G. Lippert - JAMES POTTER AND THE VAULT OF DESTINIES

James looked aside at Ralph. "We didn't say Roebitz," he replied in a puzzled voice. "We said Roberts . Can't you hear?"

"Spell it!" Zane demanded, nearly vibrating with excitement.

Ralph sighed, and spelled out the name. Zane's eyes bulged even further.

"It's your accent!" he said, as if to himself. "The English accent! When you say Roberts… it sounds like Roebitz !"

" We don't have any accent," Ralph scowled. "You Americans do."

"Don't you see?" Zane said, pushing James hard enough to nearly knock him off the stone wall. "Magnussen spoke with the same accent you two do! He never approved of the country's break from England and insisted on speaking the same way you Brits do! He called it 'the King's English', remember?"

James' own eyes began to widen slowly. "In the Disrecorder vision," he said, "when Franklyn was explaining Magnussen's riddles, he imitated Magnussen's accent! We didn't recognize it, though since Franklyn's an American. We heard it wrong because we didn't recognize that he was mimicking the way Magnussen spoke . He didn't say 'Roebitz' at all!"

Ralph finished the thought for all of them. "He said Roberts," the big boy breathed in a low voice, glancing at his friends. "The Nexus Curtain… lies within the eyes of Roberts !"

All three boys stared at one another, dumbstruck. Slowly, they all turned toward the ruin behind them, looking up over the broken bits of garden wall and the weed-choked stairs toward the remains of the grand façade. The lintel over the door still bore the engraved name of the original owner: 'ROBERTS'.

In front of this, jutting crookedly up out of the tall grass, just as always, was the statue of the man himself, his stern face weathered with age, his wand held purposely at his side.

"The eyes of Roberts," James said quietly, suddenly flush with adrenaline.

"It can't be that easy," Ralph muttered, shaking his head. "Can it?"

"Only one way to find out," Zane said, jumping down from the stone wall and clapping his hands together. "Whaddaya say, Ralph? Feel like giving me a little boost?"

Three minutes later, James stood in the shadow of the statue of Roberts, peering up at Zane as he stood atop Ralph's shoulders, struggling to reach the back of the statue's head.

"It's a good thing this thing's pedestal is mostly buried in the dirt," Ralph grunted. "Otherwise we'd never be able to reach the top of it."

"There're holes in the back of the head!" Zane called down. "Two of them, side by side, see? Push me up a little higher, Ralph."

"I'm pushing as high as I can," Ralph groaned, struggling to stand on tiptoes. "What do you see?"

"Nothing," Zane said, his voice muffled as he pressed his eyes to the back of the statue's head. "The holes go all the way through the statue, right out the eyes, as far as I can tell. But there isn't anything inside here at all."

James frowned, and then a burst of inspiration struck him. "Can you see through the front?" he called up. "Like, what if the secret isn't literally in his eyes. What if it's what he's looking at?"

Zane was silent for a moment as he struggled to line up his own eyes with the holes in the back of the statue's head. Finally, he shook his head.

"No good," he replied. "It's all blurry. I can't line up the holes, somehow. It's like being totally near-sighted."

"Hurry it up," Ralph grunted. "Your heels are like anvils. How can a skinny little prat like you weigh so bloody much?"

"Wait a minute!" James said suddenly. "I've got an idea!"

Swiftly, he dropped his knapsack and unzipped it. He dug for several seconds and finally retrieved something from the bag's recesses.

"Here," he said, jumping up and turning to Ralph. "Hand these up to him."

"Your glasses?" Ralph frowned, glancing at the object in his hands. "You're serious?"

"It could work!" James insisted. "Just hand them up to him!"

"Let's see 'em, Ralph," Zane called down, reaching. "You never know. James is due for a good idea one of these times."

Ralph reached up and handed the glasses off to Zane. Carefully, Zane stretched up again, wrapping his arm around the statue's neck and pushing the glasses onto the stony face.

"Uh oh," he said suddenly.

"What!?" James called.

"I heard a crack," the blonde boy called back. "I think ol' Roberts has a bigger head than you, James. I think he broke the nose of your specs. Sorry."

James sighed. "I have a spare," he said, rolling his eyes. "Can you see any better?"

Zane pressed his eyes to the back of Roberts' carved head again. There was a long, tense moment as he adjusted the glasses and struggled to pull himself into position. He was nearly riding piggyback on the statue's leaning back now.

"It works!" he finally announced. "Sorta."

"What do you mean 'sorta'?" Ralph asked.

Zane adjusted the spectacles on the statue's face again. "Well," he called down, "I can see through Roberts' eyes all right. The glasses work almost like a telescope. It's just that there isn't much to see. At least, not anything that's very helpful."

"What is it?" James demanded, nearly hopping with impatience.

"Roberts seems to just be staring straight down the mall toward Administration Hall," Zane replied, still peering through the back of the statue's head. "He's looking right at the front doors, in fact. They're propped open, so I can see right through the main corridor. Hey! There's Albus and Lucy! Probably going to get an early dinner."

James shook his head. "That can't be the secret entrance to the Nexus Curtain. We've been in there a hundred times."

"Well, that's what's in the eyes of Roberts," Zane called back. "Maybe we should go snoop around in there a little more. Who knows what might be—" He stopped suddenly and pressed himself harder against the back of the statue's head, frowning slightly.

" What ?" Ralph asked impatiently. "What might be what?"

"Hold on," Zane said. "Someone's opening up the doors on the other end of the main corridor now. I can see straight through the whole building. Cool."

James waited. He knew what was on the other end of the campus, behind Administration Hall. Victory Hill was the honorary home of every year's Clutchcudgel tournament winner. According to tradition, the night of the final match was marked by the magical March of the Houses, when the winning team's residence would magically arise from its cellar and circle the campus, coming to rest on the permanent foundation atop the hill near Pepperpock Down. Unfortunately, Zane himself had not witnessed a March of the Houses, nor had anyone else for the past ten years or so, since Team Werewolf had handily won the Clutchcudgel tournament for over a decade, thus holding onto that position of honor.

"It's just Ares Mansion," Zane called down. "I can only see the base of it through the back of Administration Hall, up on Victory Hill. Man, I hate those guys."

"Is that it?" Ralph asked, exasperated.

"That's it," Zane replied. "Just the foundation up on Victory Hill with that big mausoleum house of theirs sitting on top of it. The only part that's really visible is the cornerstone with that weird little 'U' engraved on it."

James frowned. "Weird little 'U'?"

"Yeah," Zane sighed. "On the cornerstone of the permanent foundation, there's just this odd symbol like a little letter 'U'. Nobody knows what it stands for. 'University' maybe? Or 'U are here'?"

James narrowed his eyes very thoughtfully. "Are you certain…," he asked slowly, "that it's a 'U'?"