The Enemy Within

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The Enemy Within

At first I didn't notice that Terry wasn't at our usual study spot in the library. He wasn't watching the Quidditch practice on Saturday either, but I assumed he must be in the library. After lunch, when I walked right past the Ravenclaw table, he was so busy with Anthony Goldstein that he didn't even see me. When I finished my piano practice, I heard laughter from Music Room Three. Terry was sitting there – although he didn't play anything – with Colin Creevey and Katie Bell. I waved, assuming they would ask me to join them.

But they didn't. Terry smiled just enough to indicate that he had seen me, then turned back to ask Katie a question. I stopped stock-still for a moment before I had the sense to hurl myself down the corridor towards the stairs.

Terry was avoiding me!

What was this about? Terry had told me only this term that he couldn't tell Katie Bell from Alicia Spinnet and had asked me which class Colin Creevey was in, so I knew they weren't close friends. What were they talking about that I couldn't share? I told myself that I would ask Terry about it, but it's easy to miss people in a place the size of Hogwarts, especially people who have suddenly decided to avoid their usual haunts.

On Monday morning, Terry marched into History of Magic with his Ravenclaw friends, waved at me casually and sat down next to Michael Corner. Despite the friendly wave, something suddenly seemed very wrong.

As soon as the bell rang for break, I swept up my parchments and raced to Terry's desk. But Terry already had his back to me. He moved towards the door, still chatting to Michael and Anthony.

I stared at their retreating backs, not hearing whatever Megan was saying to me. Terry had walked out. That was what people did after History of Magic, of course – and as quickly as they could. But Terry's way of walking out was now horribly different. Not like an enemy, or even like a stranger, but simply as if we had never been friends.

Were we breaking up? Could we break up when we had never exactly been going out together anyway? But we had certainly been friends. And the dark certainty steadily grew in my mind that we were no longer friends.

"He can't mean it," said Megan. "Terry did really like you, Sally-Anne. You didn't quarrel, isn't it?"

"No-o."

"And he hasn't found someone else, isn't it?"

"We probably wouldn't know if 'e 'ad," Sophie pointed out.

"It doesn't feel like a finding-someone-else," I said. "It feels like a quarrel. Except that... we didn't quarrel."

"Not about anything?" asked Megan.

I felt myself blushing. "The only thing... It seems so odd... He did want me to join some kind of homework club, and I said I didn't have time. But that can't be the reason... can it...?"

"Yer disagreed about an 'omework club? No, definitely not, that inn't it," said Sophie.

"He ought to have had better sense," said Megan. "Everyone knows that Sally-Anne wouldn't go joining any club once Umbridge had passed her idiotic decree against it."

I tried to pull my eyes away from Terry setting up Michael Corner's cauldron while Anthony Goldstein poured newts' eyes into Terry's scales. I had known before the Potions lesson began that Terry would not choose to work with me today. It was nearly a week since we had talked about that stupid homework club, and we hadn't talked since. I almost wanted to apologise, but what on earth had I done wrong?

"Hello, Sally-Anne!" said Stephen. "Are you not speaking to friends either?"

"What?" I scanned the dungeon, hoping Stephen didn't know about Terry and me. Hannah was working with Ernie and Justin, which was quite usual, and Wayne had moved into the space between Megan and Sophie. Susan was chattering away with Padma Patil, which was not at all usual. Since when had Susan been friends with Padma – or chattery with anyone? And why wasn't Padma with Morag MacDougal?

Morag was behind me, testing Stephen's scalpel. "Come and work with us," she said to me. "We'd best try to look as if nothing's wrong."

"Morag, what's going on around here?"

She passed me a pile of fungi and a knife. "We're brewing Doxycide."

"That's not what Sally-Anne meant!" burst out Stephen. "She's wanting to know why some folks are behaving so oddly." He took no notice of Morag's reproving frown although he must have seen it. "There's stuff going on, Sally-Anne. My Mum and Dad have told me to have nowt to do with Harry Potter – or Ernie Macmillan – or Neville Longbottom – or a whole heap of folks. And my uncle – that's Morag's Dad – has told her to keep away from Padma Patil. But they did not say your name, so you must be all right."

Morag flushed pink under her freckles. "They're liking us to keep out of trouble," she said. "Stephen, you're needing to sift the arsenic. Sally-Anne, we're hoping that this fuss will not last long and that everybody will stay friends. But meantime it's seeming wiser not to discuss... politics."

Politics? Terry had said something about politics. But how did Stephen and Morag expect to "stay friends" when they were the ones refusing to speak to half the class?

Just what was this "homework club" that Terry had urged me to join? If it was really about politics and not homework, then why hadn't Terry told me the truth? If it was important, why hadn't he invited me to the next meeting? And why in any case did he think some political situation was more important than his friends?

"Has Susan gone wandering off again?" asked Megan.

"And 'Annah," said Sophie.

The three of us looked at each other across the common room table. It had been just the three of us for several weeks now. Hannah and Susan still sat with us in lessons, but we hardly ever saw them at other times. Even in the dormitory, they seemed to speak mainly to each other.

"What's going on?" I asked. "Hannah's become really quiet." Hannah always used to blurt out exactly what she was thinking; but while there still seemed to be plenty of thoughts flitting through her head, she had lately stopped confiding them.

"There's certainly summut she inn't telling anyone," Sophie agreed. "She ignored us in the courtyard today because she were talking to Cho Chang."

"Susan's changed too," I said. "She seems to be best friends with Padma Patil."

"With Lee Jordan, too," said Megan. "I asked her if they were going out together, but she said no, they were just friends."

"I expect everyone makes new friends now and then," said Sophie sensibly. "Including yer, Sally-Anne!"

I thought yet again about Terry and agreed that the friendship situation had certainly changed.

"So understated!" teased Megan. "Tell us all about it, Sally-Anne. What do you two talk about? You know – with your new best friend, Morag MacDougal!"

"Oh." I had never really had a "best friend". Hannah, Susan, Megan, Sophie and I had always been a group, all of us equally close to each of the others. But now Hannah and Susan had mysteriously withdrawn from Megan, Sophie and me. "I hadn't really thought of Morag as a friend. She's been... really nice to me in Potions lessons. But that's what we talk about – potions. She never tells me anything personal."

"And yer've been busy with new interests too," said Sophie. "Are yer going 'ome again this weekend?"

"I have to," I said. "It's the Muggle half-term, so I can guarantee my stepbrother will be difficult. Mum needs me. We have to put family first, don't we?"

"Before Queen and country?" asked Megan, catching at a Post Office owl that was swooping past us. "Before Cymbru am byth? No, no, just kidding! When I do my Welsh-nationalist things, my family does them with me. Look, the owl's for Sally-Anne."

It was from our family solicitor.

Dear Miss Perks,

We refer to your enquiry of 15 October 1995.

According to our files, your only legal guardians are Mr Flavian Ophiuchus Perks (your father) and Mrs Julia Melea Slater (your mother).

Hence the said Mrs Cressida Clematis Perks (your stepmother) has no jurisdiction over you and no legal right to alter the terms of your access arrangements.

If Mrs Perks has an objection to the Wizengamot access ruling, we suggest that she make every effort to settle the matter amicably with her husband (your father) before resorting to legal intervention.

Yours sincerely,

Dempster Wiggleswade,

Solicitor.

Mum's bookshop was very busy in the days before Christmas. I told Ella-Jane and Molly-Rose that they would have to help too. Molly-Rose was delighted, although she spent more time sitting with her nose in one of the books than actually serving customers. It didn't matter too much; she was a good advertisement, so we just found her a cushion and seated her in the bay window.

Ella-Jane hated it. "We have enough books at school! Aren't we allowed to have fun in the holidays?"

Jeremy backed me up. "No. Not if we want to stay together as a family. As long as the ex-spouses keep sending in the bills, we need to keep working in this shop."

Christopher backed Ella-Jane. "Let's sneak off," he told her. "We could go to Brendan's house – he has a Star Wars video."

Molly-Rose turned a page of her picture book: a prince was riding a black stallion through the hawthorn-hedged countryside in search of his lost princess. In real life, however, I knew that Terry had completely given up on me. He was certainly not going to keep last year's half-promise and take me to another dance!

"Is it true," asked Christopher, "that Sally-Anne doesn't have to go to your Dad's this year?"

Ella-Jane kicked a bookcase. "Whether she goes or stays away, Cressida will be certain to decide that we guessed wrong. She'll complain to the Wizengamot either way."

"And that will cost money!" interrupted Jeremy sharply. "So how about you two unpack that new crate of books without complaining and hope some customer comes in to buy them all?"

After Christmas, my sisters went to Liverpool as usual, but I only knelt by Mum's hearth and called for Dad.

"Sally-Anne! Aren't you coming to stay with us this year?"

"Dad, I don't know what to do. Cressida told me not to come back to your house."

"What? Oh, surely not. I can't imagine she would mean a thing like that! Sally-Anne, if you've had a run-in with Cressida, perhaps you'd be better off keeping away from her until you've both cooled off a little. You know I won't make trouble about it."

"Dad, I know you won't fuss. But what if – ?" This was really awkward. "Dad, what if Cressida changes her mind – or forgets what she said – and complains that I broke access?"

"Oh, I'm sure she wouldn't do that," said Dad, glancing down towards the coals. "I know she has a fiery temper, but you must have noticed by now that she has a heart of gold."

I didn't trust myself to say what I really thought about Cressida and gold, so I just said, "Hope to see you soon, Dad. To be honest, Mum still needs me in her bookshop. Happy New Year!"

The bookshop was what I did every day for the rest of the Christmas holidays and then every second or third weekend of the spring term. At times it seemed painfully little, but Mum assured me she was grateful, and I assured her that I was still finishing all my homework. The truth was that I sometimes felt there was too little homework. There were great stretches of time at Hogwarts – especially when I stayed there for the weekend – when I was tempted to brood: about Terry, about Dad, about Mum, about Christopher, about money...

If I caught myself brooding, I would do piano practice. But music was an area where students had to be careful. While solo piano practice was allowed, Professor Umbridge absolutely forbade group jam sessions. In fact, Professor Umbridge was reducing Hogwarts to a very unhappy school. The teachers were unhappy because she inspected their lessons, and there were rumours that some of them were going to be sacked.

"Quidditch is no fun when she controls it," complained Zacharias.

"It's difficult to ask a question in class," said Ernie, "when teachers have to be so careful about not discussing anything that might not be related to lessons."

She even discouraged discussing the newspaper. She gave Stephen detention for reading a Daily Prophet article about Cornelius Fudge, even though poor, naïve Stephen was only remarking that he did not understand what he was reading. He returned from Umbridge's detention with a swollen right hand, and Morag MacDougal burst into tears when she saw it.

Late in February, Umbridge made up yet another new school rule that no one was allowed to read The Quibbler.

"What is this quibble thing?" asked Sophie.

"A sensational, pulpy tabloid newspaper," Megan explained to her. "The last edition I saw, some wizard had claimed to fly his broomstick to the moon. No person interested in knowing the real news would want to read it. But it's great fun now and then!"

"If Umbridge 'as suddenly taken a dislike to it," said Sophie, "could the latest issue be saying something worthwhile?"

"Only one way to find out, isn't it?" said Megan. "Wayne! Can you hand over your copy of The Quibbler?"

"Fat chance that I'd rread that sad rrubbish!" said Wayne facetiously as he handed over a roll of blank paper. "Wait, it's charrmed – Licentio Margarritae! Keep it; I've seen all I do need to read."

Megan's dark eyes grew as round as cauldrons as she scanned down the blank page.

"Does it say owt?" asked Sophie.

"What? Oh, it's charmed to look blank to unauthorised people. What was that spell again? Licentio Sofiae et Sarae! Can you see it now?"

Black and red letters sprang into our line of vision; I didn't understand how we hadn't spotted them earlier. Across a grinning portrait of Harry Potter, a red headline screeched:

AND THE NIGHT I SAW HIM RETURN.

We soaked in the words. According to The Quibbler, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named had returned last June – eight months ago. He had plundered a grave, ordered a minion to mutilate himself and assaulted Harry Potter as part of the Dark spell that had resuscitated him. He had murdered Cedric Diggory and tried to murder Harry Potter. He had summoned a gang of Death Eaters, and Harry Potter claimed to know their names: Lucius Malfoy, Valerian Crabbe, Gordius Goyle, Titus Nott, Walden Macnair, Augustus Rookwood, Cynbal Avery...

"Do you think Harry Potter's telling the truth?" asked Megan.

"'E inn't lying," said Sophie.

"But..." I said slowly. "Harry couldn't be mistaken about anything as detailed and specific as this. You can make a mistake about a dream or something you only half-saw or something that someone else told you. But not about something you saw for yourself in that much detail."

Megan made a grab for the newssheet. "So do you think this is the truth?"

"I suppose it could all be a total fiction," said Sophie. "It's possible that this Madam Skeeter is the one 'oo's lying – that she never interviewed 'Arry at all."

But none of us believed that; Harry was making no attempt to deny the interview.

"Do you want You-Know-Who to be back?" demanded Megan.

"What does wanting 'ave to do with it?" asked Sophie. "We should think about whether our families are safe."

I shivered. "It looks as if they aren't safe. But I don't see what we can do about it. We're still at school. There isn't anything we could do to fight off a powerful Dark wizard."

Things at school were bad enough because Professor Umbridge was continuing her campaign to make the whole world miserable. She sacked poor, silly Professor Trelawney and she was rude and critical to kindly, blundering Hagrid. Detentions increased, and Filch cackled about his hopes of reintroducing "real" punishments. Then in the final week of term, Umbridge manipulated things so that she replaced Dumbledore as head teacher!

"How did the munting old hag manage et?" asked Wayne. "She couldn't have convinced them that Dumbledorre was incompetent or corrrupt, isn't it?"

"Don't assume she needed a just cause," said Megan.

"Or even a believable one," said Sophie.

"Where is Dumbledore?" wondered Stephen. "Professor Trelawney still lives up in her tower, but Dumbledore has simply... gone!"

Professor Umbridge selected a coterie of her favourite students (mainly Slytherins) to be her spies. She didn't call them spies, of course: she called them the "Inquisitorial Squad". But Justin told us that the Inquisition had been the name of a gang of Spanish bullies who had spied on ordinary people, hoping to find excuses to torture them to death. We all thought it was a very good name for Umbridge's pets. Malfoy reported Justin for a uniform infraction on the first day, and Justin spent all evening in one of those unspeakable detentions. The next day, Millicent Bulstrode reported Hannah for patrolling the corridors after hours. Since Hannah was on legitimate prefect duty, she was "only" given a dungeon-detention with Snape, but a misconduct was still recorded on her annual report.

Then Ursula reported Ella-Jane for drawing a caricature of "Umbitch" on the toilet walls. Ella-Jane burst out of Umbridge's office at dinner time with both hands swollen. Scratched in dried blood on the back of each hand was the slogan: "I must respect my elders."

"Ella-Jane, what did she do to you? How do those detentions work?"

"Never mind!" Ella-Jane made a brave imitation of suppressing a sob. "She'll never do it again. I'll make sure of it. Once all the parents know about this, her career will be finished."

Ella-Jane pelted off down the corridor and hammered on Professor McGonagall's office door. McGonagall seemed quite sympathetic to Ella-Jane's story, but all she said was: "I can only advise you, Miss Perks, to keep your mind on your studies. It's most unwise to insult people deliberately."

I couldn't meet Professor McGonagall's eye; I might have guessed that she, Sprout and Flitwick were all powerless before the might of the Ministry's High Inquisitor.

Ella-Jane was not deterred. "Then let me use your fireplace, Professor. I'm going to tell my parents."

"Miss Perks, I'm sure you know that the fireplaces are being watched."

"I'm going to Floo my parents anyway." Ella-Jane marched right into the office and grabbed a handful of Floo powder. Professor McGonagall shrugged and allowed her to get on with it.

Dad sounded sympathetic. "Oh, come, the Hogwarts staff must know that this kind of brutality isn't on! Today's the last day of term, isn't it? When you come home tomorrow, we'll report it to the Aurors."

"Aurors are no good. They obey the Wizengamot, and the Wizengamot lets Umbitch do anything."

"Well, we'll give it a try. Now, about the holidays... Is your Mum still busy in her shop? It might be a good idea if Sally-Anne went to help her. Cressida says we're rather busy this Easter and can't afford the luxury of too many bodies in the house."

A lump swelled in my throat as Dad winked at me and then vanished from the fireplace. I hardly saw as Ella-Jane threw a second handful of McGonagall's Floo powder into the fire and called for Mum.

Mum was a little less sympathetic, but more helpful. "Ella-Jane, what possessed you to be so defiant towards that horrible woman? No, of course she shouldn't have hexed you like that, but drawing rude pictures was asking for trouble. Next time you face an injustice, how about you try the kind of negotiation that actually has a reasonable chance of improving the situation instead of just making the spiteful person angrier? Yes, yes, I'll come up to Hogwarts and demand her side of the story. No, you don't have to go back to school if we can't sort it out..."

So once again, I spent the whole holiday with Mum. She did go up to Hogwarts to reason with Professor Umbridge, but the "reasonable negotiation" was not a success.

"She was utterly intractable!" Mum complained. "She said that students who dislike punishments ought to be careful to behave well. When I questioned the legality of her methods, she waved around some Wizengamot dispensation that apparently gives her the right to do whatever she likes, and her ears were completely closed to anything I could say about proportion. Sally-Anne, I was really frightened for the three of you."

My heart leapt with hope as I turned over the cod fillets. "Mum, would it be better if we didn't go back to Hogwarts?"

"I told Professor Umbridge I was removing you, but she laughed at me and claimed that wizarding law requires children under sixteen to be at school. When I pointed out that 'school' need not mean 'Hogwarts', she gave that stupid simper and told me, 'Once at Hogwarts, always at Hogwarts. If any Sorted child leaves my tender care at Hogwarts before her O.W.L. exams, you may be sure I'll send the Snatchers around.' Heaven knows who or what these Snatchers might be; I didn't wait to find out!"

I stirred the cheese sauce and poured it into the serving jug. "Mum... Do you think the Snatchers could be Death Eater-type people?"

"Whatever makes you say that, Sally-Anne?"

"There are rumours at school that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is back. Umbitch punishes people who talk about it, but the rumours don't go away."

Mum looked even wearier. "Yes, I've heard the rumours. I lie awake at night, worrying about what would happen to Raymond, the boys and my mother if it turned out to be true. But no one ever offers any proof."

"Well, these Snatchers..."

Mum sighed and pulled the plates out of the cupboard. "Sally-Anne, it makes no difference whether they are Death Eaters or just Ministry busybodies. The point is that you girls have to return to Hogwarts and make the best of the bad situation. But if the worst is true... if You-Know-Who is back... there's nothing we can do about it. The best way we can protect the Muggles in our family is to keep a low profile and stay out of trouble. Just concentrate on your studies... and try to take care of your sisters."