Jewel of the Harem: The Grindelwald Continuum Book One

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The sun was setting in the west, its rays touching the waves with shimmering light, gilding the masts of the Ban Righ with orange, and spreading patchy patterns over the sails as they billowed in the wind that blew from the west. Some of the light was the deep pinkish-red of the burgundy they had loaded up in casks in the little village on the coast of France the week before, and some was the dark gold of the oranges of Seville, where they had picked up fresh water and supplies. They had been under sail for a month, and had already passed through the Strait of Gibraltar and into the Mediterranean Sea, nearly to the western coast of Italy. The captain spoke of favorable winds and portentous tides, but the sailors all knew that the ship was moving too fast, and it sent a strange undercurrent of unease through them all. This was supposed to be a straightforward voyage, but odd things seemed to be afoot, even though no-one could quite put their fingers on them.

"'Tis the odd folk on board," Jem the cabin boy said in his slow, soft West country accent when the sailors lounged on the orlop deck amidships between hours of work. There were always at least a few people sitting down there. Along the walls were stowed the triple rows of hammocks where most of the sailors slept at night, their little trunks placed below them. Sailors sat against great coils of rope or boxes of supplies when they were not on duty, carving little pieces of wood with knives from their belt, eating, gambling for pennies, or simply talking. Ginny had figured out very quickly that the most clever thing for her to do would be to keep silent. Because of the shadow-cloak she always wore, she attracted almost no notice unless she spoke.

She sat now in the dim twilight of the orlop deck, her back against one of the curved wooden sides that made up part of the hull, her knees drawn up to her chin, listening, her breath caught. It was just before the changing of the watch to second dog, and there were only a few sailors sitting about. It made her nervous to hear the discussion turn to the Malfoys and the Death Eaters, and yet there was a strange fascination to it, as well. Ginny had tried to stay out of their way as much as she could, and for the most part, she had succeeded. But she was always conscious of their presence... or perhaps the presence of only one of them, as rarely as she saw him. Draco Malfoy almost never seemed to be on deck. And of course, he had no reason to visit any of the areas where the sailors were when off duty, just as they had no reason to be in the stern cabins. It was undoubtedly a good thing, Ginny knew. If anyone would recognize Pansy, he would. But she could easily count the number of times she had seen him during the past month on one hand. The last time had been three days before, when she had seen his brilliantly fair head next to Snape's dark one on deck while she was climbing onto a wooden watch platform perched on the top of the mizzenmast. She hadn't been able to resist staring for just a moment. It was Draco, she knew; Lucius Malfoy had the same hair, but he would have matched Snape's height. And the light, quick way he moved was too distinctive to miss, even from fifty feet up. She had been staring so hard that only a push from Robin kept her from nearly falling down the ratlines and all the way to the deck.

"Strange passengers make strange voyages," agreed another sailor with a slow, laconic, northern face and a voice to match. Philip, the ship's carpenter, Ginny thought. She wished they'd talk about something else.

"I haven't seen them much," persisted Jem.

"Aye, keep themselves to themselves, they do," agreed Philip.

"But when one of them passes me on deck at dawn or dusk..." The boy shivered, his earnest eyes going round.

"Summat cold goes up yer spine, lad?" Philip asked in a soft voice. Jem nodded. From the corner, Sven gave a grunt that might have been assent, or might have had nothing at all to do with the conversation. He was a taciturn, sullen Norwegian with long, drooping blond mustaches, and Ginny wasn't at all sure that he either spoke or understood English.

"I wonder the captain allows such queer folk on board," Jem said.

"Nowt queer about the color of their money, I'll warrant," said Philip.

Robin tried to catch Ginny's eye. She looked down, feeling the familiar pang of guilt. He only wanted to help her. She knew it. But she had kept him at as much of a distance as she could in the past month, rebuffing all his overtures at friendship, and all his attempts at confidences. She didn't dare to let him get too close. He was a wizard in the raw even if he didn't really know it himself, and he would learn, or guess, too much.

Robin shrugged and gave her a tiny wink, as if he'd read her thoughts. "What's it to us, what they may or may not be?" he said easily. "We've got our work, and our silver at journey's end. What care we for aught else?"

"The tall, fair one sets my skin a-creep each time he passes by me on deck," persisted Jem. "There's something unnatural-like about him. Those eyes, like molten silver. They look right through me, they do..."

"There be two of those, like as like can be," said Philip. "One taller than the other, but like as two peas in a pod. They'll cast the evil eye on 'ee, Jem lad, if 'ee don't watch out."

"Lucius and Draco," Ginny whispered, hardly aware that she had spoken. But the sailors could be describing nobody else, and these were the names that had haunted her for so long that she could no longer remember when she did not know them.

A lull had fallen in the conversation at that moment, and her whispered words rang out in the still, dark orlop deck as if they had been shouted. Every head turned to look at her.

"'Ee knows their names, lad?" asked Philip, looking at her oddly.

A splinter of fear went up Ginny's spine. "I suppose I must have heard them speak to each other once," she mumbled, trying to pull the shadow cloak more closely around herself. It felt like very scant protection, at the moment.

Philip and Jem exchanged glances. "Yet they never speak," Jem said slowly. "I have never heard their voices, even once."

Ginny attempted to scrunch further into the corner. "I don't know, then," she said.

Philip looked around the room in a significant way. "Those be their names?" he asked. "Lucius, and Draco?" He fixed her with an almost menacing eye.

Ginny gulped and nodded.

"How thou art fallen from heaven, Lucifer, son of the morning!" said Philip darkly.

She had no idea what to say to that, and tried to paste an innocent expression on her face. She was sure that she ended up looking half-witted.

"The great dragon was thrown down, the old serpent, he who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world. He was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him," continued Philip, looking around the room significantly at each sailor in turn.

Ginny could feel her own fingernails digging into her palms. They're getting too long, she thought idiotically. I ought to cut them. Maybe I could get Jamie the cook to lend me a knife--

The ship's bell rang out, its clear tones penetrating the dark nether dungeon of the orlop deck. Robin got to his feet. "'Tis our watch, George," he said softly, and Ginny hurried out of the deck and up the forecastle entryway behind him.

Jamie the cook thrust a basket of fish into each of their arms with a distinct lack of ceremony and returned to muttering over his clay oven in the galley, a look of permanent ill-humour on his face. Ginny had discovered early on, however, that his bark was worse than his bite. She'd also learned that to be in good favour with the cook on board ship was to experience a relative taste of heaven, while to be in his bad books was to catch a glimpse of a place located decidedly in the opposite direction. She hurried up on deck with her basket, Robin behind her. They settled to a place in the waist of the ship and sat cross-legged to begin their task, facing each other. He handed her one of the knives they'd been given, and she began to gut the fish. They worked in silence for several minutes. At last, Robin cleared his throat.

"You do know them, don't you? The strange passengers?" he asked quietly.

Ginny's knife slipped and cut a gash in the fleshy part of her thumb. She did not say a word.

Robin rose to his feet. "Clean that quick, or it will fester. And there's no leechcraft aboard this ship."

He dipped a handkerchief from his pocket in one of the water barrels near the foremast and pressed it to Ginny's thumb.

"Thank you," she murmured, and then added, "You've been so good to me, Robin. About everything."

"But you still won't tell me how you know them, will you?" he asked.

She shook her head, her eyes pleading mutely with him to ask her no more. He sighed, and set back to gutting back the fish.

"Might as well finish the work up here," Robin said, and Ginny picked up her knife and set to work once again.

She glanced at him as she worked, and sighed inwardly herself. I wish I could tell him, she thought. Yes, I wish I could tell him everything. But it's not safe. What a heavy burden all this secrecy is to carry!

Any ship ran itself like a little world, a microcosm of society. Ginny had learned that much from all the talks she'd had with Arthur Weasley about her father's day in the Royal Navy. But life aboard the Ban-Righ was very different from anything she would have expected. It wasn't because of the million differences that had sprung up in shipboard life in the past four hundred years, either. Oh, those differences were there without a doubt, both large and small, from the foul-smelling smoke of the tallow candles they used for light to the weevil-infested, jaw-crackingly hard bread they ate to the strange sounds of a hundred different accents among the sailors, but this was something more basic.

Arthur Weasley had spent a great deal of time talking about the camaraderie on board a ship, and the sense of fellow-feeling that sprung up among sailors. There was absolutely none of that here. As Robin had said a month before they were a collection of alehouse runabouts who found a forecastle pleasanter than a jail. The crew was made up of sullen, silent malcontents who did their work with resentful faces, tried to keep out of Tuke's way, and waited none too patiently for the end of the voyage and their pay. Ginny had kept her head down and the shadow cloak wrapped tightly about her at virtually all times, silently doing whatever she was told with Robin's help and whispered instructions. The days and nights were a round of picking oakum, scraping the deck, mending sails, helping the cook, standing watch, shimmying up and down the masts, and the thousand and one other things that needed to be done on board a ship. She knew that she almost certainly never would have made it without Robin's help.

Robin. Ginny sighed inwardly, glancing up at the boy where he sat across from her, gutting fish and whistling. She owed him so much, and he had helped her even though she had been cool and distant to him during the entire voyage. She just didn't dare to speak to him too much, or to be too friendly. She was afraid that she would let something slip that would reveal her secrets, and Ginny couldn't even begin to imagine what would happen then. And there were so many secrets.

Let's see, she thought glumly, pulling out fish guts and dropping them into a small barrel. I'm from the twentieth century. That's one. I'm a witch. There's another one. I think Robin already guesses that. Sometimes I think he's known it from the first day we met, but I'm certainly not going to be thick enough to remind him. I know that all the passengers on board ship are evil Death Eaters hatching evil plots. I'm pretending to be a boy and I'm actually a girl. I still can't believe I've been getting away with that one, but it's not as if anyone ever takes baths on board ship, so there's been no need to undress. And it isn't as if Pansy has any natural endowments that would give her away! Oh, and I'm actually Ginny Weasley, trapped in Pansy Parkinson's body by some sort of spell that went wrong. My real body is hidden downstairs in a cabin, and it's supposed to wake up in a month. Then I'll be used for the evil Death Eater plans. The only way I can even think of to foil them is to somehow get to my brother and Harry and the rest on the other ship, the one I should've got on in the first place. But I can't think how. I've seen their ship in the distance when I'm on watch, sometimes. But they're never close enough to hail, and what would I say anyway? So I don't have the faintest idea how to contact them. Anything else? That's enough secrets to be getting on with, I think. Layers upon layers of deception... I don't think I could tell the truth anymore if I tried.

They worked on in silence. Jamie the cook was down in the galley, the captain and first mate were standing on the forecastle, discussing something, Jem was repairing a rope near the bow, and the watch was up on the mizzenmast top. Contrary to usual custom, there were no other sailors in the waist of the ship, and no sound except for the wind and the soft slapping of the waves. But then Ginny heard the noise of footsteps on the main deck, on their other side. She looked up.

On the main deck, two figures were silhouetted against the sinking sun, one much taller than the other. They moved against each other as if in a dance; now forward, now back; now advancing, now retreating, and as Ginny watched, she saw that they were dueling with short swords of some type. Both were graceful, but the shorter one seemed much less sure of himself. He parried the taller one's thrusts with some difficulty, and his every movement seemed to take a great deal of effort. Once he stumbled, and almost fell. The rays of the sinking sun touched his brilliant hair, and Ginny recognized Draco Malfoy. She drew in her breath.

Robin looked up at the sound, and his eyes followed hers. "Who the tall one is, I don't know. But the shorter one is Draco. Is that not so?"

Ginny nodded. She didn't feel that she could lie.

Robin scanned the deck, taking in Jem, the captain and first mate, and the various sailors clambering up the ratlines or scanning the horizon from the tops. "None of them can see what we see, can they." It was a statement, not a question.

"No," admitted Ginny. She hoped he wouldn't ask her anything more. She had been rebuffing his every question for nearly a month now, and she wasn't sure how much longer she could keep up her coldness towards Robin when he'd been so kind to her.

But Robin didn't say another word. He only watched Draco recover from his lapse, and continue to duel with Snape.

I should be able to do better than this, by now. I should be better than this. The words thrummed in Draco's head relentlessly. Dueling with the yatagan is like a dance, Snape said. It has a rhythm and a tempo all its own, and once you can dance to them, you will never struggle with them again. But I can't do it; I still can't do it... He parried one of Snape's thrusts, but not very well.

"Don't move your arm when you disengage, Draco," said Snape in impatient tones. "You're leaving that entire side of your body open to attack."

"Sorry," muttered Draco, his face flushing.

"And don't waste time and energy apologizing!"

"Make a smaller parry than that," said Snape. "How many times have I told you--if you move too much in response to a feint, you open yourself to your adversary's true attack?"

Draco set his mouth hard and did not say a word.

"And don't look at me. Look at the hilt of my yatagan. Keep your eyes there and you'll always know what I'm about to do."

Draco felt himself stumble against the railing of the ship, his feet almost losing their purchase on the planks of the deck.

"You let me past your guard, Draco," snapped Snape. He was looking rather harried. "You let me in. You know better than that; or you should, at least, after a month's practice! Garde! And keep your point under control!"

Fuck it all, can't you see I'm trying, you sneering bastard? I think I know now why none of the Gryffindors liked you rose to Draco's lips and nearly made it all the way out of his mouth, but he stopped himself in time. Most likely, he realized, it was because even though they were on a ship in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea in the sixteenth century, he still didn't want to say anything that might put him in the same category as a Gryffindor. It was amazing how house rivalries still held, he thought. Gryffindors. Of course, that led to thoughts of one particular Gryffindor, even though he knew very well that he shouldn't think of Ginny Weasley. Not now, when he was trying to avoid Snape's parry in terce by retreating across the deck. Not ever. Or at least, not until he had to. But he thought of her anyway, even as Snape's lips tightened in exasperation because Draco's point had started to drift again.

She lay in enchanted sleep still upon the bed in tiny cabin down the corridor from his own, her glossy red hair spread out over her shoulders, her cinnamon lashes casting little shadows above her closed eyes when he held a tallow candle high to see her. Nobody knew that Draco had sneaked into the cabin twice in the past month. He hadn't dared to stay more than a few minutes during the small hours of the night each time, and he hadn't even tried to touch her. He had only looked, and held his breath, listening for the sound of her breathing. But she didn't breathe. Once, he had run his hand along the magical barrier that separated her from the outside world, and felt the faint sparks prickle on his skin. If I could only touch her, he thought, really touch her, then surely she would wake. Then he had heard a sound coming from the corridor, and hurried back to his own little cabin, his blood thrumming hotly in his veins, the air feeling hot and close and tight around his-

"Draco!" said Snape's exasperated voice.

He blinked, and looked up. Somehow he had ended up flat on his back on the deck near the mainmast with the point of Snape's yatagan at his throat.

Snape sighed, and sheathed his weapon at his belt. "Why am I experiencing appalling flashbacks to my fruitless attempt to teach Potter Legillimency?" he muttered.

"I don't know," said Draco lamely. He couldn't even summon up enough energy to get angry at hearing himself compared to Potter. Pathetic, he thought.

"Get up," said Snape, reaching out a hand to help Draco to his feet. The older man's voice had lost that snide, cutting edge that Draco remembered so well from Potions classes with the Gryffindors. Now, he only sounded tired, and almost sad. It made Draco feel much worse. He began to walk along the railing of the ship, and Draco followed him.

The sun had sunk almost completely into the west by now, casting long orange ripples over the calm blue sea. A light wind had begun to blow, ruffling Draco's hair. He watched it send an errant strand of his teacher's dark hair across his aquiline face, revealing a touch of grey near the temples. Snape had cast a light glamour over the two of them while they practiced on deck, as he always did. It wasn't very strong, since it was only wandless magic; nothing else could be used on board ship, nor in this time, or in this place. But it still covered them both, and Draco knew that the few sailors on deck wouldn't be able to see them. He felt strangely invisible, walking with Snape--no, somehow more than invisible, as if nothing anchored him, and the slightest puff of wind might blow him away. At last, Snape stopped, and leaned against the railing on the main deck. Just above them was the forecastle, and below that, the little chimney that came up from the galley, where all the food was cooked. He rubbed a hand across his chin, looking very tired.

"You're not improving," he said flatly.

Draco didn't know quite what to say. There seemed no point in denying it.

"And it's been a month."

"I'm doing well in everything else," Draco said sullenly.

"You are," Snape conceded. "But I'm beginning to believe that this is the key."

Draco looked up, startled. "The--the key? What do you mean, Snape? It's just a martial art the Turkish use, nothing more than that, really. Isn't it? It's not as if it's a wand."

"But what is a wand, Draco?" Snape turned to look directly at him.

"Well--" Draco's mind went blank for a moment. "Er--the source of magic, I suppose."

Snape made a sound that sounded very like a snort. "You know better than that. Do try to put that intelligence of yours to some use, Draco."

As always, a reprimand from Snape stung more than it could have done from anyone else. Not that my father's even talking to me, these days, Draco thought. Or any of the other Death Eaters, really. We might be on separate continents instead of stuck together on a sixty-foot ship. But, still... "Well," he said fumblingly, "children do wandless magic, I suppose, before they ever go to Hogwarts or any other magical school."

Snape nodded.

"So... I suppose that means that magic can't come from a wand entirely, or that wouldn't be possible. But then why do we--why did we, I mean-- use wands at all? And why can't we do magic without wands as adults?"

"Because wands focus the will of the wizard," said Snape.

Draco's brow furrowed. "But they don't contain it?"

"Magic can't be contained in a nine-inch wooden stick," said Snape. A very faint smile touched his lips, although it was a weary one. "I suppose that I'm not being entirely fair with you, Draco. You were only halfway through your sixth year when we left, and that sort of concept wouldn't have been introduced to you yet. But it is something which you must understand now."

Draco looked out over the waves. They marched to the horizon in an infinite series, one melting into the next until the darkening sky met the sea. "So what is this magic that we have, then?" he asked.

Snape drew his yatagan again and moved it in strange patterns with one hand, almost lazily, gazing out over the sea. As Draco watched, golden sparks trailed from the edge of the blade. They joined together to begin a dance, pirouetting into blossoms of fire along the railing.

"Magic isn't something anybody has," said Snape. "Magic is what passes through."

"I don't understand," Draco admitted.

"Don't you?" Snape pulled his fingers through the fiery blooms, and they winked out into nothingness. "No, I can see you don't, Draco. And that worries me."

Draco clenched his teeth and turned so that he was staring out over the railing, and no longer looking at Snape. "I'm doing the best I can."

"I know that. But you are resisting the yatagan. And so it has become the focus of the magic that you cannot do."

Draco thought of his wand, which he had wrapped up in a piece of cloth and shoved into the very bottom of a trunk beneath his bed. It was only a lifeless piece of wood, now. He tried not to think of it too often, or to remember how he had once used it.

"Is that why you won't let me try to see any more visions through Ginny Weasley?" he asked abruptly.

"I don't think it wise," said Snape in an unsurprised way. "Did your father tell you that he wanted you to try?"

"Nobody tells me anything," muttered Draco. "I overheard it. But--but I think I could do it. I really do. And if we can't use her that way before she awakens, we might never--"

"I'm sorry, Draco. I can't allow it."

Draco turned so entirely away from the older man that he knew only the back of his head must be visible now. "You won't allow it," he repeated. So I'm to live in this state of suspended animation, just like Ginny, really. I might as well be in a trance! I'm not permitted to know anything, or to do anything. I'm not anywhere. I'm waiting to arrive somewhere. I'm told nothing. I'm taken into confidence about nothing. And I'm just expected to take it!

"But--" Snape seemed to hesitate.

"But what?"

The wind picked up a little then, and ruffled Snape's linen sleeves; Draco saw it out of the corner of his eye. It was far too hot for black cloaks, and they both wore the finely woven shirts. "If you want power," he finally said, "you must first master yourself, Draco. And I believe that is precisely what you are not doing."

"I don't know what you mean."

"I think you do. Or at least, you could know, if you were willing to face what you fight so hard--the memory that is blocking your mind. It's the memory of what happened to you over the Christmas holidays one year ago, isn't it?"

Draco didn't reply. After a few more moments, he heard Snape's light footsteps cross the deck, away from him. He stood at the railing until the sun had sunk all the way into the sea.

The evening was nearly still now, with an occasional breath of wind. The sails creaked, and Draco could hear ropes slapping and sailors scampering up and down ratlines, moving quickly and almost noiselessly, moving in and out of the billowing white shrouds. Some of them were so high up in the air that they were only tiny black dots moving around the riggings, illuminated by the very last rays of the setting sun. The ship's bell rang out from somewhere in one clear stroke; Draco certainly didn't know where it was kept, and had no particular desire to find out. The less I know about this ship, the better, he thought, pausing to stare out over the waves that rose and fell endlessly to the horizon. It was a bit hard to ignore, however, as it was rung every half hour. His mind reckoned up the meaning of the bell in spite of itself. The first half hour of the second dog watch, he thought. He'd overheard a great deal of the sailor's talk in the past weeks, as well.

He leaned on the rail, letting the faint wind play with the edges of his cloak, feeling wisps of his hair blow about his forehead, trying to make his mind a perfect blank and not succeeding very well. Finally, he gave up, and turned to leave.

The practice duel with the yatagans had ended up driving them all the way down to the other end of the ship from where he and Snape had originally started, and Draco had to cross the entire length of the deck to get back to the stern cabins. But Snape's glamour should still be holding, he thought wearily, beginning to walk. And indeed, none of the sailors on deck so much as glanced at him. All I want is a bath. A long, hot bath in that odd barrel tub we rigged up. Thank all the gods that the freshwater spell doesn't require a--

In his haste, he nearly tripped over two sailors sitting cross-legged on the deck, two baskets in front of them. He caught himself in time, and prepared to hurry on.

But then he heard one of them gasp.

Draco's head whipped round sharply at the sound, and he stared down at the figure who crouched on the deck. The sailor wore a short cloak despite the warmth of the day, and--he? She? Well, surely it had to be a he--pulled the hood hastily up over his head. Draco's eyes narrowed. He saw me! But how can that be?

"Who are you?" he asked abruptly.

Although he had addressed the boy in the cloak, it was the other one who answered, leaping to his feet and smiling brightly. "Robin of Peeves, sir. At your service. Any little help I might be able to render such a fine gentleman as yourself--"

"I didn't ask you," said Draco, trying to peer around Robin, who had moved in front of the other boy, who huddled even further into the cloak. "I asked him."

There was something strange about that cloak, thought Draco. And something strange about the boy. He seemed to be both there and not there; right in front of him on the deck and miles away, as if surrounded by a confusing mist. Draco couldn't seem to look straight at him. And he wanted to, because as incredible as it seemed, there was something about the boy that was almost... familiar.