James strode confidently ahead of the others, jauntily swinging a cauldron in one hand and a lantern in the other. Soon the cauldron would be filled with the bountiful treats he was expecting to receive from the residents of Ottery St Catchpole. A small voice had been niggling him since he had left the Burrow, taunting him gently with the idea that he might, just might, be a little too old for trick-or-treating. He was due to start Hogwarts the following year, and had the sneaking feeling that this wasn’t very grown up.
Rose and Hugo squabbled behind him, challenging each other over the respective size of their cauldrons. James was not interested in their bickering, secure in the knowledge that he had managed to procure the largest cauldron in his grandmother’s kitchen. This also disturbed him; it had not been that long since when he would have taken great pleasure in their debate and enjoyed winning it. He stopped as they approached the first lights of the village and opened the solid gate that led to a short-cut across Brackenhill Farm. Albus had overtaken the two siblings and joined his own brother by the gate. He smiled, making his blue, painted face distort alarmingly.
“I can’t believe you have come as pixie again,” James said with a shake of his head. “You look ridiculous and the paint always leaves a stain. I don’t know why you don’t let Gran do it with magic.”
“It isn’t the same with magic, and you know what the Muggles are like around here for being scared of pixies. I always get the best treats. I got a whole chocolate cake last year! And you can’t talk. Most of them won’t even know what you are meant to be.”
“It’s obvious that I am a Chimera,” James said, with a slight sneer in his voice. This was another thing that worried him, He was inordinately proud of his costume, in particular the splendid lion’s head that he wore to cover his own. However, last year he had been happy to come as Nearly-Headless Nick, an altogether easier feat, and one which had clearly cheered up the Muggles no end. All-in-all, James felt he was getting much too serious for this whole malarkey.
Lily brought up the rear, holding on to Victoire’s hand. Both of them glowed silver in the light from their lanterns, both of them dressed immaculately as the prettiest fairies imaginable. All the boys had snorted when they saw their costumes, pointing out that the whole point of All Hallows was to frighten the living daylights out of people, but Victoire and Lily has smiled at them serenely and got on with business of finding silver cauldrons to match their outfits. They knew very well that not everyone liked monsters, and they knew exactly where to find them to extract the maximum treats.
They approached the village together and smiled at the sight of so many Jack o’Lanterns in the windows of all the cottages. Some of the village children were also out and about, dressed garishly in masks and orange-coloured cloaks. Parents shepherded the younger children in groups from door to door, and the atmosphere was one of fun, with the local residents only too happy to dole out various treats. Granted, some of these treats were not what the children considered treats, including one poor soul who was on the receiving end of some roasted pig’s ears. His quick-thinking mother rapidly disposed of them in the direction of a grateful dog at the next house they came to.
The Weasley grandchildren had not been troubled by such oddities, and their cauldrons had begun to fill with sweets and chocolate, even some Muggle money. Rose was turning over a pound coin in her hand thoughtfully, wondering how many Knuts she could exchange it for. As they rounded the corner into Rosehip Lane, all of them stopped dead in their tracks, their mouths open in fear. It was Victoire who let out the first scream, pulling Lily backwards, and Hugo quickly followed them.
James held his ground as the two figures crossed the street towards them, one masked and the other bearing the dread features of a creature they all thought dead and only to be found in the pages of books. Albus almost dropped his lantern, but held fast as they were spotted by the very things that had stopped their fun so abruptly.
“It’s… It can’t be,” Albus whispered. “They were all captured. He, that thing, he was killed.”
James was silent, the sickening lurch in his stomach transferring itself into a feeling of blind panic. Voldemort. That name still had the power to churn dark feelings in the hearts of most wizards, but to see him on the street, alive after so long. He began to feel how his father must have felt, that intense fear, but the need for victory, for bravery. He tried to work out what he would do, what he would say to this monster, who was walking along so calmly with one of his Death Eaters. His wand was at home and all he had was his quick wits to save them all. How blind the Muggles were to not see the evil that walked amongst them.
He glanced around for a weapon to use against them and his eyes alighted on Rose’s lantern as she walked ahead of him. He wondered how the darkest being the wizarding world would react to having a lantern pole shoved up its… Rose! She was ahead of him, walking towards the danger. She was talking, but the rush of blood to his head made him unable to hear the words. The evil pair crossed the lane and she made straight for them, her lantern aloft and her back straight. Fear for his cousin forced his legs into action and he raced to her as she drew level with Voldemort and his Death Eater. He threw himself between them and shoved Voldemort hard in the chest.
Voldemort gave a shout of alarm and his arms wheeled as he fell backwards into a holly bush. His Death Eater gave a cry and reached to pull his Dark Lord out from the clutches of such a voracious plant. James fell across them both, flailing his arms, cauldron and lantern forgotten on the ground as he fought to save his cousin.
“James!”
He landed a good punch on the Death Eater’s chin, but received Voldemort’s foot in his ear as a punishment, dislodging his lion’s head, which rolled into the gutter to lie forlorn.
“James!”
He felt his lip split as he hit his face on the pavement, struggling to make sense of the nightmare that was engulfing him. He managed to stick a leg out and trip someone up, which gratified him.
“James, what on earth are you doing?” His befuddled brain managed to place the voice. It was Rose and she sounded less than pleased. “Stop this immediately! Henrietta, are you all right?”
He propped himself up onto his arms and saw his cousin help the Death Eater to its feet, brushing off its cloak, which on close inspection looked more like a curtain than anything a Death Eater might have worn. He wiped the blood from his lip and staggered to his feet, surprised to see quite a crowd had formed. Voldemort was clutching his face and moaning something about thugs and imbeciles. A thought drenched him; Voldemort might actually not be Voldemort. Voldemort could actually just be someone doing exactly what they were doing “ dressing up as a monster and attempting to terrorise people.
“Apologise this instant!” Rose seemed to be talking in ever-increasing exclamation marks, and so James mumbled an apology, against his better judgement. Rose was now involved in a conversation with the erstwhile Dark Lord. She seemed to know him quite well and called him Rupert several times in a voice which suggested she would like to know him better.
Once apologies had been received and the crowd dispersed, it was a rather more subdued set of Weasleys that continued their evening. Rose took great delight in grumbling to herself about the idiocy of boys, while Albus extracted an explanation out of her. Rupert was a friend from the Muggle school and she had lent him a history book, which she did manage to look ashamed about, knowing full well that such a thing was expressly forbidden. She had taken pains to make Rupert understand that it wasn’t really history, just funny Dorset mythology, but he had evidently been so taken with Voldemort that he had decided to recruit his sister as a Death Eater and mimic the dark wizard.
James listened to her explanation in stony silence, his lip and his pride smarting from the whole encounter. Of one thing, he was absolutely sure.
He was definitely too old for trick-or-treating!