Chapter 12
I’d spent countless evenings in the library’s shadowed corridors, poring over brittle, ancient tomes that hinted at the secret components required for conscious dreaming. The ingredients were arcane and precise: moonlit myrrh, oneiric bloom petals, powdered mandrake root, and dew collected at midnight from an enchanted rose bloom. Each ingredient was said to represent the ethereal essence of dreams.
One crisp autumn afternoon, while following the steps described in a particularly cryptic manuscript, I found myself wandering the castle’s lesser-known halls. Draco, our ever-unexpected ally, appeared by my side at this point. With a mischievous gleam in his eye, he extended a small velvet pouch. “Looks like you might need this,” he said, revealing the oneiric bloom, a delicate, luminescent flower with silvery petals that sparkled like stardust. Despite our constant sparring, his discovery was invaluable, and I couldn’t help but smile at the rare opportunity for genuine collaboration.
I returned to the manor’s private potion lab and set to work with meticulous care. I started by heating a base of distilled water from an enchanted spring until it had a soft, starlit glow. When the cauldron’s surface rippled invitingly, I measured out a pinch of finely ground mandrake root—a substance known for its potent, dream-inducing properties—and stirred it in with a steady hand.
Next, I added a few drops of dew collected at midnight, its shimmering essence intended to stabilize the potion’s unstable energies. Finally, with a respectful nod to fate, I folded in the oneiric bloom petals. Their otherworldly glow imbued the deep blue liquid with a fleeting radiance, as if the potion itself was capturing the light of a forgotten sky. As I chanted the age-old incantations, each ingredient fused together, and the mixture began to emit a faint, silvery vapor that curled around the room like ghostly fingers.
By the time the brew was finished, every detail had been taken care of—a symphony of precise measurements, delicate textures, and whispered spells. With the potion completed and the promise of lucid dreaming in front of us, Draco and I prepared to enter a realm where the lines between sleep and wakefulness blurred into pure possibility.
The cauldron gently bubbled, emitting a faint, silvery vapor that curled around the dimly lit room like ghostly fingers. The potion had taken hours to perfect, with exact measurements, finely ground ingredients, and ancient texts guiding me through each delicate step.
But now it was ready.
I stood over the worktable in the manor’s private potion lab, gazing at the dark blue liquid swirling inside the cauldron. This was it—the key to stepping into our dreams and discovering our Eidolons before it was too late.
Behind me, Draco scoffed. “Are we absolutely certain this isn’t going to kill us?”
I rolled my eyes and reached for two goblets. “It will not kill us.” At worst, we wake up feeling nauseous. At best—”
“We get trapped in a nightmare dimension with no way out?” he asked, unhelpfully.
I huffed. “At best, we finally take control of whatever is happening to us.”
Draco muttered something under his breath but did not protest as I filled both goblets. The potion shimmered, almost alive, its surface rippling against the still air.
I turned to him, holding a goblet. “Are you ready?”
He stared at it as if it were poison, but then sighed and took the cup from my hand. “You realize this is insane, right?”
“Of course,” I replied. “But it’s still our best option.”
Draco exhaled through his nose. “Right. “Cheers to terrible decisions.”
After that, we both drank.
A tingling sensation spread throughout my limbs almost immediately after I took my last sip. The lab’s edges began to blur, as if the ancient stone were dissolving into a shifting haze of silvery light. Draco’s usual skepticism gave way to a dawning wonder as the familiar manor faded into a vast, nebulous expanse where the rules of time and space no longer applied.
One moment I was standing in the potion lab, and the next—everything stretched and twisted, colors warping around me, pulling me down—
And, suddenly—
I stood on solid ground.
The sky above was pitch-black, but flecked with shifting gold and silver light, like ink dissolving in water. The air hummed with power, thick and heavy, as if the entire world was holding its breath.
Draco appeared beside me, staggering slightly. “That was—” he exhaled while rubbing his temples, “—deeply unpleasant.”
I ignored him, my heart racing as I took in our surroundings. We were back in the ruins from the dream, which had appeared repeatedly over the previous week. The same shattered stone, the same towering pillars, the same oppressive silence.
But this time, I could feel it—magic twisting around us, tugging on the edges of reality, waiting for something to occur.
Draco also noticed it. “This place is…wrong.”
I nodded and stepped forward. The ground beneath us was solid, but it felt strange, as if it didn’t belong in the same world we knew.
Then the whispering started.
Soft at first. Indistinct.
Then, louder. Closer.
“I’m bound by fate. “Divided by choice.”
I turned around, wand raised. “Did you hear that?”
Draco tensed. “Yes. And I do not like it.
The whispering intensified, swirling through the air like wind through broken glass. The ruins shook underfoot, and then—
The creature appeared.
I felt Draco stiffen beside me as the hulking figure emerged from the darkness.
Just as before.
The burning eyes, the twisting, shifting form, and the flickering gold-and-black fire that appeared to devour the surrounding space.
“You have come at last.”
The voice echoed through my bones, deep and unmistakably strong.
I held my ground. “Where are our Eidolons?”
The creature’s glowing eyes fixed on me.
“You ask the wrong question, Hermione Granger.”
Draco took a step forward, raising his wand defensively. “Then what’s the right question?”
The being tilted its head, a slight amusement flickering across its burning features.
“Why did they vanish at all?”
A sharp coldness swept through me. I clenched my jaw. “Because something took them.”
The whispers drew closer, circling like unseen shadows.
“No.”
Draco inhaled sharply. “What do you mean, no?”
The creature’s flames darkened and shifted, pulsing in time with the magic in the air.
“They did not leave you.”
The ground shook under us.
“You forced them away.”
My breath caught. “That’s not possible.”
The creature’s burning gaze focused entirely on me.
“Isn’t it?”
A flash of heat and shadow erupted outward, slamming into both of us. The dream landscape rippled, and suddenly—
I wasn’t in the ruins anymore.
I was back at the wedding.
I gasped and looked around wildly.
The enchanted ceiling. Rows of Ministry officials. The gold binding magic is swirling around my fingers.
And Draco.
Standing before me in black.
His face was carefully blank, his body rigid and unwilling, as the golden threads of the binding spell wove between us, cementing the vow.
And then—
I saw it.
For the first time, I actually saw it.
When the spell ended and the golden light bound our hands, there was a ripple in the air—a pulse of magic so deep and ancient that I had previously missed it.
And that pulse—it pushed something back.
It’s like a lock snapping shut.
Like a door closing on something attempting to pass through.
My stomach dropped.
I spun around, searching, my mind reeling from the impossible realization. “We—we didn’t summon them at the wedding.”
Draco’s voice was just behind me. “They were already there.”
I turned to him, my heart pounding in my chest. He had the same expression as I did: realization dawning, horror settling in.
“They didn’t come because of the vows,” I said softly. “They came before.”
His throat bobbed. “And the binding spell—”
“It forced them out.”
The whispers returned, curling through the air, heavy with meaning.
“You reject them, as you reject each other.”
The moment the words hit, the scene shattered like glass.
I gasped, the force of it ripping me backward, the world pulling me away from the vision.
I shot up in bed, panting.
The dream was gone.
The ruins. The whispers. The truth.
I looked to the side.
Draco was already awake, sitting up and breathing heavily, his silver eyes widening with the realization.
We were staring at each other.
For a long, terrible moment, neither of us spoke.
Draco exhaled and drew a shaking hand down his face.
“Granger,” he said, his voice hoarse, “I think we’ve made a terrible mistake.”