June Week

Chapter 6: Year Of The Cat

Once back within the castle´s timeless walls and far away from airplanes and explosions, Minerva was able to put her experience in Diagon Alley more or less out of her mind, though it was a long time before she stopped flinching at sudden noises. Luckily, she had the distractions of Christmas to help.

Her present from Dumbledore was a heap of additional books on Animagi, which he gave her with orders to put them away until after the holidays. ("You´ll be spending enough time on this for the next few months. Go and enjoy yourself now while you can.") She tried to follow his instructions, but couldn´t resist flipping through some of the books in idle moments. No doubt he expected it of her anyway.

He had outlined an exhausting course of study stretching all the way to the end of the school year (she refrained from mentioning that she planned to cut that in half so she could get on with the business of spying) and they were scheduled to begin on New Year´s Day. Before that could happen, however, she had to think about which animal she might become. And being the methodical person she was, she went about it in a methodical manner.

Cat

Advantages: Quick, strong, can see in dark, has natural weapons (claws and teeth)

Disadvantages: Sheds

Owl

Advantages: Can fly, has natural weapons (talons and beak), lightweight

Disadvantages: Can´t travel on the ground

Toad

Advantages:

Minerva paused for a minute and looked up from the neat list she was making. Were there any advantages to being a toad? She couldn´t think of one, except perhaps being so grotty that few people would want to touch her.

"It´s owl or cat, then. Which do you think I should choose?" she asked Sugar, who was perched on her shoulder, looking over at her list as if he could read it.

Owl! Be an owl, Minerva! We can fly together. I´ll teach you to hunt for rodents. It´ll be lovely. He nearly pecked her in excitement, but recovered himself just in time. Like Dumbledore, he was pleased to see Minerva happy for a change. He didn´t really understand what had made her withdrawn and nervous all the summer and fall, but he knew that she´d been hurt, and that she meant to catch the perpetrator. Privately, he thought she should have told the old man what had happened straight away. Annoying as he could be, Dumbledore always seemed to know what to do about things. But Minerva was Sugar´s person, the only person he had ever cared for at all, and he supported her in whatever she did, whether he approved of it or not.

That loyalty was seriously tried when Minerva said musingly, "I think I should be a cat. No offense to you, Sugar -- you are an amazing creature -- but you´re so conspicuous. I need to be stealthy."

Hmmph. Well, you´ve got the "amazing creature" part right, Sugar grumped to himself, but a CAT -- ugh! He spread his snowy wings and flew up to his perch, where he promptly went to sleep in a snit. Rolling her eyes, Minerva went off to announce her decision to her teacher.

Dumbledore approved of her choice of animal, but warned her that it wasn´t always possible to become precisely what one wanted to. Some Animagi had started out with lofty dreams of being phoenixes and centaurs, only to discover that they were turtles and flobberworms on the inside.

"I think you´ll do well enough, though," he said. "If you feel as if you might be a cat, then you may very well be one. And there is something rather catlike about you."

Not sure whether to take that as a compliment or an insult, she ignored it and set about her work. She read far into the night, every night, for weeks, drinking countless cups of tea and hot chocolate and filling rolls and rolls of parchment with notes. At the same time, thinking that having an actual cat around might be just the inspiration she needed, she asked Headmaster Dippet if she could borrow Isolde, his beloved Siamese. Isolde was extremely lazy and spoiled, but friendly enough as cats went, and Minerva spent what seemed like hours watching her eat, sleep, wash herself and chase things.

Unfortunately, she also discovered that for all Isolde´s finickiness about personal hygiene, the cat had some disgusting habits. The first of these manifested less than a week after Minerva had taken custody of her. She´d been down to Hogsmeade to do some errands she´d been putting off for ages, and was returning to her room with an armful of packages and a pleasant sense of accomplishment.

"Sugar, I´m back, and I brought you the Owl Tr - bloody hell, what is that?" she finished, staring in horror at what appeared to be the severed head of a robin on her pillow.

Sugar screeched from his perch high on the wall. Don´t look at ME! I leave all MY remains outside where they belong. Ask the fur rug under the bed. As if on cue, Isolde poked her head out beneath the edge of the crimson bed curtains, licking her lips with immense relish and not a shred of guilt.

Minerva sighed, set her parcels aside, gingerly removed the head and threw it out the window. "I´m beginning to think you´re more trouble than you´re worth, Isolde," she said to the cat, which responded by leaping onto the bed and curling up on the now-empty pillow.

I´ll second that! Sugar put in snippily. He was still offended that Minerva hadn´t wanted to become an owl, but thought he could put up with feline company as long as she was the feline. Isolde was another story. Not only was she taking Minerva´s attention away from him, but she would keep stalking him when he wasn´t looking. He would have moved completely to the Owlery if he hadn´t thought his girl needed him there for protection. Anyone who tried to harm her would have an angry owl to deal with, and that was no small obstacle. He was quite sure that Isolde, faced with danger, would do nothing but lie about purring and licking her paws. That, or hide in the closet.

Despite such inconveniences, Minerva´s groundwork progressed smoothly enough, taking up the entire months of January and February and spilling over into early March. She was forced to give up her watch on Tom during this time -- she was just too busy with her teaching job and her extra studies to handle any other activities. Although her spying efforts had been cursory and ineffectual thus far, it galled her to abandon them, even in the cause of learning to do better. She´d heard the House heads discussing whom next year´s Head Boy and Girl should be, and Tom was almost a shoo-in for the position. Just what she needed -- another honor to make his star brighter and her mission more difficult.

She longed desperately for the moment when Dumbledore would announce that she was ready to begin work on the actual Animagus transformation. But no matter how she pestered him, his only response was to tell her to keep studying

Late in the second week of March, they got an abnormally fine day for the time of year, and she decided a change of scenery might help her concentrate better on her research. She didn´t have any classes of her own to teach that day, and none of the professors needed help, so she packed up all her books and notes and carted them out to a private place on the grounds, near the edge of the forest. It was a little copse of trees, just a few of them, standing all on its own like a sentry the forest had sent out to scout for it. She´d gone there for many reasons during her tenure as a student: to cry over disappointments, to ponder her future, and, of course, to study.

The spot was as pleasant as ever, even if the ground was still rather damp and chilly. She conjured a blanket from her room and spread it on the grass to save her robes getting dirty, then carefully laid out her supplies and set to work. Perhaps an hour had gone by when a large shadow -- a very large shadow -- fell across her, and she glanced up in alarm.

Hagrid, the huge gamekeeper´s assistant, was standing in front of her, looking as if he wanted to say something, but didn´t want to interrupt her. She´d seen him around the school several times this year, burning leaves and carting things about, but hadn´t been this close to him since he´d been expelled. He´d been a big boy then. Now his size bordered on shocking. He had to be close to seven feet tall, Minerva thought, and wondered briefly if that was normal for a fourteen-year-old.

Well, overgrown or not, she knew him, and wasn´t frightened of him. "Hello, Hagrid," she said.

"I´ve been wantin´ to talk to yeh," Hagrid said. Then he stopped as if he´d run out of words. Minerva waited a minute.

"Here I am," she said at last, when he didn´t seem to be planning any more conversational gambits. "Can I help you with something?"

"It´s Professor Dumbledore´s birthday tomorrow," he said. "Yeh knew that, of course. And I was wonderin´ -- I was wonderin´ if yeh´d like to help me plan a little celebration for him."

Minerva was touched by this idea. She´d bought Albus a gift weeks ago -- it was wrapped and tucked away on a high shelf, safely out of range of Isolde´s slashing claws -- but she hadn´t thought of having a party for him, other than the one that all the staff was attending that night.

"That sounds nice," she said. "What sort of celebration did you have in mind?"

"I thought we could fix dinner for him," Hagrid said, "I know yeh´re very close with him, like I am, so the two of us together -"

"I don´t know -- I can´t really cook," Minerva said dubiously. She had many skills, but cooking wasn´t one of them. When she´d lived on her own in the months after her father had died, she´d done what any eleven-year-old in that situation would have done: eaten things she liked and didn´t have to fuss over, which in her case had meant a steady diet of bread, butter, jam, tinned meat and Walker´s shortbread biscuits. Then she´d come to Hogwarts, where she´d never had to think about food because it simply appeared on her plate at mealtimes. As a result, she didn´t have a clue where to begin making a boiled egg, much less an entire dinner.

"I can!" said Hagrid, suddenly eager and animated rather than shy. "Dad taught me, `fore he passed on. I´ll tell yeh what to do -- I just can´t work the magic. They broke my wand, yeh know." He looked sad for a minute, then brightened. "So, what d´yeh say? I think Dumbledore´ll like it. And we both of us owe him a lot. We´re like his kids, yeh know, since he´s got none of his own."

Minerva choked with laughter, though the thought of being lumped in as one of the "kids" hurt - that certainly wasn´t how she wanted Albus to think of her. "A fine brother and sister we´d make! Oh, don´t look so wounded, Hagrid. You have to admit we don´t have much of a family resemblance, to each other or Professor Dumbledore."

"You´re right abou´ that," Hagrid admitted with a faint smile. "Will yeh help me, then?"

"Why not?" she said, giving in to impulse for once. "Do you want to do it in your house?" She saw Hagrid blush, realized that hadn´t come out quite right, and added "Have the dinner there, I mean?"

"Sure," he said, scuffling the ground with a large boot. "Come down tomorrow afternoon and we´ll get started. Oh, and tell Dumbledore when to stop by, but don´ tell him why."

"All right," she said. Impulsively, she took Hagrid´s hand and gave it a friendly squeeze. "This really is thoughtful of you, Hagrid. Thank you for letting me be part of it."

Hagrid blushed harder. "It´s nothing," he said.

~~~

At three p.m. sharp the next day, she was outside Hagrid´s hutlike residence, knocking on the painted wooden door. He answered looking excited and nervous, and quite forgot to invite her in. Eventually, she just edged past his bulky form and into the interior of the house.

He´d obviously made an effort to tidy up -- the floor was freshly swept and the table already laid -- but the detritus of a teenage boy living on his own was in evidence all over the single room. There were posters of various Quidditch teams stuck up on the walls, several articles of grungy-looking laundry peeking out of a basket in the corner, and piles of cheap magazines, some with Muggle film stars on their covers, some with wizard musicians and athletes, and at least one with a half-clothed girl, teetering on the floor beside the bed. Hagrid followed her gaze to this last item, swooped down, removed it from the top of its pile and swiftly hid it under his mattress, blushing all over again.

Minerva decided to ignore that. If Hagrid wanted to read dirty magazines when he was here alone, it was his business. At least he´d had the decency to look embarrassed.

"So, what are we making for dinner?" she asked, walking over to the small kitchen area and surveying the ingredients he had laid out.

"Rabbit stew and dumplings," he said. "I caught rabbits in the forest a few days ago. They´re hangin´ up outside, should be ready by now. We´ll make a cake too."

"Very well, let´s get started," she said.

An hour later, she had vowed that if cooking was always this difficult, she´d never eat anyplace but the Great Hall for the rest of her life. Between the two of them, they´d managed to spill flour all over the floor (her), sustain a nasty cut to the thumb (Hagrid) and burn some chopped onions into a caramelized black mess in the bottom of Hagrid´s best frying pan (both of them). They didn´t know each other well enough to feel comfortable working together, and by the time they´d gotten the spells right and set the stew pot simmering and the cake baking, they were both overheated and irritated.

"Let´s sit outside while it cooks," Hagrid suggested, and she agreed gratefully. They went and settled themselves on the front step. Across the lawn, they could see students moving back and forth, heading to classes in the greenhouses and animal paddocks, stopping in pairs and groups to talk.

"Still seems funny, not bein´ with the rest of `em," Hagrid said, his gaze fixed pensively on his former classmates.

What am I supposed to say to that? Minerva wondered. She felt whatever she said would be wrong, so instead she asked "Are you enjoying your new job?"

He shrugged, and the fabric of his jacket stretched perilously over his massive shoulders. "It´s all right. I get to work outside, and Ogg´s nice enough for a boss. He´s taught me a lot. Anyway, yeh got to do somethin´ to make a living."

"I feel the same way about my job sometimes," Minerva said, and he gaped at her in amazement.

"You? Hard to believe. Look at yeh, not even a year out of school and almost a professor already. `Course it´s no surprise, yeh were always so smart, near first in everything and a prefect too. A real asset ter Hogwarts."

"You make me sound like a complete prig," she said.

"Well, yeh weren´t a pain about it all, not like that fuckin´ Tom Riddle -- oh, sorry! That´s not a nice thing to say in front of a girl." He clapped a hand over his mouth as if he could push the offending word back in.

"I´m sure I´ll survive the trauma," said Minerva wryly.

"I still shouldn´ have said it," Hagrid insisted, getting up and rearranging some tools hanging on the wall of his hut to avoid looking at her. She watched him, thinking now about his mention of Tom. She wasn´t the only person who´d had a run-in with the notorious Master Riddle -- Hagrid had, too. She´d automatically assumed that he and his giant spider had been guilty, but was it true? Might Hagrid know something about Tom that could help her trap him?

"You mentioned Tom Riddle -- she began, but Hagrid cut her off.

"I don´t want ter talk abou´ him," he said. "What happened with him and me is in the past, and that´s where it should stay. Dad taught me that yeh should let the past go. He said he never would have made it after Mum -- after she was gone, if he hadn´ been able ter to do that."

Minerva frowned disapprovingly at this.

"That´s not right," she said. "What about justice? Suppose someone had done something wrong, and you could see them punished for it?"

"There´s no such thing as justice," said Hagrid in bleak tones. "When something bad´s happened, yeh jus´ have ter pick up an´ go on from where yeh are."

"But -"

"I said I didn´ want ter talk about it."

She noted the fierce, beetle-browed grimace on his face and gave in. The last thing she wanted was to get him all wound up and ruin the evening they´d planned for Dumbledore. She´d just have to stick to her original plan of collecting information on her own.

Dumbledore turned up right on time and acted duly surprised, though Minerva privately suspected him of having caught on to their scheme in advance. They all went inside, and Hagrid, much happier now that his hero was here and Minerva had stopped trying to talk about his nemesis, ladled out three huge bowls of the rabbit stew.

Minerva peered into hers and shuddered. She wasn´t a huge fan of game to begin with, and somehow their concoction looked and smelled odder than such things usually did. It didn´t make sense. All the ingredients had been fine when they´d put them in the pot. She took an exploratory bite and nearly spat it out again, but forced herself to chew.

This is the worst stuff I´ve ever eaten, she thought. Across the table, Dumbledore seemed to be having the same idea, and even Hagrid looked less than delighted.

"Tha´s strange," he said ruminatively. "It always came out better than this when Dad made it."

They all finished their first bites and sat there, spoons in hand, each waiting for someone else to continue. Finally Minerva said "Suppose we just go straight to the cake part?" and Hagrid jumped up to fetch the cake. She lit the candles with a flick of her wand, and they sang a relatively tuneful version of "Happy Birthday" to a pleased-looking Dumbledore. Hagrid plunged a large knife into the cake to cut slices -- and exclaimed in unhappy surprise when a gooey mess of semi-baked batter oozed out of the center. It seemed the cake hadn´t baked all the way through, which was odd, as some burnt bits were showing around the edges where the icing didn´t cover.

Everyone stared at everyone else for a long minute. Then Hagrid gave a huge guffaw of laughter. Dumbledore followed suit. And Minerva found herself laughing too, harder than she´d laughed in ages and ages, until her sides hurt and tears ran down her face. She forgot about fear and pain and secrets and fatigue and just sat there, looking at their foul stew and half- raw, half-scorched cake, and nearly shrieking with laughter. It was a wonderful feeling.