A Lecture on Time
Croaker had a very serious expression on his face when they all entered the main chamber after dinner. Harry thought he looked almost nervous.
”This is going to be awful,” Rookwood huffed.
Bode merely laughed.
”You have to admit he’s only become more obsessed since meeting Lord Time,” Rookwood said.
Bode did not deny it. But he refrained from saying anything else either. He imagined he would be much the same if Lady Luck joined them in the chamber. He had devoted his life to researching her magic, just as Croaker had Lord Time’s.
The two unspeakables settled themselves in for a long, detailed and very interesting lecture.
Croaker cleared his throat and with a swish of his wand the word time appeared in midair.
”Time magic is by definition completely foreign to our own magic,” Croaker began. “Our magic comes from Mother Magic and obviously the two celestials are different entities and as such there magic is bound to be different. Just as my magic is different from Unspeakable Bode’s magic.”
Hermione was busy scribbling away, noting down everything he said. It wasn’t every day that you received a lesson from an unspeakable.
”But it is more than that,” Croaker continued. “Mother Magic gave us her magic freely to do with it what we please - within reason. Obviously there are laws but in general you have control of the magic that Mother Magic has bestowed upon you. That is not the case with Time Magic. To the best of my knowledge, Lord Time has never bestowed Dendora onto a witch or wizard. Of course, there are magical creatures that have been gifted in such a way, but never humans.”
"Magical creatures that have time magic?" Hermione asked.
"Well, the most obvious is the Phoenix," he said crossly. He did not like being interrupted. "The way they regenerate through burning days is in fact Dendora."
Harry blinked at that. He raised his hand, not wanting to interrupt but having a question of his own.
"Yes, Prince Myrrddin?" Croaker smiled.
"Is that why they're so rare?"
"Indeed it is," Croaker said with a nod. "Then there is the Tengu which is native to Japan, the Cú Sìth, a strange fairy-like dog native to Scotland, and for some time wix believed that the Golden Snidget used time magic to fly as quickly as they did."
Hermione looked like she had about a thousand more questions but she decided it might be better to write them down. She could always ask Croaker when he was finished. She wasn't sure why he had been annoyed with her and not Harry. Was it because he was the prince? Or... Oh, wait. She hadn't put her hand up. She sighed deeply. She really needed to work on that.
"As I was saying, while some creatures have been gifted by Lord Time, to the best of my knowledge humans never have. Our understanding of time is severely limited, and those of us who research it are heavily regulated. Messing with time is dangerous, I cannot stress that enough." He glared momentarily at the headmaster. "Most people think of time as something linear, a straight line from past, through present, and into the future, with key events popping up from time to time. However, this is inaccurate. We think of time as how we quantify our existence. Hermione Granger is eleven years old. It took me four years to achieve my mastery. Harry Potter became a national hero at the age of one. That sort of thing. However, time is so much greater and more vast than that allows."
Everyone was paying Croaker attention, almost as much as they'd listened to the book during the last chapter. Time Magic was fascinating.
"Time as a measure and Time as a magic are not the same thing and should not be regarded as such," Croaker said. "This is why we call Time Magic Dendora. Having another name for it, reminds us that the two things are not one and the same. But equally Time itself is neither the same as Time the measure or Time the magic. Are you with me so far?"
Several people shook their head. Just what was time then?
"Time is the vast stretch of eternity," Croaker said with a toothy grin. "It has no beginning and no end. Or at least it should not."
He was very uncomfortable with the idea that if this group of people didn't save Mother Magic, then even Lord Time would perish, and time itself would come to an end. Except, how could something with no beginning end? No. It would merely cease to exist. And that was strangely worse.
"Eternal time moves freely in all directions, meaning that though you do not know it, what happens in the future may in fact influence what happens in the present. Although, the Unspeakables know this to be true, they have never been able to comprehend how. Eternal time seems to resonate around significant events and those events affect the Eternal time around them in all directions. This is one of the reasons why playing with time is so dangerous. If you change something within a significant event, the changes you make will have a significant impact on the Eternal Time around that significant event. Imagine it like shock waves." He flicked his wand and a diagram appeared. "Let's say we went back in time and destroyed Voldemort's horcrux before Harry knew of its existence, would Harry - the prophecy child - have reason to be born?"
Several people began muttering between themselves. "Prophecy child?"
Harry frowned at that.
"Of course, that is a misleading question, because we know that as Prince Myrrddin, Harry has far more reason to exist than a mere prophecy."
Bode huffed at that.
"Time, the measurement, not Eternal Time or Dendora, is governed by natural law," Croaker continued. "And it is within those limitations that those that study time try to stay. This is a safety measure. A precaution. And it is absolutely necessary. Time Magic, Dendora, is often mislabeled as unstable, when in fact it is merely not understood and quite frankly unquantifying to the human mind and very much so outside of our control. Remember how I said that Mother Magic gives us dominion over our own magic. It is within our control. The same cannot be said for Dendora. Therefore caution is necessary when using this magic. We restrict our use of time magic to hourly increments of which we allow a maximum of five. Anything more than this and we risk harming ourselves and time itself."
Hermione could hardly sit still she had so many questions.
"In the year 1899, the Department of Mysteries conducted its final experiment with Dendora greater than five hours. Eloise Mintumble was sent back to the year 1402. She ended up being stuck there for five days and when she was returned to our time..." He paused. "The Department of Mysteries will tell you that the Unspeakables of the day retrieved her, but in reality, we suspect Lord Time returned her because her time-travel was causing time itself to unravel, something he could not allow. When she returned, she had aged five centuries and died in St Mungo's. But more than causing her death, it led to a great disturbance to Eternal Time. Imagine every decision you make is like a fork in the road. You go left you have cottage pie for dinner. You go right and you study so much that you forget to eat. That sort of thing. Or perhaps more significantly than if you eat dinner or not, you go left you marry and have a child, you go right you don't. No fewer than twenty-five people vanished from the present because of how Mintumble had influenced the past lives of their ancestors. They were quite literally un-born. But not only that, but Tuesdays lasted two and half days, while Thursdays were suddenly only four hours long."
Someone gasped. That was insane.
"Do you see that how we use Dendora influences Eternal Time which in turn affects how we measure time. Of course, our measure of time is less important than Eternal Time. Unfortunately, we cannot see how Eternal Time is influenced by Dendora but it is safe to say that if Time, the measurement, is affected by what we do with Dendora then Eternal Time is likewise impacted and that is something we cannot allow. So we restrict the use of Dendora to what will not affect Time, the measurement, in the hope that it will protect Eternal Time."
Croaker sighed. While he enjoyed speaking about Eternal Time it was outside of most people's understanding so the next part of his lecture would focus on how time travel could affect them directly. That would hopefully scare them off messing with time. Even if fear of damaging Eternal Time did not.
"Using Dendora also has personal risks," he said. "You may accidentally kill your past self, or your past self could kill you. This has happened several times and is impossible to remedy. Changes are to be avoided wherever possible and interaction with people from the past should be limited. If you fail to follow these rules, you risk altering your own life past drastically, something that can result in temporal anomalies such as un-births. Or worse, you might influence one of those significant events and create shock-waves through time, creating an alternative timeline. Imagine for a second if someone used a time-turner to stop Voldemort going after the Potters. What do you think might have happened?"
No one said anything. They didn't want to even consider that.
"Lord Voldemort might have taken control of the ministry," Croaker said, "and still be ruling to this day. Harry Potter may have been un-birthed - of course, this is if his life was defined by his so called destiny as attributed to him by the prophecy. It is currently unknown if such a spectacular cock up could actually be reversed."
Now that was terrifying. Several people looked like they might actually have nightmares about that.
"The problem is that you don't have to be intending to influence that particular event. Let's say your use of Dendora caused Lord Voldemort to get an especially important invitation to dine, putting off his plans to attack the Potters. This would no doubt have the same affect."
His lecture continued on for some time before he turned to Albus. "I should add that it is reprehensible to encourage others to break the laws that govern the use of Dendora. If you want to break the law, on your head be it, but if I ever hear of you encouraging school children to do your dirty work for you again, Albus, and I will ask Lord Time to allow me to change time just enough to Un-born you."
Albus grimaced. That was fair. He couldn't believe his older self had been so foolish.
"But then Grindlewald!" someone muttered.
But Albus almost laughed. Would Gellert even become a Dark Lord if he wasn't friends with Albus?
Sometime later, Tonks was sitting next to the fire with the other aurors. "We still didn't get to shout at the headmaster."
Kingsley laughed. "You're really set on having it out with Dumbledore, aren't you?"
Tonks shrugged. She wasn't sure why it was bothering her so much.
"Personally, I think the threat of being Un-born will do more than any shouting ever could," Amelia said with a chuckle.
None of the other aurors disagreed with her there. They all grinned.
"Two whole days of rest," Tonks said with a small sigh. "I can actually get a lie in."
Moody shook his head. "Unlikely. The Prince might be resting but we have work to do. We'll meet at eight thirty tomorrow morning in our office."
"What do we need to do?" Tonks groaned.
"For one thing, we need to make sure the case against the Dursleys is iron clad," Moody said.
Tonks nodded. That was important, she supposed. She yawned and waved the others good night, wishing that she could sleep in past noon.