James Potter and the Curse of the Gatekeeper

        'Make him repairrr meeee…,' the portrait screamed in its thin, insectile voice. 'Do it, Luciussssss! Make him repairrr meeeeee…'

        'It will be his pleasure, my Lord,' the pale man smiled, looking up at Forge, his eyes wet, glistening.

        'M-my Lord?' Gregor said, as if shocked to hear the decimated portrait speak so clearly. 'You remain! But we thought…'

        'It matterssss not!' the portrait of Voldemort cried. 'The Gatekeeper isss descended! The work of our forefather is at hand! Vennngeance!'

        Gregor seemed hopelessly at a loss by this sudden change of events. 'But… but how will we find it, my Lord?'

        'Weeee will not…,' the portrait hissed. The sound of its broken voice flapped a shred of the canvas. Forge dreaded the sight of the horrible thing, dreaded what they were going to make him do to it. But he dreaded most what he knew it was going to say next.

        The painting sighed deeply and said, on the exhale, 'It will find ussss…'

1. ENDINGS AND BEGINNINGS

'C ome on, James!' Albus cried, hopping impatiently. 'Let me give it a try. Nobody will tell!' 'You know I can't, you Skrewt,' James replied calmly, swinging a leg over his Thunderstreak. 'You're underage. You'll just have to learn in school like everybody else does.' He kicked off, leaning forward so that the broom rocketed out over the garden.

        'You just want me to look as much a fool as you did on a broom your first year!' Albus called, running after his brother. 'It won't work! I'm gonna be brilliant! I'll fly circles around you, you watch!'

        James smiled as the wind whipped through his hair. He pulled up and banked, circling back toward Albus. Albus stopped, frowning, and ducked as James flew past, tousling his younger brother's hair.

        James hugged his broom and climbed into a streaking corkscrew, pulling up into the blue dome of the sky. Below, the Burrow spun lazily, casting its shadow out over the garden and the nearby fields. James drew a deep breath of the rushing air, and then dipped his broom, pulling it to a sudden, practiced stop. He knew he shouldn't show off in front of his brother, but he was quite proud of his increasing skills. His dad had been working with him over the summer, and James had become cautiously confident that he'd make the House team this year after all.

        'About time, Potter,' Ted called, swinging in next to James on his old but well-maintained Nimbus 2000. 'Three-on-three is hard enough, even with experienced players. You'll need to play Beater and Seeker. Just keep an eye on Angelina. She'll let you think she's delicate as a flower until she drafts you into a tree. George is playing Beater and Keeper as well, so he'll be plenty busy, but his long-range Bludger will still find you if you don't watch it. But the one you've really got to keep an eye on is—'

        Something red and green roared between Ted and James, forcing them into opposite tumbles. James gripped his broom and swung it around, craning to look. His mum spun to a stop and drifted gently over him, grinning, her cheeks flushed and her hair pulled back in a neat ponytail. She was wearing her Holyhead Harpies tunic.

        'What do you think, James? Still fits!'

        James heard the sound of an appreciative whistle behind him. He looked and saw his dad smiling at Ginny, pulling his broom into position thirty feet away.

        'Dad! Mum!' James reproached, stifling a grin. 'Quit it! You're both an embarrassment!'

        Ginny blew a stray hair out of her face. 'You just watch your back out there, love. I may be your mum, but that doesn't mean I won't broadside you to get to the Snitch.' She grinned at him, and then spun on her broom and zoomed to the opposite side of the pitch.

        'She's not serious,' James said, turning to Ted.

        'You better hope not,' Ted answered, watching Ginny fly off. 'I've played against her before, and I tend to think your only hope is that she won't Bludger her own son in the back of the head.'

        'You're a great help,' James said, but Ted had already dropped back into formation.

        'Knock James off his broom, Mum!' Albus yelled from below. James glanced down and saw him standing at the edge of the orchard. Nearby, Lily, Rose, and Hugo sat on a huge tartan blanket, grinning and squinting up into the sunlight. Charlie's twins, Harold and Jules, were perched in a gnarled old oak tree by the barn.

        Rose nudged Lily with her elbow. 'Go for it, Aunt Ginny! Knock him flying! You can always have another kid! One with better manners and less stinky feet!'

        'I heard that!' James called down.

        'I should hope so,' Rose said primly, putting her fists on her hips and smiling coquettishly. Lily giggled.

        'Enough, Rose,' Aunt Hermione admonished from a deck chair at the edge of the garden.

        'I'd play on your team, Harry, if I could,' Ron yelled from the chair next to her. 'But three-onthree's the tradition. Maybe somebody will get hurt enough not to play and I'll be able to sub in, eh?'

        Hermione grimaced and scowled at him.

        'What? A guy can hope, can't he?' Ron protested. He looked back up at Harry. 'Looks like we'll have to host an all-out tournament by next year!'

        Harry nodded. 'None of us were kidding when we said we wanted to have enough kids to make a Quidditch team, were we?' he called back.

        Charlie stood in the center of the garden, below the players. He had one foot on the family's bedraggled old Quidditch trunk. He held a Quaffle, yellow with age and grass-stained, in his right hand.

        'The Annual Weasley Family Quidditch Match is now underway!' he boomed, grinning. 'I want to see a mean match. I want to see plenty of blagging, loads of bumphing, and a good bit of blatching. Any player not bloody by the end of the match will be deemed unfit to remain a Weasley and will have to defect to the Potters. Understood?'

        'Throw the Quaffle or get on a broom, Freckles!' Harry yelled, resulting in a round of laughter and catcalls. Charlie grinned crookedly.

        'Ball up!' he shouted, lobbing the Quaffle and releasing his foot from the Quidditch trunk. The lid exploded open and the balls soared into the air.

        James gulped, gripped his broom, and lunged into the fray.

        Technically, it wasn't James' first Quidditch match. He'd played several matches over the summer with whoever happened to be around. Granted, most of them had been two-on-two matches, sometimes using 'ghost players', which Ted provided from a small box he'd bought from George. Apparently, it was a Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes test product. When the tiny wooden box was opened, it released four Boggarts, all of which had been specially hexed to only take the shapes of famous dead Quidditch players. They looked extremely convincing even if they were a bit transparent. The problem was that the Boggarts didn't have the slightest idea how to play Quidditch; thus, despite their impressive appearance, they tended to simply swoop randomly over the pitch, their arms in the air, making ghostly noises. Also, Bludgers flew right through them.

        'Still,' George had concluded, 'they do add a certain something to a match lacking the right number of players, don't they?'