Alternative Authors: Or, It Could Have Been Worse

Alternative Authors, or, It Could Have been Worse

From The Adventure of the Chamber of Secrets after the manner of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

The Journal of Ronald A Weasley

It was one of the chief peculiarities of my friend, Mr Harry Potter, that although when inspired, he was a youth of intense energy, between times he would fall into the most extreme lethargy. At such times, he would lie around our study in Gryffindor Tower, ignoring his books, bemoaning the general lack of inspiration and, I am sorry to say, indulging in far too many Chocolate Frogs.

It was on one such autumn day that the series of events I am privileged to record began. I had been working through the homework set by our new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, a Professor Lockhart. Potter had been supposedly doing the same, but had for some time been staring dreamily out of the window. Looking up, I ventured to remind him that our essay was due the following day. Potter threw up his hands with a sigh.

"What on earth is the point, Weasley?" he asked with some asperity. "The man is an unbearable, self-aggrandising coxcomb, and this so-called essay is merely an invitation for us to sing his praises and further inflate his already swollen ego!"

"I dare say you are right, Potter," I replied, attempting to be reasonable, "but he is our teacher, and if we are to pass the course, we need to complete the work."

"Hah!" Potter snorted. "We are merely passing the time, Weasley. I find my faculties beginning to desert me for want of stimulation. I require a challenge, my dear fellow, some test of my mettle!"

I was about to point out that the Quidditch season was upon us, and that Potter would have a key role to play if Gryffindor House were to do well this year, when there was a peremptory knock on the study door. It opened at Potter's call to admit the slender form of our good friend Miss Hermione Granger.

At this time, I am obliged to say, Miss Granger was still rather a plain girl, with bushy brown hair and somewhat prominent front teeth. It is also true that her manner was often abrasive; she and I frequently argued, despite our best intentions and the strength of our regard for each other. It must also be said, however, that she was then, and is now, the most intelligent person I have ever known.

At this moment, however, Miss Granger seemed hurried, and more than a little anxious. Potter also saw this, and gestured her to a chair, his eyes lighting with anticipation.

"Sit down, Miss Granger, please! Now, what has happened?" he asked.

"Don't you know, Harry?" she asked.

Potter leaned back in his chair, his hands steepled in front of him, gazing keenly at her, then smiled quietly.

"Beyond the very obvious facts that you have been in the library, studying for Lockhart's infernal essay, and that you came here in something of a hurry, I know nothing, Miss Granger."

Miss Granger rolled her eyes and sighed, "How do you do that, Harry?"

Potter shook his head. "Surely you know my methods by now? There are spots of candle wax on your sleeve, showing that you had a candle next you while working, the Common Room and your study are lit by lamps, so you were in the library. You have fresh ink stains on your fingers, so you were writing. There is a small, pink paper heart adhering to your cuff, of the kind you are accustomed to place at the foot of all your work for Professor Lockhart. As to hurrying here, there is a strand of cobweb on the shoulder of your robe - if you had not been rushing, you would have avoided it, would you not?

"Now Miss Granger, what is the cause of your urgency? Please state the facts clearly and fully."

Miss Granger gathered herself, and began. "I was in the library, as you said, Harry. I'd finished my work, and was on my way back to my study, when I passed the ladies' powder room on the Third Floor. There was a crowd outside, a lot of students and some teachers, and in the middle of it all, there was the caretaker, Mr Filch, cradling that awful old cat of his. Harry, she was as stiff as a board, splayed out like a stuffed cat! Something dreadful must have happened, Harry!"

I could tell at a glance that this was the exact stimulation Potter had been waiting for. His frame was quivering with suppressed energy, and his eyes were keen and piercing. He turned to me eagerly.

"Come, Weasley this is a matter that requires our attention! Quick, old fellow, the game's afoot!"

Note: The 'study' shared by Ron and Harry is a common facility at English boarding schools. Introduced originally by Arnold of Rugby in the 19^th Century, a study was a small, private room allocated to a pupil - or perhaps shared by two or three - where they could do 'prep' (homework) or have semi-private space to read or carry on hobbies away from the noise and rough and tumble of the Common Room. Why JKR never used this concept I don't know!

From The Chronicles of Harry Potter: Vol IV - The Pyretic Cornucopia in the style of Stephen R Donaldson

"Hellfire!" groaned Harry Potter, fighting to stay erect, held standing only by the final preterite shards of his will. He was surrounded by the Death-Eaters, who stood like ebon stalagmites, immobile, watching. Beyond them, the misty, night-shrouded necropolis was full of tenebrous lurking, the shadows of his own unspoken fears, his subtle betrayals, hovered waiting there.

The wound in his arm sent argute pulses along his veins, heightening his senses, causing the figures before him to blaze in algetic cynosures. Pettigrew, hunched, quivering, gazing up at Voldemort in an agony of self-loathing sycophancy. Voldemort himself watched Harry, his eyes like fangs, venomous in his ophidian mien.

"Pathetic, grovelling, child!" he hissed. "The Boy Who Lived, they call you, praising you as my nemesis. Fools, I am not so easily undone! Now, in this act, in this place, I prove myself undying, and that coward Dumbledore shall see the truth in your corpse, Potter!"

Potter shook his head, forcing himself to look away from that hypnotic gaze. His eyes fell on the dead visage of Cedric Diggory, lying like a broken plaything close by. Cedric's face was taut with shock, with agony, his dead eyes transfixed Potter with accusation. With that realisation came other faces: Ron, eager with faith, firm with friendship; Hermione, strict as a tablet, fierce and demanding; Dumbledore, firm in command, warm in humanity. Potter would not, could not, betray them again. He raised his head, glared at Voldemort.

"By Hell, Voldemort," he growled, "I won't let you do this!"

Voldemort laughed like a rattlesnake, "Ah, you are stubborn, boy!"

Yes, stubborn, thought Potter. You don't begin to know how stubborn!

Using his pain as a lever, he raised his wand. Voldemort, eyes lashing at him, raised his own. They cast their spells simultaneously, and both were dazzled by a sudden argent blaze. A thread of silver might stretched between the wands, and the duellists were locked, unmoving in a cupola of white light.

Then figures began to emerge from Voldemort's wand, insubstantial forms limned in a nacreous glow. One was an old man Potter didn't know, who simply gazed at Voldemort in mute accusation. The next approached Potter, and with a wrench of guilt he recognised Cedric. The revenant looked at him with the same frankness he had shown in life.

"Harry," he said, "there's no blame for you in my death. I ask you though, to take my body back, for my parents' sake?"

Potter nodded and Cedric stepped back, to be replaced by a woman. Potter's heart spasmed as he recognised his mother. She whispered to him,

"Harry, remember we love you. Be strong, your father is coming!"

Then his father was there, smiling,

"We can hold him, Harry, but only for a while. When we have him, lower your wand and go. I'm proud of you, son!"

Potter's throat was clogged with ashes, unable to articulate his heart's exigency as, with one last smile from his mother, his Dead moved to surround the silently screaming Voldemort.

Groaning, he lowered his wand, breaking the argent thread, but the white light still incarcerated Voldemort, the cynosural figures of the Dead still pressed on him. Turning, on bones that could bear anything now, Potter grabbed for Cedric's body and began to lumber towards the Portkey.

From The Long Sixth Year in the style of Raymond Chandler

It was raining in Knockturn Alley. A hard rain, hard enough to wash the slime off the street. I was leaning against the doorway of Borgin & Burkes, in my Invisibility Cloak, wishing I could have a cigarette, and listening.

I wasn't meant to be there, but I'd seen Draco Malfoy heading this way, and that made my gut churn. Malfoy was bad news, always had been. He was no tough guy, but he was a weasel, and even a weasel can be dangerous if he gets in the chicken coop. Borgin & Burkes wasn't a nice place, either. It was the place you went to buy stuff you shouldn't have. Presents for people you don't like, maybe. If it was cursed, and you had enough Galleons, you could buy it there. So what was Malfoy doing there?

The door didn't fit too well, and my hearing's pretty good, so I listened.

"No, I ain't taking it with me," Malfoy was saying. "But I bought it, and it stays right there in your back room, pal!"

The assistant had a voice you could grease squeaky hinges with.

"But suppose somebody else wants to buy it, sir?"

"You're not listening to me, buddy!" Malfoy snarled. "It's sold, and you tell 'em just that. And just in case you feel like mentioning names, here's one for you. Fenrir Greyback is a friend of my Pop, you understand what I'm saying? You don't want trouble, and neither do I, so let's be smart about this."

He'd finished, and was heading for the door. I got out of his way and let him get clear, then took the cloak off and went back towards Diagon Alley. I figured the assistant wasn't going to tell me much, I'd heard him squeak when Malfoy mentioned the Greyback character. He wouldn't talk to anyone if he was that scared.

I got back onto Diagon Alley and lit a smoke, then somebody shouted, "Hey, Harry!"

I almost went for my wand, but I knew the voice. It was my buddy, Ron Weasley, and he was coming up with two girls. One of them was a little brunette, another friend, Hermione Granger. She's no great looker, but she's got a mind so sharp it can cut diamonds. The other was Ron's little sister, Ginny. Only she wasn't so little any more, these days. Ginny's a redhead, a redhead to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained glass window. I had to watch myself with her; Ron's my best pal, but a guy looks out for his sister.

Ron slapped me on the shoulder, and I nearly flew into the gutter. The guy ain't much bigger than a Kodiak bear, and I think I once saw an ox that might have been stronger.

"What's cookin', pal?" he asked.

"Our goose, I figure," I said.