Interlude – the voice from Azkaban
Let me ask you a question.
If you had to hide a great treasure, how would you do it?
Bury it? Lock it away? Give it to a friend to guard?
In my time, I have held many treasures. Most of them I held on behalf of other people, to help them with their own stories. The greatest of those stories was Arthur's.
But when he died, the vultures began to move. People who sought his treasures for their own purposes. I kept them safe for many years – my power was strong then, and my opponents' magic usually patchy. In those days magic was taught individually, by word of mouth, and so pupils could usually learn only as much as their master knew. I grew more powerful by dealing with the supernatural, but that was not a route I expected others to take.
Still, I have never claimed to be infallible, and magical power is not a guard against every form of attack. At the heart of all my magic was a human, who could be outwitted, out manoeuvred. The treasures needed more protection than one wizard in a cave.
I guarded them until finally better protection was built. Two witches and two wizards were contemplating building a school. A place where magic could be taught in a structured form, knowledge could be preserved and individual witches and wizards protected and hidden. They consulted me, of course. Arthur was long dead and I no longer had the same influence over royalty, but amongst wizards I was still a formidable name. As they built the school I had time alone with each of them, and I had time to tell two of them of my treasures.
Godric agreed to take Excaliber. I often wonder what would make him choose it over the second treasure though. The sword undoubtedly had power, but Arthur only ever saw it as a means to an end, a useful tool. Godric apparently saw it as a treasure worth having for itself. I still wonder who was right.
But to Arthur, and indeed to myself, it was the second treasure that was worth having and when Helga saw it, she recognised it for what it was. I couldn't give the cup to her with it's power unchained – it would be too dangerous.
So I made an oath upon it, and broke the oath. You must understand that the power of the cup was anchored in goodness, and breaking an oath upon that power offended the cup, as I knew it would. The glowing light that had emitted from it for as long as I had known it faded, and its power receded, locked away somewhere unreachable.
I added some small enchantments upon the cup, powers that would be of use to Helga, but the true powers were now, I was sure, unreachable. She understood, and all her life she kept the secret of the cup, and let people believe it was just a pretty cup with interesting powers.
The oath itself had another function. It involved binding the owls to the service of wizards, carrying their messages and obeying their commands. That was my official present to Hogwarts upon its opening, and over a thousand years later it still holds true.
The owls still serve us. Even locked deep in Azkaban, I have the power to know that. That is how I know the oath remains broken, and the power of the Grail is still trapped.
