Year Five, Chapter Twenty Nine
- Location
- Australia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Year Five, Chapter Twenty Nine
Holly found herself standing on top of a lonely hill, surrounded by a mist-shrouded moor. A bitterly cold wind howled across the night, whisking away the residual heat of Fawkes' power. The moon shined down upon her and Dumbledore, bright and full in the night sky. A circle of weathered stones crowned the hill, with ancient carvings visible on each stone slab. In the moonlight, they almost seemed to dance.
"Professor?" she asked, her breath steaming in the cold night air.
"I do apologise for the cold, Miss Potter, but our lesson tonight will be most effective here," Dumbledore said, though he cast a silent warming charm on the two of them as he spoke.
"What are we learning?' Holly asked. She was curious, of course, and excited. Dumbledore had taught her everything from conjuration and animation to fiendfyre.
"History of Magic," Dumbledore said, his eyes twinkling lightly in the moonlight.
"History of Magic?" Holly asked, confused.
"And perhaps a few simple charms," Dumbledore replied, smiling slightly.
"Well, who wouldn't want a few simple charms?" Holly said.
"Quite. You remember I take it, the creature that emerged from the well at the Gaunt house?" Dumbledore asked, and Holly nodded.
"What... what was it, sir?"
"The glib answer is 'a fairy'. To be somewhat more comprehensive, it was a creature from a world unlike our own. Once they could come and go from this world freely, but wizards grew tired of the competition and sealed away all the passageways from here to there," Dumbledore said, and Holly nodded along. That was basically what Dumbledore had told her in his office right afterwards.
"Dobby told me something like that, once," Holly said.
"House Elves do descend from such beings. It is why they require what magical theorists call a 'contract of invitation' to remain here. Without one, they would surely be forcibly returned to the home plane of the ancestors."
"That thing at the Gaunt house wasn't anything like a house elf, sir," Holly said.
"No. You must understand that even the magical world has little information on such beings. As our plane is inherently hostile to them, so is theirs to us. Magic can allow some limited exploration, but without a similar contract of invitation no human - muggle or magical - could remain there for long," Dumbledore said.
"I guess that makes sense, but I don't see an evil tree person being too keen to be Voldemort's house elf," Holly said.
"The bargains struck by house-elves are the most generous such contracts. What folly it is of wizards to think them not generous enough. Voldemort has most likely paid it in the only currency such a dark creature would respect."
"Lives," Holly whispered, and Dumbledore nodded sadly.
"Indeed. I can see no other way for him to... balance the equations as it were."
"But... professor, why would this be a shock? Voldemort has never cared about killing people," Holly asked.
"The invitation of such creatures as weapons of war would be one of the few things guaranteed to bring down international intervention against him. For all his cruelty, never forget that Voldemort is both intelligent and cunning. It is not wise to underestimate your enemy," Dumbledore said.
"So if you don't know much about them, what are we learning tonight, sir?" Holly asked.
"Ah, I see you are as eager as ever. As you saw at the Gaunt house, such creatures are less vulnerable to ordinary magic. There are a few methods to dealing with such beings, but in the case of many of them the most effective spell is one you already know," Dumbledore said, and Holly blinked.
"One I already know... the Patronus charm, sir? But that's only useful against dementors, and lethifolds," Holly asked.
"Indeed, commonly - though Dementors are much like House Elves, in that they do not originate from this plane. Other dark spirits - less physical than the fairy you fought at the Gaunt house - are also vulnerable to it. For those that are made of more substantial stuff than manifested despair, alchemical iron or silver will often work," Dumbledore said.
"As in, pure conjured or transfigured iron or silver? Completely pure?" Holly asked, and Dumbledore nodded.
"Indeed. I suspect muggle science could also provide such materials these days, and there may be other metals worth investigating, but these have known conjuring charms in the degenerate form," Dumbledore said.
Holly gave him an odd look.
"A technical term. Alchemy, outside the purest elemental conjuration, is not a simple or rapid process. However, in the seventeenth century Ottoman wizards invented a process by which more complex alchemical conjurations could be performed, though the materials conjured are not... stable," Dumbledore said.
"Not stable?"
"They have an alarming tendency to explode violently on prolonged contact with air. For our purposes, it is no issue, but do not use this magic to conjure things meant to last - or even simply not to injure. If pure alchemical transfiguration were possible, such spells would be far easier," Dumbledore said.
"What did wizards use before they were invented?" Holly asked.
"Goblin silver is a magical alloy of alchemically produced iron, carbon, and silver. Alongside the time required to cast most spells in the premodern era, the danger from such creatures is why wizards such as Godric Gryffindor carried weapons like his famous sword," Dumbledore said.
"Wait, Goblins do alchemy?" Holly asked, confused. She'd learnt in History of Magic that Goblins had been banned from wand use since modern wands had been invented.
"Of course. Goblins are just as capable of magic as wizards and witches, though their own foci are heavily regulated by the ICW. I have repeatedly attempted to end wand-bans, but there is global resistance to the idea. Other magical devices may allow for complex and powerful spells, but a wand is just as powerful and channels far more magic. You yourself have seen how, as powerful as so-called 'wandless' magic may be, it is no match for the speed of a wand," Dumbledore said.
Holly felt unsettled. She'd never known much about Goblins, but then History of Magic was such a boring subject. Binns' lectures were so dull but she'd gotten the impression from them that while Goblins had rebelled for wand-rights, wands wouldn't do anything for them.
"Why do you let Binns teach the way he does, then? Or at all, come to think of it?" Holly asked.
"Let is an interesting choice of wording. I would much prefer an engaging teacher teaching something approaching reality, but History of Magic has long been the most heavily regulated subject taught at Hogwarts. There is a wide base of political support for teaching a whitewashed fairy tale - if you will pardon the expression - rather than the truth. However, there are no regulations on what Hogwarts may stock in its library, and as I consider the curriculum any teacher would be forced to teach to actively harmful..." Dumbledore said, and Holly grinned.
"You let Binns keep the job!"
"Exactly, my dear. Now, as to the basic form of degenerate silver conjuration..." Dumbledore said and began to teach. Holly was enraptured - lessons on things like conjuration and animation were her favourite. Not because of the content, really, but because Dumbledore was teaching her things the whispers couldn't. She was learning things. That, and he was a really good teacher.
Dumbledore taught her the basic conjurations first, which just conjured silver or iron from thin air in a sort of shapeless lump. After a few seconds, the conjured objects dissolved and then violently exploded, which was great fun to watch from behind a shield charm. After that, Holly learnt a few refinements of the arrow-conjuring charm (though some scholars argued it should be called the arrow-conjuring curse based on the effect, arithmantically speaking it was a charm, much like the stunning spell).
Conjuration was never faster than transfiguration for the same effect, and so too was transfiguration never faster than animation for the same effect. Carrying dozens of alchemical silver arrowheads on her would be pretty inconvenient, not to mention expensive, though so Holly got to work on casting it faster and faster.
The charm conjured a number of silver or iron arrows and sent them flying through the air at speed, and was based off of a medieval charm designed for sieges and battlefields. With a modern wand, it could be cast with a few words and a gesture - or without the words at all, if the witch in question was skilled enough. When it was first invented, even the most skilled wizards would have required a cumbersome staff or sceptre and a full minute's chanting to cast it.
After they returned to Hogwarts, Dumbledore gave Holly a few books from his personal collection to read up on. They were esoteric, mostly handwritten, and not in modern English, but years at Hogwarts had let her read that sort of thing - if a little slowly. Hermione had been interested, too, and both of them ahd stayed up far too late studying them.
Holly had reached out to a number of people to join their underground duelling club, which still didn't have a formal name. Lavender Brown and the Patil twins had been the first people she'd asked, simply because they were well known and had friends all over the school - and she knew they were trustworthy. They'd recommended a few more people in other houses, but neither they nor Ron, Hermione, or Ginny could think of any Slytherins to invite.
She wanted to try and find a few decent ones to invite, and she knew that they must exist - plenty of them had seemed to be perfectly decent people. The rivalry was just too strong for her to spend any time with them, and it seemed like the same thing extended to her friends.
That was why Holly found herself in Snape's office, the Potions Master already looking bored.
"And what is it that you want my help with, Miss Potter? I certainly hope that it isn't anything to do with an unauthorised defence group," Snape said.
"Well, say I did, um get authorisation for a defence group - a smaller one than the duelling club. If I only wanted to involve trustworthy people, which Slytherins would I invite?" Holly asked. Snape's eyes narrowed.
"How many such people would you, theoretically, need?"
"Just a few, I guess," she said.
"Peter Murk and Zubeida Khan. Seventh Years, reliable and not... affiliated," Snape said, each word sounding carefully chosen.
"Thank you. I'll keep them in mind - I think I remember them from the Duelling Club," Holly said. How, she wondered, had that become something she'd say to Snape?
The two of them were apparently friends, dating, or something along those lines because they seemed to stick pretty closely together on the Marauder's map. Holly saw them in the library the next day and headed there after them.
Peter Murk was a tall, lanky boy with brown hair, pale skin, and an unfortunate case of acne. Zubeida Khan was a short, stocky girl with darker skin and black hair. From the way the two of them were sitting next to one another, Holly thought they probably were dating.
"Can I talk to the two of you? Sorry for interrupting, but it's important," Holly asked them, after casting a silent anti-eavesdropping spell.
"Sure, Potter," Zubeida said. Her Birmingham accent was strong, and Holly was pleased to hear a lack of the usual venom attached to her last name by Slytherins.
"I know both of you came to the Duelling Club pretty regularly. Would it be fair to say you're, uh, concerned about passing your Defence N.E.W.T.?"
"You could say that," Peter said, his upper-class, aristocratic accent a stark contrast to Zubeida's.
"How concerned?" Holly asked flatly and looked at the two of them.
"Very," Zubeida said quietly.
"And if I said that I was restarting the duelling club as a smaller, unofficial organisation? Would the two of you be interested in joining?" Holly asked them. They looked at each, and then slowly turned back to her.
"Yeah, we would," Peter said, Zubeida nodding along with him. Holly got her sign-up sheet out of her robes.
"Sign here. It's linked to a magically binding contract that will curse anyone who breaks it," she said.
Both of them read it through in its entirety, and then signed it. Neither of them looked that comfortable with the idea, but Holly thought that they were probably more uncomfortable leaving Hogwarts without knowing how to properly defend themselves.
" The first meeting's Saturday night, come to the seventh-floor corridor with the painting of the dancing trolls at seven-thirty," Holly said, and the two Slytherins nodded.
"By the way, Potter, this contract is a pretty impressive bit of magic. Who put it and the curse together?" Zubeida asked.
"Hermione Granger," Holly replied, grinning at their nervous expressions.
Holly found herself standing on top of a lonely hill, surrounded by a mist-shrouded moor. A bitterly cold wind howled across the night, whisking away the residual heat of Fawkes' power. The moon shined down upon her and Dumbledore, bright and full in the night sky. A circle of weathered stones crowned the hill, with ancient carvings visible on each stone slab. In the moonlight, they almost seemed to dance.
"Professor?" she asked, her breath steaming in the cold night air.
"I do apologise for the cold, Miss Potter, but our lesson tonight will be most effective here," Dumbledore said, though he cast a silent warming charm on the two of them as he spoke.
"What are we learning?' Holly asked. She was curious, of course, and excited. Dumbledore had taught her everything from conjuration and animation to fiendfyre.
"History of Magic," Dumbledore said, his eyes twinkling lightly in the moonlight.
"History of Magic?" Holly asked, confused.
"And perhaps a few simple charms," Dumbledore replied, smiling slightly.
"Well, who wouldn't want a few simple charms?" Holly said.
"Quite. You remember I take it, the creature that emerged from the well at the Gaunt house?" Dumbledore asked, and Holly nodded.
"What... what was it, sir?"
"The glib answer is 'a fairy'. To be somewhat more comprehensive, it was a creature from a world unlike our own. Once they could come and go from this world freely, but wizards grew tired of the competition and sealed away all the passageways from here to there," Dumbledore said, and Holly nodded along. That was basically what Dumbledore had told her in his office right afterwards.
"Dobby told me something like that, once," Holly said.
"House Elves do descend from such beings. It is why they require what magical theorists call a 'contract of invitation' to remain here. Without one, they would surely be forcibly returned to the home plane of the ancestors."
"That thing at the Gaunt house wasn't anything like a house elf, sir," Holly said.
"No. You must understand that even the magical world has little information on such beings. As our plane is inherently hostile to them, so is theirs to us. Magic can allow some limited exploration, but without a similar contract of invitation no human - muggle or magical - could remain there for long," Dumbledore said.
"I guess that makes sense, but I don't see an evil tree person being too keen to be Voldemort's house elf," Holly said.
"The bargains struck by house-elves are the most generous such contracts. What folly it is of wizards to think them not generous enough. Voldemort has most likely paid it in the only currency such a dark creature would respect."
"Lives," Holly whispered, and Dumbledore nodded sadly.
"Indeed. I can see no other way for him to... balance the equations as it were."
"But... professor, why would this be a shock? Voldemort has never cared about killing people," Holly asked.
"The invitation of such creatures as weapons of war would be one of the few things guaranteed to bring down international intervention against him. For all his cruelty, never forget that Voldemort is both intelligent and cunning. It is not wise to underestimate your enemy," Dumbledore said.
"So if you don't know much about them, what are we learning tonight, sir?" Holly asked.
"Ah, I see you are as eager as ever. As you saw at the Gaunt house, such creatures are less vulnerable to ordinary magic. There are a few methods to dealing with such beings, but in the case of many of them the most effective spell is one you already know," Dumbledore said, and Holly blinked.
"One I already know... the Patronus charm, sir? But that's only useful against dementors, and lethifolds," Holly asked.
"Indeed, commonly - though Dementors are much like House Elves, in that they do not originate from this plane. Other dark spirits - less physical than the fairy you fought at the Gaunt house - are also vulnerable to it. For those that are made of more substantial stuff than manifested despair, alchemical iron or silver will often work," Dumbledore said.
"As in, pure conjured or transfigured iron or silver? Completely pure?" Holly asked, and Dumbledore nodded.
"Indeed. I suspect muggle science could also provide such materials these days, and there may be other metals worth investigating, but these have known conjuring charms in the degenerate form," Dumbledore said.
Holly gave him an odd look.
"A technical term. Alchemy, outside the purest elemental conjuration, is not a simple or rapid process. However, in the seventeenth century Ottoman wizards invented a process by which more complex alchemical conjurations could be performed, though the materials conjured are not... stable," Dumbledore said.
"Not stable?"
"They have an alarming tendency to explode violently on prolonged contact with air. For our purposes, it is no issue, but do not use this magic to conjure things meant to last - or even simply not to injure. If pure alchemical transfiguration were possible, such spells would be far easier," Dumbledore said.
"What did wizards use before they were invented?" Holly asked.
"Goblin silver is a magical alloy of alchemically produced iron, carbon, and silver. Alongside the time required to cast most spells in the premodern era, the danger from such creatures is why wizards such as Godric Gryffindor carried weapons like his famous sword," Dumbledore said.
"Wait, Goblins do alchemy?" Holly asked, confused. She'd learnt in History of Magic that Goblins had been banned from wand use since modern wands had been invented.
"Of course. Goblins are just as capable of magic as wizards and witches, though their own foci are heavily regulated by the ICW. I have repeatedly attempted to end wand-bans, but there is global resistance to the idea. Other magical devices may allow for complex and powerful spells, but a wand is just as powerful and channels far more magic. You yourself have seen how, as powerful as so-called 'wandless' magic may be, it is no match for the speed of a wand," Dumbledore said.
Holly felt unsettled. She'd never known much about Goblins, but then History of Magic was such a boring subject. Binns' lectures were so dull but she'd gotten the impression from them that while Goblins had rebelled for wand-rights, wands wouldn't do anything for them.
"Why do you let Binns teach the way he does, then? Or at all, come to think of it?" Holly asked.
"Let is an interesting choice of wording. I would much prefer an engaging teacher teaching something approaching reality, but History of Magic has long been the most heavily regulated subject taught at Hogwarts. There is a wide base of political support for teaching a whitewashed fairy tale - if you will pardon the expression - rather than the truth. However, there are no regulations on what Hogwarts may stock in its library, and as I consider the curriculum any teacher would be forced to teach to actively harmful..." Dumbledore said, and Holly grinned.
"You let Binns keep the job!"
"Exactly, my dear. Now, as to the basic form of degenerate silver conjuration..." Dumbledore said and began to teach. Holly was enraptured - lessons on things like conjuration and animation were her favourite. Not because of the content, really, but because Dumbledore was teaching her things the whispers couldn't. She was learning things. That, and he was a really good teacher.
Dumbledore taught her the basic conjurations first, which just conjured silver or iron from thin air in a sort of shapeless lump. After a few seconds, the conjured objects dissolved and then violently exploded, which was great fun to watch from behind a shield charm. After that, Holly learnt a few refinements of the arrow-conjuring charm (though some scholars argued it should be called the arrow-conjuring curse based on the effect, arithmantically speaking it was a charm, much like the stunning spell).
Conjuration was never faster than transfiguration for the same effect, and so too was transfiguration never faster than animation for the same effect. Carrying dozens of alchemical silver arrowheads on her would be pretty inconvenient, not to mention expensive, though so Holly got to work on casting it faster and faster.
The charm conjured a number of silver or iron arrows and sent them flying through the air at speed, and was based off of a medieval charm designed for sieges and battlefields. With a modern wand, it could be cast with a few words and a gesture - or without the words at all, if the witch in question was skilled enough. When it was first invented, even the most skilled wizards would have required a cumbersome staff or sceptre and a full minute's chanting to cast it.
After they returned to Hogwarts, Dumbledore gave Holly a few books from his personal collection to read up on. They were esoteric, mostly handwritten, and not in modern English, but years at Hogwarts had let her read that sort of thing - if a little slowly. Hermione had been interested, too, and both of them ahd stayed up far too late studying them.
Holly had reached out to a number of people to join their underground duelling club, which still didn't have a formal name. Lavender Brown and the Patil twins had been the first people she'd asked, simply because they were well known and had friends all over the school - and she knew they were trustworthy. They'd recommended a few more people in other houses, but neither they nor Ron, Hermione, or Ginny could think of any Slytherins to invite.
She wanted to try and find a few decent ones to invite, and she knew that they must exist - plenty of them had seemed to be perfectly decent people. The rivalry was just too strong for her to spend any time with them, and it seemed like the same thing extended to her friends.
That was why Holly found herself in Snape's office, the Potions Master already looking bored.
"And what is it that you want my help with, Miss Potter? I certainly hope that it isn't anything to do with an unauthorised defence group," Snape said.
"Well, say I did, um get authorisation for a defence group - a smaller one than the duelling club. If I only wanted to involve trustworthy people, which Slytherins would I invite?" Holly asked. Snape's eyes narrowed.
"How many such people would you, theoretically, need?"
"Just a few, I guess," she said.
"Peter Murk and Zubeida Khan. Seventh Years, reliable and not... affiliated," Snape said, each word sounding carefully chosen.
"Thank you. I'll keep them in mind - I think I remember them from the Duelling Club," Holly said. How, she wondered, had that become something she'd say to Snape?
The two of them were apparently friends, dating, or something along those lines because they seemed to stick pretty closely together on the Marauder's map. Holly saw them in the library the next day and headed there after them.
Peter Murk was a tall, lanky boy with brown hair, pale skin, and an unfortunate case of acne. Zubeida Khan was a short, stocky girl with darker skin and black hair. From the way the two of them were sitting next to one another, Holly thought they probably were dating.
"Can I talk to the two of you? Sorry for interrupting, but it's important," Holly asked them, after casting a silent anti-eavesdropping spell.
"Sure, Potter," Zubeida said. Her Birmingham accent was strong, and Holly was pleased to hear a lack of the usual venom attached to her last name by Slytherins.
"I know both of you came to the Duelling Club pretty regularly. Would it be fair to say you're, uh, concerned about passing your Defence N.E.W.T.?"
"You could say that," Peter said, his upper-class, aristocratic accent a stark contrast to Zubeida's.
"How concerned?" Holly asked flatly and looked at the two of them.
"Very," Zubeida said quietly.
"And if I said that I was restarting the duelling club as a smaller, unofficial organisation? Would the two of you be interested in joining?" Holly asked them. They looked at each, and then slowly turned back to her.
"Yeah, we would," Peter said, Zubeida nodding along with him. Holly got her sign-up sheet out of her robes.
"Sign here. It's linked to a magically binding contract that will curse anyone who breaks it," she said.
Both of them read it through in its entirety, and then signed it. Neither of them looked that comfortable with the idea, but Holly thought that they were probably more uncomfortable leaving Hogwarts without knowing how to properly defend themselves.
" The first meeting's Saturday night, come to the seventh-floor corridor with the painting of the dancing trolls at seven-thirty," Holly said, and the two Slytherins nodded.
"By the way, Potter, this contract is a pretty impressive bit of magic. Who put it and the curse together?" Zubeida asked.
"Hermione Granger," Holly replied, grinning at their nervous expressions.
