Rose blinked rapidly up at the professor. “We have to go through the Nexus Curtain? We have to visit the place where Morgan, the evil Petra, and Judith hid out and planned their W.U.L.F. attack on Uncle Harry and Titus Hardcastle?” Her tone was even more hushed, bursting with equal parts trepidation and heady excitement.
“Well, yes and no,” Odin-Vann nodded vaguely. “You won’t, actually, Miss Weasley. But you shall perform perhaps the most important task of all.”
Rose looked taken aback but didn’t object, at least not yet.
Odin-Vann went on, turning to James.
“According to Petra, James, you have in your possession a singularly useful map of the school grounds. Is that correct?”
“The Marauder’s Map?” James confirmed. “Yes, I still have it.
Dad let me use it year before last to keep an eye on Lily and Albus, making sure they didn’t skive off on Hogsmeade weekends before they were allowed. It’s still hidden in the bottom of my trunk.”
“And a particularly powerful cloak of invisibility?” Odin-Vann cocked his head, his eyes nearly sparking with interest.
“Ah, no,” James admitted, drooping his shoulders. “I tried, but Dad keeps that safe and tucked away at home. That’s caused too much trouble in the wrong hands. He doesn’t exactly trust me with it anymore.”
Odin-Vann pressed his lips into a thin line and nodded curtly.
“Ah. Well. No matter, then. The Map is the most important tool for tonight. Can you give it to Miss Weasley?”
James nodded and glanced at Rose. “Of course.”
“Excellent,” Odin-Vann went on, becoming intent. “Your job, then, Miss Weasley, will be to watch the Map tonight. It may require you to be awake all the way until dawn, but it is essential that you keep alert.”
Rose looked deeply disappointed. “You mean, I’m staying here?”
Odin-Vann nodded patiently. “I need you to stay and act as sentinel. It is an absolutely essential duty. You must keep an eye on the headmaster at all times. Assure he stays inside the castle. And if he does not, if he vanishes from the Map, even for a moment, you must let us know somehow.”
“The Protean ducks,” James suggested, glancing at Rose. “I’ll take mine. If Merlin leaves, you can duck me a message. But,” he turned back to Odin-Vann. “Why are we concerned with Merlin?”
“Because noble as he may be,” Odin-Vann sighed reluctantly, “he, like the rest of the wizarding world, will attempt to capture and stop Petra. Unlike the rest of the wizarding world, however, he may be capable of succeeding.”
Rose agreed to this with obvious reluctance. She had never been to the World Between the Worlds, and James knew that her curiosity about it must be nearly overwhelming.
On the other hand, as they both knew, it was where their cousin Lucy had died. James had a sense that this was the main reason Rose did not push any harder to come.
“What about me?” James asked. “Will we start at Alma Aleron?
Will Petra meet us there? Is Zane involved?” At that thought, a jolt of nervous excitement fanned out in him. “That’s why she contacted him, isn’t it? I tried to ask him about it, but he’s been out whenever I try to raise him on the Shard!”
Odin-Vann was shaking his head. “All of those details will come to light soon enough. Your job, James, is to do exactly what you did a few weeks ago, when you appeared to both Petra and myself. Your job is to travel to her via the connection you seem to share. She has opened her end. She expects you.”
“You mean,” James said, deflating slightly. “My task is… to go to bed?”
Odin-Vann shrugged. “However you did it before, do it again.
I am permitted to leave the castle. You are not. But you can make your own way to Petra, it seems. Do so this night. If it works as I believe it does, you will travel to wherever Petra is, without anyone knowing you’ve even left your bed. Accomplish that, and the rest will take care of itself.”
James did not feel anywhere near as certain of his ability to accomplish this task as did Odin-Vann, but he nodded slowly, his mind spinning.
Rose was clearly unhappy with the plan, but didn’t seem inclined to argue about it, at least not to Odin-Vann himself. With their business concluded, for the moment at least, the three returned to the warm glow of the castle.
“We are clear on our roles, then?” Odin-Vann whispered, pausing beneath a hanging lantern.
Rose nodded soberly, still frowning.
James shrugged. “I’ll do my best.”
Odin-Vann studied his face intently, and then nodded. “Give me an hour. And then, just go to sleep. Petra will more than allow you to come through. She will summon you. It will work. Just be prepared.”
James wasn’t entirely sure what being prepared entailed under these circumstances, but he nodded anyway.
Odin-Vann parted from them at the next corridor. James and Rose continued on, each lost in the dense fog of their own thoughts as they made their way back to the common room. Outside the portrait hole, Rose stopped James and whispered, “Do you trust him?”
James blinked at her. Amidst his mingled worries and excitement about the night’s plan, he hadn’t even given that question any consideration. “I… I guess so. I don’t see much reason not to.”
Rose nodded slowly, her eyes drifting. “You’re right, I suppose.
Petra trusts him, apparently. Still…”
“I’ll get you the Map,” James said, nodding to himself. “And maybe you can hex me with a sleep charm before I go up. I feel about as far from sleep right now as I’ve ever been.”
Rose agreed to this and the two climbed through the portrait hole, each filled with their own stew of excitement and worry.
The common room was still half full of students. The walls rang with loud chatter and the crackle of the fireplace. Almost no one noticed the two students’ return.
James ran upstairs to retrieve the Map. When he came back down, he found Rose seated on the loveseat beneath the window with Scorpius. He could tell by the tilt of their heads that she had told him what was happening. James wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but if it meant Scorpius would help Rose stay awake through the night, perhaps it was for the best. At least it meant that they weren’t fighting for the moment.
Scorpius glanced up at James as he approached. James handed his knapsack past him to Rose. Inside it was the Marauder’s Map.
“Don’t forget to take your Duck,” Scorpius commented, arching an eyebrow at James. “Assuming you really can.”
“I think I can,” James nodded. “I brought some of the dirt back from the place I went to last time. I think I can take with me whatever I’m holding. My biggest problem is going to be getting to sleep at all.”
Scorpius shrugged. “Rose is a treat with a sleep charm. You’ll probably collapse on the stairs before you reach the first-years dormitory.
Say hello to your daft American friend, should you see him.”