(This chapter and the one that will follow in a couple days have been in the works for over 3 years, I really hope you enjoy it.)
Previous Chapters:
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003768423
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003769317
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003770117
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003771789
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003772695
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003774876
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003775746
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003776170
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003776958
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003777821
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003778655
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003779874
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003781975
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003784137
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003786670
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003788477
https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003788958
Tags:
@Teddy.J.B @Pervaza972 @CatsAndRoblox @Missy Clara Oswald
Chapter Eighteen: The Three Broomsticks
The next day Harry confided in his friends the memories he had seen and the task that Dumbledore had set him, though he left the part out about Morgan Nott and Christopher Avery as to not upset Theodore.
Allison thought that Harry was unlikely to have any trouble with Slughorn at all.
‘Despite you avoiding him for four months he still adores you,’ she said at breakfast, while taking a bite of toast. ‘He’d give you anything you ask for. You’re his prized potions student, you’re both a legacy thanks to your mother, and an expert in his subject thanks to the Prince’s book. Just ask him and I’m sure he’ll tell you.’
Tracey however wasn't so sure.
'Even if he really likes you Harry, if Dumbledore couldn't manage to convince him to give the true memory then he probably will still be hesitant to give it to you,' her eyes then surprisingly lit up. 'Oh Harry, speaking of people who like you, I just heard yesterday from Ginny that Cho and Michael Corner have broken up, you might have a shot with her again.’
‘Er, I guess, I haven’t really thought about Cho in a while,’ admitted Harry, who both had his eyes on someone else, and at this exact moment would rather focus on the task at hand.
'Anyway, maybe we don't even need the memory, it seems Dumbledore is looking for information on this Horcrux thing,' said Theodore. 'I've never heard of it, do any of you know some information about a Horcrux?'
Theodore knowing nothing was a bad sign, but deep in Harry's subconscious the word did sound familiar.
'I do recognize it, though I'm not sure from where,' said Harry.
'I think it was in that book I leant you in our second year, Magick Moste Evile, I don't really remember what it said either,' said Allison. 'Do you still have it?'
'No,' said Harry, now remembering the book. 'At the time staff where looking through student's stuff for illegal goods so I burned it. Canini also had a copy from her brief time at Durmstrang, but after she dropped out Remus returned it as it was just to dark.'
'Well them maybe we should focus on getting the memory, maybe its more important then simply what a Horcrux is?' suggested Tracey.
'One things for certain, if it was in that book, and Voldemort wanted it, it must be dark magic,' concluded Allison.
'So if it is so dark, you best be careful how you approach the subject with Slughorn,’ said Theodore. ‘When do you plan on talking to him?’
‘I’m not sure. Dumbledore really wants the memory, so sooner rather than later. Maybe after today’s class?’ said Harry.
Theodore looked a little skeptical of the idea, but then shrugged, ‘If you think that’s best.’
Before Harry knew it, him, Allison, and Theodore were in the Potion’s classroom, and Slughorn was calling for silence from the front of the room.
‘Settle down, settle down, please! Quickly, now, lots of work to get through this afternoon! Golpalott’s Third Law…who can tell me—? But Miss Granger can, of course!’
Hermione Granger recited at top speed:
‘Golpalott’s-Third-Law-states-that-the-antidote-for-a-blended-poison-will-be-equal-to-more-than-the-sum-of-the-antidotes-for-each-of-the-separate-components.’
This description set a chill amount the three friends, and Harry was sure that like him they were each thinking of the blended poison used on Mrs Runcorn. A terrible thought quickly ran through the back of Harry’s head that if they had learned about blended poisons and their antidotes a year earlier maybe Allison would have been able to save her mum…
‘Precisely!’ beamed Slughorn. ‘Ten points for Gryffindor! Now, if we accept Golpalott’s Third Law as true…’
Harry was going to have to take Slughorn’s word for it that Golpalott’s Third Law was true, because he had not understood any of it. Nobody apart from Hermione and Theodore seemed to be following what Slughorn said next either.
‘…which means, of course, that assuming we have achieved correct identification of the potion’s ingredients by Scarpin’s Revelaspell, our primary aim is not the relatively simple one of selecting antidotes to those ingredients in and of themselves, but to find that added component that will, by an almost alchemical process, transform these disparate elements—‘
Allison was sitting beside Harry, her eyes drooping and head bobbing as she tried to stay awake. This has never been a problem in one of Snape’s lessons as their fear of him always kept them sharp. Like Allison, Harry was finding it hard to focus and kept spacing out, only hearing every couple occasional word.
‘…and so,’ finished Slughorn, ‘I want each of you to come and take one of these phials from my desk. You are to create an antidote for the poison within it before the end of the lesson. Good luck, and don’t forget your protective gloves!’
Theodore had left his stool and was halfway toward Slughorn’s desk right behind Hermione’s before the rest of the class had realized it was time to move, and by the time Harry and Allison returned to the table, he had already tipped the contents of his phial into his cauldron and was kindling a fire underneath it.
‘Do you want my help this time,’ asked Theodore, not taking his eyes off his work. ‘Like Slughorn said, this is more about Alchemy and Scarpin’s Revelaspell, your book will be useless this time.’
‘No,’ said Harry stubbornly. ‘I’ll be fine.’
Harry uncorked the poison he had taken from Slughorn’s desk, which was a garish shade of pink, tipped it into his cauldron, and lit a fire underneath it. He did not have the faintest idea what he was supposed to do next. He glanced around at Allison, who looked just as lost as Harry did, as she hadn’t listened to Slughorn’s lecture either.
‘Harry, I know what Theodore said, but are you sure the Prince’s book can’t help us?’ Allison muttered to Harry.
Harry pulled out his trusty copy of Advanced Potion-Making and turned to the chapter on antidotes. There was Golpalott’s Third Law, stated word for word as Hermione had recited it, but not a single illuminating note in the Prince’s hand to explain what it meant. Apparently the Prince, like Hermione and Theodore, had had no difficulty understanding it.
‘Nothing,’ said Harry gloomily.
Theodore was now waving his wand over his cauldron. Unfortunately, they could not copy the spell he was doing because he and Tracey were now so good at nonverbal incantations that they did not need to say the words aloud. With Tracey in mind though, Harry had an idea.
‘Remember at the beginning of the year when you were all casting revealing spells on my book, well Tracey said hers was quite powerful, maybe it can reveal what ingredients are in the poison,’ suggested Harry, and Allison nodded.
They both waved their wands and said, ‘Specialis Revelio!’ several times, but either they weren’t casting the spell right, or it was meant to reveal hidden magic and not individual poisons in a poison soup.
It took Harry only five minutes to realize that his reputation as the best potion-maker in the class was crashing around his ears. Slughorn had peered hopefully into his cauldron on his first circuit of the dungeon, preparing to exclaim in delight as he usually did, and instead had withdrawn his head hastily, coughing, as the smell of bad eggs overwhelmed him.
Theodore did not gloat, but he did smile slightly at this. Theodore still held a grudge that Harry’s rise in the class was from knowledge Harry did not obtain for himself. He preferred to only complete for the top spot in the class with Hermione, not a third party.
He was now decanting the mysteriously separated ingredients of his poison into ten different crystal phials. More to avoid watching this irritating sight than anything else, Harry bent over the Half-Blood Prince’s book and turned a few pages with unnecessary force.
And there it was, scrawled right across a long list of antidotes:
“Just shove a bezoar down their throats.”
Harry stared at these words for a moment. Hadn’t he once, long ago, heard of bezoars? Hadn’t Snape mentioned them in their first-ever Potions lesson?
‘A stone taken from the stomach of a goat, which will protect from most poisons.’
It was not an answer to the Golpalott problem, and had Snape still been their teacher, Harry would not have dared do it, but this was a moment for desperate measures. He hastened toward the store cupboard and rummaged within it, pushing aside unicorn horns and tangles of dried herbs until he found, at the very back, a small cardboard box on which had been scribbled the word bezoars.
He opened the box just as Slughorn called, ‘Two minutes left, everyone!’
Inside were half a dozen shriveled brown objects, looking more like dried-up kidneys than real stones. Harry seized one, put the box back in the cupboard, and hurried back to his cauldron.
‘Time’s…UP!’ called Slughorn genially. ‘Well, let’s see how you’ve done! Blaise…what have you got for me?’
Slowly, Slughorn moved around the room, examining the various antidotes. Nobody had finished the task, Theodore was standing proudly in front of what he managed to accomplish, at another table Harry saw that Hermione was trying to cram a few more ingredients into her bottle before Slughorn reached her. Allison had tried her best but in the end had given up completely and just threw together some random ingredients with known healing properties. Harry stood there waiting, the bezoar clutched in a slightly sweaty hand.
Slughorn reached their table last. He looked over Theodore’s and gave an absentminded nod, muttering something about still sixty antidotes to go. He did not linger over Allison’s cauldron, but backed away swiftly, grimacing.
‘And you, Harry,’ he said. ‘What have you got to show me?’
Harry held out his hand, the bezoar sitting on his palm. Slughorn looked down at it for a full ten seconds. Harry wondered, for a moment, whether he was going to shout at him. Then he threw back his head and roared with laughter.
‘You’ve got nerve, boy!’ he boomed, taking the bezoar and holding it up so that the class could see it. ‘Oh, you’re like your mother…Well, I can’t fault you…A bezoar would certainly act as an antidote to all these potions!’
Theodore, who was sweaty-faced and his hair now nearly as untidy as Harry’s, looked livid. His half-finished antidote, comprising forty ingredients, as well as his own sweat and blood, did not get admiration for his hard work but Harry’s small stone did.
‘And the bezoar was completely your own idea, eh, Harry?’ he asked with fury in his eyes.
‘That’s the individual spirit a real potion-maker needs!’ said Slughorn happily, before Harry could reply. ‘Just like his mother, she had the same intuitive grasp of potion-making, it’s undoubtedly from Lily he gets it…Yes, Harry, yes, if you’ve got a bezoar to hand, of course that would do the trick…although as they don’t work on everything, and are pretty rare, it’s still worth knowing how to mix antidotes…’
The only person in the room looking angrier than Theodore and Hermione was Malfoy, who, Harry was pleased to see, had spilled something that looked like cat-sick over himself. Before any of them could express their fury that Harry had come top of the class by not doing any work, however, the bell rang.
‘Time to pack up!’ said Slughorn. ‘And ten points to Slytherin for sheer cheek!’
Still chuckling, he waddled back to his desk at the front of the dungeon.
Harry dawdled behind, taking an inordinate amount of time to do up his bag. Neither Allison or Theodore wished him luck as they left; both looked rather annoyed. At last Harry and Slughorn were the only two left in the room.
'Come on, now, Harry, you’ll be late for your next lesson,' said Slughorn affably, snapping the gold clasps shut on his dragon-skin briefcase.
'Sir,' said Harry, reminding himself irresistibly of Voldemort, 'I wanted to ask you something.'
'Ask away, then, my dear boy, ask away...'
'Sir, I wondered what you know about...about Horcruxes?'
Slughorn froze. His round face seemed to sink in upon itself. He licked his lips and said hoarsely, 'What did you say?'
'I asked whether you know anything about Horcruxes, sir. You see—'
'Dumbledore put you up to this,' whispered Slughorn. His voice had changed completely. It was not genial anymore, but shocked, terrified. He fumbled in his breast pocket and pulled out a handkerchief, mopping his sweating brow. 'Dumbledore’s shown you that—that memory. Well? Hasn’t he?'
'Yes,' said Harry, deciding on the spot that it was best not to lie.
'Yes, of course,' said Slughorn quietly, still dabbing at his white face. 'Of course...well, if you’ve seen that memory, Harry, you’ll know that I don’t know anything—anything'—he repeated the word forcefully—'about Horcruxes.'
He seized his dragon-skin briefcase, stuffed his handkerchief back into his pocket, and marched to the dungeon door.
'Sir,' said Harry desperately, 'I just thought there might be a bit more to the memory—'
'Did you?' said Slughorn. 'Then you were wrong, weren’t you? WRONG!'
He bellowed the last word and, before Harry could say another word, slammed the dungeon door behind him.
Neither none of Harry's friends were at all sympathetic when Harry told them of this disastrous interview. Theodore was still seething at the way Harry had triumphed without doing the work properly or accepting his offer of help. Allison was resentful that Harry had let her stand there empty handed like a fool when he had a plan, and that they could both have used a bezoar. Tracey was taking Allison's side.
'It would’ve just looked stupid if we’d both done it!' said Harry irritably. 'Look, I had to try and soften him up so I could ask him about Voldemort, didn’t I? Anyway, it didn't matter, I didn't succeed.
Infuriated by his failure and by his friend’s attitudes, Harry brooded for the next few days over what to do next about Slughorn. He decided that, for the time being, he would let Slughorn think that he had forgotten all about Horcruxes; it was surely best to lull him into a false sense of security before returning to the attack.
When Harry did not question Slughorn again, the Potions master reverted to his usual affectionate treatment of him, and appeared to have put the matter from his mind. Harry awaited an invitation to one of his little evening parties, determined to accept this time, even if he had to ask Terence to reschedule Quidditch practice. Unfortunately, however, no such invitation arrived. Harry checked with Theodore: He had not received an invitation and nor, as far as they knew, had anybody else. Harry could not help wondering whether this meant that Slughorn was not quite as forgetful as he appeared, simply determined to give Harry no additional opportunities to question him.
Time continued to pass, and before Harry knew it, it was the first of February. The snow melted around the school as the month arrived, to be replaced by cold, dreary wetness. Purplish-gray clouds hung low over the castle and a constant fall of chilly rain made the lawns slippery and muddy.
By this point he had become used to not receiving mail from Remus and only a monthly letter from his aunt Andromeda and uncle Tonks, but on that cool rainy day Hedwig came flying down with a slightly rained upon letter in her mouth. It was from Nymphadora, and because the Ministry was still reading his main and he wasn't supposed to go to Hogsmeade it was in code.
"Dear Harry,
The event we discussed over Christmas is the following Saturday. Dress comfortably and bring your special traveling cloak incase the weather turns. I'll meet you where you said to around one o'clock. If something has come up or you have changed your mind send an owl by Thursday evening.
I'm really looking forward to this.
-Tonks"
So from what Harry could get from this was wear his civilian clothes instead of his Hogwarts robes so he isn't in trouble for being out of Hogwarts grounds when he shouldn't be, and that she'll meet him in Honeydukes cellar. What Harry couldn't figure out was what disguise magic she was going to use on him that wouldn't trigger the trace letting the Ministry know he wasn't in Hogwarts.
‘Maybe you shouldn’t go, Harry,’ said Theodore when he told the group about the letter and what he was going to do. ‘Leaving the school without permission can get you in trouble regularly, but the Ministry doesn’t want you to either so you could get expelled if you are caught.’
‘Tonks is an Auror, she knows what she’s doing,’ said Allison confidently. ‘She’ll keep you safe.’
‘I just wish I could go,’ said Tracey. ‘Sneaking out sounds like fun.’
'How do you plan on getting back to the school?' asked Theodore. 'The slide part of the tunnel makes it a one way trip.'
'The slide portion is right under Hogwarts, I should be able to use magic to get back up without the trace saying I'm outside of Hogwarts grounds,' said Harry confidently, thinking of a few spells that could help.
'Well, alright then,' said Theodore, who couldn't think of any other reasons why Harry shouldn't go. 'Just be safe and don't do anything stupid. We'll cover for you while you're gone.'
'Tell Tonks I said hello,' said Allison.
'Oh, and bring us all some bottles of Butterbeer if you can,' said Tracey.
And so soon the day arrived, Harry spent the morning getting ahead in as much homework as he could, and then headed for the third floor of the castle just before noon. Thankfully he didn't look to out of place as being Saturday many students were out of their uniforms and wearing warmer comfort close. With his Cloak of Invisibility in one pocket, and a small bag of Galleons in the other, he waited for his part of the Gunhilda of Gorsemoor corridor to be empty before approaching the hunched over statue and quietly said the password.
'Dissendium,' and the moment the word exited his lips that hump opened revealing the ancient stone slide.
Taking one last look around to make sure no one was there, Harry then hopped onto the slide, and as he descended that hump closed behind him, engulfing him in darkness. For about an hour he walked through the cold damp tunnel until the passage began to rise, and after about another ten minutes he came to the worn stone steps, being in darkness he nearly tripped over them. Carefully he rose the many steps, and soon he reached the trap door. He took out his Invisibility Cloak, and while putting it on, listened to hear if there was anyone in the cellar. After being positive that there was no one moving around at least, he very slowly pushed the trapdoor open and peered over the edge. He could see the wooden crates and boxes, but no people in sight, so Harry climbed out of the trapdoor and replaced it, even though he had done this a couple times he was always amazed how perfectly the door blended with the dusty floor that it simply looked like another tile. Lowering it down though did make a small thud sound, which seemed to get someone's attention.
'Harry?' whispered Tonks, who had just emerged from behind some stacked crates. Her hair was back to being mousy brown with only a few green highlights, and was just as straight as always. The winter gloom must have been sapping the limited joy she got from Christmas.
'I'm over here,' whispered back Harry, who removed his cloak just enough that his head was visible.
'Oh, there you are. I was starting to get a little worried, you're about ten minutes late of when we agreed,' she said while coming to meet him.
'Yes, sorry, I haven't used that tunnel in three years and forgot how long it was,' admitted Harry. 'So, how are we making me not Harry Potter without using spells?'
She pulled out two Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes products. One was a multi-coloured box with a hairbrush pictured on it called Comb-a-Chameleon. The other was a light blue tin with each side having a different moustache on it and was called Out to Lunch Fake Moustache.
'Its a good thing the Weasley twins made a joke shop with disguises or else I'd probably have had to figure out how to find a muggle costume shop. Now, hold still, don't worry the cream is temporary and you can use the comb to change your hair back,' she said as she opened the products.
'Back?' said Harry nervously, but let his cousin get to work.
She used some cream from the tin on Harry's upper lip and within seconds he had a pencil moustache. Next she used Romanian celanese acetate hairbrush on his hair and newly grown moustache and not only did it change its colour from jet-black to a light brown, it also changed it from its messy style to bowl-cut with a mullet. The bowl-cut not only made him not look like himself, but it also had the bonus effect of hiding his very identifiable scar.
