- Text Size +
Amplificare


James had come out from under the blankets only long enough to go to classes, but that entire week he skipped dinner and Peter made an effort to bring back food wrapped up in paper boxes that Remus conjured. The boxes sat stacked on James’s nightstand, exactly where Pete had left them, untouched, until Remus had taken the initiative to throw them away because the smell of food was starting to turn his stomach again as the moon cycle progressed. On the night of the Quidditch team practice, James had told Frank Longbottom to act as captain, saying he wasn’t feeling well enough to play, and he had skipped Herbology altogether - the class where he would’ve seen Maryrose, as she was his Herbology partner.

It was Friday and Lily Evans was walking with the other three Marauders back across the grounds to the castle. “He can’t just not come to Herbology anymore, his grades will suffer terribly,” she said, frowning.

“I told him as much,” Remus said sadly, “But he doesn’t care.”

Sirius said glumly, “I know how it feels… I mean, Prongs is feeling it different than I did… do…” he stared hard at his shoes.

Remus put his arm ‘round Sirius’s shoulders.

Lily said, “There has to be a way to cheer him up.”

“I tried planning a prank with him, but he doesn’t want to hear about it or anything,” Sirius said. “But I tried.”

“And I used a secret passage to Honeydukes and got him his favorite candy and he didn’t eat it!” Peter said, “Barely even looked at it.”

Remus said, “I’ve done his homework for him all week so he won’t be too far behind. Made sure I got a couple answers wrong on both my own copy and his so that nobody would suspect…”

Lily sighed. There had to be something - something more - something they could do to help James Potter...




Maryrose Jenkins’s face smiled up from the pages of the Daily Prophet, a news story about what happened featured as one of the stories on the front page of the paper. The Dark Lord stared at the paper, his fingers wrapped tight about the pages. He glowered at the words that spanned the column…

HOGWARTS STUDENT KILLED AFTER RESCUE OF LUCY MINCHUM
15-year old Hogwarts student, Maryrose Jenkins of Hufflepuff, was killed by He Who Must Not Be Named for her involvement in the rescue of Lucy Minchum, the granddaughter of the Minister for Magic, earlier this month. Jenkins was assisted by another student, 15-year old James Potter of Gryffindor, who returned the young girl to the Ministry and is being heralded additionally for assisting in returning the body of Maryrose Jenkins to her family after --- (continued on page B14)


The Dark Lord dropped the pages onto the table before him, making the tea cup clatter against the saucer. His eyes moved over Walburga Black, Lucius Malfoy, Rudolphus Lestrange, Corban Yaxley, and Evan Rosier, who were spattered about the table among other Death Eaters. “I can’t help but question why it is that we are in this uncomfortable position of looking like absolute fools… Why we have lost our hold over the Ministry?” He glared at them each in turn once again, his eyes lingering on Evan Rosier, whose back was stiff and eyes unfocused, staring at a knot in the wood of the table, his father’s jaw grit tightly in disapproval beside him. The Dark Lord stood up and ran his hand across the table as he walked around his chair, his long fingers gliding over the polished wood. He stepped around to the back of the chair, wrapping his fingers ‘round the backrest of the seat of Evan Rosier.

“I want James Potter - and any other who helped the boy in this endeavor - dead.” The Dark Lord’s voice was cold and hard. He looked around the room slowly, his mouth a solid line. “I will also be in need of an… assistant… to help me in securing the inferius army.” His eyes roved over the table, “I’ll need a Secret Keeper… Who shall help the Dark Lord in this most important matter? Great honor shall await the one that Dark Lord chooses.”

“Choose me, my Lord,” breathed Bellatrix Lestrange, leaning against the table to look around Rudolphus’s form, her hands splaying across the table as she laid her head down, her thick hair streaming over her shoulders as she stared up at him with her heavily lidded eyes. “I will not let you down, my Lord, I will serve you well… Choose me, my Lord…”

“No, Bellatrix,” he mused, “Not for this.” He looked to Walburga, whose eyes followed Bellatrix as she writhed against the tabletop with her plea… Walburga felt his stare and looked up, meeting his gaze and within her, her blood chilled. “I shall give the Black family one… last… chance… to redeem itself.” He walked closer toward the end of the table, where Walburga sat. “Summon your son to me, Walburga,” the Dark Lord commanded, “Summon Regulus Black to me.”

Walburga drew a deep breath and closed her eyes. “Kreacher,” she said calmly.

Crack!

And there was Kreacher on the table before her. “Kreacher is here to serve his Mistress…” he croaked as he bowed low to the table, his ears flat to his back, fingers clasped before him.

“Go to Hogwarts, Kreacher, and fetch my son, your Master, Regulus. The Dark Lord has need of him.” Walburga’s voice was steady, though her nerves shook within her. “Quickly.”

“Yes Mistress, Kreacher is going to fetch his Master for this great honor. Kreacher will fetch him quickly, Mistress!” And with another crack, the house elf was gone.




He was walking back from Care of Magical Creatures class when Kreacher appeared before him on the grounds. Regulus stopped, ankle-deep in snow, blinking through the bright sunlight reflecting off the ice crystals to see Kreacher, whose teeth chattered as he shuffled closer, holding out his hands for Regulus’s, “Kreacher has been commanded by his Mistress to bring Master Regulus to see the Dark Lord.”

“What?” Regulus blinked in surprise. He looked around the grounds - luckily there hadn’t been anybody walking near enough to him to overhear what Kreacher had said. He hastened to take the arm of the House Elf and, with a quick glance around, he dashed through thick snow, knee deep, and ducked against the wall of the castle, where the sunflowers grew during the spring and summer, where he’d spoken to Maryrose for the first time ever, and he bent low to look into Kreacher’s great bulbous eyes. “Kreacher, what’s going on?”

“Kreacher isn’t knowing,” he said, “But Mistress has asked Kreacher to fetch Master Regulus to fulfill the need of the Dark Lord.”

Regulus’s heart raced. The Dark Lord must know, he thought. That’s the only explanation. Why else would the Dark Lord desire him, Regulus, there? There couldn’t possibly be any other explanation.

He shivered and looked up at the castle. High above the wall where he stood loomed the turrets and towers and he could see Gryffindor tower, high in the sky above, and he wished fiercely that Sirius was there to give him advice -- What should he do?

What could he do?

He wanted to go and see Sirius, but he didn’t have time. If he did not hasten to go along with Kreacher, the Dark Lord would be angered by the delay. Even more angered than he probably already was.

He took a deep breath, boxing up his mind, packing away his thoughts, his memories… his other hand went to his medallion, fingers wrapping around the gold necklace, drawing strength. Help me out, Maryrose, he thought as he squeezed his finger tight. He opened his eyes, nodding, and looked upon the house elf. “Alright, Kreacher.” He held out his hand. “Let’s go.”




Regulus Black was not in Patronus class that day.

Sirius wondered where he was. He hadn’t seen Regulus since he’d left the hospital wing after the incident in the cave… not that it was unusual for the brothers not to see one another, but he had sort of supposed that… maybe… after everything, the talk in the tunnel and all… perhaps they would now. Perhaps something had changed. But, Sirius supposed, perhaps not, too.

Sirius had had to physically drag James to the class, and even after getting him there, James refused to participate, sitting on the desks along the wall, picking absently at his fingernails as he stared at his lap, listening as everyone shouted the incantation, trying and trying to cast their patroni. It was that day that Sirius and Peter each cast their patroni for the first time.

Peter’s patronus was a chameleon with long twisting tail and a long, darting tongue, which he was sort of afraid of and had jumped back from when he’d first managed to produce it. He didn’t like lizards.

Sirius Black had a werewolf - identical to Remus Lupin’s and nobody was surprised because they’d already decided Sirius’s would match Remus’s long before Remus had cast the werewolf and with all the rumors flying about, most of the students weren’t about to be surprised by anything pertaining to Dark Magic coming from the wand of Sirius Black…

The moment the wolf had burst from his wand, Sirius turned ‘round to James. “LOOK!” he cried, and he waved his wand for the shimmering werewolf to wind its way about to where James sat, excitement all over his face as the werewolf ran the loop and returned to him, “Bleeding hell, James I’ve done it. I’m not completely hopeless!”

James forced a smile, briefly, and said, “Yeah, there ya are, Sirius… good one.”

Sirius turned to look at Remus, who gave him the adoration and praise he’d been seeking, hugging him excitedly, “And look, we match,” he added, kissing Sirius’s cheek as the patronus disappeared and the Prewett brothers repeated their declarations that everyone had done brilliantly.

“Keep practicing, you lot, you’ll all get it! You’ll see! Patience and hard work!” Fabian said.

Gideon caught James ‘round the elbow before he could leave, “A word with you, Potter?” he requested and James hung back as everyone else left, including the Marauders and Lily, all of whom went with an air of reluctance and had to be shooed out the door by Fabian Prewett.

The moment the DADA classroom door closed, Remus rushed for the door and pressed his ear against it, trying to hear through. He was immediately followed by Peter and Sirius. Lily stood across the hall, rolling her eyes, “Honestly! Listening in through the door!”

“Like you aren’t curious what they want, Evans,” said Sirius without moving his ear from the door.

“Shhh,” hissed Remus, batting at Sirius to shut it so he could hear.

With an eyeroll - “Amplificare,” announced Lily, aiming her wand at the door.

Suddenly, they could hear everything from the room quite easily.

Remus looked from the door to Lily’s wand, impressed, “Where’d’ya learn that at?” he asked.

Lily shrugged, “A friend.”

“Snape,” said Sirius knowingly.

“Blimey, that’s a good one,” Remus said.

Sirius and Peter gave him a look.

“What? You gotta give Snape credit where it’s due,” Remus said with a shrug, and the three Marauders, plus Lily, gathered about the door in interest as the voices of the Prewetts and James Potter echoed into the hallway…

“Potter,” said Fabian, “How are you doing? Are you feeling any better?”

James thought for a moment. It seemed a rather idiotic thing to ask - if he was feeling any better. Of course he wasn’t. Maryrose was still dead, wasn’t she? There was nothing he could do about it, was there? Nothing to redeem what he’d done. But he didn’t particularly have words to wrap up exactly what he was feeling, nothing that really succinctly described the wobbly feeling in his heart. He looked Fabian in the eye and he shrugged, “I s’pose I’m doing what I can, as far as feeling better.”

Gideon glanced at his brother, then back to James. “Look, we’re… we’re thinking that perhaps you could help us out with something.”

James looked to Gideon, his face straight, emotionless.

“As you know, it’s suspected the Dark Lord still has hold of Harold Minchum -- the real Harold Minchum,” Gideon continued on.

“And though we’re not aurors ourselves, we’ve, of course, heard things from our friends who are,” Fabian added. “There’s reasons to believe Minchum is still alive.”

GIdeon nodded, “And the Ministry isn’t doing much to seek him. Bartemius Crouch is sitting as temporary Minister, he’s been sent one of Minchum’s fingers with the threat of further damages to be made to our Minister if the demands of the Dark Lord aren’t made.”

“He wants a registry of muggle-borns,” Fabian explained.

“Basically a list of targets in the hands of a Death Eater,” Gideon added.

“And so Giddy and I, we were thinking, when - when we heard… you know, about this place you found the body of the Jenkins girl… we thought that perhaps this cave is where the Dark Lord keeps his prisoners.”

“Perhaps this cave is where we’d find Harold Minchum.”

Fabian nodded, “And we thought that perhaps you might be able to show us where the cave is.”

James stiffened.

“Could you do that, Potter?” Gideon asked, his voice gently pleading, “Could you take us to this cave?”

The last thing in all of the world that James Potter ever, ever wanted to do in his entire life was to return to that cave. He could not bare the thought of it. It seared his very soul to think of ever seeing it again. Especially so soon after what happened. He felt his throat lump up and he balled his fists, which were sweating with the very concept of it.

“It could be you who saves the Minister for Magic,” Gideon prodded.

James’s voice shook as he asked, “How soon?”

Gideon looked to Fabian. “Well,” Fabian said, “We, uh, we don’t have any other classes today.”

James closed his eyes. And he nodded. “Yeah… yeah. Alright. Sure. Let’s… let’s just go, then.”

When they stepped into the hall, it was to see Sirius, Remus, Peter, and Lily all scatter a bit, like bugs uncovered beneath a rock, attempting to act as though they’d not been listening. Lily was the worst at it of them (which was really saying something, seeing as Sirius and Remus literally had run into one another, slamming their chests against each other in their hustle) - she didn’t even try to scuttle away. Instead, she hurried forward and her eyes met James’s, all watery with worry, as she took his hand. “James,” she said, “You haven’t got to do this. If it’s too soon, you tell them that.”

Gideon and Fabian paused, looking between her and James, then back to the Defense door, as though making sure it didn’t have any holes (how had she heard their discussion?).

James’s voice was numb, “It’ll always be too soon. It’s no sooner now than it would be later.” He shrugged.

“But James --” Lily looked at Gideon and Fabian, then lowered her voice, “This isn’t fair, what they’re asking of you. It’s too much. You’re just a kid. We’re all just kids, James. We’re not aurors. We’re not even adults. They shouldn’t be involving you. They can’t without your consent. And if it’s too much - if you’re not ready - you tell them no. You tell them no and you walk away. You’ve already done so much. You need to protect yourself, too.”

“It’s alright, Evans.” He nodded slowly, his eyes wandering away from hers, looking off to one side. “If I can help, I’m going to help. Anything to set things right, to make her death less pointless… to make all the deaths that old wanker’s caused less pointless.” His eyes moved back to hers and he said, “It’s not just for Gideon and Fabian I’m going. It’s not just for Maryrose. I mean, sure, it is for her, but it’s also for Derek and Alice Bell. For Alex Tinnamin. For your Dad. For Andy Woodhouse’s eyes. For all the hundreds of people who have suffered and died because of Voldemort. I’m going for them. I’m helping for them. Because defeating him is bigger than me. Defeating Voldemort is more important than me.”

“You’re right, Potter,” she said, swallowing back the great lump that had risen up in her throat.