Harry Potter and the Society of Orpheus and Bacchus

Prologue

DORIS CROCKFORD was having a devil of a day making preparations for the arrival of the master and mistress of the manor. ‘The Manor,’ she mused, just a modest nickname for the Pevensie castle and estate. With a weary sigh, Mrs. Crockford rested on the bottom-most step of the circular marble staircase in the vast entrance hall. She had just finished rubbing the large brass knockers on the twelve-foot oak doors and sat back to admire her handiwork. Pushing back a lock of short, mousey hair, she craned her neck and raised her eyes towards the vaulted ceiling. There was enough of a glow to illuminate the tapestries Peter Pevensie had accumulated over the years. Mr. Pevensie and his wife were very proud of them, particularly one depicting a scene on a hill above a deep wood, featuring four young children and a large lion.

A slapping and swishing noise from behind announced the arrival of a tall, wispy girl named Ivy, mopping her way across the stone floors.

“Oh, do hurry up, Ivy,” urged Mrs. Crockford, impatiently. “You still have the tapestries and the draperies. Maybe you can share the work with Gerry and Ewan. The mister and missus will be here within the hour.”

“Yes, ma’am,” nodded Ivy, obediently picking up speed with her mop.

Both Mrs. Crockford and Ivy, like the rest of the servants of the castle, thanked themselves every day for the good fortune of having a master and mistress who treated all those under the roof like family. They never wanted for anything that went unprovided by the Pevensies. The couple had one child, a girl called Lily, just turned five years old and currently too ill with the flu to have joined her parents on the annual trip to inspect Mr. Pevensie’s aircraft factories in Birmingham and Cardiff. In fact, Mr. Pevensie loved making and flying planes so much that he would have preferred to go by air. But for factory visits, he always took trains, as Mrs. Pevensie found them “rather quaint and amusing, if old-fashioned.”

“Oh, my goodness!” started Mrs. Crockford. “Three o’clock! Mr. McClanahan will have already picked them up from the station and they’ll be here any minute. Tell Cook to have the tea ready. Oh, nevermind, I’ll do it.” And at this, Mrs. Crockford cupped her hands around her mouth, projecting her voice down the long corridor to the kitchens. “Cook! COOK!”

The hurried scuffling of feet could be heard in the passageway and a tall, reedy-looking man in a soufflé-shaped chef’s cap appeared in the doorway. “Yes, Mrs. Crockford?”

“Yes,” she said to Cook, whose real name was Roger Brown. “The tea must be ready, because the Pevensies will be back at any moment.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Cook said. “I shall alert the house-elves.” Cook was just about to turn and disappear in the direction of the kitchen when a loud pounding on the front doors made them all jump.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The noise reverberated through the hall. Then the muffled sounds of masculine sobs came at them through the wood. Mrs. Crockford flung a worried glance over her shoulder at Cook and Ivy before cautiously pulling open the door.

Standing in the rain outside, soaking wet and… sobbing was the Pevensies’ chauffeur Gerald McClanahan. His thinning grey hair clung damply to his face, his eyes blinking through rivulets of rain from his creased forehead.

“Good God, man!” exclaimed Cook. “What’s ‘appened to you?”

“Cook! Do be quiet,” ordered Mrs. Crockford sharply. Then, she turned to Mr. McClanahan, ushering him in, “Gerald, what on earth’s happened to you? Where are the master and missus? Why haven’t you picked them up at the station?”

Mr. McClanahan leaned on the doorframe, looking as if he needed it for support, taking a short moment to compose himself. Cold raindrops fell from his slicker into a puddle on the threshold. Shaking, he dried his red eyes on the sleeve of his wet jersey.

“Oh, God,” he said, choking back more sobs. “S’ terrible. Terrible! They’re… they’re…”

Jesus, Mary and Joseph, she thought to herself, feeling the onslaught of panic. But she managed quietly to order him to continue.

“I ‘rived at the station. They were waitin’ fer me at the end of the… the platform. Mrs. Pevensie looked up an’ waved. But jus’ then I saw a train comin’… on the op… opposite track. It was goin’ too fast… too fast to stop. I could see it. The train… it tilted an’… an’ swerved off the track. There was an awful screeching, and I saw ‘em both… both turn ‘round. They saw it comin’ towards ‘em, an’… an’… it was too late. In seconds, it hit the end of the platform. It was goin’ so fast. So fast. They was thrown backwards an’… disappeared with the crash… with the front of the train… into the… the station....”

“Oh dear God,” breathed Mrs. Crockford, clutching at her chest and dropping onto the step, clinging to the banister for support.

The room was silent apart from the occasional sob. After what seemed an age, Cook asked tentatively, “Was anyone… else… hurt in the accident?”

“Other passengers on the train, I s’pose. It wasn’t just a freight train. The driver must’ve been killed as well. I can still see ‘is face. ‘E looked young, like a boy. Dark ‘air, dark eyes. Pale.” Gerald shook his head mournfully. “’S no wonder. ‘E must’ve realized it was all too late, the poor sod. ‘E looked so calm.”

Cook wrung his cap anxiously in his hands. Ivy clutched her throat, looking pale. They joined Gerald in his sobs and soon the news was conveyed to the rest of the staff. As Mr. McClanahan was in no fit state to inquire after the bodies, Cook, drying his eyes with his apron, went to the site to help with the police enquiry. Mrs. Pevensie had informed Mrs. Crockford of what was to be done in just such an eventuality. The Pevensies’ lawyer and executor of the Pevensie estate, Jacob McGovern, was notified. Only the most difficult task remained. Someone would have to tell Lily.

**********

Jacob McGovern peered over his wire-rimmed reading glasses at the child in front of him. His vision had slowly worsened with age, but he could still see that young Lily Pevensie was uncharacteristically still for a five year old. She sat motionless in the chair in the lawyer’s little office, gazing blankly out the window. In profile, she took after her father, the same cheekbones, the same narrow nose, turning up ever so slightly at the end. But her other features belonged to her mother: the curly red hair and the green eyes, which McGovern had before seen so full of life, but today, deep and mournful. Understandable, he thought, especially for a wee orphan.

The will of Peter A. Pevensie and Nan R. Pevensie lay soberly in his hands. The couple had been very specific. Pevensie’s aircraft parts empire would be sold to the highest bidder and the millions in revenue put in a trust fund to provide for their daughter’s education and other needs. The castle and its contents would pass to Lily alone at the age of majority.

Custody over the girl, in the event of the death of both of her parents, would go to Mr. and Mrs. Frank Evans. The Evanses, close friends of Mr. Pevensie, had always welcomed the young couple into their home and both adored Lily. Mr. McGovern on one occasion ventured nevertheless to express some doubt about them as a surrogate family. While the Evanses themselves struck him as a nice, decent couple, he noted that their only child, a girl slightly older than Lily, seemed a haughty, spoiled and jealous type who would surely harbour deep-seated resentment upon discovering that she would have to share parental affections with a stranger.

But the Pevensies had been insistent. The little girl’s next of kin would have been Nan Pevensie’s wealthy uncle Thomas, notorious as an elitist class-conscious snob, as well as a miser and absentee parent to his son. His wife was no different. What’s more, Nan Pevensie swore she could already detect signs of a certain unsavouriness in Thomas junior, already in his teens. Unwilling to allow her daughter to be brought up with such an influence, she was adamant that the Evanses take in Lily. Mr. McGovern, as their lawyer, could only follow the couple’s wishes.

The servants, as beneficiaries, had also gathered at his offices for the reading of the will. They, too, had been well-provided for. It was clear that their quiet tears were not due to any limitations in their bequest, but out of grief and sympathy for the little child. He squinted slightly at the blurry images of two of the shortest kitchen servants he had ever seen, hovering timidly behind Cook’s knees. (He thought for a fleeting moment that he saw large flapping ears pop out from behind their chef’s caps, but realized his myopia was no doubt worse than it had ever been.) They had been secured positions with a boarding school in the north, while the other servants had accepted positions with other households. Now surveying the assembly of Pevensie servants, he saw them waiting with subdued grief for him to conclude the will reading.

Mr. McGovern finally put down the will and nodded at Mrs. Crockford. He sighed sadly for a single unguarded moment. It was surely a sign of his age that he had lived long enough to see some of his dearest friends to the grave.

With a start he remembered the box on his desk. In his grief, he had forgotten to give the child Mrs. Pevensie’s specific bequest. When he had inspected it the night before, he could not detect an opening, although upon shaking it, it was obvious that it was by no means empty. The old lawyer peered at it more closely now. It was made of metal, perhaps silver, with the inlaid mother-of-pearl and platinum figures resembling small people with wings. Given his generally pragmatic disposition, Jacob McGovern would scarcely have identified these as the fairies that they were—even if his eyesight had been 20/20. Winged people he found odd enough, but what troubled him most of all was that they appeared to be… moving. Their wings swung to and fro and he fancied that some of the grinning figures waved at him.

He cursed silently, furrowing his thick white brows and rubbing his lined forehead, feeling the early signs of a migraine. Damn, he sighed, I must pay that optician a visit. And having mentally resolved to do so first thing in the morning, he leaned forward and laid the box in Lily’s tiny hands. The girl numbly accepted it, without the merest flicker of curiosity, before allowing Mrs. Crockford to lead her to the door.

In the corridor, her new family was waiting: Frank and Jane Evans and, scowling unpleasantly in the corner, their daughter Petunia.

Chapter 1 : If Ears Could Hear

“WHO’S GOT THE MAP?” Despite the dense curtain of foliage in the Forbidden Forest, Ron’s voice seemed amplified several times its normal volume, as if by a Sonorous Charm. Harry and Hermione, sharing with Ron the cover of Harry’s Invisibility Cloak, both jumped at the sound. Luckily the moonless September evening made it difficult even to see the three pairs of ankles sprouting from the three pairs of shoes creeping close together along the twig-strewn path skirting the boundaries of the wizarding school. They had been in their first year at Hogwarts when Harry had received his father’s cloak. Four years later and several inches taller, the cloak strained to conceal two, let alone all three of them.

“Shhhh!!! We’re getting closer to Hagrid’s cabin, he might hear us,” chastened Hermione.

“Not if he’s asleep. If he could sleep through Norbert’s squawking, it would take more than a few whispers to wake him,” said Ron, recalling the baby Norwegian Ridgeback dragon Hagrid had tried to domesticate in their first year.

“Here.” Harry poked him in the ribs with the roll of parchment.

“Ow!”

“Sorry. It’s too dark to see how far away you are.”

Despite the darkness, the irritation in Hermione’s voice was almost palpable. “I don’t know why we have to go looking for it now; it’s already two in the morning, not to mention not even midway through our first week as fifth years and you’re both already setting us all up for expulsion! That’s classic. It’s not as if we don’t hear the same warning from Dumbledore every year that the Forest is off limits.” She heaved an exasperated sigh. “I might as well hand in my Prefect’s badge right now.”

“Did you ask her to come, Harry, because I know I didn’t,” snapped Ron. “Look, Hermione, we’ve been through this already once today. If we don’t get some of the dragon droppings for the Verivue Potion, you can bet we’re going to start off the year with negative marks in Potions. Neville even told me he’d seen Snape—the git—sneak that rotter Malfoy a key after class—“

“For his office cabinet, I’ll bet,” huffed Harry in a low voice. “It seems unfair of him to make us scrounge around for the rarest supplies at the last minute and not put them on the bloody list.”

“Harry’s right. And all the while Snape’s giving the Slytherins access to the scarcest commodities on the sly!” The indignance was clear in Ron’s voice. He then proceeded to give vent to his opinion of the Potions Master, muttering colourful phrases he’d picked up at the Romanian dragon-training camp over the summer while visiting his brother Charlie.

Harry found an elbow on each of his friends and gave a squeeze to insist on silence. They were now skirting the edge of Hagrid’s hut, from which a dim light glowed through its two small rear windows. A snore or two at regular intervals told them their Care of Magical Creatures professor and groundskeeper at Hogwarts was fast asleep. Following Harry’s lead they slipped around the hut and toward the edge of the Forest.

Harry looked around carefully and paused under the first tree, taking care to avoid the branches of the Whomping Willow. He and Ron had discovered the enchanted tree the hard way in their second year when it violently attacked them after they accidentally collided with it in Ron’s father’s flying Ford Anglia. Towering against a thickly veiled sky, it seemed to leer at them viciously.

“Lumos,” he whispered and directed the glowing tip of his wand at the dusty piece of unfurled parchment. The three huddled closely to inspect the Marauder’s Map which indicated the position of any living being in and around Hogwarts. Looking down they saw three small dots hovering near the edge of the parchment at the border of the Forest. Each dot was marked with a name: “Harry Potter”, “Ronald Weasley” and “Hermione Granger”. Inside the little illustration of the groundskeeper’s hut was a lone, although slightly larger, dot labeled “Rubeus Hagrid”.

“Good, no one but us.” After getting his bearings, Harry extinguished his wand. “I think I saw Hagrid put the fertilizer here yesterday, under that lean-to by the fence,” said Harry, striking off. Hagrid’s snores from the hut grew fainter in the distance, but Ron and Hermione stumbled behind on tiptoe nevertheless, peering nervously at the blackness of the wood. Previous experience had made all three well aware that there was more to the Forest than meets the eye, particularly at night.

“He’s using it as fertilizer? For what?” asked Hermione.

“I don’t know. For something of Professor Sprout’s. We’ll probably find out in Herbology the day after tomorrow.”

“If we don’t get caught,” said Hermione. “Why doesn’t Professor Sprout keep it in the greenhouse then? ---Eeeuuch!!” She brought the wool of her jumper sleeve up to her nose, but not quick enough to avoid committing the acrid stench to memory.

“Ugh! That’s why,” sputtered Ron, doing the same. “I guess we found it. Although, how could you miss it? No wonder Sprout didn’t want this in the classroom.”

Harry wrinkled his nose, squinting involuntarily. “Chalk it up to Snape to give us the most unpleasant kinds of homework.”

“Yeah,” chimed in Ron. “As if boils and gangrenous pus weren’t enough to put us all off lunch.”

“Well, at least he’s consistent,” muttered Hermione, raising a sardonic brow.

The tip of Harry’s foot kicked at one of the sacks of manure. “Lumos,” he whispered and a faint glow emanated again from his wand. Bending over the top, he drew out a small pocketknife from under his robes.

“Wait!” Hermione stayed his arm with her hand. “Snape said we only need about a quarter of an ounce. We don’t want to damage the bag, this stuff is expensive. Let’s try this. Abrerominutio!” With a wave of her wand a small hole appeared underneath the seal. Deftly scooping them each portions no larger than a pinky nail, she dropped the samples into small envelopes treated with an olfactory-blocking charm.

“Cerrad’aperturo!” muttered Hermione, tapping her wand along the opening to ensure it had vanished. Ron was just stuffing the envelopes under his robes when Harry suddenly held them back.

“Listen!” he said.

“What is it?” Hermione whispered.

“I thought I heard something.”

“Where?”

“’Don’t know. It’s gone.” Harry glanced at the map again. Still only the four dots he counted before in their corner of the parchment. “But maybe… it’s coming from over there, not on our map…”

Hermione, ignoring this and impatient to get as far away from the Forest and as close to her bed as possible, took a few steps back in the direction of the school and Hagrid’s hut. But the boys hadn’t moved and she found herself snagged by the cloak.

“Come on, both of you. Before we get into trouble.”

“Wait,” said Ron. “I hear it, too. It’s--”

“Music?… Shh,” said Harry. He and Ron mechanically turned to face the wood.

Hermione frowned in the darkness, peering forward into the trees. She thought she had for a moment seen a figure crouched in the distance. But when she blinked again the depths of the forest were still. It must just be my imagination, she chided herself, peering down at the map. “I don’t hear anything. Let’s g—Hey! Where are you two going?” she hissed.

Both boys had taken short wooden steps toward the dense tree line. The cloak slipped further off with Ron and Harry’s every step and the chill of the breeze up to her knees made Hermione shiver. “Oh, all right, I’m coming. Wait.” She decided it was better to accompany them than remain standing alone at the edge of the Forbidden Forest.

They had gone no further than the first crossroads in the trail when Harry suddenly came to a halt and Ron, directly behind, collided into him.

“What?” asked Hermione. “What is it?”

Neither answered. The boys stood still as statues.

“Harry? Ron?”

Both stared ahead blankly, neither issuing a response. Hermione, moved by a mixture of anxiety and impatience, gripped them by the arms. “Hey!”

“Ow!” they both yelled suddenly, seeming to come to. Ron swatted at her irritably under the cloak.

“Shhhh!!” cautioned Hermione. Too late.

“Who’s there?! Show yerself!” The raspy twang of Argus Filch’s voice cut through the stillness of the clearing behind them. The overzealous and mean-spirited caretaker at Hogwarts carried a dim lantern just in front of his thin, sour face twisted into a scowl. Just visible on the grass, creeping carefully ahead of him was Filch’s cat Mrs. Norris, who bore an uncanny resemblance to her master.

“Someone’s here, my sweet. Ye can smell ‘em, can’tcha?” By this time Filch and Mrs. Norris were so close they could see the shadows cast by the scant stubble on the caretaker’s chin. As Filch approached they spotted the yellow-brown tinge of his crooked teeth, some of which were missing. “It’s no use hiding. Show yerself!” They soon realized his breath was no better.

Mrs. Norris looked directly up at them, but made not a sound. The three wondered apprehensively—and not for the first time—whether the cat could actually see through Invisibility Cloaks.

Having frozen at the sound of Filch’s voice, the three held an unnaturally crouched position to keep their ankles and shoes under the cover of the Cloak. By the time Mrs. Norris seemed to lose interest in whatever she may have sensed in their direction, the cramping in Hermione’s legs had become unbearable. She feared she might have to ask the boys to use a Mobilicorpus Charm to get her back to Gryffindor Tower.

Filch lingered for a moment, staring searchingly through their faces, before disappointedly giving up the hunt. A whole summer without inflicting punishment of any kind to a student had done nothing to temper his taste for it. The three heard him grumbling audibly to Mrs. Norris.

“Must be summat out there,” he said, squinting. “How I’d love to get my hands on whatever little brat might be out ‘ere breakin’ curfew.” He nodded at the cat. “I ‘spect it could be some o’ them older students roamin’ the grounds. They do it fer kicks, ye know—like that Potter and his whingey friends.” The boys winced as Filch unsuspectingly flung a nasty scowl in their direction, his disgust evident. “Damn that bloody Wizards’ Educational Council. They don’t even give a toss ‘bout corporal punishment nowadays. Biggest mistake they made, in my ‘pinion, was to abolish it.” Filch spat at a spot close to the edge of the Cloak. Hermione watched in horror as the cat turned slowly, hissing in their direction. But Filch merely nodded. “That’s right, my sweet. Hardly seems worth punishin’ them little brats anymore seeing’s all they’d get’s a detention. In my day,” he sighed nostalgically, “it was all hot coals, the rack and partial dismemberment…”

Expelling a disgruntled sniff, Filch turned abruptly on his heel, and struck off in the opposite direction. Once his ramblings to Mrs. Norris faded completely into the distance, the three stole their way back to the entrance to Gryffindor Tower without attempts at further conversation. In the entrance hall, a suit of armour lolled its sleepy head as they crept past, but they otherwise encountered no one along the staircases and vaulted corridors.

In front of the entrance to the tower marked by a portrait of a fat lady dressed in a large pink dress, a lone figure sat huddled, resting its head on its knees.

“Neville, what are you doing here?” asked Harry.

“I—I forgot the password.” Shivering, he drew his robes closer around his pajamas. He rubbed his eyes sleepily leaving a streak of dirt on his rounded cheek. They knew this short, plump boy with straight, mousy hair to be perhaps the most absent-minded in the whole of Gryffindor House. Ron helped him up.

Hermione turned to the portrait of the Fat Lady. “Sad cow,” she said.

“Same to you, dear!” huffed the Fat Lady.

“Hermione!” admonished a startled Ron.

“What?” She frowned at him irritably. “It’s the new password. Or can’t you remember them either?”

Indeed, the Fat Lady followed her indignant outburst with a nod and the portrait swung forward to let them through.

Without another word, Neville climbed in ahead of them. Hermione could hear the pad-pad-padding of his slippers fading as he disappeared up the spiral staircase leading to the boys’ dormitory.

No sooner had they entered the circular, tapestry-laden common room, than Harry and Ron turned soporifically to the boys’ staircase. The fireplace held cold embers and the common room was empty (not entirely surprising given that it was already 3:30 in the morning). Hermione, still fully awake, hands on hips, called after them. “Hey, aren’t you going to explain yourselves? What was all that about out there? What did you hear?”

Harry glanced back, frowning. “Hear? When? What do you mean, what did we hear? Nothing.” He shrugged, yawning, his eyes glazing over.

“But didn’t you say you h—?”

To her bewilderment, Ron half turned and shrugged at her as well. Hermione watched as both turned and ascended the staircase, together whistling in perfect time an unfamiliar and mournful tune. And for the first time that year, even counting their first Potions class, Hermione’s hairs stood on end.

To Be Continued…