Harry Potter & The Thousand Mysteries

13/?

Double, double, Toil and Trouble

Harry walked slowly down the marble staircase and into the Entrance Hall, where Professor Janney was standing, talking quietly in Ron’s ear.

‘Who’d you get?’ asked Ron eagerly, as Harry was engulfed in light. The torches that lit the Hall were only starting to relight. The doors, Harry noticed, had been fixed quickly.

‘Lupin, Sprout, Moody and Dumbledore,’ said Harry, almost embarrassed.

‘You got Dumbledore! And Moody! Oh God, Harry!’ said Ron. ‘I got Gilderoy and Flitwick duelled with me. I put the Impediment Curse on him and ran- he’s too good.’

Hermione came in the doors from the Great Hall. ‘I got Flitwick and Rita Skeeter!’ she exclaimed ecstatically.
’History repeats itself,’ said Harry dryly.

Dumbledore entered at that moment with a crowd of other phoney Death Eaters. He winked at Harry.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ called Professor Janney, getting everyone’s. ‘Congratulations. It took you just under three hours to rid the school of fifteen Death Eaters…’

‘No, it didn’t,’ said Snape, pulling his mask off triumphantly, the silky, sneering patronizing grin Harry had come to hate plastered smugly across his vile, sallow face. ‘Not one of them caught me.’

‘Stupefy!’ said Harry lazily, and Snape slumped to the floor. Everyone laughed.

‘Finite Incantatem,’ said Janney, resuscitating the Potions professor. ‘They got you there, Severus.’ Snape smiled thinly.

‘Hardly. Ten points from Gryffindor for attacking a teacher, Potter.’ The smiles were instantly banished from the Gryffindor faces. Dumbledore chuckled.

‘I do love a battle of wits!! You know, I have a good mind to deduct points as well. I think more than one of you saw this as an opportunity to attack your innocent teachers. But, alas, no! I think I’ll add points instead! Fifty should suffice, I think. The other students shouldn’t get to suspicious at that.

‘Now, to bed with you. I have the feeling you’ll all be sleeping in tomorrow morning. Or should I say this morning. And just by the way,’ he called after the retreating Gryffindors. ‘No wild parties this week, eh?’ Everyone looked at Dumbledore as if he’d told them all they were being executed at dawn.

‘Please, dear children’ he said, looking at them through his twinkling blue eyes, emanating a light of their own. ‘Teachers do notice things! Goodnight!’ He turned around, and began to chat cheerily with Professor Lupin and Rita Skeeter.

‘A word, Ron, if you please,’ called Professor Janney, looking excited, and the other pupils made their way up to Gryffindor Tower, tired and silent.

‘Double, double, toil and trouble,

‘Fire burn and Cauldron bubble!’ The fifth year History of Magic class chanted.

‘Fillet of a fenny snake,’ Hermione said, pretending to stir a cauldron at the front of the classroom. ‘In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg and howlet's wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble,’

‘Double, double, toil and trouble,

‘Fire burn and cauldron bubble!’ The class chanted once more.

‘Excellent,’ said Professor Binns, the History of Magic teacher told the class in his usual drone, as Hermione returned to her seat. The class were studying Macbeth, as part of their project on the changing attitudes towards witchcraft and magic throughout time in muggle society.

‘Shakespeare is clearly trying to promote an idea of witches in Act IV, just as he did in the opening scene. What ideas does he promote, and why does he do this? Complete a short essay by Friday explaining your answers to that question.’ He floated off through the blackboard.

‘Here, read this,’ said Hermione, thrusting a letter into Harry’s hand. ‘Don’t let anyone see.’

Harry unfolded the letter, and began to read.

Obscurus Books

18^A Diagon Alley

London

Dear Ms. Granger,

An Appraisal of OWL Course Education

We are delighted to inform you that your book will be on the shelves in Flourish & Blotts by Friday 24^th December.

We thank you for choosing Obscurus as your publishing company. We will be requesting 9.5% of the royalties, which at present estimates would appear to be upwards of 2,000 Galleons per annum. You will receive approximately 14,000 Galleons, divided up at monthly intervals throughout the year. This will double if Hogwarts adds it to it’s Student Booklist, and reports indicate this is imminent.

Once again, we are very happy doing business with you,

Your humble and obedient servant

Matilda Gilchrist

Obscurus Books

‘Oh, Hermione,’ said Harry, drawing her into a tight hug. When they withdrew from each other, it felt uneasy. Neither of them had brought up their encounter in the hallway two nights ago during the Simulation.

‘Fourteen thousand Galleons!’ she exclaimed, ‘I’ll have to buy you a present with that.’

‘What is it?’ asked Ron.

Hermione looked at Harry in anguish. She breathed deeply, before looking Ron square in the eyes.

‘Ron, please don’t laugh, or tell anyone, but I wrote a book, and it’s getting published on Christmas Eve. Read this.’ She shoved the letter under his nose.

Ron read the letter, looking up every so often, and then grabbed Hermione in a tight hug.

‘Hermione, you’re so clever! I can’t believe that you would do this! You’re going to be so rich! What’ll you spend the money on? Will you write a new book?’

‘Ron! I’m so glad you’re not making fun of me or anything,’ said Hermione, her voice at an unusually high pitch.

‘Laugh at you? Moi? Come on, Hermione, I’m keeping in with you! How else am I going to pass my exams.’

Hermione laughed deeply, throwing her head back.

‘Listen, I’ve got to go see McGonagall,’ said Harry. (He hadn’t told Hermione or Ron about his animagus transformations)

‘Yeah, bye,’ said Hermione, still looking at Ron.

‘Seeya,’ said Ron, again ignoring him.

‘I’ll just go then, shall I?’ said Harry.

Both of them ignored him.

Harry started the long climb up the staircase at the top of the South Tower, which ascended up thirteen stories. As he walked up, he couldn’t help but feel a little sad. He was glad Ron and Hermione were getting on well, but he couldn’t help but feel disheartened just a tad. After the escapade between Hermione and himself during the scenario, he thought they might… do something. It seemed Hermione wanted to do something with Ron instead. Oh, well. As he climbed the last few steps of the South Tower, he finally admitted into himself that he had feelings for Hermione.

I want you to try and run, Potter,’ said McGonagall. They were, once again, going over animigus transfigurations. Harry was starting to feel quite bored of it now- it was very draining. It did keep him very fit. Now that he thought of it, Hermione had been looking very fit recently as well. She was quite strong, for a girl of her age. So was Ron, thought Harry, in a less positive way.

He unfurled his wings, and opened his beak. He tried to speak, but all that came out was a choking sound.

‘Stop, stop!’ said McGonagall. ‘Sing, Potter, use you phoenix apparatus, not your human voice box, which, you simply must remember, doesn’t exist anymore.’

Harry opened his mouth again, and after a few breaths finally produced a long, quavering note. He felt his insides vibrate as it resonated throughout the room.

Professor McGonagall sat back in a chair.

‘Potter,’ she said, slowly. ‘You may never hear me say this again, so I suggest you listen closely.’ She eyed the red and gold phoenix standing on the ground beadily. ‘You really are a most excellent student.’

Harry changed back to his human form with a pop. He didn’t realise it at the time, but it was actually quite painless. In the last few lessons, it had all seemed to come together. Everything slotted nicely into place, and he was finally getting a hold of the whole animagus malarkey.

‘What?’ he asked. McGonagall wasn’t the type to shower one with praise.

‘The way you have focused yourself during these training sessions is exemplary. You have shown you clearly have the knack for transfiguration, and have excelled further than I would have thought possible in this area…’ The door bursting open cut her off, however, and Albus Dumbledore appeared in the doorway.

‘Minerva,’ he said, his eyes without the twinkle they three nights ago, at the end of the simulation. ‘We’ve got a situation. We’re all meeting in my office in two minutes. Harry, you come too.’

He turned around, and McGonagall followed him swiftly out the door. Harry followed, trying to keep up.

They walked through the school towards the large gargoyle that guarded the entrance to Dumbledore’s office silently. McGonagall and Dumbledore both looked very sombre.

‘Parrot Pasties,’ said Dumbledore, and the gargoyle leapt to life. Another from Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes, thought Harry, somewhere in the depths of his brain.

Dumbledore hurried up the staircase, and opened the door to his office. The first thing Harry heard was an excited babble of talking breaking out.

Dumbledore walked through the front room, which was filled with people talking through makeshift fireplaces to heads, and people hurriedly scribbling notes on paper. There was a deafening din of hurried chatter.

‘Minerva, Severus, Claudia, Remus, Harry,’ he called, and the four teachers and Harry looked up at him. ‘My office, please.’ They followed him in.

‘We have a situation,’ said Dumbledore, closing the door with a snap. No sooner was it shut than it was pushed open, and one of the people whom Harry didn’t recognise handed Dumbledore a sheet of parchment.

‘Arthur Weasley just gave us this, sir,’ he said, and shut the door.

Dumbledore perused the letter, before crumpling it up and throwing it in the waste-paper basket.

‘It is as I suspected,’ he said, sighing sadly. ‘About an hour ago, a source at the Ministry set me an urgent message informing me that the three hundred and fifty two muggles who disappeared along with the GNER Paddington to Glasgow Central 11.54 train on the 2^nd September had been found.’

‘That’s excellent, Albus!’ exclaimed McGonagall.

‘No, it’s not, Minerva,’ he corrected her. ‘They were all dead- particularly horrible deaths which I’d rather not go into at the moment- apart from one. It was a small child who boarded the train at York, a Gustav Gimmerman. He survived just long enough to give us this message.’ Dumbledore picked a piece of white, muggle paper off his desk and read it aloud.

‘The man with red eyes says that if Dumbledore doesn’t hand Potter to him, then he will strike again.’

Professor Janney let out a gasp, and Professor McGonagall clutched her chest. Lupin sighed. Harry heard Snape curse under his breath.

‘That’s not all,’ continued Dumbledore. ‘We received a further message later this afternoon. The aeroplane, which vanished in Aberdeen, was also found, a mere ten minutes after the first discovery. The passengers inside the plane, which was in perfect condition, were in the last stages of dying. The intestines of every person on board were found in the luggage compartment, apart from Eilidh Dunnan, a four-year-old girl from Buchan, who watched her mother, father, brother, two sisters and eighty-three year old grandmother die languishingly. She was being treated for shock at St. Mungo’s, when the medical experts found the Dark Mark branded on her back. The consultant, who was present at the time, told me the Mark began to burn acid green, and burn the poor child’s skin worse than ever. She died of a cardiac arrest five minutes later.

‘The three army helicopters that went missing have just been found,’ he continued, looking disgusted, ‘on the Isle of Drear. The occupants have been torn to pieces and devoured by the resident Hairy MacBoons.

‘Voldemort left one twisted message- a lock of Lily Potter’s hair.’

Harry felt sick and angry. He heard the other teachers gasp. Snape looked slightly green.

How could Voldemort do this, he thought. How could Voldemort do this to two poor children? They had nothing to do with the wizarding world, and yet he killed them.

Harry felt an anger boil up inside him he had never experienced before. This wasn’t dislike, the kind he had for Snape and Aunt Marge; this was actual hatred. He felt as if he would murder Voldemort with his own bare hands if he were given half the chance.

Suddenly, the jug of water on Dumbledore’s desk exploded, covering the desk with water and fragments of glass.

‘Excuse me,’ said Harry, and he walked out the room. He walked out the other room, still full of busy workers. He walked out into the corridor, along a corridor, up a staircase. He walked, not even thinking where he was going.

Harry sat at the top of the Astronomy Tower. He hadn’t meant to come up here, he just found himself there. He sat, propped up against the wall, thinking. He watched the sky turn from light pink to orange and gold to deep blue-grey to midnight black.

Voldemort.

The thought echoed through his head. He felt the hatred seethe inside him. I’ll get him for this, he thought to himself.

‘I’ll kill you, Voldemort,’ he said aloud, even though there was nobody there. ‘I’ll kill you, or I’ll die trying.’ The words came from his mouth of their own accord. He felt he could set the whole Forest alight through unintentional magic; the hatred inside him was so strong.

He changed into his phoenix form, opened his beak, and began to sing. He didn’t know why, he just sang. The sound of the phoenix song lifted his heart tremendously. After a while, the dull pain that came with transforming went away, and he felt natural in this form. He sang, the notes reverberating through his throat and out his mouth, shaking his gilded beak.

Slowly, he placed one claw out on top of the ledge that ran around the battlements then the other. He spread his wings, and jumped off the battlements. He felt the air whip between his feathers. He felt his eyes tense up as the wind dried them, and he felt his feet tuck in to his body. He fell about ten stories before pulling his wings out and flying up, up, ever up.

He flew over the castle, covered with a frosting of snow, over the lake, over Hogsmede and up into the snowy mountains where Sirius had hid-out last year. He didn’t head for Sirius’ cave- that might be asking for trouble, but instead landed in the clearing of a copse, which crowned the largest mountain.

Harry sighed, as he looked at Hogwarts, its many lights glimmering and gleaming in the nighttime dark. In the other direction, he could just make out a small Muggle town, with yellow streetlamps, miles away on the horizon. Hogsmede was at the foot of the mountain, directly in front of him. With his phoenix eyesight, which was a thousand times sharper than that of his human, he saw the clerks in the post office shutting up, and the lights in the Three Broomsticks spilling out onto the streets. Harry made a slight double take when he saw a huge silhouette of a large man come out the pub doors. Good old Hagrid, he thought. Hagrid was the first magical person Harry had ever met since his parent’s death. Harry watched the huge figure lumber up the main street, illuminated in the warm orange glow of the streetlamps, which were just ever-burning candles in elaborate decorative stands.

A sudden thought his Harry- Hagrid had said there was a Death Eater at Hogwarts.

Harry turned back towards the castle. The lights were shining, beacon-like. He looked at the grand structure and marvelled at the thousand years of magical education and history encased within it. The school that had brought up Tom Riddle and spoon-fed him to the world, the school that currently held one of his servants. Harry felt his smaller phoenix stomach convulse with disgust that there could be someone in there that would serve such a person- someone who passed him every day in the corridor, someone who ate in the same room as him.

Harry spread his phoenix wings, and took off, heading back to the castle. He flew over the massive Hagrid, who was just a smudge on the path leading up to the castle.

‘Lo, Fawkes,’ Hagrid shouted up at him. Harry wanted to go down and speak to him, but he was too tired and too angry and too upset. A thousand emotions boiled within him, simmering and bubbling like a corrosive stomach. As a phoenix, although his body was different, his mind was the same- he still thought the same thoughts. Harry wasn’t too sure if that was a bad thing or a good thing.

He landed at the top of the West Tower, where he and Hermione had bade farewell to Sirius after setting him free at the end of their third year. The battlements were covered in snow, and anyone looking at the tracks would have seen a few claw marks that turned into footprints without warning.

Harry, however, paid no heed to this, and instead ran down the stairs and through the school to Dumbledore’s office.

‘Parrot Pasties,’ he wheezed to the gargoyle, as he struggled to catch his breath. The stone statue jumped aside, and Harry resumed his run up the stairs, ignoring the stitch in his side.

‘Dumbledore?’ he asked simply, to the people in the front office. Their number had halved, but there were still a good seven or eight people frantically working, even at the late hour.

‘In his office,’ said one, a short, slightly fat woman with a Yorkshire accent. ‘but you can’t go in, lad, he’s meeting the…’ Harry ignored her, however, and burst into Dumbledore’s office.

‘Harry!’ said Dumbledore. ‘How nice to see you! You’ve met Cornelius, I think?’

Cornelius Fudge, the Minister for Magic looked at Harry from his position in the leather chair facing Dumbledore.

‘I’ll wait outside,’ said Harry.

‘No, No, come in, Harry,’ said Dumbledore. ‘There are some things you need to hear about.’

Harry sat down in the other seat, beside Fudge. ‘Hello, Minister,’ he said unsmilingly.

‘Harry,’ said Fudge, his eyes cold.

‘Well, Harry, Cornelius and I have just been discussing today’s discoveries, and we have some developments to tell you about.’

Harry leaned forward in his chair. He didn’t want to miss a word of Dumbledore’s news.