Gemstones and Hunger
“Human Language/speech”
“Parseltongue/Spells”
(Start of chapter):
Hardym clothed himself for the day, he still had some trouble with the robes, they were too narrow for his head to pass through so he had to brute force his way into the black cloth. It was now colored in the Gryffindor colors, gold and red, not his favorite colors -especially red after seeing the common room- but they would do, the silver chain was a nice contrast… wait… silver chain? Since when did the uniform feature chains?
It didn’t, apparently, for he managed to pull out a small locket from the chain, housing a big green gem, engraved with a dark green ‘S’. It looked nice, though it didn’t fit the gryffindor motive. Casting a quick glance towards the window and his still sleeping roommates, he decided to stay a little longer and investigate this new trinket of his.
It took him longer than he wanted to admit to notice the small, carved symbols on its silver frame. There were five different types of symbols, one he recognized as norse runes while he couldn’t pinpoint the others, what they did eluded him but he could sense the distant humm of magic touching beneath his skin, not exactly searching for something but close. He knew there was some form of power behind this, not the symbiotic stream of his wand but not the overwhelming pressure of Hogwarts either. It was much more subtle, delicate, where his wand was a sword, this was a tool, a key.
At the sound of his awakening roommates, Hardym forced himself to let the chain slip out of his hand and into the front pocket of his rope, its power still brushing lightly against his chest. This was his pendent, why should the others see it? They would just want to take it for themselves.
“Mornin’”, groaned a still groggy boy -Neville?- as he reluctantly climbed out of his comfy bed.
“Good Morning”, Hardym answered,”How did you sleep?”
“Hmm…? Oh- good, not enough”
Hardym let out a small chuckle, who knew something as simple as a waking boy could be this amusing? Then again, he never had a sleepover before, perhaps he just wasn’t used to it. Last before he left the room -he really didn’t want to deal with Ronald when he would ultimately awake- Hardym put on his wand holster, resisting the temptation to take his wand out right then and there, he couldn’t wait to have his first lesson.
Breakfast was… okay. There was a lot of unwanted attention on Hardym, accompanied by a lot of whispered rumors, most of which ridiculous. The food was good though.
The real fun however, began with their first lesson of the day, Charms with professor Flitwick, whose aura -Hardym really needed a better way to describe it- filled the classroom with its iron scent.
“Now my dear Students, this will be your first introduction to the most wonderful art of magical charms”, the small man addressed the classroom cheerfully,”Charms is the most versatile branch of mafic, countless spells fall under the study of charms and it is the base where upon many other branches are built. Without Charms we wouldn’t have enchantment, alchemie or even some more abstract forms such as wordsmithing. Most Charms can be cast using any language one desires but in England -as well as most other western countries- the spellcasting language is latin. Do any of you know why we don’t just use English for spellcasting?”
Several hands were raised after a moment of hesitation, Hardym’s and the Muggleborn’s hand both contributed to that number,”Yes Miss Granger?”
“Latin is used for Spellcasting due to its connection with European Witches and Wizards, a language imprints onto one’s magical signature, so the latin, as a formerly widespread language is very potent in most magical signatures in the western world”, the bush of hair rambled on, not even trying to alternate the words of the textbook in front of her, though she did leave out the part about it being passed on through bloodlines… he could already guess why.
“Correct Ms. Granger but you have yet to answer why we don’t use english, as the language we use every day wouldn’t it be more powerful?”,the smug look on the girls face disappeared, though it was quickly replaced by a content smile when he added “Still 5 points for Gryffindor for that explanation”
“Mr. Potter, what do you think?”
“Well Professor, even though I am not sure, I would guess it is to avoid accidents”
“How so?”, the professor asked, his voice hinting he was indeed correct.
“When we learn spells we connect the words with the spell mentally, so if we used English then maybe we might accidentally cast a spell while talking normally? For example, someone tells his friend ‘you're such a jackass’, they might actually turn into a donkey?”
It always seemed weird to Hardym why friends Insulted each other, wasn’t that rude? It seemed normal enough though, Vernon and Petunia didn’t even bat an eye when Dudley and his crownies talked to each other like that.
“Absolutely right, 15 points to Gryffindor!”, Flitwick praised,”Now, most charms you will come across will fall in one of two categories, attaching a temporary attribute to something -this may also be an effect on an area such as a light orb- or a stream of magic which causes a negative effect on the person or object it hits, many jinxes and hexes are charms. For today, we will focus on the simplest charm one might try to perform, the light charm lumos and its counter nox. It doesn’t require any wand movements, just the incantation and thinking of where it should appear, the easiest for now is conjuring the light at the tip of your wand. Go on, try it!”
“lumos!”, it came from every direction, about half of the students managed to form a full light charm, a fourth only got a small glow and the last quarter didn’t get it.
“Very good! Those who succeeded try putting it out with nox, those who are still struggling try putting a bit more power behind it, focus on the feeling you got when first touching your wand if you need to. 1 point for everyone who managed lumos first try and another 2 points for those who manage nox first try”
A mix of lumos’ and nox’s followed, a few minutes later everyone had gotten both the spells right and Flitwick began with a bit of theory.
Herbology was fine, it reminded him a bit too much of working on Petunias garden but he would get by.
After the two herbology lessons they had a free period -which he spent exploring the castle a bit- before Defence Against the Dark Arts. It was truly horrific, not the things being taught, the spells and creatures were truly fascinating but the teacher -one Quinerous Quirrel- had a stutter beyond anything Hardym thought possible, getting a single word out seemed like running a marathon for the weird smelling man. His aura kinda made up for the awful smell in his classroom but the garlic stench was just too much, Hardym doubted he would learn anything from the man if this continued, self-study it is.
“Professor quirrell, where did you get your turban from?”, asked a Slytherin girl, Davis was it?
“W- w- well I- i- i- it w- was a- a g- g- gi- gift fr- from a p- p- prince I- t- that I help- helped w- w- with a n- n- n- n- nasty vamp- pire at- ta- ta- tack”, well that was mildly interesting, Hardym wondered whether the real vampires were the same as the ones in fiction, were there maybe even different kinds?
“Wow, how did you do that?”Davis asked with wide open eyes. Most of the other students also focused their attention onto Quirrell now, almost 40 separate pairs of eyes laid upon the quivering professor, though to the collective annoyance of the class, he just began talking about how nice the weather was… It wasn’t, it had begun raining shortly after Hardym had left Herbology and not stopped since.
When Quirrell’s nervous gaze landed upon Hardym, he felt the familiar shapes of his covered up, black scar burn into his flesh, accompanied by an emotion that wasn’t his but he somehow knew wasn’t Quirrell’s either, it was a deep, gluttonous hunger. In his head he heard the chorus and echo scream in harmony,”GET AWAY!” before being replaced by another, one similar to his own but deeper, more raspy, more primal,”Devour… must- must devour them all… feed- need to feed… to… *Growl* feel warmth… again… must devour them both… must… EAT! MUST-”
As soon as Quirrell took his eyes off Hardym, it stopped. There was a loud bang and darkness devoured Hardym’s sight.
///HPTSB///
Cold… he was so cold and hungry.
A toilet, he needed to get to it, to satisfy his hunger, to quench the cold.
It belonged to him, he had the right to devour it!
‘the stone’, hissed a sweet voice,’you need the stone’
Yes… the stone… it was higher… right… left… right… down… but where then? It wasn’t here, where was it? ‘further, devour everything on your path, it will give you the strength to get what you need’
Yes… he just needed to devour all… satisfy his hunger… feed…