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alt_potterverse

Dataset card Data Studio Files
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Hermione looked disappointed for a moment, but it was soon replaced by determination.
"Now," Harry said, grabbing one of the dummies and standing it back up on its feet, "you've practiced three different fatal wounds. I want to see you use each of them, as quickly and smoothly as you can manage."
"Yes, sir," Hermione said.
After training and lunch, Harry and Hermione spent the afternoon in the library. Harry grabbed a stack of books from the Transfiguration and Charms sections and started looking through them. A few moments later, an ancient leather-bound volume the size of one of Dudley's smaller presents landed on the table with a thud...
"What's that?" Harry said, looking up at Hermione, who was panting with the effort of carrying the book.
"The Rules and Regulations of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry: The Complete, Unabridged, and Ridiculously Verbose Edition," Hermione said. "We can't find a way around the rules unless we know what the rules are, right?"
Harry shrugged. "Better you than me," he said, and he turned back to his spellbook.
A few hours later, Harry tossed the copy of Armaments for the Unarmed he was skimming to the table. "This one's just a list of creative ways to use the Disarming Charm. I don't think I've read anything about working with Muggle weapons."
"I'm sorry," Hermione murmured, squinting to read the tiny text.
"I should probably work on combat magic anyway," Harry mused. "But that'll help me in six months, not now."
"Well, if we can't find anything better, that might...be..." Hermione's voice trailed off, and she leaned towards the rulebook.
"You might not have any," she murmured to herself, "but maybe...I'll be right back!" she said, and ran off into the stacks.
Harry blinked bemusedly, then picked up the next book in his pile. A moment later, Hermione hustled back to the table, clutching another huge book. This one, though, looked much newer, and had a title on the cover in silver foil: Black's Magical Law Dictionary.
"A dictionary?" Harry said. "Do you get this excited every time you come across a new word?"
"A law dictionary," Hermione corrected as she set it down. "A lot of words have different meanings in law. Now let's see...looking for H..." She flipped through the pages quickly, muttering to herself. "Yes! I think this'll work!"
Harry sat up. "What? What'll work?"
"Take a look," Hermione said, pointing to a line in the thick rulebook.
Harry looked at where she was pointing. Then he squinted. Then he leaned forward. Then he took off his glasses and quickly rubbed them clean on his robes. Then he leaned forward again. Finally, he could read it: "'Notwithstanding any other Hogwarts rule, students may wear or openly carry any magical heirloom, provided ...
"Yes," Hermione said, "but that's the common definition of an heirloom." She shoved the dictionary into his hands. "Here, take a look."
Harry quickly scanned down the page until he reached the definition in question.
Any object that:
(a) has been owned by members of at least three consecutive generations of the same family, or
(b) was crafted by a member of one generation of a family and then given to a member of the next generation, or
(c) was crafted by inhuman hands and then gifted or sold to a family line, or
(d) was bestowed upon a wizard by magic beyond the ken of any who live.
"'Inhuman hands', Harry," Hermione said. "Goblins craft weapons—amazing weapons imbued with all sorts of powerful magics that are completely inaccessible to human wizards. And if the Potter family bought one, it would immediately become an heirloom. The only problem is, they're very expensive, and pretty rare..."
"I've never shown you my Gringotts statements, have I?" Harry asked.
"No," Hermione said. "Why?"
"Because if I had, you'd know that expensive isn't a problem," Harry said. "You'd have to buy a house to even put a dent in my trust vault. I have no idea why my parents set it up that way."
"Maybe they thought you might need to," Hermione suggested. "Your parents fought Voldemort, right? If he hadn't fallen when he did, your guardians might have had to go into hiding with you."
"Not that they'd have bothered," Harry muttered, and Hermione frowned. "Anyway, I think I saw a place in Knockturn Alley that sold them."
Hermione gasped and nearly shouted, "You've been to—"
"Shhhh!" They both looked up, and Madam Pince was glaring at Hermione.
Hermione colored under her gaze and turned back to Harry. "You've been to Knockturn Alley?" she whispered harshly.
"Yes," Harry said.
"But it's the most dangerous place in Britain! Why would you go there?"
"To see what was there," Harry said.
"But—but—how did you not get hurt? An eleven-year-old boy, there?"
"Oh, you have much to learn, grasshopper," he said with a grin. "Let's put this stuff away and I'll show you."
Hermione copied down the rule and definition while Harry shelved the books. A few minutes later, they were walking through the halls of Hogwarts, heading in a direction Hermione didn't recognize.
"Okay, we should pass groups walking from Ravenclaw Tower to the library. Try to pay attention to them, but don't be obvious about it."
Hermione nodded and followed him for a couple minutes. Soon, they heard unfamiliar voices echoing down the hall. As she watched, Harry's normally straight shoulders sagged; one of his arms came up to grasp the other; he averted his eyes to the floor; his long, steady steps became a shuffle.
Two girls—one Chinese, the other with reddish-blond curls—and two brown-haired boys, all older, appeared down the hall. They noticed Harry immediately.
"Look, it's the Boy-Who-Fell," the taller of the two boys said.
Harry's shoulders tensed.
"Congratulations," the Chinese girl said. "Of course, most Seekers only need one broom to win the game."
Harry's steps quickened, and Hermione hurried to follow. The four Ravenclaws behind them laughed.
"What was that?" Hermione asked, but Harry shushed her. Another group of Ravenclaws was coming. This time, Harry returned to a more normal posture and gait; he made eye contact with the students and smiled a little.
"Nice catch yesterday, Potter!" a boy said.
"Thanks," Harry said with a friendly wave.
Once they'd passed, Hermione whispered urgently, "What did you do?"
But footsteps were already sounding from up the corridor. "One more," Harry said. "Stay with me—this won't work if you're attracting attention..."
Harry slipped over to walk near the wall. He put his eyes on the floor, not the approaching students, and took slightly shorter, slower steps. This time, the Ravenclaws passed them without comment.
"That's enough," Harry said, turning back towards the main stairs. "I think you've gotten the point."
"I got the point that you can—can control how people interact with you," Hermione said. "But how?"
"I'm sending different signals with my body language," Harry explained. "With the first group, my posture and gait suggested I was vulnerable, and they pounced on that. For the second, I went for confident and friendly, and they responded in kind. Just now, I took steps to ensure I was easy to overlook, and they oblige...
"So you just used...body language to walk down Knockturn Alley without anything happening to you?"
"Yes," Harry said.
"What sort of body language does that?"
He shrugged. "Just walk like they should be afraid you will happen to them."
"...an attempt on his life, that much is certain," Snape's voice said from down the hall.
"At least someone believes me," Harry muttered. Then he swore in a whisper, grabbed Hermione's elbow, and dragged her down a corridor to their right.
"What is it?" Hermione whispered.
"I'm still carrying my knife from training!"
Hermione didn't swear, but the words she used were less polite than her usual choices.
"Loath as I am to admit it, I'm afraid I have to agree," said Dumbledore's voice.
Harry and Hermione came to a locked door.
"Oh, hell," Harry murmured. There weren't any other doors in this corridor, and Snape was getting closer.
He dropped to one knee and thrust his hand into his money pouch, drawing from within a length of bent wire. Harry had practiced picking the locks at Hogwarts, and though they were of an old-fashioned design that was normally easy to defeat, they also tended to have far more tumblers than ought to fit in an ordinary doo...
Hermione drew her wand and murmured, "Alohomora!" The lock clicked and she turned the knob. "Come on!" she whispered, pulling him to his feet and through the door.
"I have got to learn that spell," Harry said.
Once inside, Harry and Hermione leaned against the door, listening closely.
"...would do anything but come here and try to steal it," they heard Dumbledore say. "Linger in the shadows, gathering information, perhaps, but this? Attacking a student in broad daylight, in front of hundreds of bystanders? Not in my worst nightmares. It makes me wonder if we should rethink the entire endeavor."
"But where would we move it?" Snape said. "The obstacles we've erected will slow him down enough for you to catch up, but only if you can respond quickly. If we put it anywhere else, it would be too late by the time you arrived."
"Yes," Dumbledore responded with a heavy sigh, "I suppose there is no alternative. We will simply have to ensure he doesn't have another opportunity to endanger a student." The two of them walked off.
"I think they're gone," Hermione said, sagging against the door in relief. Then she gasped. "H-Harry?"
"We might have been better off with Snape."
Harry turned to see what she was looking at.
It was an absolutely enormous dog, a dog that made all other dogs look like puppies. It was drooling. It was growling. It was snarling. It was doing all of this with three separate heads.
Hermione drew her knife, and Harry exchanged his pick for his knife. "We try to retreat first," Harry said. "Only attack if we can't."
"Yes, sir," Hermione said, and she reached slowly for the knob.
The dog padded towards them. Hermione fumbled for the doorknob. Harry flipped open his knife. Two of the dog's heads growled, and Harry could smell their foul breath on his face...
The latch clicked and Hermione pushed the door open. They both ran through it. The dog barked and Hermione slammed the door in its face. They both ran, Harry's hand on Hermione's arm.
A few minutes later they stopped, gasping for breath. Harry folded his knife again.
"What was that about?" Harry said.
When Hermione didn't answer, Harry looked over to her. She was swaying on her feet, holding her hand over her heart and trembling.
"Oh," Harry said, and he wrapped an arm around her. She leaned heavily against him. "It's okay, Hermione."
"I was so scared," she said.
"You did great. Kept your head beautifully. Couldn't have done it better myself."
She smiled tremulously. After a moment, she broke away from him, and he let go of her.
"That was the right-hand third-floor corridor," she said, slipping her dagger back into her pocket.
"The one Dumbledore mentioned at the opening feast?" Harry asked, handing her his knife. Best not make the same mistake twice. "No wonder he wanted everyone to stay away."
"It's not just that," Hermione said. "The dog was standing on a trap door."
"Really? Well spotted," Harry said with admiration, "I was too busy looking at its heads to notice."
"Thanks," she said, blushing. "Anyway, I think it must have been guarding something."
"Guarding something...maybe it's the first of the obstacles Snape was talking about!"
"So it's really true, then," Hermione said. "Dumbledore hid a gold-generating, immortality-inducing Dark wizard magnet in a school full of children."
"Behind a lock a first-year could charm open—nice spellwork, by the way—and a dog that would happily eat any first-year who managed it," Harry reminded her.
"And they think you're a danger to the school?" Hermione grumbled.
That night, the Twins approached Harry with a set of techniques to render him perfectly stealthy. It involved a half-dozen spells—everything from Silencing Charms on your mouth, shoes, and the inside of the Cloak to a Scentless Spell to a Disillusionment Charm on your shoes to keep them from appearing beneath the hem o...