CH 233

He quickly grabbed his mobile phone, gave his loyal sooty owl some owl treats, and made his way back outside, before shooting of again into the mountains where the reception would be horrible, but the magic would be low.

He punched in the phone number and waited.

The phone rang.

PC Woodman, currently serving the graveyard duty for ogling the Inspector's wife longer than was polite, stared at the mobile phone in the evidence rack behind his desk in shock and disbelief.

He quickly picked up his own phone and punched a number in. "Hey, Robert?"

"Charles! Curtis' phone — the one to Malfoy — it's ringing!"

There was a sharp intake of breath. "Don't pick it up! Just leave it for the moment. I'll be there in two."

His connection clicked dead, and all the while the phone continued to ring.

PC Woodman stared at the ringing phone in bewilderment. The arrest of Curtis' and a good chuck on Britain's drug dealing elite had been all over the national news and in all the papers. What kind of hole would someone have to live in to not know that?

Harry stared at the phone in mild annoyance. Curtis usually picked up pretty sharpish. Hopefully someone hadn't muscled in on his business while he'd been out of it. That would be awkward, but at least he'd have the philosopher's stone project in backup. Despite the great relationship he had with the Boneslicer Clan, he still didn't fancy testing how friendly they'd stay if he stopped paying his debts.

He punched the number into the device and tried again.

Click.

Finally.

"Hey, Malfoy," said the gruff voice Harry easily identified as Curtis Lawless from the other side, "that you?"

"Yes, Mister Lawless, it is me."

"Christ mate, thank god you called. I've had it up to 'ear with this lot. Listen, we need a whole lot of ships from you, understand? You can do it right?"

"Yes, I can do it. I have seventy kilos in my safe house, but I'm going to guess you need, what? Thirty-five?"

"Thirty-five is good — same rates as before."

Harry raised a single, slightly surprised eyebrow. "Sounds good on this end. Same meeting place as usual? 2:00am next Wednesday?"

"Yeah, alright. My boys will see you there."

"Right."

The phone clicked dead. Harry smiled, pocketed the phone, flew back to Hogsmeade, deposited the phone back on his desk, and flew back to the shrieking shack, to be met by a happy and bubbly Daphne who'd just managed to get the floating eyeball to zoom around the room and turn invisible on command.

As he happily waved good night to the girls at the entrance to the Slytherin dormitories, and climbed into his comfortable four poster bed, he couldn't help think that things were going really quite acceptably.

"Granger."

Draco Malfoy had wondered if the mudblood meeting was a regular event and it turned out he'd been right. He had the mudblood princess boxed into the room again, and this time, he'd made sure to have Crabbe and Goyle on the other side of the door, holding it shut against all attempts to leave. Victory last time had tasted sweet. Victory this time, would be a full course banquet.

"Heir Malfoy," Granger said, looking at him nervously, fiddling with her beautifully crafted trunk before shrinking and pocketing it, and causing a slight tinge of jealousy to pass through him. No. He shook his head. Not jealousy — anger — yes, that's right anger that someone so unworthy was allowed to possess such valuable artefacts.

He smirked. She looked like a trapped animal, the way her eyes flittered to the exit, the way she stood, the way she breathed. How good would she look in a cage? He chuckled and shook his head.

"Might I ask what's so funny?"

"Oh, nothing," he drawled, raising his wand. "just wondering what colour your hair's going to change." And with that, he let loose the first of his spells.

Granger brought up a shield like expected, and it splashed off it. He fired a second spell and again the spell hit the shield and did nothing. But unlike last time, Granger seemed to be making no frantic bolt to the door. Heh. He casually threw a tourettes jinx. All the easier for him.

Then, suddenly, with a flick of her wrist, Granger sent a bright blue spell directly at him.

Shocked, Draco raised a shield of his own and the spell splashed off of it. "Granger!"

"What?" Granger took a step forward and suddenly Draco noticed that her whole stance had changed. Gone was the nervousness, the darting eyes, the bent stance — instead she stood like a jungle cat getting ready to pounce.

"Y-you can't! You'll get into trouble!"

"Oh, Malfoy." Granger tilted her head to the side. "That was last week."

An orange spell splashed off his shield.

"That was a soprano jinx," Granger said, as though she were answering a question in class. "It raises the tone of your voice to almost a squeak."

A fluorescent pink spell was next. Draco cringed.

"That was a rapunzel jinx — causes your hair to grow a foot a minute until it wears off." Draco felt his shield weaken as a bright orange spell hit it. Damn how powerful was Granger?

"And that one," Granger said with an almost demented grin, "was the oedipus jinx…

Draco gave her a look of horror.

"Oh, I see you know what that one does," she said sweetly. "I'm sure the world will love to know how much you think about your Mummy, Heir Malfoy."

And suddenly Draco didn't have time to do anything but shield and try to cast offensive spells wherever he could, which wasn't often.

A soprano spell clipped him through his shield and he gave a little squeaky yelp while barely managing to side step an unknown rainbow beam of magic. He sweated. This was a mistake. A bad mistake.

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