"I am a dryad, a tree sprite, a spirit of a single tree. All the trees in the wood have spirits, but they have been asleep for ages and ages, seeped down into the earth, almost diminished. Until now. The naiads and dryads have been awakened, though we know not why. Those few humans that once communed with the trees are gone and forgotten. Our time is past. Yet we are summoned."

        "Who summoned you?" James asked.

        "We have not been able to know that, despite our greatest efforts. There is disharmony among us. Many trees remember only the saw of man, not his replanting. They are old and angry, wishing only to do harm to the world of men. They have gone over. You have experienced their wrath, though not as they would have it."

        "What do you mean they've 'gone over'?" Zane asked, taking half a step closer, squinting at the dryad's beauty. "Is it that place? The island? The… the Hall of Elder's Crossing?"

        "Man's time is short on the earth, but we trees watch the years march past like days. The stars are motionless to you, but we watch and study the heavens as a dance," the dryad said, her voice becoming soft, almost dreamy. "Since our awakening, the dance of the stars has become dire, showing a thousand dark destinies for the world of men, all swinging on the balance of the coming days. Only one possible destiny bears good. The rest are heavy with bloodshed and loss. Great sorrow. Dark times, full of war and greed, powerful tyrants, famines of terror. Much will be determined within the closing of this cycle. We tree folk can only watch, for now, but those of us who remain faithful to the memory of harmony between our world and the world of men, when the time comes, we will help as we can."

        James was almost hypnotized by the dryad's voice, but he felt a rising sense of helplessness and frustration at her words. "But you said there is one chance we can avoid this war. What can we do? How can we make the one good destiny happen?"

        The dryad's face softened. Her large, liquid eyes smiled sadly. "There is no way to predict the path of a single action. It could be that you are already doing that which will bring about peace. It could also be that the very things you do to for good are the things that will result in war. You must do what you know to do, but only with an unclouded mind."

        Zane risked a derisive laugh. "Helpful stuff, there, Sensei."

        "There are greater dangers in the fabric of destinies than you yet know, James Potter," the dryad said, slipping closer to James so that her light played across his face. "The enemy of your father, and of all who know love, is dead. But his blood beats within a different heart. The blood of your greatest enemy lives still."

James felt his knees grow watery. He wobbled, and then threw his hand out, pressing it against a nearby tree for support. "Vol-Voldemort?" he whispered.

        The dryad nodded, apparently unwilling to say the name. "His preferred plan was thwarted forever by your father. But he was infinitely crafty. He prepared a second plan. A successor, a bloodline. The heart of that bloodline beats today, at this moment, not one mile hence."

James' lips were trembling. "Who?" he asked in a barely audible voice. "Who is it?"

        But the dryad was already shaking her head sadly. "We are prevented from knowing. Not from without, but from within. Those trees that have gone over work against us, fog our vision, keep many of us asleep. We can only know of that heartbeat, that it is there, but no more. You must beware, James Potter. Your father's battle is over. Yours begins."

        The dryad was fading. Her eyes slipped shut and even as she drifted into nothingness, she already seemed to be asleep.

There was a creaking groan, then a splash from the island.

        "Well," Zane said with manic cheerfulness, "what say we jump back onto our giant buddy's shoulders and make this place a memory before it does the same to us?"

        The three of them met Titus Hardcastle before they were halfway back to their starting point. His face was like a thunderstorm, but all he said was, "Is everyone safe?"

        "Safe enough," Zane called down from Grawp's shoulders. "But let me tell you, we've had one weird time of it."

        Grawp bent down to allow Hardcastle to climb onto his back. "It's going around, then, isn't it?" Hardcastle grunted.

        Zane held a hand out, intending to help Hardcastle climb up and almost getting yanked from his seat instead. "So what was that thing you were chasing, anyway?" he said, puffing.

        "Spider. One of old Aragog's kin, no doubt. They've grown dumb in the last decade or two, but that one had gone and found himself a toy." Hardcastle held something up, and James saw that it was the little handheld video camera that the intruder had been using on the Quidditch pitch. "It was still working when I caught up to the brute, the little screen all lit up. Got broken when I, er, dispatched the beast. At least it'd had a good last meal."

        James shuddered involuntarily as Grawp began to make his way back through the woods. "You really think it… ate the guy?"

        Hardcastle set his jaw. "Circle of life, James. Strictly speaking, though, spiders don't eat people. They just suck their juices out. Ugly way to go, but at least he's not a problem anymore."

        James didn't say so, but he had a feeling that the real problems were just beginning.

        Wednesday morning, James felt sluggish and prickly as he entered the Great Hall for breakfast. It was a thoroughly glum morning, with a low, bruised sky filling the top portion of the Hall and a fine mist speckling the windows. Ralph and Zane were seated at the Slytherin table, Zane blowing on his traditional morning coffee and Ralph attacking an orange with a butter knife, sawing through it, peel and all. They didn't appear to be talking much. Zane wasn't typically a morning person, and he had been out just as late as James had been. Neither Zane nor Ralph looked up, and James was glad. He was still angry and disgusted with Ralph. Under that, though, he was sad and hurt about the boy's betrayal. He tried not to feel resentment toward Zane for sitting with Ralph, but he was too tired to make much of an effort, and the mood of the morning wasn't helping.

        James made his way to the Gryffindor table, glancing up at the dais as he went. Neither his dad nor Titus Hardcastle were anywhere to be seen. James figured that, despite the lateness of the previous night, they had still risen and breakfasted shortly after dawn and were already about their morning's business. The thought that his dad's and Titus' day was already well underway, probably full of exciting meetings and secret intrigues, while he was just now having breakfast on his way to a day of gloomy classes and homework, filled him with melancholy. He found a seat surrounded by happily babbling Gryffindors, plopped into it, and began to eat methodically, joylessly.