Begin to Hope

Positive I hadn't heard him correctly, I politely said, "Come again?"

Klaus looked me up and down, calculating my appearance and muttering to himself, "Yes--I'm thinking--blonde hair, maybe? Red, perhaps. We'll try both."

"Klaus, what are you talking about?"

Looking around cautiously and lowering his voice, he moved closer so he was nearly standing on top of me. He leaned down and whispered in my ear, "Kerry--Maverick, you, and I; the three of us!--are going to find our way into Voldemort's school, cloaked in disguises of all sorts, and find out everything he is up to. We will become favored members of his league, and pretty soon, while we live there in secrecy, learning everything about them, we will learn enough to take over, and then we'll win, Kerry! We'd better leave soon, d'you think their term starts in September, as well? I don't even know what day it is, but I suspect it's nearly late August--"

"Klaus, slow down! You are making no sense. None of this is making sense -- and even if you were making sense, there would be no possible way for the three of us to work our way into Voldemort's most trusted people. He doesn't even know us. We would be found out immediately."

"Not so! If we completely change our appearances and pretend we are from some far off land, nobody would know the difference! We say we'd like to join his cause, and poof! We're in!"

I looked at him skeptically. "Klaus, there is no way it could be that easy."

"At the very least, we have to give it a try. What have we got to lose?"

"....Our lives." I replied pessimistically, turning from him.

He touched my arm gently. "Kerry, there's nothing for us here either. We've got to try, and--see!-- I knew we were going to think of a plan soon, and this is exactly it--this is just the thing we need to defeat Voldemort -- what a terrific plan! I'm brilliant."

"Oh, yeah, brilliant boy? And what are the others supposed to do while we're gone for six months or a year -- or what if it even took longer? Who knows how long we might have to stay there before Voldemort trusts us enough to tell us his plans? If ever? And what if knowing his plans didn't help us? Then what? Your plan is full of potholes, Klaus."

"Oh, balderdash. If anything goes amiss, we'll just come back home." With a wave of his hand he dismissed any of my further questions. "Time for bed! We have to get up early tomorrow, get prepared, get everything ready, change our appearances, and then head off towards Voldemort!" He kept talking about our...adventure tomorrow as he lead me back into a comfortable sweet bedroom filled with a dressed and complete bed, none of it destroyed, looking nearly brand new.

"Can I sleep with you?"

I whipped around to stare at him. "What?"

"I mean--not like that!--just--you know--if you're scared, I'd be happy to stay here with you... for the night." His cheeks flushed red and he looked down at the ground, embarrassed that he'd said anything. "Never mind," he muttered, turning away.

"Wait!" I called, reaching out a hand for his retreating figure. "Um...I mean--you can sleep--on the floor."

His face brightened, just a little, and came back to join me. He ran forward and leaped onto the bed, bouncing several times and landing roughly on his back, a huge grin on his face. For a split second, I saw the old Klaus. The pre-every adult in our lives is dead-Klaus. And it was nice, seeing him being able to act like a child without any responsibility, if only for a moment.

I tipped my head towards the ground and he shrugged, slipping off the bed, taking a blanket and pillow with him to the ground. He snuggled up right next to the side of my bed, almost underneath it, and then boldly reached up a hand for me to hold.

"In case I get scared?" he asked in a little boy voice, smiling up at me.

I lay down on the side of the bed closest to him and stretched out a hand. I took his cool, smooth hand in mine and we interlocked fingers. I would have sworn I would have felt electric running through my veins from his touch, if it were not for the breeze that blew through the room at that exact moment.

Within minutes he was fast asleep. As for myself, I tossed and turned half the night, thinking about Klaus' plan and what we would have to do to destroy Voldemort. One side of me thought it would be fantastic to explore Voldemort's lair and find out exactly what they were planning, and if there were any others like us out there still...and the other half of me thought it was a terrible idea, bound to end in destruction and death.

Unfortunately for myself, all of the others thought it was a great idea.

"Wow, what a great idea, Klaus!" Annabelle beamed at him from across the long wooden table we had found in the library. The nine of us were seated around it the next afternoon, calmly discussing this absurd notion Klaus had. "Who's going with you?"

"Well..." Klaus glanced nervously at me, for he knew the others would all feel left out when he announced they weren't allowed to go. "I was also hoping to keep the party coming with me small, you know.. maybe like one or two others..."

"And?" Penelope asked eagerly, leaning over the table. "Who's going?"

"Maverick, Kerry, and myself."

As I had suspected, several cries of protest rang out. Everyone demanded to know why he picked us, when they were all just as worthy. I was rather eager to hear his response.

"Kerry always gets to go, and Maverick is younger than me! Why shouldn't I get to go?" Kimberly made a good point.

"Because we only need one girl. And--" Klaus added before Annabelle could respond, "We need someone older to stay and watch over the younger ones. Princeton likes you more than Kerry, you know." He tried to butter her up to keep her from arguing, and it seemed to work, for the moment.

A few protests later and they had all quieted down, finally realizing that Klaus wasn't going to change his mind no matter what they said to persuade him.

"When are you leaving?" Tally asked sadly.

"Tonight. But first--we have to change our appearances as much as possible. If we run into Orlando while we're there, and he gives away our disguises..." he didn't have to finish his sentence; we all knew what he was thinking. He pointed to me. "I'm thinking red hair on Kerry, and we'll cut it real short."

"What?!" I yelped, a hand instantly clutching my long brown hair, "I don't want to be bald!"

"Not that short. Just shorter. Ear-length. We'll also give you a limp. How good are you at fake limping?"

"Limping? Gee, I don't know, I've never tried before--"

"I could cut off a couple toes, if you'd like." Maverick offered, waving his wand in my direction.

I grimaced. "I'll try the fake limping, thanks."

"And for Maverick... any ideas?"

Everyone turned to look him up and down. Meanwhile, he stood up and modeled himself, posing in different angles so we could get a good look at him.

"I think he'd look good as a dark blonde. If we change his eyes to green, and pretend to be half-deaf...yes, in fact, that works nicely--then maybe people would be more open about talking about their plans in front of him."

Maverick stopped turning about and sat back down. "Dark blonde? Ugh."

"What's wrong with blonde hair?" Penelope demanded, poking him in the chest with one finger.

"Nothing. Except everyone will think I'm stupid."

"No, it'll be fine. And as for myself..." Klaus thought for a second, then snapped his fingers. "No glasses, black hair, I'll give myself a hideous scar on one cheek, and grow my hair out longer."

Tally grimaced. "Sounds gruesome."

Klaus shrugged. "Anything for our cause."

"When are you guys leaving?" Humphrey asked quietly, looking at me with a rather sad expression on his face. I immediately felt sorry for neglecting him. I wanted to hug the little guy.

Klaus stood up, running a hand through his hair. "As soon as we make these changes to ourselves, we'll gather what we'll need and leave. Why don't we all pitch in and gather things? I've made a list of things we'll need--" He handed the list to Annabelle and she glanced over it. "Why don't you take the rest of them and make a game of it? Search the entire castle, why don't you?" She nodded and ushered them towards the door.

"Wait!" Klaus called. "Can I talk to Kimberly and Humphrey first, please?" They looked at each other and stepped forward; the rest of them made their way out and closed the door behind them.

"I want the two of you to be in charge of Peter while we're gone. That means feeding him everyday and talking to him, seeing if you can get any more information out of him. And sending me anything you find out via owl." He produced from behind his back a small brown owl in a golden metal cage, hooting happily. "This is a present for both of you to share. You can name it whatever you like, and share the responsibility of sending me weekly letters on how things are going here. Tell me everything: whatever Peter tells you, how everyone is holding up, how badly Annabelle is treating you..." He grinned at them. "How's that work?"

"Klaus, that's fantastic!" Kimberly lunged at him and gave him a big hug. "Thank you so much!"

Humphrey nodded, too speechless to say anything, but I knew he was feeling overwhelmed at being given so much responsibility.

"Where did you get this owl?" Kimberly asked, taking the cage from Klaus and peering in at it. "It's so cute!"

"Early this morning I was searched the castle, and I must have stumbled upon what was once an Owlery. There were hundreds of owls in there. A piece of the ceiling had fallen in, so they had access to get outside, and they must have all made their home in there. This was the first one that came down and landed on my shoulder, so I thought it would be the best behaved." He waved a finger at it. "Aren't you, little guy?"

The owl hooted happily and hopped around in its cage. Kimberly squealed with delight. "Thanks again, Klaus. Really."

Klaus shrugged and gave them a nod. "Now why don't you two go put the owl in one of your bedrooms and help the others find the stuff we'll need?"

They agreed and the two of them rushed off, talking excitedly about their new pet.

Klaus finally turned to Maverick and me, rubbing his hands together eagerly. "Let's make some magic!" He drew out his wand and looked at me critically. "Alright, hair color on the three of us." He narrowed his eyes at me, lifted his wand, and whispered something under his breath.

Pop! I felt something go whizzing over my head, and Maverick started laughing hysterically. Klaus turned red and looked away, trying to hold in a laugh.

"What is it? What did you do?" I demanded.

Maverick couldn't stop laughing long enough to answer me, but Klaus handed me a mirror. I took a look at my reflection and was horrified to see my long brown hair gone. In place of it, Klaus had put a mess of bubble gum pink hair, cut shoulder-length, framing my face, making me look absolutely ridiculous.

I looked up at him, angry. "What did you do?!"

"You--you look ridiculous!" Maverick managed to say, pointing at me, nearly doubled over laughing.

I scowled at him, covered my head with my hands.

"Maybe that didn't go as well as I had hoped," Klaus replied meekly. He waved his wand at me again, this time turning my hair a dark red color, a nice shade that wasn't too stupid looking.

I looked again in the mirror, this time liking what I saw. "Much better, Klaus." I praised him.

He smiled confidently. "Maverick, you're next."

Before Maverick could reply, he waved his wand and Maverick's eyes changed to green, and his red hair was replaced with a mop of grungy dirty blonde hair. Dirty in the messy, greasy sense.

He reached a hand up to feel his hair and immediately made a face. "Yuck! I feel gross!"

"Oh, well." Klaus turned his wand towards himself and held it there, whispered things silently. Within a moment he had grown long black hair, looking nothing like his former self. He removed the glasses from his face and muttered a spell that gave him better vision. He then looked at me, a huge smile on his face.

"What do you think?"

I studied his face. "I personally liked you better the other way."

He shrugged off the comment, but I thought I almost saw disappointment cross his face.

"Man, this is so weird." Maverick said, grabbing the mirror from me and looking at himself in it.

"Now, just one more thing. If you will each take your wand and point it at yourself and say, 'Tusten', it's a spell designed to not let anyone else see your original appearance. In case the Death Eaters try and reveal us. Or if Orlando finds us. Alright?"

We nodded, and at the count of three, we shouted, "Tusten!" together. A chill went down my spine and I knew our appearances had been finalized.

"Let's get going, find the others, see if they've got everything. I want to get out of here by tonight." Klaus lead us out of the library and into the main hallway. Looking around for the others as we walked, he continued talking to us. "The stuff on the list is normal stuff. Food, rope, weapons, parchment, quills, that kind of stuff. I was just wondering if they could find it all. If not, that's fine. We'll pick some up on the way there."

We found Annabelle and Tally packing most of the stuff the list had asked for into a cracked brown suitcase.

"There you are!" Annabelle greeted us. "We just about got everything you asked for, however, we didn't find any tuna fish, and this thing here--a 'condom'? What is that? And why does it have a little heart around it?" She waved the list at him.

Klaus turned red and ripped the list out of her hands. "That's nothing. I--just--nothing. Um, yeah, you have everything? Good. If you'll just gather everyone down here, we'll say our goodbyes and get going."

Annabelle nodded and blew a whistle that was hanging around her neck. Within a minute everyone had assembled with us in the hall.

"Well," Klaus said, shoving his hands deep inside his pockets and standing there awkwardly, "we're going to head out, so if you'd like to say goodbye--"

The three of us sadly said goodbye to the remaining six of them. They told us to be careful, watch ourselves, not to do anything stupid, a whole number of things. There were a few tears shed, most of them from Penelope.

"Watch out for everyone else," I told Humphrey, embracing him warmly. "You're going to be the head male left here. They need you. Watch out for the younger ones, pay attention to everything Annabelle says, help Kim take care of Peter. Be a good boy." I gave him a kiss on the forehead and he nodded.

"You don't have to worry about me, Kerry. I can do it."

I smiled at him. "I know you can, Humphrey."

After a few more moments of painful goodbyes, we were all packed up and just about ready to go.

"Oh! Just one more thing!" Klaus dashed off, leaving Maverick and I there to wonder what he was getting.

He returned in a moment, carrying the half of the necklace book that we had.

"Couldn't forget this, now, could I?" He asked, waving it at us.

"Of course not, Klaus."

Heading out onto the grounds of the Hogwarts castle, I hoisted one of the suitcases and one of the brooms Tally had found for us, hidden away in a secret closet. Klaus, Maverick and I walked into the middle of the field and waved valiantly to the others standing in the doorway.

It was a cool, clear night, only a few clouds drifting lazily across the sky. Perfect for flying.

"Be careful!" Annabelle issued her final warning before she turned and pushed the rest of them back into the castle, sad expressions on their faces.

"Well... this is it." Klaus said glumly. He tied his suitcase to the end of his broom and sat on it. Maverick and I followed suit, but before we took off, Maverick interrupted with a question.

"Klaus... what happens if they don't accept us? What if they kill us on the spot?"

"Then that's a chance we'll have to take." Klaus pushed off from the ground without another word and was soon up among the clouds, beckoning for us to follow him.

Maverick looked at me, and for the first time I saw a hint of fear in his eyes.

Trying to sound brave, I mustered up as much cheerfulness as I could and uttered, "Let's go, Maverick!" It came out sounding fake.

I pushed off from the ground, Maverick following close behind. The three of us took off into the night, and before long, Hogwarts was far behind us, completely out of sight.