The Harry Potter Literary Storm
I'd love to dive right in, but first - a warning. To all Ron-lovers: I'm Sorry. With a capital S. I'm a bit of a fangirl too, so I feel your pain. But don't shoot me until I've gotten last (and final) chapter up, okay?
Previously:
“It was a portkey,” commented Hermione, nervously.
“And now,” realised Ron, glancing around, “we’re in a grave yard!”
… and slightly later in the chapter
Harry flipped the paper over, to reveal the side with content. Over the paper were small arrows, from place to place, and informative illustrations. It looked almost like…
“A map,” said Harry. “It’s a map.”
Chapter Seven, Part Four: ‘X’ Marks the Spot
“A map to what?” inquired Ron, coming to look over Harry and Hermione’s shoulders, which was easy, taking into account his considerable height.
“Something called the Pillar of Storgé, apparently,” said Harry, pointing at the top of the page, where there was some large writing that read,
‘Directions to something called the Pillar of Storgé’.
“Do you think it’s particularly important?” asked Ron.
“I’d say so,” Harry told him, pointing to some massive red letters at the bottom of the page, which read,
‘PARTICULARLY IMPORTANT’.
“Do you think finding this ‘Pillar of Storgé’, could help us get to You Know Who?” questioned Ron.
“Sounds likely,” said Harry. “After all, look at this…” He pointed to some words that had been written in brackets,
‘(please note that is the only way to get to me, Voldemort)’
“I think this plan is promising,” Hermione told the boys, “but judging by this map, it will not be an easy venture. Look at the names of the places! ‘The Fortress of Shadows’.” Hearing the accursed name out loud sent shivers down the spines of the trio.
“Well,” said Harry, trying to overcome his fear, “how do we get started?”
Hermione pointed to the map, where a little green cross was labelled, ‘You Are Here’.
“I think we are here,” she informed them. Harry nodded. “We should be able to face the North, where we will see the ‘Fortress of Shadows’.”
The trio shivered at the name.
“Which way is North?” asked Ron.
“Hold on,” said Harry, giving Hermione the map and placing his wand on his palm. “I’ll do the spell we learned in our fourth year for the Doomspell Tournament, which acts as a compass. Compasify!.” The trio watched in suspense as his wand began to quiver, and then turned clockwise, to point at what appeared to be a shadowy fortress.
“There!” announced Ron, pointing to it. “I think that’s it!”
“It says there’s a trapdoor in the floor of the Fortress of Shadows,” informed Hermione, causing the three of them to shiver in fear.
Silently, the trio approached the Fortress. It was not large, but was certainly sturdy, and made of solid wood. Inside were the creepiest of odds and ends, old, burnt debris, and Harry was sure he had saw things crawling from shadow to shadow.
Ron was very pale.
“I had hoped my comic arachnophobia wouldn’t have a chance to resurface,” he told the others, a certain quiver to his tone. “After all, it has been very relevant in the past, remember…?”
In the past…
“In that case,” said the giant spider, “I will talk to you two for a while, before I eat you horribly and allow my to children fight over your remains.”
Ron had reached the end of his tether.
“Is that pathetic crying I hear?” demanded the giant spider.
“Yes, Mr Giant Spider Sir,” whimpered Ron. “I am comically afraid of spiders!”
“Were you really crying pathetically?” asked Hermione, with a snicker.
“It comes with comical arachnophobia!” snapped Ron, unhappy and defensive, most likely regretting telling that particular story and describing how, exactly, he had cried.
“This is all very interesting,” admitted Harry, “but we’re meant to be looking for a trapdoor.”
“Right,” remembered Ron and Hermione.
They searched the ground for quite a while, but couldn’t find a thing.
“Do you think this is the right Fortress?” asked Harry, worriedly.
“It’s definitely shadowy,” Hermione reminded him, doubtfully, “Not to mention, we can’t exactly have followed the wrong North, can we?”
“I suppose not,” agreed Harry. “But how are we going to get through the floor?”
“We should have brought Hagrid,” commented Ron. “Get him to jump a few times, then the floor wouldn’t be in the way any more.” Harry nodded, but had a slightly more realistic idea.
“We have the next best thing though,” he informed the other two.
“What?” pried Ron. Harry winked.
“Hermione!”
Hermione didn’t look pleased, for some reason.
“I mean, magic,” Harry corrected himself, “which Hermione is very good at and could use to explode the floor, seeing as how we have no dynamite.” Hermione raised her eyebrows.
“Hear that, Hermione?” asked Ron, obviously trying to lift her mood. “You’re equivalent to dynamite! Which, whatever it is, is probably very intelligent, independent and beautiful.”
Hermione just rolled her eyes.
“Just get out of the way, will you?”
Harry and Ron, knowing what was good for them, got out of the way as Hermione blew up the floor. Panels of wood flew everywhere, completely destroying any elegance the Fortress had ever exhibited. Old, darkened pottery was smashed, and the pieces were scattered over the already dirty floor. More importantly, however, Hermione’s attempt was successful in uncovering the entrance to a dark tunnel.
And then, they heard the thumping of footsteps.
“Oh, no!” hissed Hermione. “We’ve awakened an angry beast!”
“I don’t think you were meant to blow open the Fortress,” Harry suggested fearfully. The thumping grew louder, and a faint growling could be heard.
“Isn’t there are quieter, gentler explosion spell?” asked Ron, listening hard.
“Quick!” Hermione snapped, ignoring the two of them. “Into the tunnel!”
Harry, Ron and Hermione climbed quickly down into the tunnel, and, seeing as how the passage became very small for a while, crawled as fast as their little arms and legs would carry them. There was a huge crashing noise from the Fortress, and the trio hurried through the widening tunnel, until the area below the old, shadowy structure was out of sight.
Hermione consulted with the map.
“We need to follow the tunnel until we reach something called ‘the Toenail of Icklibõgg’,” she said uncertainly, “and then turn left…”
They reached something closely resembling a toenail, in about five minutes. It was huge, yellow, and carried a funny smell.
“Is that it?” inquired Ron, disgusted.
“Does it look like a toenail?” asked Harry, bouncing back with another question. Ron looked at the thing seriously.
“Yeah,” he decided, “Crabbe’s.”
“And he would know,” Hermione commented seriously. “As you, Ron, were him for an hour in our second year, remember…?”
In the trio’s second year…
Harry, Ron and Hermione all rose to take the potion.
“Actually,” said Hermione, “I’ll go into a cubicle. After all, friends though we certainly are, there’s a reason why boys aren’t allowed in the girls’ dormitory.”
“Fair enough,” agreed Ron. Hermione dashed away, and Harry looked at the liquid in his goblet. The Polyjuice potion looked like the kind of thing he would never want to step in, let alone drink.
“Well,” said Harry awkwardly to Ron, “bottoms up, eh?”
“What?” asked Ron, confused. “I fail to see what our bottoms have to do with anything.” He paused for a moment. “But if it’s something about the procedure of taking the potion, don’t tell Hermione I said that…”
“I mean, shall we drink?” Harry corrected himself, ignoring his best friend’s clueless antics.
“I suppose we shall,” agreed Ron.
Harry and Ron clinked glasses, and both drank at the same time, completely draining their goblets. What followed was an odd feeling, like taking a shower in warm jelly.
“How odd,” commented Harry. Ron nodded… only it wasn’t Ron. It was Crabbe.
“Harry!” exclaimed Ron. “I’ve never seen you this ugly!”
“You neither,” agreed Harry.
He paused for a moment.
“No, you neither,” he said more firmly, taking extra special account of Crabbe’s hairdo. “Now, let’s go grill some Malfoy.”
“Grill?” asked Ron, now even more confused and a little worried. “Harry, I think that’s illegal…”
“Yes, I remember,” agreed Harry, recalling his experience of being Goyle.
“Oh, yes, me too,” Ron added. “And before that, I had thought that Malfoy would have better taste in side-kicks… You know, with more expensive pedicures, at least.”
Thankfully, unlike their second year experience, none of the trio had to get too close to the toenail, and simply turned down a narrow tunnel to the left.
“What do we do now, Hermione?” asked Harry, who was fearlessly and heroically in the lead.
“You might want to tune down that fearless heroism, mate,” warned Ron. “Or you might get yourself killed again, and perhaps inadvertently get my entire family killed again as well.”
“Have you forgotten the plan, Ron?” scolded Harry. “I said I wouldn’t get killed, so I won’t. Hermione, what do we do now?” he repeated.
“I don’t know,” Hermione admitted from the rear. “I think we’re meant to keep going straight, but there’s a little star on the map…”
“Have you checked the Key?” asked Harry.
“Oh “ right,” muttered Hermione, looking slightly embarrassed. “Uh “ we’ll need to keep going straight, but will encounter an ‘Obstacle, booby-trap or Giant Spider’”.
“That’s ridiculous,” grumbled Ron. “How many Giant Spiders are there in the world? Couldn’t they come up with something else Giant instead, like?” He paused before continuing thoughtfully. “Well, I guess that toenail was quite big, and there was Basil, and also Ernest, but still, I’d prefer something more along the lines of a Giant Flobberworm…”
However, Ron didn’t get to keep up his annoying rant, as something large had fallen from the ceiling.
Without even getting a clear glimpse of what it was, Harry, Ron and Hermione ducked behind a rock, which was conveniently only feet away.
“What was that?” asked Ron, quivering, and completely forgetting his complaints. “Was it a Giant Flobberworm?”
“I think that was the ‘Obstacle, booby-trap or Giant Spider,’ Hermione told him worriedly
“It didn’t look like a Giant Spider,” Harry told the other two, narrowing it down.
“And I’m quite sure it’s not a booby trap,” added Hermione, “or it would have trapped us, rather than falling in our path. We’re looking at an Obstacle, Ron and Harry.”
They sat there for a few moments, hoping for more clues, but heard only scuffling.
“I’ll pop my head out and take a peek,” offered Harry. The other two nodded, and Harry silently poked his head out.
“Is it a bird?” asked Hermione, fearfully.
“No,” whispered Harry.
“Is it a plane?” inquired Ron.
“That’s completely stupid,” Harry told him. Ron shrugged.
“Well, all I know about planes is that they fly,” he said. “So… is it a toad?”
“No, Ron,” Harry said, irritated. “It’s not a toad. Take a look yourself, you git.”
Looking hurt, Ron accepted the challenge, and stuck his head out, to see the danger.
Which caused him to faint.
Hermione groaned.
“What is it?” she asked Harry.
“A sphinx,” Harry said. “So we should probably wait for Ron to wake up. We might need his “ uh…” He glanced at Ron, who was unconscious on the floor. “… Intellect.”
“Ennervate,” pronounced Hermione magically, and Ron awoke instantly, causing everyone to wonder why no one had ever thought of that spell before. After all, it would have saved Ron from missing out on all sorts of information, not to mention the fact that because of Ron’s fainting, Hermione had once had to lightly converse with Lucius Malfoy for several minutes.
“It’s a sphinx!” Ron told the other two nervously. “What should we do?”
“They’re not that bad,” Harry informed his friends, neither of whom had ever met a sphinx. “I saw one in the third task of the Doomspell Tournament, just before the horrific event that particularly aggravated me, peculiarly reconstituted Voldemort and didn’t kill Cedric Diggory. I remember like it was only a few years ago…”
A few years ago…
“Wow!” exclaimed Harry, looking at the enormous sphinx.
“Hello,” said the sphinx, tipping its hat.
“Are you an obstacle, booby trap or Giant Spider?” Harry asked nervously.
“Yes,” the sphinx agreed. “I am an obstacle. Also, I’m a sphinx. And I could be a booby trap too.”
“So how do I get past… you?”
“You just need to answer my riddle. If you answer correctly, I let you pass. If you answer correctly and then ask nice-like, I won’t let anyone else pass after you, even if they do answer the riddle. If you walk away, I don’t let you pass, and if you answer incorrectly, well…”
“Well?” asked Harry.
“Well, you’ll never walk again, that’s for darn sure,” said the sphinx.
Harry gulped.
“I “ I suppose I’ll hear the riddle then, if that’s alright?”
The sphinx nodded. It was funny how such a friendly-looking part woman, part lion could be so ferocious.
“First, tell me what we are told,
To call what grows on food that’s old.
Next add in the only thing,
In ‘heal’ and ‘green’ but not in ‘King’.
Then finally tell me of pants that reach,
To the knee or less, and are worn on the beach.
Then, string together all of this junk,
Solve the near rhyme and tell me: Which man’s not a hunk?”
Harry’s first thought was to answer, ‘Snape!’ and hope for the best, but thankfully, he had restrained himself.
“So I’m assuming this one will have a riddle, too,” Harry finished.
“Should we go and see?” asked Hermione, knowing that if the sphinx had a riddle, she’d have to answer quickly. After all, Hermione had a reputation to uphold. Harry nodded, and the three of them emerged.
“Hello,” greeted Harry timidly.
“Hello,” greeted the sphinx.
“Umm “ we were actually hoping to follow this tunnel,” Harry informed her. The sphinx nodded.
“Of course,” she said. “Of course. No one would come down just to see a sphinx, would they?” Remarkably, the sphinx pouted.
“Well…” began Ron, honestly. Harry didn’t let him go on.
“We didn’t know you were here before now,” he explained, confused.
“Well, of course you wouldn’t. I’m not important enough to mention in conversations, now am I?”
The trio exchanged odd glances.
“You wouldn’t happen to be related to someone called ‘Myrtle’, would you?” asked Hermione curiously. The sphinx shook her head.
“No,” she said sadly. “I’m all alone.”
“Look, I’m sorry,” Harry apologised, “but we really need to get through. We’re defeating an evil Dictator and saving the world; I’m sure you know how it is…”
“Oh, of course,” said the sphinx, “the world is more important than a lowly sphinx!”
“Well… yeah,” agreed Ron, apologetically.
“Fair enough,” sighed the sphinx. “You know, I’m being paid to sit here anyway, and I switch with some cousins of mine every now and then. I’m not that lowly, or, you know, all that ‘alone’ either…”
“That’s nice,” Ron told her sincerely.
“So, do you have a riddle?” asked Harry. The sphinx nodded, and closed its eyes, remembering.
“A train leaves from destination ‘A’, and travels fifty-eight miles in twelve seconds, then a broomstick leaves from destination ‘B’ and rises at least eighteen miles, but slows down after travelling ninety-five miles across the land, then passes by a magic carpet, missing it by three feet, which has been moving for approximately fourteen minutes and has spanned over two-thousand feet, originally having started three miles from destination ‘A’.
If then the train, broomstick and carpet all continue moving, with the carpet beginning on a circle with a circumference of one hundred and eighty-eight miles and the broom spiralling upward in a reverse figure eight, how long before train, broomstick and magic carpet collide?”
Ron fainted again.
“Are you serious?” asked Hermione, who, although having taken Arithmancy, could not work out half of that in her head. In fact, it took all of her brainpower to stop herself from joining Ron in fainting. The sphinx glanced down the corridor.
“You know what?” she said in a hushed voice, “Since you’re saving the world, don’t worry about it. You can go through.” The sphinx walked out of the way, and Harry and Hermione (thanking her profusely, as it was in their nature) dragged Ron down the passage until they met with a fork.
“We need to go down the left fork,” informed Hermione, “and then ‘X’ marks the spot!”
The sense of achievement that radiated through the room was apparently enough to wake Ron up.
“Excellent!” he commented.
Moving with renewed vigour, the trio took the left fork, and had walked for barely five minutes, before reaching a dead end.
“A dead end?” demanded Ron. “But we took the left fork!”
“Yeah,” agreed Harry, inspecting the wall, in case it was not a real wall or could be broken through. No luck, sadly. “Hermione, what happened?” he asked. Hermione scratched her head, looking closely at the map.
“There’s some writing here… something about a Green Flame Torch being vital…”
“What’s a Green Flame Torch?” asked Ron, confused.
“I don’t know,” Hermione said honestly. “I’m assuming it’s a Flame Torch of some sort, which is Green.”
“Or a Torch that emits Green Flame,” added Harry. Something (utterly figurative) lit up in Ron’s head.
“I had a torch!” he reminded them. “It was a port key!”
“That’s probably it!” Hermione told him. “Come on, light it up.”
There was an awkward pause.
“I think I dropped it somewhere…” muttered Ron, checking his pockets.
When the trio had gone back, found the torch (which, in Ron’s defence, had only been lost when he fainted), and returned to the dead-end tunnel, Hermione lit it up with her wand.
Predictably and unoriginally, it burned Green. However, something far more interesting happened than the area simply growing lighter, bathed in an odd, gloomy light. In the middle of the floor, several little statues had appeared, smaller than dolls’ houses. They were like little pyramids, and they were only visible because of the Green Flame, which reflected uniquely off the small structures.
“What do we do now?” asked Ron, inspecting them. “Harry?”
“I think we should poke them,” suggested Harry seriously, and took his own suggestion. His hand, however, went straight through the model pyramids.
“The map says… it’s so small,” Hermione told the other two, “Something about apparating though.”
“Apparating where?” asked Harry.
“It doesn’t say,” said Hermione, and looked hopelessly at the little pyramids.
“Maybe we should go and see Aragog again,” commented Harry, with no idea what to do next. “He seemed to know a lot about things.”
“No,” said Hermione, “No, I’m quite sure it’s unhealthy to cause Ron to faint too much. Why don’t we try apparating to these pyramids instead? You know, they may be a real place somewhere.”
As Harry and Ron couldn’t think of any better ideas, the three of them soon concentrated on the little glowing pyramids, all linking arms.
“On the count of three,” Harry informed. “One… Two… Three!”
:oOo:
Aha! I did it again! (the ending, I mean)
As per usual, thank you for reading, and I would adore a review.
Questions are more than welcome in my Duelling Club thread, and… erm…
Long live the Queen?
The Harry Potter Literary Storm by Mind_Over_Matter
Chapter Notes: Here we have Part Four, and the second last instalment of this story!
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. J.K. Rowling owns Harry Potter. And I don’t own J.K. Rowling either “ I’m not just averting credit for tax reasons! I seriously don’t own the Potterverse or anything you see in the Harry Potter novels. Also, I don’t carry more than two dollars in change.
Guess who I’m going to thank?
*Drumroll*
Thanks go to Schmergo, my friend and beta who’s seriously only slightly insane!