself hadn't been a problem, but the rest of his assignment was nagging at him.

"What's wrong, Connor?" Rachel asked him from where she was reading one of the books they hoped would unlock some of the secrets of the Marauder's Map. "You've been staring at that parchment for fifteen minutes. Are you stuck?"

"Kind of," he said, looking up at her. "I'm done with my essay, but we're covering boggarts in Lupin's class, and we're going to be facing one on Wednesday."

"And?" Rachel asked, obviously not seeing the problem. "What's your problem with that?"

"I don't know what I'm most afraid of," he admitted. "And if I don't know what my biggest fear is, how am I supposed to fight it when it shows up?"

"Put it in underwear, whatever it is," Aiden suggested, obviously listening in from where he was sitting in a squashy armchair next to them. "That's what most of my year did when we had that class."

"He's probably right," Rachel said with a smile. "What can really seem threatening in a pair of knickers?"

"I suppose you're right," Connor said. "It would just be nice to know what to expect."

"Well you're not really afraid of all that much, are you?" Aiden asked curiously. "How hard could it be to pin it down?"

Connor merely shrugged.

"Well we'd better go get changed for practice, or your biggest fear is going to end up being Whitney Glendale, team captain extraordinaire," Aiden said, shoving himself out of his seat and heading for the stairs. "See you at dinner."

#*#*#*#*#*

Practice went particularly well. Whitney was beside herself with happiness over the perfectly executed Porskoff Ploy that Connor, Quentin and Amanda managed to pull off. She was a little more sceptical about some of the other special moves that her Chasers had come up with. In the end, she told them that if they felt confident about pulling them off successfully, she would allow them to try them during the game.

Tuesday's practice went just as well, and the entire team was feeling confident about their rapidly approaching match against Ravenclaw.

"Okay everyone, don't forget that tomorrow is Halloween, so we're going to be practicing in the morning since none of us want to miss the feast," Whitney told them as practice came to a close. "We just barely beat Ravenclaw in booking the pitch, so we're going to make the best use of it we can. I expect you all to be on time and ready to play by six!"

Everyone groaned, but the fiery look in Whitney's eye seemed to quell any protests. Connor headed back to the castle thinking that he'd have to wake up at five to Occlude properly before practice.

Connor decided to go to bed early in anticipation of the early morning wake-up, but was perturbed to find that sleep eluded him. He couldn't stop worrying over tomorrow's Defence Against the Dark Arts class, and what the promised boggart would see in his head. It was well past midnight when he finally drifted off, still concerned about it.

#*#*#*#*#*#*

Practice that morning was a blur, though Connor guessed that he played adequately. At least Whitney hadn't scolded him or threatened to send him to the reserves. He was so tired from only getting four and half hours of sleep that he could barely recall getting dressed after his Occlumency and following his team mates to the pitch.

Breakfast was strangely tense for the third years. Gryffindor and Slytherin had Defence Against the Dark Arts first thing, and Connor noticed that he was not the only one who seemed jittery at the prospect of seeing their worst fear in the flesh. The others seemed both excited and scared, so Connor relaxed a little. He wasn't the only one.

"Post's here," Quentin said, hiding a yawn behind his hand. Apparently Connor wasn't the only one who hadn't slept well.

A large barn owl swooped down to Connor and landed neatly on his shoulder, immediately extending one leg that had a letter tied to it.

"Good morning, Moonface," Connor said. The bird was one of his father's.

He untied the letter and offered the owl some bacon before sending it on its way, only to have three more owls drop letters in front of him in quick succession.

"More fan mail?" Rachel asked, reaching over to snatch one of the letters up.

"Probably," Connor said, failing to hold back a wide yawn as he opened the letter from home.

He didn't care if Rachel or any of the others opened strange mail for him anymore. Ever since it had been made public the year before that Connor was clairvoyant, he'd been receiving letters from witches and wizards all over Europe. They usually asked for his help or advice on all sorts of matters, ranging from gambling prospects to wanting to know if it would rain on someone's wedding day.

"Junk," Rachel declared after scanning the letter she had taken. She discarded it and picked up the other two. "Junk," she declared again after reading the second, "and this one is from Mr. Barker."

"Clive?" Connor asked with surprise. "Cool."

He took the letter from Rachel, unopened, and looked forward to reading it later. Clive was currently tutoring a young girl in India, and his recent letters had been full of interesting facts and sometimes even photos. Connor pocketed that letter and opened the one from home. He was pleased to see that he'd gotten a letter from each of his family members.

He didn't have time to read five letters before he had to go to class, but he thought that reading the shortest one (Adam's) might help distract him from the fact that Defence class was only fifteen minutes away.

Deer Connor,

Happy Haloween. How ar you doing at Hogworts? I am fine. Lucy and Ian are in big truble. They made Mum's caldron melt with a joke from Uncle Fred and Gorge's shop..

Snowbal, Sweetie and Pit-Pat ar all gud. Here is a pichr I made.

Luv,

Adam

The picture Adam had drawn was clever; done with paint, showing Adam with a brown blob in each hand that Connor assumed represented Sweetie and Pit-pat. Adam loved his pet puffskeins with a fervency that bordered on obsession. On the green-painted grass beside Adam was a large white blob that could only be Snowball.

'I really hope that Adam is exaggerating that thing's size,' Connor thought to himself as he noted that Adam's depiction of Snowball had the mutant puffskein large enough to reach above Adam's hips.

"We should go now," Ivy said, breaking into Connor's thoughts. "We don't want to be late."

Connor grabbed the two letters that Rachel had declared junk and shoved them in his bag for disposal later. He put the letters from his family in his pocket, and left the Great Hall feeling like he was forgetting something.

When Connor mentioned this to Zack, the other boy said, teasingly, "You didn't stuff your pockets with food!"

"That was it!" Connor said with a laugh. "I was so busy with my post that I forgot."

He jogged back into the Great Hall and grabbed an apple out of a basket on the Hufflepuff table before catching up with his friends.

"You act like you're going to starve between now and lunchtime," Quentin said with a roll of his eyes.

"I might," Connor said jokingly, following his friends up the main staircase. "I'm a growing boy!"

Connor joined the unusually quiet queue of students outside of the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, and began to worry his lower lip with his teeth. He still had no idea what he was about to face, and he wondered if he could put off facing the boggart until the next time the class met. Surely there were too many students in the class for them all to have to face the boggart today?

Just as Connor had entertained that cheerful thought, Professor Lupin opened the classroom door from within, and beckoned them all to enter. Connor noticed Lupin's lips twitched as he watched them file silently past him to find their seats. Connor suspected the professor was enjoying their discomfort.

Connor brightened a bit when he noticed that Ms Grayson was sitting on a large trunk that was situated directly in front of Lupin's desk. She was wearing dark purple robes had a cheerful smile on her face, and paid no attention to the fact that the trunk she was perched on shook violently every once in a while.

Connor saw that he was not the only one to have noticed the trunk's behaviour. The students were staring at it apprehensively - some looking distinctly green.

"Welcome!" Professor Lupin enthused as he shut the door. "If you would all please take out the essays I assigned you last time and pass them forward?"

There was shuffle as everyone complied, and Lupin collected the parchment from the students seated in the front row. He set the parchments on his desk, and ignored a rather forceful shudder from the trunk beneath Ms Grayson.

"We discussed boggarts during our last class together, and you've done your essays," Lupin told them unnecessarily. "I propose that we get straight to the practical side of our lesson. You all were instructed to think of what you thought might be your greatest fear, and also to think of ways to diminish that fear by changing it into something comical."

The class shifted in their seats. Connor wondered how they were going to proceed. It was very plain that the boggart they were to face was in the trunk off of which Ms Grayson had just hopped.

"If you would all get a mental picture of your fear and its antidote, so to speak, I'll ask you to stand so that the room can be cleared to give us the space we'll need."

Everyone scrambled to their feet. Ms Grayson waved her wand and made the desks slide noiselessly to the edges of the room, leaving a large open space in the centre of the room.

"I would like everyone please to stand in a semi-circle around the back of the room," Lupin said firmly. Everyone instantly obeyed. "Good! Now I will give as many of you a chance today as possible. I'll call you forward to take your turn, so please have your wand at the ready and remember the proper incantation. Riddikulus!"

Connor looked around at the other students. Many of them had their fists clenched or their eyes scrunched tightly closed as they muttered to themselves. Ivy stood in between himself and Zack, and Quentin was on his other side.

Ms Grayson used her wand to levitate the trunk forward a couple of metres, positioning it in front of the semi-circle.

"Remember to give each person facing the boggart plenty of room," Lupin called to the group. "Is there anyone who would like to volunteer to go first? Get it over with quickly?"

A hand on the other side of the room shot into the air instantly, to Connor's surprise. He was grateful to the Slytherin girl who looked as though she were already regretting her rash decision.

"Excellent, Andrea," Professor Lupin beamed, even though the girl was visibly shaking. "Ten points to Slytherin! Step forward. Do you remember the incantation?"

Andrea nodded as though she might be sick if she tried to open her mouth just then. She stepped forward until she was about three metres from the trunk. Everyone else in the room was utterly silent.

"Ready?" Ms Grayson asked in a kind voice as she unlatched the fastenings on the trunk. "Remember that we're here to intervene if you run into trouble."

Andrea swallowed hard and took a deep breath before she nodded.

Ms. Grayson stepped away from the trunk and used her wand to lift the lid.

There was a shadow that seemed to rise from trunk, and spill forward over the edge before it began to take shape. The shadow seemed to solidify and grow into the tall figure of a man, with vacant eyes, deathly pale skin, and sharp, pointed fangs covered in blood. Andrea's worst fear was apparently vampires.

Andrea whimpered at the sight of the vampire and hesitated for a moment, causing the boggart/vampire to press its advantage and begin to approach her.

"R-Riddikulus!" Andrea said in a frightened, high-pitched voice. She pointed her wand at it, and the vampire stopped in its tracks. Its teeth had fallen out.

Everyone laughed, and Connor suspected that most of the chuckles were more from relief than anything else.

"Good," Lupin cried over their noise. "Zack! Forward!"

Zack stumbled forward looking nervous, and took Andrea's place. The toothless vampire glared at him, and with a loud crack, suddenly changed into a large circus clown in loud colors, looking oddly malevolent and holding a large bucket of ominously smoking liquid.

Many of the students laughed that Zack's fear would be something that most of them already found funny, but Connor was worried. If his friend didn't find clowns funny, what could he possibly do to make one appear humorous?

"Riddikulus!" Zack said firmly, his knuckles white from gripping his wand so tightly.

The bucket of liquid that the clown had been holding flew from its grip and emptied itself over the clown's head with a splash. The clown then melted into nothingness, leaving only a pile of empty, colourful clothing.

Zack heaved a huge sigh and smiled crookedly back at Connor and his friends.

"Nicely done!" Lupin congratulated. "Michael! Forward!"

Michael Stewart from Slytherin hurried forward with a look of intense concentration on his face. The sodden pile of clown costuming on the floor gathered itself together and, with another crack, morphed into a huge shape that eventually took the form of a big green dragon.

Several people screamed and scrambled backward as the dragon took a deep breath as though to breath fire, but Michael was faster.

"Riddikulus!"

The dragon rapidly shrunk in size and de-aged before their eyes until there was suddenly nothing but a large green-flecked, brown egg on the floor in front of them.

Connor soon caught on to the fact the Lupin was alternating houses as he called them forward.

Crack! A giant grew roots and turned into a tree.

Crack! A swarm of angry bees were swept up into a huge net.

"Wonderful!" Lupin praised as Daniel White retreated back into the semi-circle. "Ivy, you're next!"

Ivy paused for a moment, and was shaking as she approached the net full of buzzing bees on the floor. With the sharp crack that warned them all that the boggart had decided which shape to take, Ivy stood facing.... A cloak?

Connor stared, puzzled, at the black shape on the floor that looked for all the world like a discarded cloak.

"It's a lethifold!" Quentin whispered beside him. When Connor still looked puzzled, even as the cloak rose a few inches from the floor and began to creep toward Ivy, Quentin hissed, "It eats people!"

"Oh Merlin!" Ivy moaned under her breath. It looked as though she had frozen up, but just as Professor Lupin stepped forward, she cried, "Riddikulus!"

The lethifold changed into a prettily patterned flying carpet in the Gryffindor colours.

Ivy let out a breath and scrambled back to her place beside Connor.

"Darcy!" Lupin called a Slytherin girl forward.

Crack! The flying carpet turned into a huge, hairy spider.

Several students shouted in alarm, as they had with the dragon. Connor felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up in response to the monstrous arachnid. He thought of how terrified Rachel would be if she could be here now-- her greatest fear was spiders.

"Riddikulus!" the spider suddenly seemed to be made out of glass, and was transparent and frozen as Darcy scrambled back into her place.

"Connor!" Lupin called out. "You're up!"

Connor's heart gave a huge thump in his chest that he was surprised no one else seemed to hear. He could swear that it stopped beating for a full five seconds before it took off at a gallop. He stepped forward, aware that sweat had instantly appeared on his brow, and held his wand out, not sure what was going to happen next.

Crack!

There was complete silence before several people began to laugh.

A huge white ball of fur, roughly the size of a baby elephant, was sitting on the floor in front of a confused Connor. He eyed the puffball warily, recognising it as an insanely large mutant puffskein.

My biggest fear is Snowball? Connor asked himself, feeling bewildered.

The entire class sounded as though they were having a huge laugh at his expense, but Connor refused to take his eyes from the thing before him. There had to be more to it that what he was currently seeing.

Almost as soon as that thought passed through his mind, the giant version of Snowball began to growl viciously.

The room fell silent.

Connor took a step backward, trying to think of something that would make any of this seem funny enough to banish the boggart. He raised his wand, thinking vaguely of turning it back to normal puffskein size, and maybe changing its colour to pink. That's when Snowball made a slight choking sound and a shoe came shooting out of an unseen mouth, covered in blood. Adam's shoe.

The effect was instantaneous.

"What did you do to Adam?" Connor shouted at the puffskein. "What did you do to my brother?"

"Connor!"

Connor vaguely heard Lupin's voice over the fear and rage pumping through him and the blood roaring in his ears.

"Connor, it's only a boggart! It's not real!"

Connor couldn't wrap his mind around that one simple fact, though. He couldn't tear his eyes away from Adam's shoe. Everything inside of him wanted to scream out a denial and he knew he wouldn't be able to hold back for much longer. He was just on the verge of launching himself at Snowball, when Professor Lupin came forward and shoved Connor backward, hard.

Connor stumbled and fell, looking up to see Snowball and Adam's shoe disappear with a loud crack, to be replaced by a miniature version of a full moon, hanging in the air.

Connor's breath was coming in pants, and he knew that everyone was staring at him as he sat sprawled on the floor where Lupin had shoved him. He could feel the heat in his face that heralded his embarrassment instead of the panic he'd been experiencing a few moments before.

He watched as Lupin forced the moon-shaped boggart back into its trunk, and Ms Grayson stepped forward to close the lid and latch it.

"Connor," Ivy said from beside him. She was kneeling beside him, with a gentle hand on his shoulder. "Are you okay?"

Connor nodded miserably. How long would it take for this story to spread around the school? "I feel stupid," he admitted quietly.

At that moment, Professor Lupin strode over and helped him to his feet, dusting him off briskly, as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

"All right?" Lupin asked.

"All right," Connor agreed, trying not to look anyone in the face.

"Everyone stand out of the way so that we can return the desks to the proper places!" Lupin called out to everyone. "Then take a seat!"

Connor dropped into his chair glumly and looked at the clock. Not as much time had passed as he had expected, and they still had about five minutes until it they were dismissed.

"Who can tell me where Connor went wrong?" Professor Lupin asked the class.

Connor sighed and raised his hand.

"Connor, why don't you tell the others what your mistake was?" Lupin said kindly.

"I forgot that I was dealing with a boggart. I panicked when I thought that my brother had been killed," Connor said.

"By a giant puffskein?" one of the Slytherin boys said with a snort of amusement. His friends snickered.

Connor turned red again and sank lower in his seat.

"Ten points from Slytherin, Mr Thorne," Lupin said mildly. "Perhaps you can earn them back when it's your turn to face the boggart on Friday."

Bruce Thorne quieted down considerably. Connor viciously hoped that the Slytherin prat was afraid of something like garden gnomes or fairies.

"Connor is correct," Professor Lupin continued. "Boggarts don't always act on a rational fear, and one mustn't forget how to deal with a boggart. If Connor had acted on impulse and actually attacked the object of his fear, as he looked prepared to do, he would have been in very real danger."

The bell that signalled the end of classes rang, so the students left the class talking animatedly about the lesson. Connor followed his friends out, relieved to hear that not everyone was talking about the giant puffskein. Still, many were, which made Connor cringe at the thought of being the butt of a lot of jokes an the coming days.

"It's the letter I got this morning," Connor realized suddenly, pulling it from his pocket to look at the picture Adam had sent him. "That's why my boggart turned out to be what it did."

Ivy took the letter from him and held it while Zack and Quentin looked over her shoulder.

"That would explain it," Quentin agreed. "I'm not looking forward to Friday."

"That's right," Zack said, "you didn't face the boggart yet."

"So what's your biggest fear?" Ivy asked.

"I'm not sure," Quentin admitted. "My dad in prison? I know it was before I was born, but... the idea still scares me."

"I can understand that," Connor said. "So instead of prison robes, you can put him in a frilly dress."

Quentin snorted.

Ivy handed Adam's letter back to Connor. "We'll see you guys at lunch," she said, then Quentin and Ivy departed for their Arithmancy lesson.

Connor and Zack paused at the door leading outside to don their cloaks before they headed out into the cold for double Care of Magical Creatures class.

"So," Connor said to Zack as they trudged through the snow. "What's with being afraid of clowns? Did you have a bad experience with one?"

"You could say that," Zack said with a scowl. "When I was four, my parents took me to the circus. There was this pair of clowns that were running around, grabbing these pails full of confetti and glitter, and they were throwing them at the audience, pretending like it was water."

Connor was trying to picture it in his head, but was having a bit of trouble. Obviously Muggle circuses were a bit different from wizarding ones. It was only logical, he supposed, that Muggles would be easier to entertain than wizards, if something as simple as the illusion of having water thrown at you was amusing.

"And you were scared they would throw some on you?' Connor asked, trying to get a metal image.

"No!" Zack said. "I wanted them to! I was in the front row, and I was standing up and waving and yelling out, 'Over here! Over here!' When one of them came my way, I was thrilled. He picked up a pail that was by the stands, and threw the contents on me."

"Let me guess," Connor said shrewdly. "No confetti and glitter?"

"Got it in one," Zack said as the heated enclosure for the class came into view. "It was full of some sort of concentrated detergent that one of the maintenance people hadn't put away before the start of the show."

"What happened?" Connor asked, horrified.

"It burned me," Zack answered with a shiver. "Badly. I had chemical burns all over my face, and they had to rush me to hospital. I was there for weeks. My dad reckons that that was the first time I used my magic, though we didn't know it at the time."

"How do you reckon?" Connor asked curiously.

"Well, I should have needed all sorts of surgeries, and I should have been blinded," Zack said with a shrug. "Maybe I should have even died."

Connor wasn't sure what surgeries were, but didn't want to interrupt to ask. He had a stomach-turning image of his friend as a little boy, with burns all over him, and he tried to shake it off. Being Muggles, Zack's parents wouldn't have known about St. Mungo's or healers or potions.

"But I didn't," Zack finished. "I was able to go home after just three weeks, with no scarring at all to speak of. The doctors called it a miracle at the time, and it wasn't until we found out that I was magical that my parents made the connection."

"Wow!" Connor was impressed; it wasn't any wonder Zack wasn't too keen on clowns.

"Let's hurry," Zack urged. "I'm freezing!"

They picked up their pace and were just about to enter the enclosure, when Professor Grubbly-Plank suddenly said loudly and firmly, "Nobody move!"

Connor froze in his tracks, and saw that everyone else in the vicinity had done the same. The only sound was the faint chilly wind for a moment, and then Connor heard it. Footsteps - they sounded in human-- too many feet.

Connor's first thought was that a centaur was wandering at the edge of the woods, but that was hardly a cause for concern. Centaurs, while not particularly social around humans, weren't really a threat when unprovoked.

Letting his eyes roam the edge of the forest line, he spotted it at the same time as several others. A unicorn. A massive unicorn was coming out of the trees, glowing and silvery as it stepped into the weak sunlight. Connor heard a chorus of, "Oooh!" as several of the girls around the enclosure made sounds of ecstasy at the sight of it, but no one moved for fear of frightening it away.

Connor watched its progress through the snow with amazement. He had never seen a unicorn this closely before, and was dumbfounded to see that the perfectly white snow around it seemed dirty in comparison with its shining hide.

The gorgeous animal ambled, apparently unconcernedly, toward the opening of the enclosure, next to which Connor and Zack were standing.

"Should I move out of its way?" Connor wondered quietly, not taking his eyes off of the unicorn that was only a few metres away.

"Just remain still, Mr Potter," Grubbly-Plank advised quietly. "It's not showing any sign of agitation. Just let him go about his business. He'll probably avoid you, since they normally won't approach males."

Connor nodded, and kept wary eyes on the Unicorn. Was the reason that they didn't approach males because they didn't like them? What if it decided to charge him? Not that he looked like he was going to.

Connor's breath was coming out in plumes of steam on the air, betraying the fact that his breathing had picked up along with his anxiety. The unicorn was right in front of him, now, and Connor could have sworn he heard Zack whimper a bit beside him, and then back slowly away. He wondered if he should do the same, but the professor seemed to know what he was thinking.

"Stay still, Potter," she urged quietly.

Connor thought it was distinctly unfair that Zack, who had been only a couple of feet away from him, had gotten to retreat, out of harm's way. Connor's eyes widened as the unicorn stopped and bent its head to sniff at his hair. From this vantage point, he could see that the unicorn's fur was actually somewhat longer than he would have expected, as if its winter coat was coming in. The warmth of the animal's breath fanned out over him and gave him gooseflesh, but Connor didn't feel so afraid anymore.

Lowering its head even further, the unicorn nudged at Connor's shoulder, and Connor slowly raised his hand to stroke its nose. The Unicorn shivered a bit at the first contact of Connor's hand, then stilled and allowed itself to be petted. A moment later it nudged Connor again, and then huffed out air through its nose and mouth, nickering softly.

Connor had the distinct feeling the unicorn wanted something from him. He almost burst into laughter with the unicorn dipped its silvery head (narrowly missing Connor's arm with its horn) and began sniffing at his pocket.

Connor slowly put his hand in his pocket and brought out the apple he had hidden in there earlier.

"Is this what you're after?"

He held it in his palm, keeping his hand flat, and offered it up to the unicorn, which took it delicately in its teeth and made short work of the fruit.

Connor smiled when it sniffed at him again, and butted its head against his shoulder as if asking for more.

"Sorry, that's all I've got," Connor told the unicorn, stroking its nose again.

The unicorn nudged its nose against Connor's face in an unmistakable gesture of affection, and then stood and looked around at the other students standing about.

"Oh!" a girl nearby said excitedly. "I've got one!"

She produced an apple from her bag, and held it out, inviting the unicorn to enjoy another treat. The unicorn regarded her for a moment, and then blew warm air on Connor's face, nudged him with its nose, then turned, almost knocking Connor off of his feet as its withers scraped along his cloak. He cantered back into the trees the way it had come, ignoring the other apple.

"What was that all about?" Zack asked, as they stepped into the warm air of the enclosure and left the snow behind.

"I have no idea," Connor said with an astonished laugh. He'd just petted a unicorn!

"That was remarkable," Professor Grubbly-Plank stated as she approached Connor. "I've never seen a unicorn behave so oddly! You seem to have a knack for dealing with magical creatures, Potter."

"I think it's more of a knack for attracting them with food," Connor said dryly, eliciting a chuckle from a few people. This was the same enclosure that the clabberts had been held in.

"I doubt it," the professor said mysteriously, but didn't elaborate. "You've got a nice collection of unicorn hair on your cloak. You should remove it and make sure that it's folded inside out. After class, you're to take it to Professor Snape so that he can collect them. They tend to be valuable Potions ingredients."

Connor did not relish the thought of returning to the castle without his cloak, but dutifully removed it and carefully folded it up as Grubbly-Plank instructed. She wrote something down on a piece of parchment and handed it to Connor.

"These are the observations I made about the unicorn. He'll need them to know how best to utilize the hairs."

"Yes, ma'am," Connor agreed, and put the note, and his cloak, in his bag.

"All right class," the professor said to gain everyone's attention, "now that the excitement is over, let's continue with our lesson."

Everyone gathered around, and Professor Grubbly-Plank waved her wand at some crates stacked at the back of the enclosure, "Finite!"

At once, the air filled with the growling and barking of a dozen crups. Another flick of the professor's wand opened the crates, and allowed the dogs to come trotting out.

"Oh! They're so cute!" Sharon Whitaker exclaimed as the canines began exploring and sniffing everything in sight.

When a crup lifted its leg over his schoolbag, Walter Tipton complained. "Hey! Stop that!"

Everyone else picked up their bags, just in case.

As they watched the crups frolic and roam about, Grubbly-Plank lectured them about the crup and what made it a magical beast "The crup is very similar to a dog that the Muggles call a Jack Russell Terrier," she said in her best professorial tones, while one of the subject of her lecture tugged on her cloak with doggie teeth. "They are born with a forked tail, however, that is usually removed with a painless severing charm while still in the early puppy stage. They tend to be extremely loyal to the wizard who owns them, and particularly vicious to anyone they see as a threat. They have also been known to be extremely aggressive toward Muggles."

The lecture continued for another ten minutes, and then the students were allowed to interact with the crups and were told to make sketches and notes to go with their observations.

Connor got down on one knee when one of the crups approached him, and held out a hand toward it.

It was a huge surprise when the crup suddenly and inexplicably lunged for Connor's hand and bit into it while shaking its head furiously.

Zack, thinking fast, grabbed the crup around the middle, and wrenched it away from Connor as it growled and barked menacingly.

"What on earth happened?" Grubbly-Plank demanded, taking the crup out of Zack's arms and shoving it unceremoniously into a crate.

"I don't know," Connor said, gritting his teeth against the pain, and cradling his bleeding hand against his chest. "I was just reaching down to pat it, and it attacked me!"

"You need the hospital wing, young man. Can you manage to get there by yourself?" Grubbly-Plank said after seeing the blood.

"Yes," Connor hissed.

He left the enclosure and ignored the cold as he jogged back up to the castle.

He was nearly up the stairs, when he ran into Professor Lyra, who looked surprised to see him.

"Connor! Have you been outside? Where's your cloak?" she asked.

"In my bag," Connor said breathlessly. "I'm on my way to the hospital wing."

"Here," she said brusquely when she saw his hand, "let me take you bag for you."

He gratefully let her slip it off of his arm, where it had fallen down from his shoulder, and followed her to Madam Cosgrove's office.

"Mr Potter! If' you've torn up your own hand again, I'm sending you straight to St. Mungo's for eval..." Madam Cosgrove began when she saw the blood on his hands.

"I didn't do it!" Connor interrupted, noting that Professor Snape was sitting across from Madam Cosgrove's desk. "I got bit by a Crup in Care of Magical Creatures class.

Snape snorted in what could only be amusement.

"Severus!" Lyra chided him. "Be nice."

"Why?" Snape asked in a baffled tone, raising an eyebrow at her.

"Don't pay any attention to him," Professor Lyra told Connor with a roll of her eyes.

"Your hands are freezing!" Madam Cosgrove exclaimed when she went to examine Connor.

"It's cold outside," he said dryly.

"He wasn't wearing his cloak, Grace," Lyra supplied.

"Why ever not?" Madam Cosgrove demanded, looking to Connor for an answer.

"Because of the unicorn," Connor said.

"I think he's delirious," Snape said, standing to peer at Connor.

"No," Connor almost laughed. "A Unicorn came out of the forest as I was going to Care of Magical Creatures. Its hair got on me, and Professor Grubbly-Plank said I should bring my cloak to Professor Snape so he could gather the hairs."

When everyone looked at him strangely, he launched into the story of the unicorn befriending him. When no one spoke, he said, "The cloak's in my bag."

Without preamble, Professor Snape took Connor's bag from Professor Lyra and extracted Connor's cloak. Apparently he was satisfied with the way that Connor had folded it, because he didn't comment.

While Connor was watching Snape handle his cloak, he had not been paying attention to what Madam Cosgrove had been doing to fix his hand.

"Was the specimen male or female?" Snape asked Connor.

"Er, male, I think," Connor said. "Professor Grubbly-Plank called it a him. I wasn't exactly looking at anything but it's head."

"How big?" Snape asked, scribbling on a parchment.

"Huge," Connor said. "I couldn't have reached the top of his head without jumping."

Snape simply gave Connor a withering look.

"Professor Grubbly-plank wrote you a note about it," Connor said. "It's in by bag, too."

"Why didn't you say so?" Snape asked testily, rummaging again in Connor's bag.

Connor was distracted by a sudden burning and stinging in his right hand, and shouted, "Damn!" before he could stop himself.

"Language," Professor Lyra scolded, but didn't take points.

It was a testament to Snape's interest in the unicorn that he didn't even seem to notice Connor's slip-up. He read the details Professor Grubbly-Plank had provided, and then took Connor's cloak over to a patient bed and carefully unfolded it.

"Just cleaning out the wound, dear," the matron said cheerfully, watching as it crackled and spat like hot grease.

Connor watched as Professor Snape took a pair of tweezers and a magnifying glass, and began to carefully divest his cloak of the slightly luminescent hairs.

"That's done, dear," Madam Cosgrove told him as she used a scouring charm on his robes to remove the blood. "You should run along to lunch now. The bell's going to ring in just a couple of minutes."

"Thank you," Connor said, examining his newly healed hand. He collected his bag from Professor Lyra, then walked toward the door, then stopped near the bed where Snape was inspecting Connor's cloak.

"Should I pick my cloak up after lunch?" Connor asked quietly.

"I'll have it delivered back to you when I am finished with it," Snape said absently, not looking up from his magnifying glass. "Five points from Gryffindor for swearing at the matron."

Connor risked rolling his eyes.

"I'll see you later in class, Connor," Professor Lyra said kindly. "I'll bring your cloak then, if he's finished with it."

*_*_*_*_*_*_*

Professor Lyra did, indeed, return Connor's cloak to him before Divination. She also pulled him aside and told him something interesting.

"I spoke with Severus after you went to lunch," she said with a smile. "It seems that the hairs he harvested from your cloak are extremely valuable to him. More valuable than you might think."

"What makes them so special?" Connor asked. The part of him that loved making potions was interested.

"Apparently that fact that they were shed on Halloween, and the fact that certain planets are in alignment goes a long way toward making the hairs especially potent in certain complex potions." Professor Lyra told him. "Having you suddenly turn up with a large number of them on your cloak was, for Severus, like having Father Christmas come early."

"Do you think...?" Connor began to ask, then paused.

"Do I think?" Professor Lyra prompted.

"No, never mind, he would never allow it," Connor said, shaking his head and turning to take a seat.

"Allow what?" she asked, sounding curious.

"I was just wondering if Professor Snape might let me watch him brew one of the potions with the hairs sometime. I like Potions," Connor said.

"I don't know," Professor Lyra said. "But you'll never know, either, unless you ask him."

Connor nodded, thinking that asking Snape a question like that was about as likely as Snape asking if he could hang out with Connor and his friends some time. Not likely

*_*_*_*_*_*_*

The Halloween feast was a lot of fun. The Great Hall was decorated with its customary floating jack-o-lanterns and swarms of live bats, and there were sweets and treats of all kinds in abundance.

Many of the students had brought small bags with them to save some of these sweets for later, and Connor took advantage of that fact. He got Zack and Quentin to help him plant Flatulent Fancies in the dishes of Fizzing Whizbees that were set out on the other house tables, and even dared to levitate one into a dish of them set near Professor Snape's plate at the staff table. Connor knew that Snape wasn't very likely to indulge in any sweets, but the dish was also near Professor Lupin, who was notoriously hard to prank, and who loved sweets.

It was nearing ten o'clock when everyone began to trek back to their Common Rooms, and Connor groaned when he realised that he still had Astronomy tonight before he could rest.

Perhaps it was because he was so tired, but Connor never saw the jinx that suddenly hit his legs and turned them to jelly. He wobbled in place for a few moments before falling to his knees, then looked around at the throng of students in the entrance hall for the culprit.

"It was that Dursley kid."

Connor looked up from his place on the ground to see Cicely Green, a second year Ravenclaw girl, looking down at him.

"The one who used to say he was your cousin," Cicely said,

Zack countered the jinx and helped Connor to his feet. "Rupert?"

"That's the one," Cicely nodded. "He's not really your cousin, is he?"

"He's something like a second cousin once removed, or something," Connor said. "Thanks for letting me know it was him."

"You're going to get him back, right?" Cicely asked with a smile.

"You don't need to worry about that," Connor said. "I'm planning on having a nice little chat with him real soon."

"See you, then," she said with a wicked smile, and departed.

"Let's go find Rupert," Connor said to is his friends, and took the main steps two at a time.

Connor raced up to his room and, panting, rummaged in his trunk until he found the Marauder's Map. He looked around to make sure Andrew wasn't around then activated the map, while the others stood around trying to catch their breaths.

"He's on the third floor," Rachel pointed out. "He's right next to the statue of the one-eyed witch."

"What's he doing there?" Quentin asked. "You don't think he knows about the passageway, do you?"

"He might," Ivy said logically. "He was in the corridor when Lupin caught us about to sneak Rachel into Hogsmeade."

"I think I should go have a little talk with my cousin," Connor decided, wiping the map clean.

"You're not going without me!" Rachel said at once.

The others nodded.

"Fine," Connor said. But we're getting close to curfew, so let's make it quick."

They hurried back down to the third floor with the aid of a couple of secret passageways and found Rupert tapping at the statue with his wand. Apparently he at least suspected a passageway was hidden in it, and was trying all sorts of different charms to get it to open.

The five friends all stopped at the end of the deserted corridor to spy on him. They saw that he kept looking at a large piece of paper in his hand. He alternated between checking his paper and tapping the statue.

"What are you doing, Rupert?" Connor asked, stepping into view.

Rupert jumped like a scalded cat and hurriedly jammed the paper into his robes.

Connor imagined that he and his friends were an impressive sight to Rupert, because he looked extremely nervous as they approached, wands out.

"Nothing!" Rupert yelped before he could stop himself from sounding so frightened. He took a deep breath and said again, "Nothing."

"I'm sure," Rachel said, circling around him to block any retreat the other boy might try to make. Quentin and Ivy followed suit, so that they were surrounding him in a loose circle. "Then you won't mind if we have a look at this!"

More quickly than Rupert could block, Rachel had reached into his pocket and snatched out the paper he had been consulting earlier.

"It's a photo," Rachel told the others as she examined it. "Of a map."

She handed the photo over to Connor, who looked at it and then glared at Rupert. "I knew you'd done something in the library that day. Little sneak." Connor tore the photo into several pieces and shoved them in his pocket. "I'll bet that how you knew where to look for the kitchens when we were caught."

"So?" Rupert spat. "You left the thing lying out."

"That we did," Connor agreed. "Too bad for you that a picture of the map won't do you any good. It still won't give you the passwords to use it properly, or do anything else the real map can do."

"So tell me the password to get into the tunnel to Hogsmeade," Rupert demanded.

Connor and his friends all laughed.

"What's so funny?" Rupert asked. "If you don't tell me the passwords I want, I'll tell Snape or Lupin that you have a map like that. I'm sure it isn't allowed!"

"Do you think they don't know about it?" Connor scoffed, bluffing a bit by omission. Lupin did know about the map, though Snape had no idea. "Even if they wanted to take it away, they'd have to find it first."

"But I have a picture of the map as proof!" Rupert said, obviously thinking that he was being very clever.

"And you're going to prove it's ours, how?" Ivy asked conversationally. "Besides the fact the we can turn it invisible, why would they take your word over ours?"

"Give me the password!" Rupert said again, more aggressively.

"Oh, all right," Zack said after a moment. "You're too fat to use it, anyway."

The others looked at him incredulously, but Rupert had a hungry and triumphant expression on his face.

But Zack didn't tap the hump on the witch's back and say, "dissendium!" Instead he muttered the charm that they had used on him twice before and hit Rupert with it before the Slytherin boy could realise what was happening.

Connor watched the beam of light hit Rupert square in the chest, then Connor immediately stated, "I want my mummy!"

"What are you.... oh no," Rupert said, comprehension evidently finally dawning on him.

"That should teach you to mind your own business," Zack said with a sneer.

"And if you ever jinx any of us again," Quentin warned with a smile, "we'll have you declaring your undying love for Professor Snape."

"You un-jinx me right now!" Rupert demanded furiously, turning an impressive shade of scarlet.

"Good night," Connor smiled evilly as they all turned to go, "Rupert."

"I want my mummy!" Rupert said, and then swore ripely.

"So you kiss your mummy with that mouth?" Zack asked in mock disbelief. "Shame on you."

They were all chuckling as they turned the corner, out of sight.

They stopped to peak back around the way they had come, and Connor's eyes widened when he was Professor Lupin and Ms Grayson come around the far corner and spot Rupert in the corridor, very near to curfew.

"What are you doing up here?" Professor Lupin asked him. "Why aren't you in your common room? It's three minutes to curfew." Rupert stood there fuming for a moment, and Lupin prompted him by saying, "Rupert? Are you all right?"

"I want my mummy!" Rupert declared involuntarily.

Connor pulled his head back so he wouldn't be seen, and stuffed his fist in his mouth to keep from roaring with laughter.

"Oh! You poor thing!" Ms Grayson's voice could be heard, dripping with sympathy.

Connor looked at his friends, who were obviously having trouble containing their mirth. He signalled for them all to retreat, and they hurried back up to Gryffindor Tower, getting lightly scolded by the Fat Lady as the scrambled through the portrait hole a couple of minutes after curfew.

They burst into laughter once they were safely in their common room, and didn't settle down until it was almost time for them to go to astronomy.