“Is that so?” Harry asked, still in an oddly banal voice, as if he was only marginally interested. “The Black family is a thousand years old?”
“The line of Blacke is far older than that, I would wager,” Merlin said. “And I would not be so quick to dismiss the legends of their charge. The guardianship of the polarities of human nature was once an established magical institution, inviolate and deeply respected, forming the very pillars of humanity, without which civilised culture would be impossible. It is a curiosity of this new age that because one finds an idea intellectually offensive, one assumes it cannot be true.”
Millie bristled slightly. “I didn’t say I find the idea offensive.
Just a little barmy.”
James moved to the curb, catching up to Merlin. “So, you think there may be something to what Millie’s grandmother says? About the Black title being responsible for some huge elemental… something?”
Merlin shrugged. “I merely say that the idea has ancient precedent. One cannot immediately dismiss it.”
“Did the Viscount Blacke that you knew have powers like that?
Was he in charge of some element of human nature?”
“The Viscount Blacke was famously reticent regarding details about himself or his holdings. Meeting him in an inn, he would lament that he had barely two coppers to rub together. And yet the opulence of his robes and carriage made it clear that his wealth was incalculable. I never wasted the breath to ask him about the rumours of his title.”
“But there were rumours?” James prodded, looking up at the headmaster.
“There are always rumours.” Merlin nodded.
“So…?” James pressed again, glancing back at his father, annoyed at the lack of interest he saw there. “What do you think the Black title is in charge of?”
“I haven’t the faintest notion,” Merlin replied simply. “And that is the truth. But I expect the name itself provides some minor hint.”
“Black?” James frowned.
“It is as you say, Mr. Potter. All the titles are colours. And yet what do we know of the colour black?”
James shrugged. He didn’t always appreciate the headmaster’s baroque conversational style. “I don’t know. It’s dark?”
Millie suggested, “It’s not truly a colour, is it? It’s the absence of all colour.”
Merlin cocked his head slightly. “It depends upon how you look at it. Black may not be a colour unto itself. But it absorbs every other hue. It is, in fact, every colour combined.”
James’ eyes widened slightly at the thought. In a quieter voice, he asked, “So… what does that mean for the elemental guardianship of the Black title?”
Merlin turned to look aside at him again as he walked. “Haven’t the foggiest notion, Mr. Potter.”
“It means,” Harry said from behind, “That if there is some enormous dangerous potential inherent in our title, then like all such things, it is best left buried, untouched, and safely forgotten. After all, we Potters don’t have the greatest record with handling huge, earth-shaking responsibilities.”
“That is a topic of possible debate,” Merlin countered with a wry look.
James was about to reply when a sudden noise startled him.
Some small but heavy object clanged off the side of Norberta’s truckish shape. It struck the footpath and fumbled to a halt against a fire hydrant. James looked and saw that it was a chunk of old brick.
“What the—” Millie started, when another brick struck Norberta, bouncing off her high bonnet. She groaned and hissed her hydraulics, shuddering on her huge tyres.
“Over there,” Harry said, pointing with his wand to a narrow alley on their left. “Someone in there is having a bit of sport.”
Another brick sailed through the air, missed the refuse truck, and broke into pieces on the road at Merlin’s feet. He looked up from it calmly, but with a grim twinkle in his eye, following the trajectory back to the dark alley.
“Muggle vandals?” Harry asked, stepping alongside Merlin.
“I think not,” Merlin answered quietly. “I smell something else entirely. Guard our charge for a moment.”
And with that, he stalked away, his robes swaying in the cold air, his feet silent on the slushy road. James watched as the huge wizard strode into the shadows, putting out his hand as he did so, producing his staff out of thin air. A moment later he was gone, vanished into the depths of the alley.
Harry watched. James stood next to him, eyes wide. Millie peered from just behind his shoulder, silent. The three barely breathed.
Behind them, Norberta the refuse truck chugged idly, revving her engine with rhythmic impatience.
No more bricks lobbed out of the alley.
Suddenly, a flash of blue light flickered from the throat of its depths. The glare illuminated trash bins and doorways in a bright stutter, and then darkness fell again, as seamless as a well.
“What’s he doing?” Millie whispered.
“Why isn’t he coming back?” James added.
Harry merely watched, his wand in his fist, pointed at the pavement next to his feet.
Another flash came, more dimly this time, as if from a distance.
Barely heard over the constant drum of nearby traffic, a deep bellow sounded. Merlin’s voice, shouting something. Harry tensed but remained in place.
And then, half a minute later, a shadow stumbled out of the alley. It wasn’t Merlin. James could see that right away. It was very small, very thin, with huge, limp ears. The shadow stumbled to its knees, caught itself with its arms, and then raised its large head, as if to look up at them.
Harry finally broke away and ran to the figure, wand out, but not pointing at it. James hurried to join him.
It was a house elf dressed in a knotted tea towel. James recognized the huge head and sad, anxious eyes. It was Piggen, the elf he had last seen stoking the fire in Gryffindor tower weeks earlier.
Harry dropped to crouch next to the elf, concern and wariness etched onto his face.
“Why are you here?” he asked, “Are you all right? Have you been injured?”
Still hunkered on all fours over the curb, the elf peered up at Harry with his huge, glistening eyes. Then, he turned his gaze to James.
“Piggen is sorry, Master Potter,” he said with heartbreaking sincerity. “Piggen is a bad, bad elf.”
Behind James and Harry, Millie screamed.
James spun around clumsily, still half-kneeling behind his father.
Harry was quicker, however, launching back to his feet and sweeping his wand around in a blurred arc.
“Lumos!” he barked, and his wand flared to blinding light, illuminating the street like daylight, casting leaping black shadows behind every object.