The Black Forest or the Secret Diary of Prof. S. Quirrell

July 2, 1990

There won't be trumpets. I should have known. My return to Levin's was greeted with a snarl and a slammed door. As I predicted, she would rather I was gone.

Charles had sent an owl ahead for me to send back again with news of my safe arrival (Jones' idea after the incident with my coming to the sanctuary, he told me). I found the bird right away - roasting on a spit behind Levin's shack.

Again, I should have expected no less. At the moment, I feel like Charles. Have I chosen the correct path or am I merely the wasted byproduct of generations of powerful mages?

Q

July 4, 1990

A second owl and this one escaped Levin's bow. The letter was from Charles, demanding immediate confirmation of my safety either from Levin or from myself. He sounded genuinely concerned so I quickly scribbled off a reply, saying I arrived safely and have been back hiking in the woods and foothills since Levin ate my only means of communication. I asked privately after Jones and Charles himself, reiterating that our talks had been therapeutic for me, and, I hoped, likewise for him.

I also wrote “One day I will tell you of Rebekah -- everything -- but that day has not yet arrived. When I return from wherever Levin takes me, I will tell you everything. I look forward to it. -- Q”

I hope for a reply.

Q

July 7, 1990

I arrived back in camp just as Levin was pulling an arrow from the breast of a large European eagle owl. She looked at it hungrily, but deep down I wanted to cry. My lines of communication cut - or in this case, shot down - again.

"This is for you," Levin said as soon as she noticed me. She threw a package at me, which landed at my feet. Thankfully, there was no sound of breakage. “If you find some way of talking to your friends, thank them for these fine birds. They are very filling.”

I ignored her, which she enjoyed to no end as she cut the bird apart in front of me. The only thing that would have made her happier would have been my fighting with her. But I was content to at least possess the packet if not the means to give gratitude back to the senders.

Jones included a small tricolor flag, the size of a patch. "Happy fourth of July!" she wrote. "Muggle pride!" Skunk sent a small flask of some ill-smelling potion. For muscle fatigue, it said, but I was afraid to apply it in test. Who knows what it really contains?

Charles only wrote a note, but it was more valuable than the gifts. He wrote in careful, small script, " Q - I understand. Keep what's yours as long as you can. Once it's spoken, it belongs to all of us. I trust the gods and mages will watch over you, but when I can, I'll send a protection spell your way. I will think of you often and hope you'll visit again when your business with Levin is over. Not bad work for Can't-Sit-A-Broom, eh? With Affection, CW."

I have a goal. At first it was only to return to Todorov's family to prove the old man wrong. Now it's to come back to Charles and show him that whatever the difficulties life brings, we are friends and will remain so. Ravenclaw to Gryffindor. Forever.

Q

July 8, 1990

I kept myself busy in the hills today and I can feel myself growing more fit. It's strange, but climbs that once left me winded now leave me no more breathless than the walk from my office to the DADA classroom. It's becoming natural, easy.

In my enjoyment of the weather and the travel, I hardly noticed the passing of day into night. When I arrived back at the camp, the air was cool and my thoughts seemed clear and bright. Bright as the full moon above me.

I think I'll sleep under the stars tonight.

Not even Levin can put me in a bad mood. I reread Charles note and I'm transported back to schooldays all over again. But without the unpleasantness.

So really nothing like school days.

No, no. I'm being melodramatic again. There were pleasant memories in my youth. I'd repressed them, drowning myself in that final miserable year. But Charles - even Skunk - allowed me to remember the good things as well.

There is a wolf howling close by. I'll leave the fire burning. To keep the wolves away.

Q

July 9, 1990

I can't piece it all together yet. My mind is a jumble and I am unable to fully comprehend the events of the past night.

I can safely say this. I am laying on the floor of Levin's hut. She has left me alone and gone out, grunting that she'll return soon.

Levin doesn't look well. She insists it's nothing, but battle fatigue. She limps.

My first battle against the powers of darkness and I'm still alive. In fact, I think I won.

Levin told me sometime around midnight, a wolf entered the camp. Instead of being afraid, as a wild animal should be, the beast faced me and attacked.

I don't remember much of that, but wildly chanting any spell I could think of at the something growling in the dark. First fire, then ice, then pain. I passed out following that last part and woke up today with Levin's bandaged hand on my forehead.

"A werewolf," she said as soon as my eyes were open. "You fought a werewolf."

"A werewolf?" I can remember a wolf howling, but I had no sense of the dark arts about it. "Am I -?"

"You're fine." She didn't smile and I hardly felt reassured. "Not a scratch. You're a powerful wizard."

"Thank you. Thank you for -"

"Saving you?" She sneered. "You're so very welcome. Now verita mic will rest. Gather back your strength."

Then she disappeared. I ate the cold stew she laid beside me. It was excellent. Very simple, but very strong. Meaty and fresh.

I should learn to hunt.

I don't think I killed the werewolf, which is preferable. We learn defenses, not curses, in my course work and I would hope in the heat of the moment, in the fear and panic, I would not resort to A... K..... nor to a Telum Argentum.

Levin's right that I've received no wounds. A thorough examination revealed nothing more than a bump on the back of my head - from falling when I fainted, no doubt.

Levin must have dragged me in here afterwards. I'm indebted to her for it and owe her my health, if not my life.

I have eaten supper alone as well. Levin rejoined me, but she would not eat. When I asked her why, she replied that she felt ill and wasn't hungry anyway.

"Are you bitten?" I asked. Not a tactful question, but a necessary one.

She shook her head no, but wouldn't look me in the eye.

"If you are, tell me. There are treatments, although no cure -"

Her teeth set and her eyes blazed. "I am not bitten!"

She sunk back on the raised pallet that served as her bed. In a few moments, her eyes closed and she was asleep.

I think I'll spend the night outside in my camp. When she awakes, I doubt Levin will expect to find me here and I fear what she might do if she found me invading her private quarters.

Great gods! My first confrontation! My body remembers it better than my mind does. I sense the remnants of power in my fingers and in my head. My eyes ache. My arms and legs are sore and heavy.

But there's adrenaline underneath it, exhilaration, strength. Some of that will stay with me from now on and as my experience grows, so will this strength. It's almost seductive, the intensity lying underneath my skin.

I want more of it. Knowledge, experience and power.

Q

July 10

“Get up!” a kick aimed at my back, but dulled by an extra fleecy blanket. “Up, verita mic, up! We're going. Today.”

Levin stood over me, looking rested and ready. She dressed herself for travel in dark brown deer skin with a large pack on her back. A rusty rifle poked out of the top of it as did a quivers worth of arrows. A wicked-looking hunting blade lay loose at her left hip.

She observed my eyes taking in her weaponry and smiled. “Now, verita mic, how do you think the nici'magie defend themselves when they have no little sticks to wave around as you do?”

“Non-magic?”

“Didn't they tell you? That I am one of those?” Her smile broadened. “But I know they warned you. They always warn them because they know I know the ways of the darkness even if I have no powers to defeat it. That is why I am dangerous. Because I am more powerful than most of them without spells or curses or charms.”

She's insane. My guide is a crazed, non-magic backwoods ruffian one step above an animal.

I thought of Skunk. Does he know she's non-magic? Would he still desire this “nice piece of ass” if he did?

“So, get up, verita mic. We've wasted enough time in Romania. We go South to the real danger.” She turned away and I could see how clearly she favored her left side. “Unless one werewolf attack is all you came here for.”

I followed her immediately, packing up with two quick spells. A direct challenge like that had to be met and met boldly.

I don't know how far we've traveled, but we've come down out of the foothills onto flatter lands. Levin avoided the roads and any semblance of civilization in our path, making herself invisible whenever someone approached us. Lacking her skills, I nodded or said good day, but the country people were wary of me.

As night approached, Levin choose a camp ground not far from a small stream. She unpacked a sleep mat made of skins, a copper flask and a few long strips of dried meat. While she ate, she kept her eyes on me.

I magicked toast and a cup of strong tea with milk and sugar. Levin found this amusing and snickered at me behind her cured flesh.

Confrontation seems to be the only way to force her to speak to me, so I took the opportunity. "What are you laughing at?"

"Verita mic, after that fight with the wolf, I thought you were ready, but now I think you are not. You will die on this journey like the others before you and again the blame will come to Levin."

"I am not going to die."

"Then stop sipping milk-water like a little princess!" Before I could react to her speed, the cup was overturned in my lap. "Behave like a man and the dark things will respect you."

I weakened staring into that pale face and those bottomless black eyes. To be honest, I didn't much feel like a man at that moment.

"And you would propose to teach me how to be one?"

"It is not something that can be taught, but something that is. Sometimes I think there is one hidden inside you, verita mic, and sometimes I think there is only a little baby boy whose mother and sisters never loved and coddled him, but ignored him for themselves."

She sat back on her haunches. "You never had any brothers, that I know."

“The Quirrell line is passed through the mother.” Why was I telling her this? I allowed her to emasculate me and then I continued on in the same vein myself. “The female members of the family have always held a higher status and become the more powerful mages. The boys are expected to sacrifice certain things for the good of the family. As a late-born and the last-born, my duty was double.”

Levin spat into the fire. “The good of the family. There is no good in the family, verita mic. Family is nothing. There is only yourself.”

I try to talk again later, but she has fallen asleep. I have been bested -- for now. There's nothing left, but to close my eyes and let the night take me. There is safety and silence in sleep.

Q