Albus Potter and the Cursed Legacy | Scorbus

16. Research and Revising

A blank piece of parchment stared back at Albus as he twiddled his quill between his fingers, the fluff of the feather tickling his skin. Earlier in the day, his mind had been racing with ideas; he'd pictured himself solving the murders, his face plastered on the front page of The Daily Prophet in celebration of his amazing feat.

'ALBUS POTTER CRACKS THE CASE' The headline would read. Below, a photo would picture him shaking hands with the Minister (which was arguably not too exciting seeing how it was his aunt). Witches and wizards would congratulate him on the street. His classmates would realise he wasn't such a squib after all. He couldn't wait to rub it in Matthias' smug face.

But Albus never considered how he'd actually get to that point. Now that he'd sat down to work, his mind was as blank as the paper before him.

The library was quiet, as always--Madame Pince made sure of it. A few students bunkered down at the tables to study on their lunch breaks or scramble to complete assignments that were due next lesson. Towering walls of books loomed over them, the sunlight from the grand windows catching the flecks on dust in the air. The old floorboards creaked as students shuffled around, whispering to their friends or picking out books.

Albus faced Scorpius at a table tucked in the back corner of the library between two bookshelves of magical cookbooks--a section where few students ever looked. Scorpius rested his chin on his palms, elbows against the table as he watched Albus, awaiting further instructions.

"Soooo..." Scorpius drew out the 'o', "Where do we begin?"

"Umm," Albus scratched the back of his neck, glancing down at the empty page. He didn't want to admit that he had no idea. It was hard enough to convince his friends to get on board, now he didn't want them to realise he had no idea where to steer the ship.

A slam rattled the table, causing Albus to jump and almost knock his pot of ink over. He looked up to see Rose, leaning against a thick leather-bound book that she'd dropped at the end of their table.

"What's that?" Albus asked, his eyes widening at the book. Loose leaves of yellowing parchment stuck out of the sides, the binding warn and close to tearing. Thick as a brick, it took up almost the entire width of the table with wide square pages. From the side, the pages appeared to be in a gradient, from newer off-white pieces of paper to old browning parchment at the very bottom, as if it had been added on to over many years.

"It's a book," Rose said, obviously. "You do know what the library is for, don't you?"

Albus rolled his eyes, "I'm not that thick."

"With the way you've been staring at that blank parchment, I wasn't too sure," Rose quipped, causing Scorpius to let out a small snicker

"Well, what book is it?" Albus asked, ignoring her comment.

Rose opened up the cover, trying to be as gentle as possible with the fragile pages, "Its a record of all the Hogwarts professors and faculty."

"All of them?" Scorpius' interest piqued, glancing over at the handwritten pages.

"This is just one volume. There's even more dating back centuries that we're not even allowed to touch!"

"Wow," Scorpius' wide eyes glittered in amazement at the amount of history in front of him. He ran his fingers delicately over the spine, where the leather was dry and cracking, the pages barely hanging on.

"So what's it for, then?" Albus asked, just seeing a dusty old record book with sprawled cursive writing.

Rose exchange a look with Scorpius, "Honestly, what would he do if we didn't decide to help him?" She said with a disappointed shake of her head.