76 Harry Potter : Chapter 75: Incoming Avalance I

Minerva slotted the last set of her bound notes onto the shelf, sighing in satisfaction as she did so: Alchemy was less of a subject and more of an Art, her understanding was barely enough to make her feel comfortable in letting others see her thoughts on the topic.

She took an instinctive half step back when a hand reached from above her head and plucked exactly those notes from where she had put them, and she immediately scowled in faux annoyance: "Rubeus! You should at least pretend that you weren't waiting here to ambush the results of my hard work!"

"I don't have that kind of time to waste." he replied good-naturedly as he immediately started to skim her notes, reaching his desk with only two of his long steps, where he sat and pulled out a quill and a mostly unblemished piece of parchment: "And I think that Alchemy might be the missing piece for the Cure."

A derisive snort sounded from another table, where Riddle was reading a thick, ancient-looking tome that sported some truly sickening illustrations: "Everything is the missing piece for your Cure, until you try it and discard it."

Minerva's green eyes returned towards Hagrid, and the rolls of parchment that he had set on one side of his desk when he had entered the Rùnda maybe an hour prior.

She suspected that those were the notes she had been waiting for on the kind of spells used against the Chimaera, but as she was kind of pressed for time, with her duties as Head Girl, Quidditch player, and potential apprentice of Flamel himself, she simply shook her head and returned to her desk.

Eyeing critically the tomes relative to the extensive charms needed to turn even an easily dismissed handbag into something far more valuable.

Now that I think about it... "Did you manage to render the Hydra properly, Rubeus?"

"He did." Tom answered idly when it appeared clear that the humungous Slytherin wasn't going to answer, "I'm waiting for the right opportunity to enquire with Professor Slughorn about a hypothetical selling of the skin and the blood, while Rubeus already wrote to Ollivander, and is waiting for a reply."

"Truly?" she was impressed despite herself, arranging for the rendering of a restricted creature that underaged wizards had no business handling sounded much harder than what it actually was.

"Good for us... I'll hop to Gringotts during the first Hogsmeade weekend: shall I open a single vault for the proceedings? Then we can split three ways at our leisure."

Hagrid raised his dark eyes from the notes he had speed-read through at that offer, only to nod and quietly return to his frantic note-taking, while Tom hummed thoughtfully: "I don't know if the rendering is complete, but Hagrid has the tools to accomplish it now, I'm surprised that his notes on the topic haven't made their way on the shelves already."

"Too vague." the tallest Slytherin replied distractedly, "Their realization is merely an application of the ritualism implicit with every potion, not a discipline onto itself..."

Minerva finished checking over her other work, and as she was satisfied, bounded the parchments with charms she was by now well versed into, only to directly levitate them towards Riddle, who arched an eyebrow at her, silently questioning her smug expression. "Rubeus mentioned how impossible you were once he revealed he didn't know how to make an enlarged trunk for you."

The younger prefect snorted dismissively, but nodded towards her nevertheless: "I was merely surprised that he couldn't accomplish something that he took an active part in when we were in Greece."

"Read the notes and figure it out: the brews we added are used in the exempli gratia written at the end." the witch saw through Riddle's attempt at having her directly explain the proceedings, an explanation during which he'd undoubtedly find a way to cajole her into producing the trunk he had asked of Hagrid before Hogwarts resumed.

"Must you truly study such a distasteful subject?" she grimaced openly when, walking closer to the Slytherin prefect, she truly understood what he was reading.

There was no doubt that it was seriously dark magic: the tome itself seemed to be swallowing the light surrounding it, the ink on its pages gleaming just too wetly for it to be natural. "And don't bother trying to talk circles around me.

Inferi can't be that interesting, and what kind of application can you take from this knowledge that cannot be achieved with a cleaner animation on a mannequin?"

Riddle raised his eyes from the book: "Knowledge is neither good, nor evil. I thought that we were over this?"

"Planning on your private team of undead, Tom?" Hagrid asked jokingly, but his gaze was serious, and his shoulders slightly tense, "I'd never thought you'd be willing to read true Dark Arts in the middle of the Rùnda..."

"Both Minerva and I are waiting for your general notes on Ritualism." the Slytherin Prefect answered at an angle, "Given it involved the sacrifice of Hydra's heads, freshly cut, the voluntary deadly poisoning... I too would have never thought that you'd be so open with practicing Dark Magic, and yet here we are."

"I saved your life." Hagrid snorted, "I'd take a 'thank you' over you picking apart my methods, only to use them as an excuse to..."

"Flamel immediately recognized this as a Ritualistic Scar." Minerva interrupted the two before they could truly start with their bickering. Then she raised her left hand, showing the pale circle of skin that stood a bit raised against otherwise unblemished pink.

"He also mentioned how interesting my bloodwork is... I don't think he'd have agreed to teach me without it."

The two other wizards stopped and eyed her curiously, waiting to see if she'd be more forthcoming, only to be disappointed when she shook her head and decided to change topic: "Returning to the Inferius, is it truly that interesting?"

"With the correct reading key?" Riddle lost the wide, predatory smile that so often mirrored Hagrid's and assumed the more common self-satisfied tilt of the lips coupled with his lightly upraised chin, "Yes, it is."

"Reading key?"

"I had originally dismissed it too," Riddle eyed Minerva with dark amusement shining in his eyes, "after all it was merely a quote that came to mind during one of the Slug Parties, something that merely happened to echo what the Professor himself told us, do you remember?"

"The mind exerts Will, the body has Strength, magic holds Power, and the soul is a reflection of them all." despite being quite tipsy that night, Minerva gave proof of how keen her mind was by recalling exactly those words, making Riddle nod approvingly.

"I didn't deem them of any importance beyond some author's poetic attempt... until the ritual: mind, body, and magic." Tom smiled widely at Rubeus, who was frowning distastefully at the smaller wizard, as if he hadn't wished for him to truly grasp the complexity of what had happened.

"And the soul is a reflection of them all... can you guess what I am certain an Inferius lacks?"

"A soul." Rubeus tilted his head, a familiar curious gleam shining in his dark eyes as he leaned back in the massive armchair that he had to transfigure so that it'd be able to hold his bulk: "Can you make an Inferius with something different than a person?"

"Now who's thinking about a private army of undead?" Riddle taunted Hagrid while he closed his book, raising his left leg so that it rested over his right knee and clasping his hands over the dark tome.

"In theory, the sky is the limit... magical creatures naturally oppose manipulation of this kind, on the other hand, being dead, even a common spider can be spelled in a manner that would kill a living specimen. Surprisingly, a few parts are oddly similar to a technique to summon selected memories to the forefront of one's mind."

"That's not surprising at all... how soon can you prepare your notes on the topic, with our favorite reading key as the founding principle?" Rubeus carefully rose from his seat and returned Minerva's notes to their original place, exchanging a penetrating glance with the witch while Tom thought about the question he had just been asked.

"You can't possibly have read them all, Rubeus, never mind understanding..."

"I read enough to understand that it'd take me a month of focused study to grasp that amount of information, and up to a year to make my first tries in the field."

Turning fully towards the much shorter Minerva, he asked seriously, almost pleadingly: "Could you produce an ingot of quicksilver so that it'd have the malleability and properties of iron, without losing any of its intrinsic meaning?"

"That kind of transmutation is quite complex... I'd need to ask for Flamel's help, but he hasn't accepted me just yet, I need to realize a personal project to show off that I'm 'creative enough to waste his time on'." she spoke with uncertainty, her eyes lowering as if ashamed.

"Do you want a hand?" the offer came immediately, and for a moment, the Gryffindor witch was sorely tempted: if not in the practical aspects, Rubeus had given ample proof of the truly unbound nature of his imagination.

Surely with his insight, she'd be able to get started much sooner... But then she observed him carefully, and despite the healthy appearance of the wizard, there were deep bags under his eyes, and his smile appeared strained.

...

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