The New Students 2/4

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The three turned to see the speaker, a tall, painfully thin man with watery brown eyes peering out behind abnormally thick glasses. His dark hair lay slickly against his narrow skull, and the paleness of his skin spoke of only a passing acquaintance with the sun. Dust specks covered his dark suit, turning it grey, and his shoes were scuffed with mud. Yet silver bracelets and a choker necklace belied his poverty. He carried a backpack slung carelessly over one stopped shoulder.

"Um, hello," said Hermione, thrusting out her hand. "I'm Hermione, and these are my friends, Harry and Ron. We've just come today, and... So, there are people here who might be upset by a floating trunk?"

"I'm sure they've seen much worse. Not to worry about the mundanes, of course. They ignore anything they can't understand. But one good breeze, and your trunk will be in New Jersey." He took Hermione's hand and kissed the back of it. "I'm Charles Dexter Ward, named for a distant relative on my father's side. I'm a student in the Mythos Department, and I TA the basic freshman course. And I'm available for private tutoring."

His eyes lingered on her face and his hand lingered on her wrist.

"She doesn't need private tutoring," Ron said hotly. "She's smarter than anybody here."

"Then she's smart enough to decide if she wants private tutoring," he replied smoothly.

Hermione shook her hand free. "So what should we do about our trunks?"

"You could leave them in the dining hall," Charles said, gesturing to the shabby building in front of them. "Though I don't know what, shape, they would be in when you returned. But if we take the tunnels across campus, you can float your trunks without fear there."

"Tunnels, tunnels," Hermione said suddenly. She shoved her guidebook into Harry's hands and rummaged in her pocket, pulling out a roll of parchment. "I've got a map of the tunnels – and there's an entrance right over there." She pointed to a vacant lot down the street.

"Where did you get that?" Ron asked, leaning over to peer at it.

Hermione rolled up the map before Ron could get a glimpse. "A gift from one of our old teachers. He spent some time here."

The three new students and Charles set off down the street, dragging their trunks behind them. Ron took the float spell off of his trunk, but then, at Hermione's suggestion, added wheels. It was such a good idea that soon all three trunks were creaking along. Before they reached the vacant lot, however, they passed by a large, sprawling building whose front was covered with ramps which seemed to go nowhere, and stairs which headed off in directions which no human could traverse. Windows and walls thrust out at unnatural angles, and strange green plants crawled up the walls. A scent of salt-water hung about the place, as if newly arisen from the sea floor, and from within its dark-limned doors came the hushing sound of rolling waves. Two great statues guarded the front entrance, each a behemoth formed of grey stone, with giant, flaccid faces stretched across the bulging monstrosity of their bodies. Wrinkled flesh pooled about trunk-like limbs, which ended in giant, flattened feet. "Shoggoth" was carved on the stone situated beneath each lumpish body.

"What is that place?" Hermione asked, all too eager to move on.

"The new art gallery," Charles explained. "I think. I don't know of anyone who has gone in, and come back out."

"Let's go," Ron said quickly.

But Harry was staring at the building, as if mesmerized. One hand had stopped half-way to his forehead, as if he started to rub it, and then forgotten.

Hermione reached up and tugged on his arm. "We've got to get out of here," she said.

"Oh, right." But Harry frowned. "I just can't figure out why they'd have statues of my cousin here."

***

The vacant lot looked extremely vacant, with wild grass growing between skeletal trees, and a low mound of charred wood in the center of a ring of grey stone. A pile of broken brick and stone huddled off to one side, and a thicket of thorns crouched against the windward side. Hermione consulted her map again, and pointed to the pile of bricks. "Under those."

Harry and Ron poked around the thorns and bricks, and finally found a wooden cover to a well. Spiral steps had been carved into the wall of the well, and the walls glowed with a faint, green light. Footsteps and scrabbles echoed up from the depths, and a stench of mold and refuse oozed out.

"Are you sure we want to go that way?" Ron asked.

Charles looked up at the mournful sky, where dark clouds scuttled and twisted like leaves in a storm. "I think it's going to rain," he said quietly.

"The tunnels are safe," Hermione pronounced, tucking her map away again. She pulled her trunk over to the well, then tapped it make it float behind her down the steps. Halfway in she turned back to her companions. "Well? Are you coming?"

"Of course," all three young men said together, and jostled to be the first to follow.