Basilisk Eyes

Chapter 125: Humpback hugs

Harry couldn't resist. He vanished the stack of Daily Prophets in the wooden box as he was leaving the dining hall—it was just as easy to vanish as his vomit and it left a nice peppermint scent in its wake.

He did keep the copy he'd read—tucked away safely in his staff. He wasn't sure why—but he thought that there might be more clues in the story that would help him uncover how Rita Skeeter had traveled around the Center undetected. He really wanted to get her and hand her over to Healer Jordan.

As he'd been scanning the headlines, his anagnóstis had run over the corner where the price of the newspaper was printed and it struck him that Rita Skeeter and the others at the aptly named Daily Prophet were making money off of one of the worst moments of his life... and that they most likely had before when his parents had been murdered. He felt a little bit of vindication when he made the newspaper disappear into nothingness. He only wished that he could vanish them all over Britain.

Harry walked swiftly to the O&M room panel where he selected a beach—he hoped that it was the same one they had visited earlier in the week with Mei for the ritual. The warm salty air blasted him as the Egress opened, tearing away some of the sticky miasma that had settled on his skin as he read the newspaper. He closed his eyelids tight anticipating the burning sun and when he didn't sense the sun on his skin, he opened them tentatively. He breathed in the air and realized that it had to be night—the sun had set. The Egress had a familiar scent—he was pretty sure he was on the South Sea Island of Mei's ritual.

He could see a bright orb-like light that had to be the moon—high in the sky, but it was a slightly different shape than it had been on Wednesday. He stared at it for a while—most of the time he couldn't see the shape of light even when it was coming in a window—why could he see the shape of the moon? It was a strange feeling to realize that he could tell the shape of something that he couldn't feel with his hands. His fingertips tingled with the desire to reach out and feel it.

Harry pulled his Nimbus out of his staff, snapped his staff in place, and took off toward the sound of the surf—startling a flock of birds that had been nesting among the grasses. They didn't have the shrill whistle of gulls, but called in a loud chirping, trilling alarm. The birds flew up around him in a chaotic burst of wings and squawks that prompted a shield charm to erupt around him. He winced as he heard a couple of them bounce off of the shield as he steadied his broom and then leaned low to race out to the expanse of the ocean before him. As he neared the beach, he heard scuttling sounds and imagined crabs scrabbling to get out of his path, no doubt thinking that he was some large predator coming to snap them up.

The air cooled down the sweat that had begun to coat his body as his agitation had grown. It felt good as it coursed through his hair. He could feel the spray of the water as he passed over the crashing waves. The sounds of the disturbed birds grew distant as he left the shore far behind and followed the contours of the water as it undulated like a heaving meadow. Every once in a while, he heard a fish that had jumped out of the water splash back against the surface.

He leaned against the handle, his feet tucked up on the twigs, and raced over the surface of the water, soaking in the saltwater spray as droplets rose from the churning waves below him. Harry felt the distance grow between him and the piercing words that had been driven into the surface of his skin and being. The effect of them began to peel away, ripped off by the wind with the ink floating away in the water. The words fell through the surface and sank like stones to the ocean floor, far below.

It seemed like he had been flying forever—he'd never just flown straight for such a long time. He wondered how long he could fly before he came up against something—a ship, an island, another continent. Would he reach the edge of the wards protected by the Egress? If he did, how would he know?