It probably tickled her mystery novel sensibilities. That or Cluedo.
It was Mr Riddle, in the Headmaster's Office, with Gryffindor's Sword.
But also, why take extra steps, when convenience is measured entirely in steps when PtV is on.
Felix Fortuna (Worm/HP)
- Thread starter Chartic
- Start date
It probably tickled her mystery novel sensibilities. That or Cluedo.
It was Mr Riddle, in the Headmaster's Office, with Gryffindor's Sword.
But also, why take extra steps, when convenience is measured entirely in steps when PtV is on.
- Location
- Canada
IIRC there's WoG that PtV is not an evil genie, and takes your preferences into account where possible, so I'm inclined to think this is suggestive of something. As far as I can tell the time pressure didn't mean she had to destroy and run. In fact she could have left sooner if she took them to destroy after escaping instead. I suppose the sword missing may have been noticed right away which may cause other problems.
That sounded weird to me, so I took a look. The work in question is this paper, which was described in a press release from Los Alamos National Lab, which was the basis for the Science Alert article you reference. In each link of this chain the actual science content decreased in favor of exciting "interpretation". So, to clarify, this is what Yan & Sinitsyn actually found:
If a single known qubit, encoded as the spin of a particle, is put through a chaotic* scrambling process (such as being part of a physical system over a long time period) involving a large number of other particles, a single spin measurement is made, and then the scrambling process is reversed, then a measurement of the particle's spin is more likely to be equal to its original value than the opposite (specifically, about 75-25 under ideal conditions), and is therefore statistically recoverable.
Now, I'm not an expert on quantum mechanics—I understand enough to read the paper, but I couldn't say for sure which of the specific conditions above are crucial. Does the qubit need to be encoded as spin, specifically? No, but I don't know which properties would produce the same result (special properties of spin are used to derive the result). Does there need to be a large quantity of other particles in play which are not being measured and whose state we are indifferent to? Yes, but I couldn't give numbers. Does it matter that we're only asking for a single (qu)bit to be preserved? Yes; I'm pretty sure that looking at more qubits would decrease the difference in probabilities, probably exponentially. Is it essential that the intervention was a measurement operation? Yes. That it only measured a single qubit? It matters, but I'm not sure how much.
Chaotic processes are still chaotic, the butterfly effect still exists, and science journalism is still terrible. The major finding is that certain types of small disturbances are (sometimes) not amplified (in a specific way) in the way that they normally are in chaotic processes, and that this is a quantum phenomenon which differs from the classical picture. Or, in Sinitsyn's words, "the notion of chaos in classical physics and in quantum mechanics must be understood differently."
(Don't quote the last paragraph of the paper at me, by the way. It needs to be interpreted in the context of the rest of the paper.)
Simulation-based precognition remains nonsensical.
Incidentally, none of this has much to do with determinism, only with the theoretical fidelity of a (probabilistic) simulation of the universe.
*In this post, "chaotic" is used in an informal technical sense. That is, it is used for its meaning in the context of chaos theory, but imprecisely, with the understanding that a motivated expert could work out exactly what conditions are needed.
- Location
- Canada
Disclaimer: I'm no expert either.
I referenced the article because it seemed to suggest that if you're looking to QM to save you from determinism you'll find stuff like that showing things are more deterministic than they seemed. If your thinking is that parallel worlds or time travel or the like would explode out into countless variations from any perturbation based on QM, that may not be the case. So, in a fictional world at least, I think you can argue that Worm can have its determinism/super-prediction without being particularly undermined by QM.
Any property should work. The Schrödinger equation describes the wave function of quantum mechanical systems.
I think the large number of particles is in order to simulate a more realistic scenario (being in an environment other than a lab where there's lots of chaotic interactions).
Since it applies to any property I think it generalizes more than that.
I was using predictability as my metric for the degree of determinism, which I think is reasonable. The history of science has been a history of increasing ability to predict things, even that which was thought to be unpredictable, with increasing accuracy & precision. I was responding to the claim, "Worm on the other hand works on a level of determinism utterly impossible within the bounds of physics." I'm trying to say that determinism hasn't been ruled out, and we keep finding things like that news article that lean more towards determinism than the popular conception that QM rules out determinism. It doesn't.
I referenced the article because it seemed to suggest that if you're looking to QM to save you from determinism you'll find stuff like that showing things are more deterministic than they seemed. If your thinking is that parallel worlds or time travel or the like would explode out into countless variations from any perturbation based on QM, that may not be the case. So, in a fictional world at least, I think you can argue that Worm can have its determinism/super-prediction without being particularly undermined by QM.
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This thread isn't the place for discussing physics, so this will be my last post on the subject—I wanted to correct a misconception about something which I found interesting and which required some specialized knowledge, and that's done.
Spoilered for length:
The Shrödinger equation is essentially irrelevant here; all that matters is unitarity. We're only interested in the system's state at two particular times, the evolution between which is modeled as random (specifically, a unitary operator sampled from a uniform distribution—page 2, between equations (7) and (8)).
If you don't want to read the paper, you can read the LANL press release:
Also, FYI: adding extra degrees of freedom "to make things more realistic" is (almost) never done unless it changes the results or methods. Physicists and mathematicians do not like unnecessary clutter.
*There exist interpretations of quantum mechanics which are deterministic. These are hidden variable theories, which can be nice but are dissatisfying for several reasons. There's also the Many Worlds Interpretation, which doesn't work the way you think it does*** and is deterministic on a technicality which makes it useless for prediction.
**Apologies to people who know better. I know this description is inaccurate, but I'm not good enough at explaining to be more correct without being confusing.
***I don't need to know exactly how you think MWI works to be confident in this assertion.
There is no pattern of discoveries leaning toward determinism, and this article only seems to do so because of multiple layers of misunderstanding.
Incidentally, Worm's notion of parallel universes is based on a common misunderstanding of the many worlds interpretation. It is necessary and intrinsic that the many worlds of MWI cannot interact—travel between worlds is not merely a violation of physical law, but a category error, as wrong as asking what wood plus three is.
Spoilered for length:
Not just any property. The specific special property of spin used was that "the second order spin correlators decay quickly with time" (page 2, between equations (5) and (6)).
The Shrödinger equation is essentially irrelevant here; all that matters is unitarity. We're only interested in the system's state at two particular times, the evolution between which is modeled as random (specifically, a unitary operator sampled from a uniform distribution—page 2, between equations (7) and (8)).
Nope. The number N of degrees of freedom (dimension of the Hilbert space) (which is finite, as can be deduced from the start of page 2) shows up in equation (10) (page 3) and the following discussion, in a term which contributes to the probability of the final state being the same as the initial state. If N is small, this term is large, and the probability of the information being preserved may be small.
If you don't want to read the paper, you can read the LANL press release:
Article: Counterintuitively, for deeper travels to the past and for bigger "worlds," Alice's final information returns to her even less damaged.
Also, FYI: adding extra degrees of freedom "to make things more realistic" is (almost) never done unless it changes the results or methods. Physicists and mathematicians do not like unnecessary clutter.
Again, no. Not only is "it applies to any property" something you made up out of thin air, but even if it were true that would be within what I described. What Yan & Sinitsyn proved is a specific, limited result with interesting applications in quantum computing and possibly a few other areas. It is an ordinary, non-sensational paper.
Nope. The key word there was "probabilistic". Quantum behavior is, under most interpretations*, fundamentally stochastic (random). Quantum states do not correspond to specific states of the world, but to probabilistic mixtures**, and a simulation which took today's world-state as input and tried to predict next year's weather would only be able to give probabilities, even in theory. This is in contrast to determinism, which is (in this context) the idea that the future evolution of the universe is determined completely by the past.
*There exist interpretations of quantum mechanics which are deterministic. These are hidden variable theories, which can be nice but are dissatisfying for several reasons. There's also the Many Worlds Interpretation, which doesn't work the way you think it does*** and is deterministic on a technicality which makes it useless for prediction.
**Apologies to people who know better. I know this description is inaccurate, but I'm not good enough at explaining to be more correct without being confusing.
***I don't need to know exactly how you think MWI works to be confident in this assertion.
Of course determinism hasn't been ruled out; it's unfalsifiable. QM technically doesn't rule out determinism, but it puts some rather tight bounds on it. In particular, the uncertainty principle guarantees that any deterministic extension to QM must involve hidden variables—quantities whose value it is impossible to determine, even in theory—and Bell's theorem rules out the possibility that such hidden variables are local (limited by the speed of light).
There is no pattern of discoveries leaning toward determinism, and this article only seems to do so because of multiple layers of misunderstanding.
Quantum phenomena are only some of the problems with Worm's simulation-based precognition. Chaos is a rather more pressing issue, as is computing power. The uncertainty principle makes things worse. The "alternate universe" stuff is separate, and is simply a matter of living in quantum universe rather than a classical one; it makes the problem bigger and harder to simulate. (There are theorems about the impossibility of simulation, but those are somewhat complex.)
Incidentally, Worm's notion of parallel universes is based on a common misunderstanding of the many worlds interpretation. It is necessary and intrinsic that the many worlds of MWI cannot interact—travel between worlds is not merely a violation of physical law, but a category error, as wrong as asking what wood plus three is.
Interlude: Die(adem) Another Day
- Location
- A M E R I C A
Untitled Omake That I Didn't Run Past My Coauthors Because They Weren't Online And I Wanted To Post It, BUT Then Chartic Approved It; Or, Interlude: Dumbledore
Here indeed was a puzzle.
Albus believed the ruined crown was Ravenclaw's Diadem, and Filius agreed with him. For it to resurface only to be rendered unusable was both a tragedy and a mystery.
"Phineas, forgive me for asking you to repeat yourself…" Albus waited for an acerbic reply, but got none. That was as close to forgiveness or permission as the prickly old cynic would give him. "You said you were attracted back to this place by screaming. Can you describe it?"
"Loud. Agonized. Short. A shriek."
"Human?"
"Distinctly."
Had there been two people in his office? Or perhaps the diadem had protested its destruction? His preliminary testing revealed traces of dark magic, which could not have come from the Sword...and yet Rowena Ravenclaw would not have used anything dark in a magical creation. Some alteration had been made, one that had been dispelled by the Sword's attack.
"Intriguing," he murmured, barely cognizant that he'd said it aloud. "Most intriguing…"
"What is intriguing?"
Albus looked up. Severus had spoken, and he was understandably irritated. He had been asleep when Albus had called him, Minerva, and Filius to the office.
"I cannot say," he said. "Certain possibilities present themselves, but each collapses in self-contradiction. I am missing something, and until I can say something worthwhile I will keep my musings to myself."
Severus and Minerva exchanged exasperated glances.
The intrusion, destruction, and the lack of communication indicated a threat. Yet the use of the Sword on an item touched by something dark indicated the neutralization of a threat. Whatever the case, he wished the Sword's wielder had left some form of explanation.
It was possible he was merely supposed to think the Sword had been used for good. A simple Reparo would provide the illusion that the Sword had been pulled from the Hat and not stolen from the case.
But that brought him back to the original conundrum of who would know enough about the Hat to pretend the Sword had been claimed by a Gryffindor in need. That knowledge was only reserved for a few...He and Minerva knew. Then there was Harry, and of course anyone Harry had told...But that was a list that surely didn't contain more than two names.
He donned the Sorting Hat himself.
"Albus."
At the sound of the Hat, warmth flooded Albus as he recalled his first day at Hogwarts, how the Hat had waffled between Ravenclaw and Gryffindor. Nostalgia for the years before his mother had died, years before his entanglement with Gellert, and years before the terrible day that had ended their relationship.
The Hat seemed to cough politely. "You want me to tell you who else has put me on today."
If you would.
"But who else? A true Gryffindor."
Naturally, Albus thought, amused. He removed the Hat and gently restored it to its place on his shelf.
Heroic intent ruled out Tom or his agents, which put his mind at ease. This left a Gryffindor, someone who didn't want to explain himself...Or, indeed, to have a conversation at all.
Someone, perhaps, who had already entered and left without getting captured though all the school was guarded against him?
Have we misjudged you, Sirius?
Here indeed was a puzzle.
Albus believed the ruined crown was Ravenclaw's Diadem, and Filius agreed with him. For it to resurface only to be rendered unusable was both a tragedy and a mystery.
"Phineas, forgive me for asking you to repeat yourself…" Albus waited for an acerbic reply, but got none. That was as close to forgiveness or permission as the prickly old cynic would give him. "You said you were attracted back to this place by screaming. Can you describe it?"
"Loud. Agonized. Short. A shriek."
"Human?"
"Distinctly."
Had there been two people in his office? Or perhaps the diadem had protested its destruction? His preliminary testing revealed traces of dark magic, which could not have come from the Sword...and yet Rowena Ravenclaw would not have used anything dark in a magical creation. Some alteration had been made, one that had been dispelled by the Sword's attack.
"Intriguing," he murmured, barely cognizant that he'd said it aloud. "Most intriguing…"
"What is intriguing?"
Albus looked up. Severus had spoken, and he was understandably irritated. He had been asleep when Albus had called him, Minerva, and Filius to the office.
"I cannot say," he said. "Certain possibilities present themselves, but each collapses in self-contradiction. I am missing something, and until I can say something worthwhile I will keep my musings to myself."
Severus and Minerva exchanged exasperated glances.
The intrusion, destruction, and the lack of communication indicated a threat. Yet the use of the Sword on an item touched by something dark indicated the neutralization of a threat. Whatever the case, he wished the Sword's wielder had left some form of explanation.
It was possible he was merely supposed to think the Sword had been used for good. A simple Reparo would provide the illusion that the Sword had been pulled from the Hat and not stolen from the case.
But that brought him back to the original conundrum of who would know enough about the Hat to pretend the Sword had been claimed by a Gryffindor in need. That knowledge was only reserved for a few...He and Minerva knew. Then there was Harry, and of course anyone Harry had told...But that was a list that surely didn't contain more than two names.
He donned the Sorting Hat himself.
"Albus."
At the sound of the Hat, warmth flooded Albus as he recalled his first day at Hogwarts, how the Hat had waffled between Ravenclaw and Gryffindor. Nostalgia for the years before his mother had died, years before his entanglement with Gellert, and years before the terrible day that had ended their relationship.
The Hat seemed to cough politely. "You want me to tell you who else has put me on today."
If you would.
"But who else? A true Gryffindor."
Naturally, Albus thought, amused. He removed the Hat and gently restored it to its place on his shelf.
Heroic intent ruled out Tom or his agents, which put his mind at ease. This left a Gryffindor, someone who didn't want to explain himself...Or, indeed, to have a conversation at all.
Someone, perhaps, who had already entered and left without getting captured though all the school was guarded against him?
Have we misjudged you, Sirius?
Fortuna Floris and the Dispersal of Cognitive Bias
- Location
- A M E R I C A
SOMEONE asked what would happen if FF and HJPEV went to Hogwarts together, and here is the content you don't want or need but are gonna have.
Fortuna Floris and the Dispersal of Cognitive Bias
For whatever reason, the Ravenclaws of her year were particularly smackable, and smack them Fortuna did. Between Candidus Craven and Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres and Hermione Granger's insistence on aiding and abetting them both, she was tempted to write the entire house off.
Even Flavia couldn't persuade her to think they were tolerable, and the only reason she still interacted with them was because her power required their involvement in their study group. Harry and Draco (a nearly equally punchable Slytherin boy) were both sufficiently dominant, i.e. loud and egotistical, personalities in their year that they had to be brought on board, and Harry in particular was such an antisocial cretin that she had to make it think it was his idea. It was very hard for him to generate ideas that had any connection with physical reality, so this took some effort on her power's part.
Teaching him that parroting garbled summaries of books he'd never read wasn't reflective of his true g factor was such an investment of time she and her power shrugged him off as a lost cause. That didn't mean that she couldn't occasionally spare the energy to spur him to ever greater heights of self-reflection by bruising his shins. (Being very intelligent, he overlooked the possibility that his classmates were kicking him because he was an insufferable prig, and settled on an unfalsifiable hypothesis involving time turners and parallel universes.)
As the year progressed, Harry got steadily more tolerable. Thanks to her power, he was surrounded by too many people who were as successful as he was at school, and the fact they were better-liked and happier than he was was so obvious it penetrated through even the inches thick armor of his skull.
One day, she found herself being attacked by a troll.
She wondered why this was happening, and it seemed that their defense professor, who was apparently Lord Voldemort in disguise, and what on earth had made him think he could get away with that, had apparently deduced she was responsible for at least some of the changes that had improved Harry's temperament. Consequently, she had to be eaten by a troll. (He had similarly grisly fates planned for half the people in their year; thankfully, she'd been the first to be targeted because she seemed the softest.)
When she felt the troll had come close enough, she threw her knife at its neck. The blade neatly severed its spinal cord. It collapsed and, after a few moments of consideration, she burned and then vanished the body.
Professor Voldemort's problem, she realized, was narcissistic injury. He viewed Harry as part of himself, and if Harry wasn't special naturally, then he had to be made special by the murder of everyone else.
She could tell Dumbledore about him. She could scare him so thoroughly he'd permanently flee wizarding Britain. She could even kill him, though it would take her time to find every earth-bound horcrux and destroy Voyager 2.
But the best way to fuck with him? Ignore him. Simply going about her day pretending that nothing had happened would drive him crazy.
Fortuna Floris and the Dispersal of Cognitive Bias
For whatever reason, the Ravenclaws of her year were particularly smackable, and smack them Fortuna did. Between Candidus Craven and Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres and Hermione Granger's insistence on aiding and abetting them both, she was tempted to write the entire house off.
Even Flavia couldn't persuade her to think they were tolerable, and the only reason she still interacted with them was because her power required their involvement in their study group. Harry and Draco (a nearly equally punchable Slytherin boy) were both sufficiently dominant, i.e. loud and egotistical, personalities in their year that they had to be brought on board, and Harry in particular was such an antisocial cretin that she had to make it think it was his idea. It was very hard for him to generate ideas that had any connection with physical reality, so this took some effort on her power's part.
Teaching him that parroting garbled summaries of books he'd never read wasn't reflective of his true g factor was such an investment of time she and her power shrugged him off as a lost cause. That didn't mean that she couldn't occasionally spare the energy to spur him to ever greater heights of self-reflection by bruising his shins. (Being very intelligent, he overlooked the possibility that his classmates were kicking him because he was an insufferable prig, and settled on an unfalsifiable hypothesis involving time turners and parallel universes.)
As the year progressed, Harry got steadily more tolerable. Thanks to her power, he was surrounded by too many people who were as successful as he was at school, and the fact they were better-liked and happier than he was was so obvious it penetrated through even the inches thick armor of his skull.
One day, she found herself being attacked by a troll.
She wondered why this was happening, and it seemed that their defense professor, who was apparently Lord Voldemort in disguise, and what on earth had made him think he could get away with that, had apparently deduced she was responsible for at least some of the changes that had improved Harry's temperament. Consequently, she had to be eaten by a troll. (He had similarly grisly fates planned for half the people in their year; thankfully, she'd been the first to be targeted because she seemed the softest.)
When she felt the troll had come close enough, she threw her knife at its neck. The blade neatly severed its spinal cord. It collapsed and, after a few moments of consideration, she burned and then vanished the body.
Professor Voldemort's problem, she realized, was narcissistic injury. He viewed Harry as part of himself, and if Harry wasn't special naturally, then he had to be made special by the murder of everyone else.
She could tell Dumbledore about him. She could scare him so thoroughly he'd permanently flee wizarding Britain. She could even kill him, though it would take her time to find every earth-bound horcrux and destroy Voyager 2.
But the best way to fuck with him? Ignore him. Simply going about her day pretending that nothing had happened would drive him crazy.
Fortuna Floris and the Dispersal of Cognitive Bias Art
- Location
- Singapore
- Location
- Academy City
- Pronouns
- They
Incredible. Truly, Fortuna is the hero we need, even if we don't deserve her.
- Location
- Lost amidst hungry sheep
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I thought Fortuna was dark skinned.
- Location
- Massachusetts
That's doctor mother, fortuna is olive skinned.
- Location
- Singapore
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chocolote12
A Penguin Flailing Against The Keyboard Of Life.
Why does he keep snapping his fingers?
- Location
- Academy City
- Pronouns
- They
It's a reference to HPMOR, where whenever Harry Potter pulled off something implausible that he didn't want to explain, he just snapped his fingers dramatically and refused to give details, because he could be a dramatic little shit when he wanted to be.
- Location
- Germany
Through that he convinced the students of Hogwarts that he could do anything if he just snapped his fingers.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Whew I finally caught up to the story! Thanks for the update and keep up the good work!
Chapter 14: Going Hog Wild
Chartic
Literally the Worst Human in the Fandom
- Location
- St. Paul
All Hallows' Eve was upon them and Hogwarts was more than decked out for the occasion. Pumpkins grinned from the alcoves and nooks of Hogwarts, enchanted bats fluttered their way through the corridors, and the ghosts were especially animated.
This had led to an increase in spooked first years, though most of the phantoms weren't intending to scare anyone. It was simply difficult to avoid because their mode of transport so frequently involved popping up through the floor.
(Difficult to avoid, that is, for anyone who was not Fortuna. She had not screamed and had not toppled over backwards when Nearly Headless Nick sprang forth from between her feet while she was on her way back from the library. She would never do such a thing.)
Most importantly, Hallowe'en was the first trip to Hogsmeade, and being two years too young would not stop either her or Flavia from going. Flavia wanted to oneup her sisters, and Fortuna, who had barely celebrated the holiday outside of accumulating a few candy bars, was eager to see what Wizards would do with it.
She wrapped her scarf, which she'd transfigured from gold and crimson to yellow and black, around the lower half of her face. "Do you have everything you need?"
Flavia finished lacing up a set of monstrous hiking boots which, when she stood up, would add four inches to her height. "I'd prefer to do a proper Polyjuice, but this should work for now," she responded.
Fortuna nodded and hiked up her hood. Then, as Flavia put on a pair of oversized motorcycle goggles, she lowered it so that her friend could receive the full brunt of her incredulous look.
"What?" Flavia asked. "Dogger lent them to me. I may as well use them."
Fortuna conceded the point by pulling her hood back up. She settled back into the hollow she'd made for herself in the bush that was serving as their hiding place.
They'd gotten up so early they had to get their breakfast of buttery crepes and tayberry jam from the kitchens rather than the Great Hall, and snuck out the entrance during a convenient argument between Professor Sinistra (who had been watching the door) and Peeves. Thanks to warming potions, spells, and blankets, hiding in a bush on a moor for three hours was significantly more comfortable than it had sounded when Flavia initially pitched the idea, and they passed the time by drinking hot cocoa and discussing the important things in life.
"Alexander simply couldn't multitask," Fortuna said. "He can't be both our mascot and our guard dog. The strain would be too great for his canine mind."
"Point the first: he only answers to King George the Fluff," Flavia countered; this was annoyingly true, but it was only because he was a dog and dogs lacked sense. "Point the second: Harbinger is barely able to clean himself, let alone perform the simultaneous task of representing our nefarious organization. Therefore he cannot be our mascot, quod erat demonstrandum."
Fortuna flicked her book open with calculated disdain. "I'll have you know that Harbinger is most certainly able to clean himself. In fact, he is the cleanest cat in Gryffindor."
That title actually belonged to Apawcolypse, but it didn't matter. What Flavia didn't know couldn't offend Harbinger's dignity.
"Moreover, his name isn't just for show. He is what warns others of their destruction. He is a force beyond human reckoning, and that is why he must be our mascot because so are we."
Flavia was torn between claiming the title of force beyond human reckoning and winning the argument, and drank her cocoa while she contemplated which side she'd come down on. "If anything," she finally said, after finishing it off, "Harbinger represents you, lounging around all day."
"I do not lounge," Fortuna said, adjusting her lounge for optimal comfort. "I simply prefer to sit comfortably while I contemplate the mysteries of the universe."
"And if by the mysteries of the universe, you mean The Secret of the Hollow Wand, whose secret is obviously that it is hollow, I—Hello. Daffy and Feely always said the carriages were horseless, but look at this."
Fortuna reluctantly abandoned her position and sat up so she could see what Flavia was talking about. Hagrid had finally (the sun was just rising) emerged from his hut, and he was making arrangements for the trip to Hogsmeade. These consisted of staging a column of carriages, each of which was pulled by a pair of bony black horses, outside the door to the main hall.
"They don't look like they'd be comfortable to fly on," Fortuna observed. This was her primary interest in things with wings, and she summarily dismissed the uncanny pegasi from consideration.
"Drat them," Flavia hissed after a couple moments. "They lied because they meant to take me by surprise...I bet Daffy screamed when she saw them and wanted me to, too."
Fortuna hummed and returned to her book. She was far more interested in whether, once Nicosius Niceley found the real killer in time to save Chloe Clegane from the Dementor's Kiss, he would be foolish enough to propose to her.
They waited another ten minutes for the groundskeeper to finish his work with the carriages and amble off to attend to his other duties for the day. This was their cue to pack up, dash across the grounds to one of the rearmost carriages, and jump inside. The two of them kept their heads ducked low as they waited for the rest of the students to arrive so that an errant glance in their direction wouldn't foil the entire scheme.
All told, she and Flavia spent another hour reading their respective books (Chloe turned down Nicosius, but something told Fortuna she'd be less reluctant in future installments) before the older students began to exit the castle.
Once doors around them began to open and close, Flavia lost focus on her book. She'd brought a Charms text instead of a Potions one, thinking that her favorite subject would be too dead a giveaway.
Fortuna was more concerned that their physical characteristics would tip their hand. Remaining inconspicuous and unnoticed was a difficult prospect, considering Hogwarts wasn't the largest school and both girls found themselves somewhere on the lower end of first year heights.
That was why she'd chosen this vehicle (Flavia had devised the plan, but Fortuna was nudging it into success). Instead of some nosy fourth years who'd ask themselves about the tiny third years sharing their space or even older students who would recognize the sibling of the Head Girl, they'd be paired off with a couple of third years who would be too engrossed in their conversation to notice them until it was too late.
A long-nosed redhead threw open the door at the last minute. "It's rubbish that they aren't letting him on," he complained as he hauled himself in. "You know what his aunt and uncle are like. McGonagall knows what they're like. It's not fair."
Hermione Granger joined him. She had to shoo him to one side because he'd automatically occupied the center. "Honestly, Ron," she said, once they'd gotten situated and the carriages had started, "The rules are there for a reason. I don't think Harry should be coming in the first place. It isn't safe for him."
"It isn't safe for him in our own common room, though, is it? He could do with some fun. You see it like I do, he wants to get out of the castle just like everyone else."
"And what if something happens to him then, Ronald? Is a trip and some sweets worth him getting hurt?"
"We're both going," Ron said defensively. "It's obviously worth something."
"Not worth encountering Sirius Black, though," Flavia said wisely.
"I'm glad to see someone here has sense," Hermione said, nodding absently along. She turned to her interlocutor, and whatever she'd expected to see, it wasn't two tiny, shifty Hufflepuffs.
It was interesting to track her thought process, Fortuna reflected. Hermione moved from smug satisfaction at being backed up to drawing the correct conclusion to outrage in a matter of two seconds.
"Fortuna," she said coldly. "How did your project on obliviation go?"
"I don't remember," Fortuna said, prompting Ron to laugh.
"Did you forget the rules about Hogsmeade, too?"
"What do you mean?" Flavia said. "We're fourth years. Fourth year Hufflepuffs."
They had chosen this lie based on the fact that nobody outside Hufflepuff could name a fourth-year Hufflepuff.
"Nonsense," Hermione said. "You're Gryffindor first years."
Ron squinted at them. "Yeah, you're the de Luce kid."
Flavia scowled and flung her hair behind her with a wave of a hand. Some of it caught on her goggles. "I often like to consider myself the de Luce Empress, but you may call me Flavia," she said in her haughtiest tone.
Hermione sighed and slumped back in her seat. "There's no way to stop the carriage now, is there. We'll just have to find a prefect and send you back the moment we arrive."
"We didn't think of doing this our first year," Ron said with a contemplative look. "But it's the kind of thing Fred and George would have done."
"Don't encourage them! We just agreed that Harry can't come," Hermione hissed, "and he's in our year!"
Ron, who hadn't agreed to that at all, temporized.
"But it's dangerous for him because of Sirius Black, right?" Flavia asked, putting on her best reasonable adult voice. "We don't have anything to do with him."
Hermione hesitated, and Fortuna judged it was time to appeal to her inmost workings. "We just want Hallowe'en candy and to look at the bookstore," she added. She paused, letting Hermione take in the textbook in Flavia's lap and recall their encounter in the library. "Nothing dangerous, nothing like fighting trolls or smuggling illegal dragons."
"What—"
"How—"
Fortuna shrugged. "Your brothers talk. Not always quietly."
"Well," Hermione said, rallying herself. "You would not believe the amount of house points we lost our first year!"
Fortuna nudged Flavia's ankle twice.
"Two hundred," she said promptly. "If the same penalties apply and you tell on us, we'll lose one hundred. And since you were the ones who let us sneak out of Hogwarts, you'll get in trouble, too!"
"What? We did no such thing!"
Flavia let the silence hang. Fortuna folded her arms.
"That's—that's blackmail," Hermione sputtered.
"An ugly word," Flavia said, steepling her fingers (the effect was spoiled by her seasonally inappropriate, Hufflepuff-colored mittens), "and an inaccurate one. Mutually assured destruction is more applicable."
"It's not worth it," Ron said, defeated. "Everyone was so angry at us the first time."
Hermione wavered as she watched Fortuna casually return her book to her bag. "Well," she said, biting her lip, "you know you'll get caught. You're really obvious."
"Maybe to you," Fortuna said. "But think about it. It's everyone's first time out of the castle and they'll be focused on themselves. And it's Hallowe'en, so nobody will care about us being dressed oddly. Besides, who else is going to be in the bookstore?"
Ron raised his left hand in a shielding gesture and pointed at Hermione with his right.
"I will tell a prefect if you even think about doing it again."
"And not a word about us if you get caught," Ron added.
"Of course not," Fortuna said.
"Never would I ever," Flavia said. "We aren't the ones who let Sirius Black into the common room."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Ron asked with a none-too-understanding face.
"What is he doing that he can waltz around the castle without getting caught to extract passwords from students? No, he had to have an accomplice. Someone let him into the castle and the common room. Who in Gryffindor hates Harry Potter that much?"
"Nobody," Hermione said with a none-too-happy face. "Nobody at school would do that."
"There's Malfoy," Ron said. "He was happy when the basilisk was hunting Muggleborns. He's trying to kill that bird you're so keen on just because it liked Harry better than it liked him!"
"Buckbeak, and he's a hippogriff, and you know that. But it can't be Malfoy, he's not in Gryffindor."
"So? Maybe Malfoy overheard it, or he beat up someone until they told him."
"Even if it was him, how would he have told it to Black when all the entrances are guarded?"
"How did he get in?" Ron said, then pointed at Flavia and Fortuna. "How did they get out?"
They forebore to comment.
When they arrived at Hogsmeade, Fortuna put a hand on Flavia's knee, keeping her in the carriage until the older students had disembarked. Hermione poked her head back in once Ron had gotten out of her way. "Don't think about doing this again," she said. "Perhaps this isn't the ideal first year to start Hogwarts, but that doesn't mean you can just disobey the rules. Right, Ron?"
The "yeah" he gave in return didn't sound all that concerned, but Hermione seemed satisfied enough and dragged him off for a tour of the Shrieking Shack grounds...which Flavia and Fortuna had agreed to avoid, lest they connect themselves with the building.
They kept off the main streets and wove their way through sleepy little alleys lined with croft houses, high off the combination of taking a holiday and the thrill of maybe getting caught. The candy shop seemed to have already racked up quite a lot of the students, so Fortuna and Flavia made their first stop for books.
"I just want to glance at their alchemy section," Flavia said as they stepped in. Fortuna knew full well they'd spend three quarters of an hour here, but nodded.
Ten minutes hadn't passed before Flavia was neck deep in the corner at one of the reading tables, her goggles perched precariously on her forehead. The shopkeep looked on with a shake of his head, likely confused at why such a young student was a) wearing heavy winter clothes and b) bothering to look through such niche texts, before returning to a book of his own. The store was otherwise empty; unsurprisingly, students weren't interested to leave some books behind to seek out others.
Seeing that her friend was lost to the world, Fortuna wandered the stacks, digging through the novels. Strange titles, which probably would have made more sense if she'd grown up reading them, dotted the shelves. The Witches' Wardrobe, The Curious Chronicles of Walter Burningthorpe, and The Bewitched Warlock were just some that caught her eye.
When the last proved to be a romance, she hastily abandoned it and fled to the mysteries. Wizarding thrillers were interesting, particularly for the fact that she recognized so many of the plots and characters from Muggle books. The two worlds were evidently that separated, even though twenty percent of the Wizarding population was Muggleborn.
It was that fifth, she realized, that was committing the plagiarism.
Neat trick.
There were other, uniquely magical novels, and it was these she browsed. One book advertised itself as the search for the living head of some long-dead warlock, another purported to be the true account of a murder case that tore the world of late eighteenth century France asunder, and the list went on and she wanted all of them.
Unfortunately, stealing from a bookshop wasn't acceptable, so she had to be a little more discerning than when she was raiding a library.
I want to know which three I'll like best and which aren't in the Hogwarts library and which can be bought for a total of less than seven sickles.
Her hands collected three books and she went to pay for them, which more or less drained her coffers. As she went to find Flavia, she reviewed the dust jackets. One of her books was about Muggles getting kidnapped out of a wizard's countryside manor; one was about a fox, a deer, and a cat trying to find out who killed a wolf; and one was about a woman who had vanished into thin air while on camera.
"Find anything interesting?" Fortuna asked, cracking this third book open.
"Only that it appears the Hogwarts Potions curriculum is even more lackluster than I originally thought," Flavia said. "There's so much research on combining Alchemy and Potions, and Snape won't ever touch it."
Fortuna peered over the top of her book to peep at the diagrams in Flavia's. The entire thing looked like gibberish. "And is this something else you think may help us out?"
"No, mainly personal interest," Flavia acknowledged. "I don't expect Severus Snape to teach me much of anything, and I have to do something these next seven years."
"Aside from teach everyone else Potions and catch killers, you mean?"
Somehow this launched Flavia into a discussion on the prima materia, its relation to the hypothetical magnum opus which could conceivably be used to create a philosopher's stone, and which only one man had ever managed to readily achieve.
Fortuna nodded where it felt appropriate to do so, but mainly couldn't follow what was going on. At around minute six of the monologue, which ebbed and flowed with Flavia's enthusiasm, she gave in and asked her power what was going on.
It turned out that Flavia also had no idea what was going on; she'd come across a concept she had absolutely no understanding of, and was thinking aloud in order to work it out. Half of what she was saying was arrant nonsense, and half of it consisted of hypotheses she was formulating and rejecting on the fly. None of it had to do with the potion she was actually thinking about.
Fortuna allowed her attention to visibly wander. She fidgeted, looked around at the shelves, and even started drumming her fingers on the cover of her book until Flavia noticed.
"I'm boring you," she said.
"It's Greek to me," Fortuna conceded with a sheepish smile. "I didn't know that Alchemy was real until a few minutes ago, so I don't even know what things like this are."
Flavia looked down at Fortuna's finger, which had fallen, apparently at random, on one particular symbol. "Oh, that's antimony, the fifty-first element. The last time I had a lot of it, I blew it up by throwing it at—well, nevermind. I wonder what would happen if I crushed it and dropped it into an erumpent horn..." She trailed off, caught up in speculation that would resolve, Fortuna trusted, to her satisfaction.
They left the stack of alchemy texts behind for the shop owner to deal with and continue their forbidden exploration. Flavia moved slowly, as she was wrapped in thought, hampered by her giant boots, and half-blind by her goggles, and Fortuna took in all there was to see and hear in a purely magical town.
A flighty song came from what looked to be a music shop, which was to be expected—except for the fact the lute in the window was playing itself. This was next to a magical smithy, whose owner was crafting a set of dragonhide vambraces. On the other side of that, a shop reeking of incense and sage peddled crystalline pendants and enchanted earrings. Finally, the smell of sugar and nutmeg signalled that they'd reached their second destination for the day: Honeydukes.
Bins of different confectioneries and sweets lined every available wall and surface with crudely drawn labels and prices above each one. Floating sugar balls and living frogs sat side by side with Muggle toffees and chocolates. Fortuna and Flavia shuffled around the store, grabbing and bagging small samples of anything that struck their fancy.
Fortuna was enjoying everything until she ventured into the "Unusual Tastes" section and came face to face with a display of dark red lollipops. Why would strawberry suckers be considered an unusual taste?
Blood pops?
Her father's last seconds threw themselves into her mind, and Fortuna wretched. She consciously swallowed her gorge and tried to forget again. It didn't work particularly well and she drifted out of the store in a daze, not even objecting when Flavia insisted on paying for everything.
The worst part of it was that she was hungry. Neither of them had eaten since four that morning, and it was inevitable that they were drawn to the smell of sizzling stew and simmering sausage emanating from the two or three restaurants the town boasted. Flavia subconsciously took the lead and steered them to the nearest pub.
It was then that Fortuna made a mistake, though she'd only know it in retrospect—not a vantagepoint she usually had to consider. She determined that the best way of putting the memory of her father's death out of her mind was to eat something hot and delicious and sweet, and allowed them to go into the Three Broomsticks.
The waitress seated them, took their order, and left them with drinks while they waited for their food.
Fortuna seized the butterbeer and discovered that its name was completely appropriate. The amount of butter that had been incorporated in the brew to balance out the sugar was practically overpowering.
Naturally, she drank the entire thing in one go.
When she lowered her tankard, Fortuna found herself blinking at an empty booth. It took her a moment to locate Flavia, who had been yanked out of her seat by a swotty young teenager who looked like she wanted to succeed Madam Pince.
"I knew that was you, with those goggles you stole from Dogger!" Her authoritative tone was undermined by her needing to crane her neck to make eye contact with Flavia, who was still wearing her platform boots. "And nobody else could have such a squeaky little piccolo for a voice!"
This would be Flavia's other sister, Daphne, who had evidently decided that the best place and time to lunch with her friends was here and now. Worse, she and Flavia had removed their disguises in anticipation of eating, and the ramifications of that were fast spinning out of control.
They'd gotten caught. Fortuna ended the transfigurations on their robes and scarves, so at least they wouldn't be punished for pretending to be Hufflepuffs on top of everything else. The difference didn't seem to make an impression on Daphne, who was still busy trying to contain Flavia.
"Let me go!"
"Oh, I don't think so. Au contraire—that means on the contrary—I'm going to go find a prefect."
Flavia wrenched her arm out of her sister's grasp. "You can't tell anyone that you saw me. Nobody will believe you. They know that you can't pull your head out of a book long enough to notice anything actually happening around you!"
A red-headed teenager approached them. The headboy pin on the front of his robes spelled certain doom.
"Hello, ladies," he said in the most self-important way possible. "Is there an issue?"
An obsequious sort of smirk slid onto Daphne's face. "Oh thank you, Mr. Weasley. I was just attempting to tell my sister that first years are not allowed here and so flagrantly breaking the rules is especially dangerous right now. Look, two of them! My sister and...my sister's friend."
Percy's chest visibly swelled with self-importance. He grabbed each of them by a wrist and pulled them out of the shop—but not before pausing to relish in Daphne's unnecessarily effusive gratitude.
Fortuna started cycling through her remaining options, disposing quickly of each in turn. Killing the head boy was far too extreme, and she was annoyed her power even suggested it. Most of the rest of her power's suggestions entailed modifying his memory, Daphne's memory, and Flavia's memory, but she considered obliviation to be unacceptable.
To punish her for sparing his life, Percy Weasley began to talk—or, more accurately, splutter. "You should know better than to do this sort of thing, when you were expressly told not to! As a prefect I am appalled by your behavior. As a Gryffindor, I am shamed." He inhaled deeply to steel himself for his next sentence. "I have no other choice but to take twenty—no, thirty—points from Gryffindor!"
If he'd hoped for a display of contrition, he was disappointed. Both girls walked by his side in solemn silence, Fortuna from habit and Flavia from a desire not to incriminate herself further.
"Well," he said, when they arrived at the line of carriages. "Be honest, tell me now. Who helped you sneak out of the castle?"
"No-one, sir," Fortuna said. "We picked one of the back carriages and hid our faces."
Flavia picked up on the cue. "Girl guide's honor, sir," she added, leaving out the fact she'd been expelled from the organization with extreme prejudice. "We used only our wits and suborned none other."
That was so far over the top that a wide-eyed fawn couldn't have sold it, but the head boy was too caught up in resuming his excoriation of the deplorable crime that he had single-handedly foiled to notice.
He would not, Fortuna knew, stop until he was convinced that justice had been served; avoiding punishment would entail force of some kind. She could blackmail or threaten him; she could bamboozle him with a simulacrum of McGonagall; she could compel him to give their points back and leave them alone with magic. She pushed these thoughts aside, some more forcefully than others, and sat down.
Percy did not stop talking the entire ride. His themes were: the shameless skulduggery of first years these days, the shame they had brought on their house and Hogwarts, and how guilty he would have felt if Sirius Black had murdered them. By this point, Fortuna wished he had and turned her thoughts to pleasanter things, like what would befall them.
She saw with perfect clarity how things would unfold: the lecture from McGonagall, the confiscation of their sweets and even their books, the removal of another twenty house points, the promise of writing to their families, and the assignment of the month-long detention.
Worse, Ron Weasley had been right about everyone else being mad at them. When all the other Gryffindors got back from Hogsmeade they'd see their hourglass short fifty rubies and they would take less enjoyment in the feast. And then Percy Weasley, being Percy Weasley, would make it known who was responsible.
Unless, of course, she used her power—but again she ran into the fact that it thought obliviation was an acceptable solution. There was another path she could take, which was to throw herself to the Dementors on their return and turn the resulting fainting spell into a medical emergency that would make McGonagall deprioritize her transgressions...
No. She wasn't ready for that yet, and she couldn't bring herself to use her parents to get out of a little trouble. The time to change the future was thirty-six minutes ago, and she'd missed it because she'd been enjoying herself. Was that so bad?
She looked for other ways to ameliorate things and found she didn't actually need to do much. Gryffindor would recover—she would arrange to pay the debt with interest, aided by the fact Flavia would be just as determined—and in the meantime their friends were all from other houses and wouldn't bear them any ill will.
She could help things along by appearing supremely miserable about her detention in public; though Flavia would want her to appear stoic in the face of their trials, she could be persuaded to see the value in public penance so long as it did not entail discussion of her family. The part of their punishment that would actually upset her was knowing that her father would be told about her rule-breaking spree.
Fortuna thought about the Simmonses and how they'd react. They'd be befuddled by the owl, then reluctantly open the letter, then reread it to make sure they weren't in danger of having to collect her, then throw it out.
That realization stung a little, and she didn't have to fake being morose as the dark horses drew them closer to Hogwarts.
Despite the fact it was midday, coldness swept into the carriage. Flavia was finally brought out of her reverie, which had been devoted to the potential uses of lupus metallorum rather than the wisdom of Percy's remonstrances, and she drew a little closer to Fortuna.
Dementors. Two of them, coming to inspect their vehicle. They'd been cleared out of the way when the bulk of the student body had left for Hogsmeade, but nobody had bothered to do the same for a single carriage.
Either Percy was far too busy expounding on their immorality to pay attention to the Dementors, or his way of coping with the worst memories of his life was sermonizing.
"The Dementors," Fortuna interrupted. "I don't—" want to have to explain this. "They make me need to see Madam Pomfrey. Please."
It took a moment for Percy to wrench himself out of his crusade-esque diatribe on rule breaking and another for him to comprehend what she had said. In that moment the dementors had drawn closer, hovering a scant few meters from their carriage, and she began to hear her mother screaming. Her hands gripped the carriage seat to stop herself from shaking.
"Oh!" Percy said like a buffoon and leaned out of the carriage, casting a spell that directed a sickly silver mist at the Dementors.
The creatures lurched back a bit, allowing the three of them to move on by. The Dementors watched them as they left and Fortuna watched them back, wondering if she'd ever be ready to deal with them. She tried to ignore the lingering taste of iron as the carriage moved through the gates to deliver them to their fate.
This had led to an increase in spooked first years, though most of the phantoms weren't intending to scare anyone. It was simply difficult to avoid because their mode of transport so frequently involved popping up through the floor.
(Difficult to avoid, that is, for anyone who was not Fortuna. She had not screamed and had not toppled over backwards when Nearly Headless Nick sprang forth from between her feet while she was on her way back from the library. She would never do such a thing.)
Most importantly, Hallowe'en was the first trip to Hogsmeade, and being two years too young would not stop either her or Flavia from going. Flavia wanted to oneup her sisters, and Fortuna, who had barely celebrated the holiday outside of accumulating a few candy bars, was eager to see what Wizards would do with it.
She wrapped her scarf, which she'd transfigured from gold and crimson to yellow and black, around the lower half of her face. "Do you have everything you need?"
Flavia finished lacing up a set of monstrous hiking boots which, when she stood up, would add four inches to her height. "I'd prefer to do a proper Polyjuice, but this should work for now," she responded.
Fortuna nodded and hiked up her hood. Then, as Flavia put on a pair of oversized motorcycle goggles, she lowered it so that her friend could receive the full brunt of her incredulous look.
"What?" Flavia asked. "Dogger lent them to me. I may as well use them."
Fortuna conceded the point by pulling her hood back up. She settled back into the hollow she'd made for herself in the bush that was serving as their hiding place.
They'd gotten up so early they had to get their breakfast of buttery crepes and tayberry jam from the kitchens rather than the Great Hall, and snuck out the entrance during a convenient argument between Professor Sinistra (who had been watching the door) and Peeves. Thanks to warming potions, spells, and blankets, hiding in a bush on a moor for three hours was significantly more comfortable than it had sounded when Flavia initially pitched the idea, and they passed the time by drinking hot cocoa and discussing the important things in life.
"Alexander simply couldn't multitask," Fortuna said. "He can't be both our mascot and our guard dog. The strain would be too great for his canine mind."
"Point the first: he only answers to King George the Fluff," Flavia countered; this was annoyingly true, but it was only because he was a dog and dogs lacked sense. "Point the second: Harbinger is barely able to clean himself, let alone perform the simultaneous task of representing our nefarious organization. Therefore he cannot be our mascot, quod erat demonstrandum."
Fortuna flicked her book open with calculated disdain. "I'll have you know that Harbinger is most certainly able to clean himself. In fact, he is the cleanest cat in Gryffindor."
That title actually belonged to Apawcolypse, but it didn't matter. What Flavia didn't know couldn't offend Harbinger's dignity.
"Moreover, his name isn't just for show. He is what warns others of their destruction. He is a force beyond human reckoning, and that is why he must be our mascot because so are we."
Flavia was torn between claiming the title of force beyond human reckoning and winning the argument, and drank her cocoa while she contemplated which side she'd come down on. "If anything," she finally said, after finishing it off, "Harbinger represents you, lounging around all day."
"I do not lounge," Fortuna said, adjusting her lounge for optimal comfort. "I simply prefer to sit comfortably while I contemplate the mysteries of the universe."
"And if by the mysteries of the universe, you mean The Secret of the Hollow Wand, whose secret is obviously that it is hollow, I—Hello. Daffy and Feely always said the carriages were horseless, but look at this."
Fortuna reluctantly abandoned her position and sat up so she could see what Flavia was talking about. Hagrid had finally (the sun was just rising) emerged from his hut, and he was making arrangements for the trip to Hogsmeade. These consisted of staging a column of carriages, each of which was pulled by a pair of bony black horses, outside the door to the main hall.
"They don't look like they'd be comfortable to fly on," Fortuna observed. This was her primary interest in things with wings, and she summarily dismissed the uncanny pegasi from consideration.
"Drat them," Flavia hissed after a couple moments. "They lied because they meant to take me by surprise...I bet Daffy screamed when she saw them and wanted me to, too."
Fortuna hummed and returned to her book. She was far more interested in whether, once Nicosius Niceley found the real killer in time to save Chloe Clegane from the Dementor's Kiss, he would be foolish enough to propose to her.
They waited another ten minutes for the groundskeeper to finish his work with the carriages and amble off to attend to his other duties for the day. This was their cue to pack up, dash across the grounds to one of the rearmost carriages, and jump inside. The two of them kept their heads ducked low as they waited for the rest of the students to arrive so that an errant glance in their direction wouldn't foil the entire scheme.
All told, she and Flavia spent another hour reading their respective books (Chloe turned down Nicosius, but something told Fortuna she'd be less reluctant in future installments) before the older students began to exit the castle.
Once doors around them began to open and close, Flavia lost focus on her book. She'd brought a Charms text instead of a Potions one, thinking that her favorite subject would be too dead a giveaway.
Fortuna was more concerned that their physical characteristics would tip their hand. Remaining inconspicuous and unnoticed was a difficult prospect, considering Hogwarts wasn't the largest school and both girls found themselves somewhere on the lower end of first year heights.
That was why she'd chosen this vehicle (Flavia had devised the plan, but Fortuna was nudging it into success). Instead of some nosy fourth years who'd ask themselves about the tiny third years sharing their space or even older students who would recognize the sibling of the Head Girl, they'd be paired off with a couple of third years who would be too engrossed in their conversation to notice them until it was too late.
A long-nosed redhead threw open the door at the last minute. "It's rubbish that they aren't letting him on," he complained as he hauled himself in. "You know what his aunt and uncle are like. McGonagall knows what they're like. It's not fair."
Hermione Granger joined him. She had to shoo him to one side because he'd automatically occupied the center. "Honestly, Ron," she said, once they'd gotten situated and the carriages had started, "The rules are there for a reason. I don't think Harry should be coming in the first place. It isn't safe for him."
"It isn't safe for him in our own common room, though, is it? He could do with some fun. You see it like I do, he wants to get out of the castle just like everyone else."
"And what if something happens to him then, Ronald? Is a trip and some sweets worth him getting hurt?"
"We're both going," Ron said defensively. "It's obviously worth something."
"Not worth encountering Sirius Black, though," Flavia said wisely.
"I'm glad to see someone here has sense," Hermione said, nodding absently along. She turned to her interlocutor, and whatever she'd expected to see, it wasn't two tiny, shifty Hufflepuffs.
It was interesting to track her thought process, Fortuna reflected. Hermione moved from smug satisfaction at being backed up to drawing the correct conclusion to outrage in a matter of two seconds.
"Fortuna," she said coldly. "How did your project on obliviation go?"
"I don't remember," Fortuna said, prompting Ron to laugh.
"Did you forget the rules about Hogsmeade, too?"
"What do you mean?" Flavia said. "We're fourth years. Fourth year Hufflepuffs."
They had chosen this lie based on the fact that nobody outside Hufflepuff could name a fourth-year Hufflepuff.
"Nonsense," Hermione said. "You're Gryffindor first years."
Ron squinted at them. "Yeah, you're the de Luce kid."
Flavia scowled and flung her hair behind her with a wave of a hand. Some of it caught on her goggles. "I often like to consider myself the de Luce Empress, but you may call me Flavia," she said in her haughtiest tone.
Hermione sighed and slumped back in her seat. "There's no way to stop the carriage now, is there. We'll just have to find a prefect and send you back the moment we arrive."
"We didn't think of doing this our first year," Ron said with a contemplative look. "But it's the kind of thing Fred and George would have done."
"Don't encourage them! We just agreed that Harry can't come," Hermione hissed, "and he's in our year!"
Ron, who hadn't agreed to that at all, temporized.
"But it's dangerous for him because of Sirius Black, right?" Flavia asked, putting on her best reasonable adult voice. "We don't have anything to do with him."
Hermione hesitated, and Fortuna judged it was time to appeal to her inmost workings. "We just want Hallowe'en candy and to look at the bookstore," she added. She paused, letting Hermione take in the textbook in Flavia's lap and recall their encounter in the library. "Nothing dangerous, nothing like fighting trolls or smuggling illegal dragons."
"What—"
"How—"
Fortuna shrugged. "Your brothers talk. Not always quietly."
"Well," Hermione said, rallying herself. "You would not believe the amount of house points we lost our first year!"
Fortuna nudged Flavia's ankle twice.
"Two hundred," she said promptly. "If the same penalties apply and you tell on us, we'll lose one hundred. And since you were the ones who let us sneak out of Hogwarts, you'll get in trouble, too!"
"What? We did no such thing!"
Flavia let the silence hang. Fortuna folded her arms.
"That's—that's blackmail," Hermione sputtered.
"An ugly word," Flavia said, steepling her fingers (the effect was spoiled by her seasonally inappropriate, Hufflepuff-colored mittens), "and an inaccurate one. Mutually assured destruction is more applicable."
"It's not worth it," Ron said, defeated. "Everyone was so angry at us the first time."
Hermione wavered as she watched Fortuna casually return her book to her bag. "Well," she said, biting her lip, "you know you'll get caught. You're really obvious."
"Maybe to you," Fortuna said. "But think about it. It's everyone's first time out of the castle and they'll be focused on themselves. And it's Hallowe'en, so nobody will care about us being dressed oddly. Besides, who else is going to be in the bookstore?"
Ron raised his left hand in a shielding gesture and pointed at Hermione with his right.
"I will tell a prefect if you even think about doing it again."
"And not a word about us if you get caught," Ron added.
"Of course not," Fortuna said.
"Never would I ever," Flavia said. "We aren't the ones who let Sirius Black into the common room."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Ron asked with a none-too-understanding face.
"What is he doing that he can waltz around the castle without getting caught to extract passwords from students? No, he had to have an accomplice. Someone let him into the castle and the common room. Who in Gryffindor hates Harry Potter that much?"
"Nobody," Hermione said with a none-too-happy face. "Nobody at school would do that."
"There's Malfoy," Ron said. "He was happy when the basilisk was hunting Muggleborns. He's trying to kill that bird you're so keen on just because it liked Harry better than it liked him!"
"Buckbeak, and he's a hippogriff, and you know that. But it can't be Malfoy, he's not in Gryffindor."
"So? Maybe Malfoy overheard it, or he beat up someone until they told him."
"Even if it was him, how would he have told it to Black when all the entrances are guarded?"
"How did he get in?" Ron said, then pointed at Flavia and Fortuna. "How did they get out?"
They forebore to comment.
When they arrived at Hogsmeade, Fortuna put a hand on Flavia's knee, keeping her in the carriage until the older students had disembarked. Hermione poked her head back in once Ron had gotten out of her way. "Don't think about doing this again," she said. "Perhaps this isn't the ideal first year to start Hogwarts, but that doesn't mean you can just disobey the rules. Right, Ron?"
The "yeah" he gave in return didn't sound all that concerned, but Hermione seemed satisfied enough and dragged him off for a tour of the Shrieking Shack grounds...which Flavia and Fortuna had agreed to avoid, lest they connect themselves with the building.
They kept off the main streets and wove their way through sleepy little alleys lined with croft houses, high off the combination of taking a holiday and the thrill of maybe getting caught. The candy shop seemed to have already racked up quite a lot of the students, so Fortuna and Flavia made their first stop for books.
"I just want to glance at their alchemy section," Flavia said as they stepped in. Fortuna knew full well they'd spend three quarters of an hour here, but nodded.
Ten minutes hadn't passed before Flavia was neck deep in the corner at one of the reading tables, her goggles perched precariously on her forehead. The shopkeep looked on with a shake of his head, likely confused at why such a young student was a) wearing heavy winter clothes and b) bothering to look through such niche texts, before returning to a book of his own. The store was otherwise empty; unsurprisingly, students weren't interested to leave some books behind to seek out others.
Seeing that her friend was lost to the world, Fortuna wandered the stacks, digging through the novels. Strange titles, which probably would have made more sense if she'd grown up reading them, dotted the shelves. The Witches' Wardrobe, The Curious Chronicles of Walter Burningthorpe, and The Bewitched Warlock were just some that caught her eye.
When the last proved to be a romance, she hastily abandoned it and fled to the mysteries. Wizarding thrillers were interesting, particularly for the fact that she recognized so many of the plots and characters from Muggle books. The two worlds were evidently that separated, even though twenty percent of the Wizarding population was Muggleborn.
It was that fifth, she realized, that was committing the plagiarism.
Neat trick.
There were other, uniquely magical novels, and it was these she browsed. One book advertised itself as the search for the living head of some long-dead warlock, another purported to be the true account of a murder case that tore the world of late eighteenth century France asunder, and the list went on and she wanted all of them.
Unfortunately, stealing from a bookshop wasn't acceptable, so she had to be a little more discerning than when she was raiding a library.
I want to know which three I'll like best and which aren't in the Hogwarts library and which can be bought for a total of less than seven sickles.
Her hands collected three books and she went to pay for them, which more or less drained her coffers. As she went to find Flavia, she reviewed the dust jackets. One of her books was about Muggles getting kidnapped out of a wizard's countryside manor; one was about a fox, a deer, and a cat trying to find out who killed a wolf; and one was about a woman who had vanished into thin air while on camera.
"Find anything interesting?" Fortuna asked, cracking this third book open.
"Only that it appears the Hogwarts Potions curriculum is even more lackluster than I originally thought," Flavia said. "There's so much research on combining Alchemy and Potions, and Snape won't ever touch it."
Fortuna peered over the top of her book to peep at the diagrams in Flavia's. The entire thing looked like gibberish. "And is this something else you think may help us out?"
"No, mainly personal interest," Flavia acknowledged. "I don't expect Severus Snape to teach me much of anything, and I have to do something these next seven years."
"Aside from teach everyone else Potions and catch killers, you mean?"
Somehow this launched Flavia into a discussion on the prima materia, its relation to the hypothetical magnum opus which could conceivably be used to create a philosopher's stone, and which only one man had ever managed to readily achieve.
Fortuna nodded where it felt appropriate to do so, but mainly couldn't follow what was going on. At around minute six of the monologue, which ebbed and flowed with Flavia's enthusiasm, she gave in and asked her power what was going on.
It turned out that Flavia also had no idea what was going on; she'd come across a concept she had absolutely no understanding of, and was thinking aloud in order to work it out. Half of what she was saying was arrant nonsense, and half of it consisted of hypotheses she was formulating and rejecting on the fly. None of it had to do with the potion she was actually thinking about.
Fortuna allowed her attention to visibly wander. She fidgeted, looked around at the shelves, and even started drumming her fingers on the cover of her book until Flavia noticed.
"I'm boring you," she said.
"It's Greek to me," Fortuna conceded with a sheepish smile. "I didn't know that Alchemy was real until a few minutes ago, so I don't even know what things like this are."
Flavia looked down at Fortuna's finger, which had fallen, apparently at random, on one particular symbol. "Oh, that's antimony, the fifty-first element. The last time I had a lot of it, I blew it up by throwing it at—well, nevermind. I wonder what would happen if I crushed it and dropped it into an erumpent horn..." She trailed off, caught up in speculation that would resolve, Fortuna trusted, to her satisfaction.
They left the stack of alchemy texts behind for the shop owner to deal with and continue their forbidden exploration. Flavia moved slowly, as she was wrapped in thought, hampered by her giant boots, and half-blind by her goggles, and Fortuna took in all there was to see and hear in a purely magical town.
A flighty song came from what looked to be a music shop, which was to be expected—except for the fact the lute in the window was playing itself. This was next to a magical smithy, whose owner was crafting a set of dragonhide vambraces. On the other side of that, a shop reeking of incense and sage peddled crystalline pendants and enchanted earrings. Finally, the smell of sugar and nutmeg signalled that they'd reached their second destination for the day: Honeydukes.
Bins of different confectioneries and sweets lined every available wall and surface with crudely drawn labels and prices above each one. Floating sugar balls and living frogs sat side by side with Muggle toffees and chocolates. Fortuna and Flavia shuffled around the store, grabbing and bagging small samples of anything that struck their fancy.
Fortuna was enjoying everything until she ventured into the "Unusual Tastes" section and came face to face with a display of dark red lollipops. Why would strawberry suckers be considered an unusual taste?
Blood pops?
Her father's last seconds threw themselves into her mind, and Fortuna wretched. She consciously swallowed her gorge and tried to forget again. It didn't work particularly well and she drifted out of the store in a daze, not even objecting when Flavia insisted on paying for everything.
The worst part of it was that she was hungry. Neither of them had eaten since four that morning, and it was inevitable that they were drawn to the smell of sizzling stew and simmering sausage emanating from the two or three restaurants the town boasted. Flavia subconsciously took the lead and steered them to the nearest pub.
It was then that Fortuna made a mistake, though she'd only know it in retrospect—not a vantagepoint she usually had to consider. She determined that the best way of putting the memory of her father's death out of her mind was to eat something hot and delicious and sweet, and allowed them to go into the Three Broomsticks.
The waitress seated them, took their order, and left them with drinks while they waited for their food.
Fortuna seized the butterbeer and discovered that its name was completely appropriate. The amount of butter that had been incorporated in the brew to balance out the sugar was practically overpowering.
Naturally, she drank the entire thing in one go.
When she lowered her tankard, Fortuna found herself blinking at an empty booth. It took her a moment to locate Flavia, who had been yanked out of her seat by a swotty young teenager who looked like she wanted to succeed Madam Pince.
"I knew that was you, with those goggles you stole from Dogger!" Her authoritative tone was undermined by her needing to crane her neck to make eye contact with Flavia, who was still wearing her platform boots. "And nobody else could have such a squeaky little piccolo for a voice!"
This would be Flavia's other sister, Daphne, who had evidently decided that the best place and time to lunch with her friends was here and now. Worse, she and Flavia had removed their disguises in anticipation of eating, and the ramifications of that were fast spinning out of control.
They'd gotten caught. Fortuna ended the transfigurations on their robes and scarves, so at least they wouldn't be punished for pretending to be Hufflepuffs on top of everything else. The difference didn't seem to make an impression on Daphne, who was still busy trying to contain Flavia.
"Let me go!"
"Oh, I don't think so. Au contraire—that means on the contrary—I'm going to go find a prefect."
Flavia wrenched her arm out of her sister's grasp. "You can't tell anyone that you saw me. Nobody will believe you. They know that you can't pull your head out of a book long enough to notice anything actually happening around you!"
A red-headed teenager approached them. The headboy pin on the front of his robes spelled certain doom.
"Hello, ladies," he said in the most self-important way possible. "Is there an issue?"
An obsequious sort of smirk slid onto Daphne's face. "Oh thank you, Mr. Weasley. I was just attempting to tell my sister that first years are not allowed here and so flagrantly breaking the rules is especially dangerous right now. Look, two of them! My sister and...my sister's friend."
Percy's chest visibly swelled with self-importance. He grabbed each of them by a wrist and pulled them out of the shop—but not before pausing to relish in Daphne's unnecessarily effusive gratitude.
Fortuna started cycling through her remaining options, disposing quickly of each in turn. Killing the head boy was far too extreme, and she was annoyed her power even suggested it. Most of the rest of her power's suggestions entailed modifying his memory, Daphne's memory, and Flavia's memory, but she considered obliviation to be unacceptable.
To punish her for sparing his life, Percy Weasley began to talk—or, more accurately, splutter. "You should know better than to do this sort of thing, when you were expressly told not to! As a prefect I am appalled by your behavior. As a Gryffindor, I am shamed." He inhaled deeply to steel himself for his next sentence. "I have no other choice but to take twenty—no, thirty—points from Gryffindor!"
If he'd hoped for a display of contrition, he was disappointed. Both girls walked by his side in solemn silence, Fortuna from habit and Flavia from a desire not to incriminate herself further.
"Well," he said, when they arrived at the line of carriages. "Be honest, tell me now. Who helped you sneak out of the castle?"
"No-one, sir," Fortuna said. "We picked one of the back carriages and hid our faces."
Flavia picked up on the cue. "Girl guide's honor, sir," she added, leaving out the fact she'd been expelled from the organization with extreme prejudice. "We used only our wits and suborned none other."
That was so far over the top that a wide-eyed fawn couldn't have sold it, but the head boy was too caught up in resuming his excoriation of the deplorable crime that he had single-handedly foiled to notice.
He would not, Fortuna knew, stop until he was convinced that justice had been served; avoiding punishment would entail force of some kind. She could blackmail or threaten him; she could bamboozle him with a simulacrum of McGonagall; she could compel him to give their points back and leave them alone with magic. She pushed these thoughts aside, some more forcefully than others, and sat down.
Percy did not stop talking the entire ride. His themes were: the shameless skulduggery of first years these days, the shame they had brought on their house and Hogwarts, and how guilty he would have felt if Sirius Black had murdered them. By this point, Fortuna wished he had and turned her thoughts to pleasanter things, like what would befall them.
She saw with perfect clarity how things would unfold: the lecture from McGonagall, the confiscation of their sweets and even their books, the removal of another twenty house points, the promise of writing to their families, and the assignment of the month-long detention.
Worse, Ron Weasley had been right about everyone else being mad at them. When all the other Gryffindors got back from Hogsmeade they'd see their hourglass short fifty rubies and they would take less enjoyment in the feast. And then Percy Weasley, being Percy Weasley, would make it known who was responsible.
Unless, of course, she used her power—but again she ran into the fact that it thought obliviation was an acceptable solution. There was another path she could take, which was to throw herself to the Dementors on their return and turn the resulting fainting spell into a medical emergency that would make McGonagall deprioritize her transgressions...
No. She wasn't ready for that yet, and she couldn't bring herself to use her parents to get out of a little trouble. The time to change the future was thirty-six minutes ago, and she'd missed it because she'd been enjoying herself. Was that so bad?
She looked for other ways to ameliorate things and found she didn't actually need to do much. Gryffindor would recover—she would arrange to pay the debt with interest, aided by the fact Flavia would be just as determined—and in the meantime their friends were all from other houses and wouldn't bear them any ill will.
She could help things along by appearing supremely miserable about her detention in public; though Flavia would want her to appear stoic in the face of their trials, she could be persuaded to see the value in public penance so long as it did not entail discussion of her family. The part of their punishment that would actually upset her was knowing that her father would be told about her rule-breaking spree.
Fortuna thought about the Simmonses and how they'd react. They'd be befuddled by the owl, then reluctantly open the letter, then reread it to make sure they weren't in danger of having to collect her, then throw it out.
That realization stung a little, and she didn't have to fake being morose as the dark horses drew them closer to Hogwarts.
Despite the fact it was midday, coldness swept into the carriage. Flavia was finally brought out of her reverie, which had been devoted to the potential uses of lupus metallorum rather than the wisdom of Percy's remonstrances, and she drew a little closer to Fortuna.
Dementors. Two of them, coming to inspect their vehicle. They'd been cleared out of the way when the bulk of the student body had left for Hogsmeade, but nobody had bothered to do the same for a single carriage.
Either Percy was far too busy expounding on their immorality to pay attention to the Dementors, or his way of coping with the worst memories of his life was sermonizing.
"The Dementors," Fortuna interrupted. "I don't—" want to have to explain this. "They make me need to see Madam Pomfrey. Please."
It took a moment for Percy to wrench himself out of his crusade-esque diatribe on rule breaking and another for him to comprehend what she had said. In that moment the dementors had drawn closer, hovering a scant few meters from their carriage, and she began to hear her mother screaming. Her hands gripped the carriage seat to stop herself from shaking.
"Oh!" Percy said like a buffoon and leaned out of the carriage, casting a spell that directed a sickly silver mist at the Dementors.
The creatures lurched back a bit, allowing the three of them to move on by. The Dementors watched them as they left and Fortuna watched them back, wondering if she'd ever be ready to deal with them. She tried to ignore the lingering taste of iron as the carriage moved through the gates to deliver them to their fate.
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- Location
- Elsewhere
Yet another brilliant use of Path to Victory.
PtV: I'm the greatest thinker power in existence. What does she have me doing? Assessing cat hygiene.
It's not plagiarism, it's inspiration.
Honestly, even adding token magic would change a story more than most derivative authors bother with.
Does PtV know better?
Or has this mistake helped set up Fortuna to heal a little better than before?
Or has this mistake helped set up Fortuna to heal a little better than before?
- Location
- Academy City
- Pronouns
- They
I mean, what's the harm? The wizards they sell to would never buy the muggle version, so they aren't hurting the authors, and what the magical are too arrogant to learn won't hurt them appreciably more on the form of ripped-off literature.
Enthusiast#117
This is not the Profile you are looking for
- Location
- United States
Confiscation of the sweets and books is literally theft. It's making me sort of mad the more I think about it, because they paid good money for those. Who has the right to take it from them?
- Pronouns
- It/Its
This would depend on if they are returned later after some period of punishment I suspect. Similar to how a teacher at school might confiscate a phone, calculator, etc. but it will be returned either after class (or at the end of the day, or some other point depending on school rules and the teacher).
owrtho
<PtV: How to not get caught at Hogsmead.>
Ganurath
Literal Enthusiast
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- A Valid Location
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1. Don't go to Hogsmeade until you're a third year.