194 And Durmstrang (2/2)

They stood, shivering slightly now, waiting for the Durmstrang party to arrive. Most people were gazing hopefully up at the sky.

For a few minutes, the silence was broken only by Madame Maxime's huge horses snorting and stamping.

Then, a loud and oddly eerie noise was drifting toward them from out of the darkness: a muffled rumbling and sucking sound, as though an immense vacuum cleaner were moving along a riverbed.

"The lake!" yelled Lee Jordan, pointing down at it. "Look at the lake!"

From their position at the top of the lawns overlooking the grounds, they had a clear view of the smooth black surface of the water - except that the surface was suddenly not smooth at all. Some disturbance was taking place deep in the center; great bubbles were forming on the surface, waves were now washing over the muddy banks - and then, out in the very middle of the lake, a whirlpool appeared, as if a giant plug had just been pulled out of the lake's floor.

What seemed to be a long, black pole began to rise slowly out of the heart of the whirlpool. . . and then Arth saw the mast.

Slowly, magnificently, the ship rose out of the water, gleaming in the moonlight. It had a strangely skeletal look about it, as though it were a resurrected wreck, and the dim, misty lights shimmering at its portholes looked like ghostly eyes. Finally, with a great sloshing noise, the ship emerged entirely, bobbing on the turbulent water, and began to glide toward the bank. A few moments later, they heard the splash of an anchor being thrown down in the shallows, and the thud of a plank being lowered onto the bank.

People were disembarking; they could see their silhouettes passing the lights in the ship's portholes. All of them, Arth noticed, seemed to be built along the lines of bulky American Footballers... but then, as they drew nearer, walking up the lawns into the light streaming from the entrance hall, he saw that their bulk was really due to the fact that they were wearing cloaks of some kind of shaggy, matted fur. But the man who was leading them up to the castle was wearing furs of a different sort: sleek and silver, like his hair.

"Dumbledore!" he called heartily as he walked up the slope. "How are you, my dear fellow, how are you?"

"Blooming, thank you, Professor Karkaroff," Dumbledore replied. Karkaroff had a fruity, unctuous voice; when he stepped into the light pouring from the front doors of the castle they saw that he was tall and thin like Dumbledore, but his white hair was short, and his goatee (finishing in a small curl) did not entirely hide his rather weak chin. When he reached Dumbledore, he shook hands with both of his own.

"Dear old Hogwarts," he said, looking up at the castle and smiling; his teeth were rather yellow, and Harry noticed that his smile did not extend to his eyes, which remained cold and shrewd. "How good it is to be here, how good.. . . Viktor, come along, into the warmth. . . you don't mind, Dumbledore? Viktor has a slight head cold..."

Karkaroff beckoned forward one of his students. As the boy passed, Arth caught a glimpse of a prominent curved nose and thick black eyebrows. It was Krum, international Seeker champion.

As they recrossed the entrance hall with the rest of the Hogwarts students heading for the Great Hall, Arth saw Lee Jordan jumping up and down on the soles of his feet to get a better look at the back of Krum's head.

Several sixth-year girls were frantically searching their pockets as they walked.

"Oh I don't believe it, I haven't got a single quill on me -"

"D'you think he'd sign my hat in lipstick?"

"What shallow girls," said Scarlett with a look of distaste.

Arth sighed.

"It's the charm of fame. . . It can entrap almost any young man or woman."

". . . . Even men?"

"Do not underestimate the power of fame."

They walked over to the Slytherin table and sat down. Arth activated his side character aura to the max which allowed for him to be unnoticed as long as he didn't engage a conversation.

The students from Beauxbatons had chosen seats at the Ravenclaw table. They were looking around the Great Hall with glum expressions on their faces. Three of them were still clutching scarves and shawls around their heads.

Viktor Krum and his fellow Durmstrang students had settled themselves at the Slytherin table. Arth could see Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle looking very smug about this. As he watched, Malfoy bent forward to speak to Krum.

"See what I mean." Said Arth with a sigh. "Even Malfoy has fallen head over heels for Krum. Fame is a drug."

"Isn't that saying usually used for people who get addicted to fame?"

"It works both ways Theo."