The one where they have a lively discussion.
“Here, take this to Dumbledore- hey! Listen to me first!! Give it to him only when he is alone.”
Tying down the letter to Gabriel's feet I finally let him fly to Hogwarts with instructions on how to find and dispose of the diadem in ROR.
‘That bird gets on my nerves sometimes’
At Least he’s cool and unique
‘Can’t argue with that’
It took a lot of deep thought and debating with Chat whether I should send albus instructions regarding horcruxes or not. In the end we decided that he can’t do a worse job than a bunch of kids. But we are still handling the ring, I don't think we should let him get his hands on a hollow.
It's the stone of resurrection, the worst he can do is get himself into a depression.
‘He already possesses two hollows, I don't even wanna think what will happen with him as the master of death’ I thought with a shudder.
I’ve told you this before, you can’t be a master of an entity like Death.
‘I didn’t mean that literally, I meant the amount of pull that the mantle has in the wizarding world. A majority of purebloods grew up with the story of hollows and the three Peverell brothers. He already has too much power.’
Imagine, a master of death giving death eaters second chances.
With that image in my mind I walked into the living room where my grandfather was sitting in his work clothes and reading a newspaper.
“Morning”
“It's afternoon lad” he replied without lifting his head, but from his tone it looked like something was bothering him.
“Huh, isn’t that something.” I went to the kitchen and made myself a cup of tea and walked back into the room. I couldn’t help but notice that there was no one else apart from us in the house. I tried to stretch my senses and search for Harry's and my mother’s magic but came up empty handed. “Where’s everyone else?” I asked my grandfather
“Harry went to play with Hermione, your mother and grandmother went to hospital, and i just got back from ministry”
Hospital?
“Hospital? Are they okay?”
“They are fine, your mother just went to give the potions she made and your grandmother was called in due some curse related injury”
“Ahh, makes sense.”
“But I wanted to talk to you about something.” he said, finally looking up and folding the newspaper. One look at his face told me that this conversation is not gonna be an easy one.
“Okay.”
“Your mother mentioned horcrux last night.” that woman can’t keep anything to her! “Care to tell me why?”
“What did she say?” I asked, trying to gauge how much I have to tell him.
“Just that you mentioned the horcrux, and that they are the reason Tommy is still kicking around. So is this true?” How much should I divulge here? I don’t want him to go and do anything stupid like Albus did with the ring. ‘What do you guys think?’ your grandfather is a smart man, perhaps you should tell him and make him believe that you have the situation under control.
“What did you tell her?” I asked him again, I don’t want the knowledge to spread
“To leave it alone. Now answer my question.” That was the best outcome I could've hoped for. Now story time!
“Yes, it is true. He made 5 knowingly, one unknowingly” I’ve never seen colour drain from someone’s face so fast before “Six?” damn, even his voice is shaky as hell. Making a horcrux is a big deal, but making six is madness in its purest form, of course he is a bit shaken up.
“He was going for seven pieces. Seven being the powerful magical number and all that.” I further explained waving my hand dismissively.
“And the one he made unknowingly?” he asked after digesting the news, but his voice was a bit skeptical, I mean that’s understandable, how can you fuck up a ritual this important. Well you can when harry potter is involved, magic is Harry's bitch! Oi! sorry
“It will be the last one to go.” I replied almost absentmindedly, half of my attention was towards chat and mage’s bickering.
“It's Harry isn’t it?” he asked quietly, pulling me out of the live argument in my head.
“Unfortunately.” I answered after a few seconds
“So you’re just leading a lamb to slaughter here?” he asked with anger and sadness. He’s gotten really close with Harry after they got to know each other properly, in a way Harry is the child that I never could be for him, or anyone in the family.
“No, fuck no. that horcrux is a extra life for him right now.” I told him quickly to prevent him from going down a spiral
“What do you mean?” he asked with hope and a look that screamed `are you mad?`, I mean this is a horcrux we are talking about. I guess I have to start from the beginning.
“The night potters died, Harry’s mother evoked powerful ancient magic through rituals, the same magic that I use, which gave harry the protection, which rebounded the spell the moment voldy casted AK on Harry, but a major requirement for the ritual was a sacrifice of someone close to the person the ritual was intended for.”
“So she gave her life willingly.” he asked, finally getting the entire picture.
“Yup and granted Harry a very powerful protection against her attacker. So when he tried to cast the AK it rebounded on him and destroyed the body, but the horcruxes prevented him from dying. And before casting the AK he performed the ritual to create the final horcrux but when the curse rebounded and his body was destroyed a little piece of him broke apart and latched onto the only living thing there. Harry.” I finally concluded and went to get a glass of water, leaving my grandfather behind to digest everything. When I walked back in I saw him ready with a new set of questions.
“So how is he not taken over by the soul shard?”
“Because a piece that small can never hope to possess a complete soul, and his mother’s protection keeps the thing at bay. The only problem is that it leeches the power from his core to stay alive, but seeing how strong Harry is we don’t need to worry about it. Infect it is sort of a gift.”
“Gift?” he asked curiously, by now he has heard things more absurd than the theory of the flat earth, so of course he’s gonna listen to everything now first.
“It gives him the parselmouth abilities, and many other things. The person whose soul it is was a great wizard, sure he did terrible things, but they were great too.”
“So what about the others?” he asked, moving on from the subject once it was established that Harry was not in any danger.
“I sent a letter to Albus to destroy the one in Hogwarts” I answered waving my hand in a dismissive manner.
“There was one in Hogwarts?” he asked with astonishment on his face.
“Yup. now I'm sure I don’t have to tell you to keep this to yourself?” I asked him making my tone just a tad bit hard
“Of course not.” he answered quickly, “This is knowledge that should not exist.” he answered quickly, satisfied I settled back with a book and started reading some newly released scientific research papers.
Half an hour later we heard the door opening and closing. I quickly expanded my magic to check who it was and found warmth of Harry's magic.
“Harry? Is that you?” I asked as he was going up the stairs.
“Yes” his voice came a bit shaky, as if he was upset or in pain. I looked at my grandfather and clearly he came to the same conclusion.
“Come here” he called harry.
“I am very tired actually, maybe i shoul-”
“Come here” I shouted with a wandless soronus which got the desired effect. Slowly harry came in the room and we saw three dark bruises forming on his face
“Sweet morgana, what happened to you son?” my grandfather asked quickly moving towards him and looking at the bruises.
“Wha? Oh this? Nothing” this kid really needs to learn how to lie better than that. ‘Sirius will take care of that’ I thought moving towards them and looking at him, incredulously I asked “Nothing?”
“I was playing cricket in the park, and I got hit by the ball in the face. That’s it” Really?
“So the ball first hit you in your jaw, then on your nose, and then on your forehead.” I asked with a bit of amusement.
“Yeah three bouncers in three balls.” he brightened as if he just convinced me.
“I’ve not played much cricket but I know for a fact that a bowler is only allowed one bouncer in an over.” I said in an absentminded manner
“It was not a professional match! Just a friendly one between friends-”
“Harry” my grandfather interrupted him with a warning in his tone.
“Okay-okay I was trying to perform a wheelie on my cycle when I fell down” Really?
“I’ve not studied physics a lot, but I know for a fact that if you fall down while doing a wheelie you’ll get injuries on your back not face.” I said again, but this time I was staring back at him intensely which was causing him to squirm a bit.
“Did I say wheely? I meant stoppie.” he quickly said with a nervous laugh
“I’ve don’t ride my cycle much but I know for a fac-”
“You haven't done anything! Yet you know everything!” he finally got irritated enough.
“Harry, lad I'm gonna need you to be honest with me. What happened?” grandfather finally asked him in a tone of warning
“I was reading with Hermione at her home and she accidentally banished three books at me.” he finally told us reluctantly.
“She banished three books at you?” I asked incredulously
“Only because I asked her to pass me the books! But she was sitting too far away, so this happened.” Harry jumped to defend her, he’s scared about what you’re gonna do now, I mean we all remember what you did to Nate down the street.
Fucker deserved it!
“Sounds like accidental magic.” my grandfather said, trying to calm harry.
“I know!”
“So what happened after that?” I asked
“She started crying and shut herself in her room.” he replied in a soft confusing tone, of course he doesn’t understand what happened here.
“She’s just upset that she hurt you.” grandfather tried to explain it to him.
“But it was an accident.”
“If you accidentally hurt your aunt wouldn’t you feel bad too?” I said trying a different approach
“Yes”
“And just like that she is also feeling bad, but the difference is that she doesn’t know that it was accidental magic.” and now he finally got it, and without wasting a single second he turned to leave. “I have to go back”
“You stay here and get your face looked at, I’ll go and talk to her and her parents.” I levitated him back into the arms of my grandfather and walked out of the house and started making my way towards Granger's home. ‘Mcgonagall should be doing this, not me!’ Too bad you’re the only one she’s got now.
Finally reaching granger’s home I rang the doorbell and waited for someone to open the door, after a few seconds Hermione’s mother opened the door and looked at me with relief
“Hey Emma” I greeted her as she gestured me to get in
“Hey Cass, how are you?”
“Just peachy. Is Hermione still in her room?” I asked, looking around.
“No, she came out a few minutes ago. But she’s still upset about hurting Harry.” she told me with a small frown on her face. Clearly Hermione didn’t tell her what happened.
“I know, Harry told me. Don’t worry, I'll talk to her.”
“She’s in the backyard.” she pointed to the backdoor
“Thanks Emma” I walked through the door and saw hermione sitting against a tree, looking at the books with sadness
“Jean? Hey lass, you okay??” I called out softly hoping I didn't spook her, she looked at me with red rimmed eyes and fresh new tears started flowing down her face. “I hit Harry,” she said with a wobbly voice.
“Don’t worry about it. It was an accident” I told her while sitting down beside her and taking the books from her hands. It was a thick atlas. Why does she have an atlas?
“But I threw those books at him, I know what I was doing.” she told me with sadness and a touch of fear. Fear of losing Harry's friendship maybe?
“You threw, but you didn’t banish them at him” I said with a small smile, jumping right into it.
“Banish?” she asked curiously, to which I responded by banishing the book in my hand right into her room through the open window without moving my hand. To anyone without knowledge of magic it would look like I just shot that book right from my hand.
“How did you do that?!” she asked, jumping up and looking between my hands and the window.
“Same way you threw the books across the room to harry. Only difference is that I am in control of it, where as what you did was uncontrolled burst of magic”
“Magic?” she asked, looking at me as if I was crazy.
“Yes, magic” I said morphing into a perfect copy of her, seeing this she quickly jumped back a bit looking at me with wide eyes
“How are you doing that?” slowly she walked towards me and started examining me, after a minute I morphed back into my body.
“Like I just said, magic. In simple terms I'm a wizard, and I can do magic.” I answered simply, but Hermione still was in denial.
“Magic isn’t real,” she said quickly, shaking her head but with a little uncertainty.
“Then how do you explain what happened earlier?” I asked, to which she had no answer. So I asked her again. “Okay answer this then, is this the first incident where you did something that can’t be explained?”
“No.” she answered after a few seconds with a little hesitation.
“That's because you’re a witch Jean.”
“Aren’t witches bad?” she asked like a child…..which she is.
“You’ve met my mom and grandmother right?”
“Yes”
“They are witches too, do you think they are bad?” I asked with a smile, knowing that Hermione loves my grandmother.
“No!”
“Having powers, or being different doesn’t define who you are. It’s what you do with it that defines who you are.” I told her but I could see that she’s still having a bit of trouble accepting the situation.
“How about this, my mother and grandparents will come here tonight and they’ll explain and answer every and all questions you have regarding all of this. How does that sound to you?”
“Okay. yeah that's alright” she said, finally coming to terms with it.
“Brilliant! Now remember, what happened before was an accident. Okay?” I asked looking her in the eyes
“Yeah okay.” she replied, in reply to which I just smiled at her. After giving her a quick hug I left to tell the adults that they have to deal with a storm that is Hermione Granger.