Zalkin

Chapter 2

James climbed into his bed very tired and very full from the enormous dinner at the Sorting Ceremony. In the past few months while he had been away from Hogwarts, he had certainly missed the food. It was always his theory that you realized how good things truly were when you weren’t able to take them for granted, and his stomach ache was proof of just how correct he was.

Now that the Sorting was completed, James felt much more comfortable with how things would proceed. Initially, when he had talked to Arabella, he was more concerned about his absence from Hogwarts than his ability to play the part of James, but it now seemed that both things were going well. He wondered how Arabella was doing in the Gryffindor house.

He thought back to his first conversation with her about the problems with the wards at Hogwarts. He knew that if the red ward were to fall it would be disastrous to the school, but even more importantly to the students. Only Arabella had been privy to all the information that he had been able to gather about Voldemort’s plan for Draco and Harry, which unfortunately was missing some very crucial parts. She had been taking care of Harry so long while he was growing up with the Dursleys that she didn’t even hesitate when Dumbledore revealed his plan.

Both of them would become younger and go to Hogwarts so they could watch over Harry and Draco. Albus would become James and Arabella would become Diane. They would board the Hogwarts Express from different locations so as not to arouse suspicion about their knowing each other. Albus would be from Salem and be interested in the Dark Arts, Arabella would be from Devon and would be studious so she could quickly befriend Hermione. She had arranged to come in as a first year student, however, she had taken some exams so that she could sit in on some more advanced classes, too. The only time their plan was revealed was during the Sorting and much to his relief, that went easily for both of them.

The only concern now was for how long the red ward would continue to hold. The ancient magic used by the Founders had been holding strong since Hogwarts was founded, but, unfortunately, somehow this ward had begun to weaken. When Dumbledore had initially found the weakness, he researched in every book he was able to find, but he was unable to find a way to strengthen the ward or to find the cause of its weakness. Something or someone on the grounds was causing it to weaken and if it were to fall, it would allow anyone with knowledge of the forest to enter the grounds unnoticed. Now, he just needed to locate the source of the problem and find a way to eliminate it before the ward weakened to a point where they would have to move the students to another location.

* * * * *

James returned to the dungeon after breakfast for his potions class. As he walked down the corridor, he thought back to a time when he took his first potions class as a student. He was lost in his memories when he heard a voice behind him.

"So suddenly you’ve decided not to talk to me now that there are other Slytherins around?" Draco said with his patented drawl in his voice.

"That isn’t at all the case, I just didn’t hear you calling me. I was trying to look for the potions class, I don’t know my way around the dungeons yet."

"Of course," Draco said. "You can walk in with me. When Professor Snape sees that you are with me, you’ll become one of his prize pupils. Being my friend can have many benefits, James."

As they reached the door, Draco cut off his conversation about how lucky James was that he had decided to take him under his wing. He said to James, "We have this class with Gryffindors. Make sure to sit with the Slytherin students and not them. I’m sure you will see when we go in why we don’t associate with their kind."

James entered the room and saw that the Gryffindor students sat to the left of the room and the Slytherins sat to the right. No one sat even close to the middle, perhaps for fear that they would be seen as associating with the enemy. Severus Snape stood in the front of the room by a huge cauldron. He looked at James with a puzzled look and started walking toward he and Draco.

"Who might you be?" He asked James in a very stern voice.

"I’m James Zalkin. I’m the student from..."

Draco cut him off in mid sentence. "He’s come from the United States. His father seems to think, as mine did, that this is the place one comes to learn if you want to be a great wizard. I’ve been showing him around and I’m very impressed with what he’s had to say."

As he finished talking, Draco looked at Harry and Ron who were snickering on the other side of the room. He gave them what seemed to be his most threatening look. They paused, looked at each other, looked back at him and smiled as though they had some private joke that he wasn’t aware of.

James caught Diane’s eye from across the room. It appeared that she had guessed about her alter ego correctly. She and Hermione were sitting together looking at the newest copy of Witch Weekly. They were giggling and pointing at something in the magazine. Well, she was certainly convincing as a teenage girl. He thought that seemed much more challenging than being a boy, but, then again, he really didn’t have much experience at being a girl.

"Are you partially deaf or something?" Draco was saying to James when he finally heard him. "You would think that you didn’t know your own name. We are going to sit in the front. Do you want to come with us?"

James nodded, followed Draco to the front of the room, and put down his potions book on his desk. He noticed that the Gryffindors were all clustered toward the back of the room and Snape was making no attempt to move them closer to the front. It did seem as though he was teaching this class only for the benefit of the Slytherins.

As the class began, James realized how much he had missed being a student. Even though what they were studying was very elementary to him, it was a nice change to be listening rather than teaching. Maybe after this was all over, he would take a correspondence course by owl. It was certainly never too late to learn something new.

* * * * *

James sat on a bench and looked out over the grounds. It really was very peaceful and beautiful. In the back of his mind he couldn’t help imagining what could happen if the wards started to fail. If Voldemort and his followers could gain access to the school, there would be little he could do to protect the students. He was all too aware of how easily dark witches and wizards used the forbidden curses.

He imagined the chaos as Voldemort and his followers entered the grounds. Some students would be running to join their family and friends at Voldemort’s side, but most would be fleeing. Teachers would be defending the students, trying to hold off the spells and curses long enough to get the students off the grounds. Professor McGonogall could lift the spell to prevent using the Port Keys to get in and out of Hogwarts. The emergency plan called for the students to be moved to a secret place in Ireland. The aurors that were contacted would be sent to Port Keys so that they could come there to help the teachers protect the students from whatever threat they had come under.

* * * * *

When he was sure that no one was around him, James pulled out his ward watcher and looked at the four colored circles. Each circle represented a ward that was put in place by one of the founders: red for Gryffindor, yellow for Hufflepuff, blue for Ravenclaw, and green for Slytherin. Three of the circles were brightly colored, but one, the red indicator was getting very dim.

It was certainly plausible that there would be much less time to solve this mystery than he would have thought. He would have to leave a message for Diane so they could meet and discuss how grave the situation was becoming. He was glad now that they had the foresight to make arrangements for the way that they would get messages to each other as he pulled out a piece of parchment and a quill to write.

* * * * *

Diane walked quickly across the grounds toward the forest. Her invisibility cloak would prevent anyone from seeing her and she walked as cautiously as possible to avoid stepping on anything that would make noise and give away her location.

As she approached the Whomping Willow, she looked at the beautiful old tree and thought that Dumbledore must have exaggerated about how deadly the tree could be. It certainly looked beautiful and peaceful to her, but as she approached with a long stick out in front of her, the tree started to whip its branches wildly about. She quickly found the knot and pressed it with the stick and watched as the tree immediately returned to its quiet state.

"Lumos," she said as she pointed her wand down the tunnel. They had arranged to meet about 10 meters down the tunnel in order to avoid their voices being heard by someone who happened to walk by. As she started down the tunnel she saw James sitting on a chair looking at something that appeared to be a large pocket watch.

"Albus," she said as she approached him "it is so good to see you. Well, I guess I should say it is good to see James, but nice to be with you."

He laughed softly. "You know, I forget sometimes how different I would seem to someone who knows who I truly am. It is most certainly wonderful to see you too."

"What are you holding there? It looks like a muggle watch. Am I later than you expected?"

"No, you are not late. This is an ancient guide that has been passed down among the Headmasters of Hogwarts since its founding. I was not aware that it existed until it was given to me on the day that I became Headmaster. Each of these circles represents a ward that was put in place by a founder. Until recently, all these circles were equally bright. Now I fear we are seeing the red circle at the last of its strength."

Arabella looked at the circles on the guide and shook her head as she saw how dim the Gryffindor ward’s circle was becoming. Previously she had not seen any indication that the problems that Dumbledore spoke to her of were actually happening. Even though she was completely confident in what he was saying, seeing this gave her a new sense of urgency about their task.

"Have you learned anything new about what could be causing this?"

"Unfortunately not. I am afraid that there are so many things that could be happening that we may never know. How are things going in Gryffindor?"

"Very well." She said with a smile. "It is nice to be young and agile again. I’ve been trying to do some more research in the library while I am there with Hermione. I told her that I am doing some research about the founding of the school as a project for my research as an accelerated student. She, of course, has absolutely no problem spending as much time as I need in the library with me."

They sat silently in the tunnel for a few minutes, each of them thinking of what they should say. Dumbledore spoke first.

"You know that we don’t have much time until we will be forced to reveal ourselves and begin the evacuation process. I’m guessing at this rate it is only a matter of days until we will have to make that decision."

"I understand." Arabella said as she looked again at the dimming circle on the guide that Dumbledore was holding. "I’m not giving up hope that we will be able to find the source of this problem. Somehow it will work out, it is a mystery but these things always seem to work out."