On the morning of Halloween, Harry got up with everyone else and went downstairs to breakfast with them. His mood was terrible, but he still had to pretend everything was normal on the surface.
"We'll bring you loads of sweets back from Honeydukes," said Hermione, feeling very sorry for him. For most young witches and wizards, Hogsmeade was a magical and irresistibly charming place.
"Yeah, loads," Ron chimed in.
Because Harry was so down, he and Hermione had finally forgotten their fight over Crookshanks.
"Don't worry about me," Harry tried to sound casual, though he was bottling up his frustration. "See you at the feast. Have fun!"
He walked with them as far as the entrance hall, where Filch was standing by the main doors with a long list, checking off each person. He squinted suspiciously at every face, watching for anyone who shouldn't be going out.
"Left behind, Potter?"
Malfoy glanced around, noticed that Marcel indeed wasn't there, and then yelled toward Harry—he was standing in the line with Crabbe and Goyle.
"Oh, how pitiful! Poor Potter—"
Crabbe and Goyle burst out laughing with him, all three exactly alike.
Harry ignored them, walked alone up the marble staircase, along the empty corridor, and back to Gryffindor Tower.
"Password?"
At the common room entrance, the Fat Lady yawned from inside the portrait—she'd just woken from a nap.
"Fortuna Major," Harry said dully.
At that moment, though, Marcel was being pulled by the sleeve toward the Ravenclaw tower by Luna.
"...Lady Grey told me about it," she said softly as she tugged him along. "She said it's the easiest passage to Hogsmeade."
"That really is nice," Marcel nodded, letting Luna drag him by the sleeve.
The Ravenclaw bronze eagle-knocker still didn't react to him at all; it just did its usual job.
After Luna answered the knocker's riddle, the two of them slipped through the common room, past shelves and tables, to the back of a large marble statue.
Here there was a small marble platform, jutting from the statue's base. On its smooth surface were a dozen shallow, round depressions that you wouldn't notice if you didn't look closely.
Luna drew her wand and carefully tapped several of the dimples.
At once, lines appeared between those points, connecting into a strange pattern.
"This must be a kind of puzzle too... very Ravenclaw," Marcel thought.
As soon as the pattern formed, Marcel felt a faint vibration under his feet—the marble platform slid aside by itself, revealing an old trapdoor beneath.
As Luna had said, this passageway was not as cramped and oppressive as the others; it was remarkably spacious. They didn't have to hunch at all. In fact, Marcel and Luna could walk side by side.
After they'd gone a short distance, Marcel heard another faint vibration behind them—the marble platform had slid back into place.
The exit of the tunnel lay in a disused basement storeroom in Hogsmeade.
Probably because almost nobody knew about this passage, the storeroom outside the exit was absolutely filthy. The crooked shelves were thick with dust, making anyone want to cover their mouth and nose to avoid choking on the stirred-up grime.
The two of them dodged the dusty shelves and clattered up a creaking wooden staircase into the house above.
It was just as dark and dirty upstairs. Clearly, no one had lived there in a long time.
This house stood at the very end of Hogsmeade's main street, beside the back door of Dervish and Banges. A few more steps on, and you would reach the Hog's Head.
Hogsmeade looked wonderful today.
Though it was still blanketed in snow, and the air on the street was still bitingly cold, the huge jack-o'-lanterns scattered across the snow did a lot to dispel the gloom that the Dementors had brought recently.
Every now and then, they passed enchanted snowmen who were waving the dead branches stuck into their middle section, greeting passing witches and wizards.
"Oh, that's my nose, please give it back—"
As Marcel and Luna passed one such snowman, a carrot rolled to a stop by Marcel's foot.
"Hmm?"
Marcel bent down and picked it up—it had just dropped into the snow and wasn't dirty at all.
"Thanks," the snowman began, but Marcel took a bite. Crunch!
Chewing, he said indistinctly to the spluttering snowman, "Oh, it's very fresh... Happy Halloween, Mr. Snowman."
"Heavens—my nose—" the snowman flapped its twiggy arms in outrage. "Yes, happy Halloween, Mr. Thief!"
"I'll give you a better one." Still holding the carrot in his mouth, Marcel grabbed a handful of snow from the nearby fence and pointed his wand at it.
The lump of snow quickly reshaped itself, and in a moment it had become a crystal-clear, pumpkin-colored "carrot."
Once the transformation was finished, Marcel stuck it into the snowman's face where its nose had been, then immediately pulled it back out again.
"Sorry, upside down."
He tossed the translucent "carrot" up, flipped its direction so the pointed end faced outward, and then plugged it back in.
"Let's make it flash a bit," Marcel added on a whim, tapping the snowman's new nose with his wand. "Tonight, you'll be the most eye-catching snowman around."
To the snowman's amazement, its nose lit up like a bulb, beginning to flash with warm pumpkin-colored light.
Blinking on and off, it looked like a wizarding version of a Muggle neon sign.
"That's beautiful," Luna said, giving a little clap as she watched the snowman's nose.
The snowman tilted its head, then exclaimed happily, "Oh! Thank you! This is much nicer than a carrot! Thank you..."
With the snowman waving madly behind them, Marcel and Luna continued toward Honeydukes—its sweets really were quite good, at least the ones that looked reasonably normal.
"Ding-a-ling"
With a pleasant chime from the doorbell, a wave of heat and noise from inside the shop washed over them.
Honeydukes was always one of the most popular Hogsmeade shops among Hogwarts students, and every Halloween it was packed to bursting with excited young witches and wizards.
The arrival of Marcel and Luna barely drew any attention—the place was just too crowded.
Most students were already tearing into their purchases right there in the shop. Here and there, someone would gobble an ice-pop and suddenly float up off the floor; elsewhere, someone who had clearly eaten some pepper-flavored sweet was coughing out thick clouds of black smoke.
One freckled girl was even breathing fire at her friend. By the time the flames died away, the friend's whole face was sooty black.
"Hahaha..."
They laughed together, as if there was nothing at all wrong with this.
In here, everyone's happiness was written plainly on their faces. Those seemingly childish pranks stirred something strange in Marcel.
"Marcel, what's wrong?" Luna brushed his hand lightly and leaned in to ask.
"Hmm? Oh, nothing..." Marcel pulled himself out of that odd feeling and shook his head slightly.
Perhaps that subtle stir wasn't an illusion at all, but a sign—a catalyst. It was telling him very clearly that his emotions still existed.
On that basis, if Dumbledore's story was taken as a reference, then to break this trial, there seemed to be nothing left but passive waiting.
"...Marcel?"
Suddenly, a voice emerged from the crowd. It was Hermione—she and Ron were both there, their arms full of all kinds of sweets.
"Hermione?" Marcel nodded to her, then glanced at the pile of sweets in her arms. "For Harry?"
"Oh, yes," said Hermione, instinctively glancing at Luna beside Marcel. "Harry couldn't come today, so Ron and I are bringing lots back for him... and this is?"
"Luna Lovegood, Ravenclaw," Ron cut in.
Marcel looked at Ron, then nodded again.
"Yes, this is Luna—my friend," he said. "We met before first year started."
"Oh, that's nice... Hello, I'm Hermione—Hermione Granger."
"...Hello."
Luna, looking a little dreamy, answered while staring at Hermione.
For some reason, the air felt slightly awkward.
"Well, could you give us a tour of the sweets here? Ron, I remember you're very good at that," Marcel said, patting Ron's arm.
Ron perked up at once. "Then you definitely can't miss these... come on!"
With Ron leading the way, the four of them plunged into the crowd.
Before long, Marcel and Luna were also loaded down with sweets. After bidding goodbye to Hermione and Ron, the two of them left the shop.
Behind them, Hermione and Ron stood in the doorway of Honeydukes, watching their backs.
"Fred and George say Lovegood gets called 'Loony' all the time," Ron said quietly. "She and Marcel walk together so often that no one dares call her that to her face. But apparently, she's pretty well-liked in Ravenclaw."
"'Loony'?" Hermione looked puzzled.
"You saw it too," Ron went on. "She always wears weird clothes, goes around preaching those odd ideas of hers... and in some ways, she seems a bit detached from reality. Her sense of what counts as normal behavior is really strange."
"It's not very nice to talk about someone like that!" Hermione scolded.
"Oh, yeah... but everyone's saying it behind her back," Ron muttered defensively.
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