[ - ]
Table of Contents [Report This]
Printer Chapter or Story Microsoft Word Chapter or Story
- Text Size +
The Evidence of the Seer


“So I got loads of Gryffindor duvets,” James was whispering, “And a bunch of extra house ties from the laundry. We can do the Shack up really brilliantly. I figured if we knick some candles we could magic them to float about and stick the duvets up on the walls…”

Sirius and James were sitting together in the corridor outside of Divination, huddled in the corner by one of the suits of armor. Peter was taking deep breaths, nervous about meeting scary, old Professor Mopsus, pacing back and forth. “He just seems so mean,” Peter was saying, fretting.

Remus came up the hall, having left to go fetch a cup for some water for Peter. Sirius and James instantly stopped talking. “Here, Pete,” Remus said, holding up the cup and waving his wand, “Aquamenti!”

Peter quickly gulped down the water.

The door to the Divination room opened up apparently by its very own accord and the students gathered out in the hall looked among one another nervously before beginning to file inside. Conspicuously missing from the lot of students filing into Divination was Severus Snape, who none of the Marauders missed being there.

James leaped off the floor and ran to catch up to Lily Evans as she turned to follow Marlene McKinnon to a table in the corner, “Wait.. where are you going, Evans?” he called, stopping at the aisle, “Our tables down this way.”

Lily looked between Marlene and James, “Well, I thought that since Professor Vablatsky isn’t teaching this term that… that we wouldn’t be paired like we were before.”

“Oh.” James blinked, trying not to look stunned. “I - I suppose you’re right.”

“But now you’re free to pair up with Sirius,” she pointed out, “You four can all sit together and… cause trouble, I’m sure.”

“Yeah,” James nodded numbly, “It’ll be brilliant.”

“Or something.”

“Or something,” he repeated.

Lily smiled and turned to go sit with Marlene.

James stared after her with a stupid expression on his face.

“C’mon, Prongs,” Sirius said, reaching over and pulling James over by his cloak, “The pretty thing walked away, time to do the same.”

They took a seat in the back, the four of them gathered about a table. Peter was wringing his hands. Remus reached over and gently put his palm over Peter’s hands to calm their movement, “It’s alright, Pete,” he whispered, “I’ll bet he’s not so bad once you get to know him.”

“I hope so,” Peter whimpered.

The room had been redone nearly completely since Professor Vablatsky had last been there. Everything was clean and the tables were surrounded by squat three-legged stools now instead of cushions as they’d been before. Gone were the sashes and scent of incense. The quirkiness of the room was now in the collection of clocks that stood on rows and rows of shelves lining the front wall of the room. Dozens and dozens of clocks, maybe even hundreds, all ticking out of sync with one another so that the sound was more of a low drone than a bunch of ticks and clicks, all the clocks shaped differently, with various faces. Some without any numbers at all. James looked over all the different clocks.

“Blimey, he’s got quite a collection, huh?” he whispered.

Sirius nodded.

A large house-shaped clock suddenly made a loud CUCKOO! sound and a bird shout out on a spring. At the moment it cuckooed, a curtained off doorway in the left corner of the room swept open and the haggard old man hobbled through, clutching his funny cane that looked like a great many trees roots had entwined together. He swept the floor with the cane, feeling his way along as he walked. Everyone in the room was silent, watching as he moved to a table in the front where Professor Vablatsky’s desk had once stood. The table was covered with a dark blue cloth, dotted with shiny silver stars, and in the center of it was a great glass orb, sitting on a wooden pedestal. Mopsus moved slowly over and lowered himself onto the squat stool, his hands shaking on the cane, his milky blank eyes staring into thin air.

“Aren’t we a quiet bunch,” he murmured. “Here I thought I was teaching a brood of fourth years. I’ve never heard teenagers be so silent in my life. Are you still there?”

A nervous chuckle rippled through the room.

“Ah… yes… there you are.”

“What’s he planning on doing with that crystal ball, exactly?” Sirius snickered quietly, “It’s not like he can see anything in it.” James looked at Sirius with a smirk.

Mopsus smiled. “Mr. Black,” he said, and Sirius looked up in surprise, “The inner eye does not rely on physical vision. The crystal does not need to be viewed to be seen.”

Sirius blinked in surprise. His voice had certainly not been loud enough for Mopsus to have heard across the room. He glanced at James with wildly questioning eyes. James shrugged.

“Mopsus sees all,” the old man said in a low, trembling voice.

Several of the students in the room started murmuring to one another.

Professor Mopsus lifted his hands from where he’d rested them on his lap and laid them upon the crystal ball, his bony old fingers spreading out so that he clasped the ball in his palms, working his fingertips as though giving the orb a massage. He felt and prodded and murmured under his breath, a sort of chanting song that sounded as though it were in another language. It was eerie, to say the least, and many of the students in the room shifted uncomfortably, including Lily Evans, who was very creeped out by the old man. She clutched the table before her, her palms a bit sweaty and looked at Marlene with a frightened expression. Suddenly, the old man stopped his chanting and he whispered, “Ah… yes… Here we are.” He paused a very long time and he closed the lids of his eyes, which then fluttered as his hands gripped tight at the orb.

Everyone waited with bated breath.

“We shall be covering crystal reading in this class,” he said lowly, “Over the term, you’ll learn how to see what the crystal speaks of, and feel the future like you would feel the memory of a touch, as though tangible still… Ah there are great changes in all of your futures, the time of life is upon you as you grow to be men and women - no longer children… In November, we shall lose one among us. Come December, two will join together that are today apart. Come February, a truth shall be known that is currently unknown, and in May, destinies shall be decided by the outcome of a test amongst four souls. Two shall pass and two shall fail, despite equal odds for each. Are there any questions?”

The students looked amongst each other. Were there any questions? Of course there were questions! Loads of questions! So many questions that stacked one upon the other they might reach the moon! Was this old wizard truly asking if there were any questions?

James raised his hand, then realized there was no point of it - the Professor couldn’t see him lift it anyway, he reckoned - and so he simply said, aloud, “Who are the four souls?”

“I cannot say,” Mopsus replied.

“Then how do we know you’re telling us the truth?” Sirius asked.

“Mopsus sees all,” the old wizard answered.

Remus cleared his throat, “According to Professor Vablatsky, a true seer is always able to produce evidence of their authenticity, which will enable the listeners of their prophecies to know the seers are true. What evidence do you have, sir?”

Sirius reached over Peter’s head to high-five Remus.

Mopsus was quiet a moment, nodding, and then he said, “Mr. Lupin, you ask for evidence that Mopsus sees all?”

“Yes, sir,” he answered, “If you please.”

Mopsus breathed deeply, then, “That book on your desk before you. The one you share with Mr. Black. It is used. You purchased it at Flourish & Blotts for a discounted price in July. The 14th, to be exact. Please open the front cover.”

Everyone was looking at Remus as he reached forward and opened the cover. James, Peter, and Sirius leaned closer to see. Remus stared down at the book. “Alright, then. It’s opened.”

“Good. Now… please direct your attention to the list of former owners on left there… the very bottom one is a name… and that name belongs to a person whom you knew quite well.”

The hair on the back of Remus’s neck had raised. Whatever were the odds? Of all the textbooks in all of the world… of all the used copies of Gazing Into The Orb that Flourish & Blotts had had on their shelves… Sirius had managed to pick up this one particular book.

The name was indeed scrawled there in a red ink quill, messy hand, with a very distinct hook to the lettering that was easy to recognize...

Derek Bell.

James’s eyes widened.

“That person is dead.”

“...yes sir…” Remus murmured.

“That person’s spirit is strong here at Hogwarts,” Mopsus commented. James looked around wildly, as though expecting to see Derek Bell’s ghost come floating through the way Nearly Headless Nick would do, his heart a great lump in his throat, both terrified of seeing Derek and excited at the prospect of it. “His memory is well honored,” the seer said.

“The Bell Towers,” whispered Peter.

Mopsus hummed lowly. “I see, too, that she who has slain this spirit… She will be forever your enemy. It is at this woman’s hand that through the veil will fall your love.”

“Excuse me?” Remus stared at Mopsus.

“Mopsus sees all.”

Murmurs went up - nobody had any idea what the bloody hell the old man was talking about.

“Does the name in the book appease your request for evidence?” Mopsus questioned.

“I - yes, I suppose so, sir, but…”

“The prophecy is but a thing to know, upon which you shall take refuge one day, knowing today I can see it happening, the future already decided there… It is not your fault.”

Remus looked at the other boys.

Sirius was staring at Mopsus, as was Peter, who was literally chewing his fingernails off with nervousness.

“Mopsus sees all,” the Professor repeated. “Now, each of you, collect a crystal from the box in the back of the room and open your textbooks to page two-hundred-seven and we shall begin to learn the mysteries of the future.”

Numbly, Remus got up and followed James, Sirius, and Peter across the room to the box of orbs, each collecting a crystal and a stand and carrying them back to their seats, everyone stealing glimpses at Remus Lupin, just as curious as he was about what the prophecies the old man had spoken meant.

“I don’t think I like him anymore now than I did before,” whispered Peter as he selected a crystal from the box, looking up at Remus.

“I don’t reckon that I do either,” Remus replied.