—CHAPTER 9—
Backup Plans
Immediately after the killing, Hermione had arranged for the DA members to be whisked back to Hogwarts before the Ministry began poking around the crime scene and questioning the students. Albus had anxiously spilled his worries about Jessica to the rest of the gang who automatically turned on to panic mode, however, things got worse. A week after Albus and the group returned from Buckinghamshire, the page disappeared again. And this time, it wasn’t Jessica who had it. Lockwood hadn’t been possessing her since the Buckinghamshire incident, allowing Albus and the others to notice how much Jessica had missed out on due to the possessing. She could barely remember what exams she’d taken, let alone people, places or information. It was terrifying. It was then that Albus decided they desperately needed a backup plan. Not believing entirely that Ciel had been completely put off by the Teranion issue, he made up his mind to ask if for some reason she might have copied down her own copy of the piece of paper. But before he did that, Albus realised that he and the others needed a way to get around Hogwarts without being recognised or seen. He didn’t want to ask Teddy as the twenty-one year old was now working more for the Order than Dumbledore’s Army so instead, Albus approached Alanna. She was out on the Quidditch pitch, throwing Quaffles to the Gryffindor chasers to practice with. ‘What do you want, Albus?’ she asked, not even turning. ‘If you’re here to deliver a message from James then...’
‘I’m not here from James,’ Albus interrupted. ‘I’m here because I need your help. James told me you were an animagus. Unregistered, of course.’
Alanna hesitated and then nodded. Albus folded his arms, leaning against the pole of one of the hoops. ‘I need you to teach me how. Me, Scorpius, Rose and Jessica.’
‘Why?’
‘Does it matter? It’s for the good of the world, if that’s what your asking. I just need to know.’
Alanna didn’t reply at first. Finally, she turned to face Albus. ‘It’s extremely difficult. A lot of hard work and it’s painful if you don’t get it right the first time.’
‘I don’t care,’ Albus said fiercely. ‘I need to know.’
Alanna flicked her hair over her shoulders. ‘Meet me in the place where nobody will find us at nine tomorrow night. Bring anyone who wants to learn.’
With that, she turned her back on Albus and returned to tossing Quaffles into the air.
‘You know,’ Albus said before leaving, ‘you really should give my brother a chance. He might be a bit of a git but he’s a good guy.’
Alanna didn’t move a muscle.
*
‘What did you want to talk to me about?’ Jessica asked tiredly, running her fingers through her chocolate brown hair as she skimmed through pages of Hogwarts, A History. Albus grimaced. Rose had been extremely against this. She’d screamed for nearly half an hour, trying to emphasise how dangerous this was and how foolish Albus was being. Well...it was lucky nobody really listened to Rose’s advice. Albus reached over and shut the book, whisking it away from under Jessica’s nose.
‘Hey!’ she cried in protest.
‘Shh!’ a student librarian hissed. Jessica looked away, glaring at Albus. ‘What is it?’
‘You want to know why you can’t remember much of the last few months?’ Albus demanded. Jessica face changed and she nodded slowly. Albus sighed and looked around. ‘Not here. There’s a chance that we’ll be overheard.’
Jessica nodded, grabbing his arm and pulling him out of the library, dragging him down the hall until she reached the Room of Requirement. ‘I need the place where nobody will find us,’ she said quietly. A strong, stone door appeared, opening with a gentle creak. Jessica gestured to Albus and the two hurried in, the door disappearing after them. Jessica whirled round to face Albus. ‘Well?’ she asked. Albus frowned. ‘When I first saw you with Ro, were we in the library, the Great Hall or the Quidditch Pitch?’
‘None of them,’ Jessica said, her face plastered with confusion. ‘We were in the Gryffindor Common room. I stunned you.’
Albus exhaled, relieved. ‘Good, so it is you.’
‘What in the name of hell is that supposed to mean?’ Jessica asked, narrowing her eyes in confusion. Albus chewed anxiously on his bottom lip. ‘Lockwood has...kind of been, well...possessing you...’
‘What?’ Jessica shrieked, all colour draining out of her face until she looked scarily like Voldemort. ‘How...how do you know?’
‘Well, we figured it out,’ Albus said, running his fingers through his hair. ‘But I sort of know from stories. My mum. She got possessed by Voldemort when she was eleven. There were these huge, long gaps were she couldn’t remember anything. Like where she was, what she was doing, why she was doing it...’
‘Yeah, that’s exactly it!’ Jessica said, tears running down her face. ‘Oh God. He’s going to make me kill you.’
‘No, no he’s not,’ Albus said quickly, taking Jessica by her shoulders and shaking her gently. ‘He thinks we have no chance anymore because he’s got someone to steal the paper that holds the fundamentals of the curse but I have a feeling someone else has a copy. I’m not going to tell you who because he can feed on your knowledge.’
The last sentence just made Jessica paler. Albus cursed himself angrily. ‘Look, I’m going to make sure nothing happens to you. That’s why I’ve asked Alanna to teach us how to become animaguses. We need a way to get around school without being caught in our own forms and with Teddy edging closer and closer towards the Order, we can’t exactly rely on him anymore. Tonight we’re meeting Alanna in the Room of Requirement at nine and Rose, Scorpio and Dimitri are coming.’
‘Why not Avery...oh, right.’
Albus nodded. ‘Are you okay?’
Jessica sighed and then smiled slightly. ‘I guess. As long as you can promise that nothing will happen to me.’
‘I swear,’ Albus said sincerely.
*
Ciel was next on the list. Albus was certain that she had made a copy. Smart-arses like her and Rose never let anything go without a fight. Albus found Ciel in the Great Hall, talking with her friends.
‘Oi,’ he called. ‘Evermore.’
Ciel looked up and her eyes widened when she saw Albus. ‘Uh..I have to go,’ she muttered to her friends.
‘Why? ‘S Potter your boyfriend?’ one of the girls asked with a giggle. Ciel rolled her eyes with an annoyed scowl and hurried over to Albus. ‘What do you want Potter?’
‘You have a copy of the page,’ Albus accused. ‘I need it.’
Ciel swallowed. ‘I...how did you know?’
Albus grinned. ‘I didn’t. You just confirmed it.’
Ciel cussed at her own stupidity and sighed. ‘Okay. But just to confirm, it really is an ancient language. I asked some of the ghosts of the castle...they couldn’t even translate a word.’
Albus raised his eyebrows, impressed that she had thought of the ghosts as an option but was smug when he heard the idea had failed. ‘Just get the piece of paper to me and directly to me.’ He was about to leave when Ciel grabbed his arm. ‘Albus,’ she said quietly, her eyes clouded with fear. ‘I was reading over it in bed. And I recognised a few words that have managed to weave their way into modern languages. Words like curse and death.’ The grey eyes met the green and Ciel swallowed. ‘What exactly is on that piece of paper?’
Albus didn’t answer. Instead, he dug his hand into his bag and handed Ciel a copy of DA meeting times. ‘Come to the next meeting and find out,’ he said, turning his back on her and hurrying out the door.
*
Albus had spent most of his time reassuring Jessica. The two spent hours pouring over books in the Room of Requirement to try and find some way to break the curse. If it hadn’t been a life or death type situation, Albus would’ve bragged to Scorpius and Dimitri about the study dates he’d been having with Jessica. Unfortunately, things were too serious to joke about. It had been nearly a month since the man had been killed in Walters Ash and Albus slowly divulged smaller bits of information to Jessica about what had been going on, seeing as Lockwood hadn’t been possessing her. Meanwhile, the gang had all been having animagus lessons with Alanna who was pleasantly surprised at how well they picked everything up. So far, they could all turn into their respective animals with ease. Rose, a cat, Dimitri, an owl, Scorpius, a German Shepard and Jessica and Albus had both agreed on being wolves but strayed closer towards both being a Husky so that they’d be able to be seen in public. One day as the weeks neared the end of February, while Jessica and Albus were ‘studying’, Jessica spoke up. ‘Remember how when your father always got possessed in a way by Voldemort, they always thought it was because of his scar but it was actually the little piece of Voldemort inside of him?’
‘Yeah, Dad went on about it to freak me out when I was a kid,’ Albus said with a scowl. Jessica laughed but then her face returned to seriousness. ‘Hey...what if Lockwood left a piece of himself in me? Couldn’t you draw knowledge or something from that one piece and perhaps find a translation to Teranion?’
Albus’s jaw dropped. ‘Sheer brilliance,’ he muttered to himself before grabbing The Half-Blood Prince’s potions book from his bag.
‘Is that Snape’s?’ Jessica asked, looking slightly put-off. Albus ignored her unease and flicked through the pages until he found a page that was full of spells about taking things from other people. Albus grimaced and then scanned the page quickly. ‘I’m hoping to find some kind of spell that would let me take the knowledge from you without you actually knowing I’d done it. So I’d take the knowledge when you least expecting it so just...don’t be on the alert. Lockwood can only know about things that you know have happened so if you don’t know, Lockwood won’t know. I could even just do it now and take you memory away.’
‘That would be so much simpler,’ Jessica said with a smirk. Albus stuck his tongue out, grudgingly turning the page to search for the appropriate spell.
Jessica licked her lips thoughtfully. ‘The only way I can think of to break the curse is...’
‘Yes?’ Albus said hopefully.
‘Well,’ Jessica said, swallowing as her face paled slightly. ‘The bit of Lockwood in me. It would die if I died. So maybe, for the curse to break I have to...’
‘No!’ Albus said, louder than he’d intended. He shook his head firmly. ‘No,’ he said again, clenching his fists. ‘We’ll find another way. I...I’m not going to let you die.’
Jessica’s face softened and she smiled. ‘Keep looking then,’ she said, returning back to her book.
It took hours but eventually, the duo found the spell they were looking for. It worked slightly like a computer...Albus was given a transparent screen that held a map to where Jessica’s knowledge was held in her brain. As he scoured through the information (which was certainly vast), Jessica spoke up. ‘Do you really think there’s a harmless way to break the curse?’ she asked shakily.
‘I dunno...’ Albus said, peering at the map. ‘Jess, you really need to stop taking in so much information...’
‘Ouch!’
‘What?’
‘You poked me! Or, your wand did, whatever! Something poked the inside of my head!’
Albus frowned. ‘So much for you not knowing...I think I’ve found Lockwood’s knowledge. Hold still, I’m going to try and copy it onto my wand.’
There was a short silence in the room and finally, Albus took the tip of his wand off Jessica’s head, grinning. ‘Hang on...Reducto Oblivato!’
A large flash of blue light clouded Albus’s vision temporarily. He turned away, stuffing the potions book into his bag, along with any other evidence of what they’d been working on about gathering Lockwood’s knowledge. Jessica opened her eyes and blinked. ‘Wow, is it dark already? The others must be looking for us, come on, Al, we need to go!’
Albus nodded. Whew, she hadn’t remembered a thing. He swung his bag over his shoulder, allowing Jessica to drag him out of the Room of Requirement. However, inside, he suddenly realised what Jessica had said earlier could be correct. One of the only ways for the Lockwood inside of Jessica to die was if she died too. And now, they had the translation. Albus knew that this evening he would translate the page as long as Ciel upheld her promise but now...the answer was not eagerly anticipated. It was dreaded. From what Albus remembered of his father’s stories, Voldemort had to be the one to kill Harry otherwise the whole thing would never work. What if Lockwood had to kill Jessica to break the curse? Then they were finished because one thing was for sure. If Lockwood was the key to breaking the curse, killing Jessica was something he was never going to agree to.