I got the spell [Evito] from Lord Silvere's: Delenda Est
Chapter 6
Harry opened his eyes and blinked several times as his drowsiness vanished. He stared up uncomprehendingly at the ceiling of his four-poster canopy for a moment, then he shot up with a yelp, grabbing his wand.
"Tempus Die Mense Anno."
3:03, 31 October, 1994… 3:04 now.
'I got overconfident,' Harry mused, watching the glow of the numbers start to fade as he moved to the common room.
'I died because I thought that I would be fine on my broom so I didn't wait for the perfect moment… I shouldn't have rushed to take that shot at the eggs… at least I'm still alive.'
At least he had confirmation now that he really was in a time loop… even if he wasn't sure how to feel about that fact.
On one hand, the time loop seemed to keep him from dying (at least permanently), which was a huge plus in his book.
On the other, he was reliving the same month (maybe more) over and over while locked in a castle with a man who regularly reads minds and wipes memories.
'Oh yes, and who seems to be going crazy, can't forget that.' Harry thought sarcastically.
That was a major league minus.
On the upside, the time loop couldn't have come at a better time.
He was expected to prepare for the tournament, so going to the library to research things wouldn't be seen as terribly strange; but the things he researched didn't have to actually be for the tournament. Similarly, it wouldn't seem strange that he was learning advanced combat spells, since he had a dragon to face at the end of the month. Granted, because it was a dragon (and not a wizard) he couldn't use it to build strategies and dueling tactics to use against Voldemort, but it was useful to have a real situation to test spells out in even if it wasn't perfect.
The dragon was a 'known wizard-killer' according to the ministry danger classification, which meant that it was a pretty difficult target. And while Voldemort was quite the hard target himself, he wasn't quite up to dragon levels of personal combat ability. With the prospect of infinite time to plan, Harry was sure he could figure out something by using the dragon as a benchmark… and that was assuming that he couldn't stop the ritual in the first place.
On the downside, the time loop couldn't have a more difficult ending.
After careful consideration over the previous month, Harry had determined that killing Voldemort was the only thing that he could even remotely consider as a 'perfect' end to his time loop, like Phil Connors' 'perfect day' ended with Rita falling for him. It was daunting to think that the loop would never end until he could actually defeat Voldemort. It could take years… maybe decades!
Fortunately, Harry had two things over Phil on this.
One, unlike Phil, who didn't know if Rita was actually attainable, Harry knew that Voldemort could be defeated. Harry had defeated him once before, it just didn't stick because as a baby Harry didn't have proper follow-through. He wasn't going to make that mistake this time.
And two, his time loop was far longer than Phils'. There was only so much Phil could try or do in twenty four hours, while Harry had at a month confirmed and probably another six available after the dragon (assuming he was right about the Voldemort thing, which he definitely was). Another upside to the longer loop was that he had a much lower chance of going crazy than Phil did, partially because he could change things around and then watch the fallout (which Phil couldn't since 24 hours is a bit short for that) and partially because he could travel much further to see new things than Phil.
He may be stuck in the castle for the time being because he didn't know what Dumbledore would (or could) do if he left, but that would change as he gained the abilities and knowledge to avoid the man.
He just had to avoid attracting attention to keep Dumbledore from catching on to his skills before he was strong enough to fight him off or escape to prevent another memory wipe... or maybe doing something worse. He really didn't want to know what Dumbledore would do to regain control of him if he realized that Harry wasn't just a time traveler, but was stuck in a time loop. The man had wiped his memory and put him under a powerful compulsion just for bog-standard time travel. It made Harry slightly ill to think of the lengths Dumbles would probably go to get ahold of a-
The wheels turning in Harry's mind halted.
No, he didn't.
He didn't have to hide anything. He was in a time loop. He hadn't really considered the ramifications of that before because it had been a theory, but now…
If things got overwhelmingly bad, couldn't he just die and restart?
Harry started to get excited.
If that was the case, he could do anything! He could walk into the Diagon Ally at noon and start blowing stuff up and as long as he didn't kill Voldemort, time would rewind in seven months and there would be no consequences! Of course if Sirius was anything to go by, seven months in Azkaban would be pretty tough, so maybe he wanted to find some sort of suicide spell to force the restart early?
He still couldn't meet Dumbledore in his office since the spells in (on?) it would tell him something was up and the man would end up wiping his memory again, which would make that specific restart pointless, but if he could locate a suicide spell he could fulfill his plan of stealing veritaserum without fear of repercussions, restarting when things didn't go his way.
He could continue doing that all the way up to the Voldemort fight.
Harry was starting to like the idea of being in a time loop.
He'd have to find a suicide spell that he could set to activate without his wand before he did anything else. Without it, Dumbledore would actually be a serious threat to his health and wellbeing. With it, Dumbles would only be as dangerous as Harry let him be. Oh, he could still make himself a nuisance and force Harry to restart if he suspected something, but Harry wouldn't have to worry about mind-control if he could set the spell to go off on Legilimency and Obliviation attempts.
He could even ask Hermione for help finding a suitable spell… for curiosity's sake, of course. After all, there was a nice, high, Astronomy tower and a Potions lab full of poisonous ingredients already available if he actually wanted to off himself now weren't there?
Harry's evil laugh woke a prefect, who promptly gave him a detention with Filch for the stunt.
Harry glowered at the squib caretakers' back as he scrubbed the entrance hall floor with a handle-less scrub brush.
It was nearly dinnertime and he still hadn't had a chance to get Hermione alone to ask her for help researching a suicide spell.
Before breakfast it was 'We'll have plenty of time later to talk', said with a rather disapproving look that told him that she was punishing him for getting a detention, and after breakfast it had been 'Ron and I are going to visit Hagrid now'. When he had tried to interrupt after lunch she had reminded him of his detention and he had had to leave, and then Filch had gleefully sprung the fact that the ass of a prefect had spitefully made it a double rather than a single detention. That meant that he wouldn't be able to intercept Hermione anytime before dinner and left him with no time at all to go to the library himself before facing Dumbledore again after his name came out of the goblet.
'Why did that prefect have to give me detention today?' Harry groaned mentally as he moved to another floor-stone. 'Why couldn't it have been tomorrow? Why couldn't it have been a single? I have things I needed to do today.'
Like finding that suicide spell.
Harry shivered at the memory of steely tentacles and razor claws ripping through his mind.
'No.' Harry thought firmly, shaking himself violently from his memory. 'It won't happen again.'
'I'll be fine,' Harry thought, trying to reassure himself, 'Dumbledore will just do a passive scan to check whether I'm telling the truth about putting my name in the Goblet like the last time and then he'll leave me alone. This won't be like that time in his office.'
He'd be fine… he would.
'But what if I'm not?' A tiny voice called from deep in the recesses of Harry's brain, the calmness of the voice a horrifying contrast to the terror of the next question. 'What if Dumbledore notices something?'
Harry's jerked reflexively at the thought as adrenaline started pouring through him.
'Dumbledore didn't notice something last time but what if this time is different? What if I can't stop my mental deflection reflex in time and Dumbles notices? Will Dumbledore ask me to stay behind to talk instead of letting me go with Cedric like usual? Will he invite me up to his office for a more 'in depth' chat? Will he just stun me right there and declare that I was an imposter? Will I be fast enough to draw my wand and commit suicide before Dumbledore stuns me if he does?! And if I'm not, will I wake up tied to a chair with razor wire and chainsaws starting to rip through my head?!'
The last time Harry hadn't been paying attention, being focused on his own plans, so he had been surprised by Dumbledore's entry and hadn't time to think about it.
Now, as the terror built in momentum, Harry was wishing that he didn't have time to think about it.
'I can't let it happen again. I won't let it happen again!' Harry thought with rising panic, 'I can't risk going to that meeting without protection!'
Harry thought frantically for a solution.
'This whole day started wrong with that detention.' Harry suddenly realized through his panic, 'I can just restart and not get that detention!'
He stood drunkenly and fumbled out his wand as his hands trembled. Dumbledore wasn't going to get him!
"Now see here. You can't use -" Filch started.
"Ossus-" Harry croaked, lifting the wand to point at his head.
"-magic to clean in-"
"-Praemium!"
"-deten…tions..." Filch finished with horror as Harry's skull exploded and his vision went black.
Harry opened his eyes and blinked several times as his drowsiness vanished. He stared up uncomprehendingly at the ceiling of his four-poster canopy for a moment, then he sat up with a sigh.
'The problem certainly seems less overwhelming now, without all that adrenaline.' Harry thought with a grimace, 'Not that it matters since this is a new loop.'
'At least I confirmed that suicide does reset the loop. That's good.' Harry evaluated morbidly as he lay back down, 'I was a bit worried about that.'
Now that he had proof that suicide was indeed a viable way to reset the loop, finding an appropriate suicide spell just became his first priority for the morning. Hopefully he could persuade Hermione to go to the library instead of Hagrids. And if they couldn't find something in time, he'd just have to keep resetting the loop before meeting Dumbledore.
Harry rolled over and fell back to sleep.
"Hey Hermione, I need your help researching something." Harry said with a serious expression as he met Hermione for the walk to breakfast. "I haven't really started researching yet, so any help you could offer would be nice. Do you mind if I take up some of your time after breakfast for a trip to the library?"
"Sure Harry!" Hermione said with a happy smile, "I'm glad you're finally deciding to take your studies seriously, you can tell me about it on the way down."
"Harry, it's time for dinner, we can continue this tomorrow." Hermione said with a frown, "Honestly Harry, this is ridiculous. It isn't like researching the history of suicide spells is urgent."
"Yeah…Alright," Harry said with a grimace as he shut a reference book and stood. "Let me just visit the restroom first."
"Sure." She responded as they left the library and Harry ducked into a nearby lavatory.
She waited for a moment, then paused as she heard something. Why would Harry be casting a-
"Hey Hermione, I need your help researching something." Harry said as he met Hermione for the walk to breakfast. "I've already done some preliminary research into the history of my topic, but I want to look up more current data, like actual uses. Can we start after breakfast?"
"Sure Harry!" Hermione said with a happy smile, "I'm glad you're finally deciding to take your studies seriously. Um…what is it that you're researching? You forgot to mention that."
"Hey Hermione, I need your help with researching something a bit delicate." Said Harry. "I've already done some significant research into the history and current uses, but I want to have a look at the actual effects of the spells. I promise it's only for my curiosity. Can we start after breakfast?"
"Sure Harry!" Hermione said with a happy smile, "I'm glad you're finally deciding to take your studies seriously. You're being a bit evasive, what are you researching?"
"Hey Hermione, I need your help researching some spells." Said Harry. "I've already done some serious research, but I can't seem to find casting instructions anywhere. The spells have some very questionable effects, but I'm pretty curious. Can we start researching after breakfast?"
"Sure Harry!" Hermione said with an unsure smile, "I'm glad you're finally deciding to take your studies seriously. If the spells you're looking up are really that horrible, you'll probably need to go to the restricted section to find instructions on them."
"Hey Hermione, I need your help researching some spells." Harry said with a frown. "I've already checked and rechecked the whole library, but I can't find casting instructions anywhere. I've even checked the whole restricted section! It took ages to go through. Can we start figuring this out after breakfast?"
"Sure Harry!" Hermione said with a thoughtful expression, "I'm glad you're finally deciding to take your studies seriously. If you really can't find the casting instructions and you know what the spells are supposed to do, you could try to re-engineer them using the Arithmancy of spells with similar effects. What spells are you trying to learn anyway?"
"Hermione, what the hell is up with the library?" Harry said with shock. "Why the hell would they actually put the incantation for the blood-boiling curse in the library? I didn't have to look hard to find it. It wasn't even in the restricted section! Do they want us to go around killing one another horribly?!"
"Relax Harry!" Hermione exclaimed, grabbing him firmly. "I'm glad you're spending some more time in the library, but I'm shocked that you're doing it to research such horrible stuff. I'd bet that it was an accident that the spell got included. Do you know where you found it? We can go look for similar books to confirm it was an error before we report it. If it was a more general oversight, we'll be able to evaluate the size of it before we warn Ms. Price."
"Hermione, there is something seriously wrong with the library." Harry said calmly, looking at her with dismay-filled eyes as he joined her in standing just inside the Gryffindor portrait hole where she always waited for their now familiar walk down to breakfast. "It's filled with torture curses, combat spells, mind-control spells, and dark magic. And I'm not talking about just in the restricted section."
"No, the things I'm talking about are out in the main section of the library waiting for anybody to learn them. It's all hidden within references to other spells in the 'modified spells' section of the books- every book says 'refer to spell X and then change Y to get effect Z', so it doesn't actually tell you outright how to cast the spell."
Harry shook his head sadly at Hermione's stupefied expression.
"I was pretty lucky to find Practical spells for Practical people, since actual instructions on how to cast the spells is in short supply- typically contained within the restricted section, so unless you dig through the library to find each of the original sources so you can actually start using the 'modified spells' section of the books, you don't realize just how much dark magic you skipped over by ignoring those sections. And nobody ever bothers to read those sections because they don't want to bother looking up the original spells to be able to learn from the 'modified spells' sections. But after you do start to read those sections, you realize that there's dark magic everywhere!"
"There are sometimes hundreds of minor, esoteric variations to the most common combat spells! I mean seriously, how much difference does expelling someones' liver with a Liver-expelling curse have from expelling their entrails with an Entrail-expelling curse or from expelling their heart or lungs or any other organ? Aren't they just as dead?" Harry ranted, "I mean, what difference could removing six feet of intestines possibly make compared to removing eight feet? Nothing, right? But there are variants for both of them! I actually found variants for twelve and twenty feet as well, in addition to references for a book that lists a bunch more categorically by length!"
"Did you know there are actually six variations on the killing curse? SIX!" Harry said with horror, shaking Hermione gently, "And several of them aren't even illegal. 'Evito' is one that isn't. It's the ancient predecessor to the killing curse, and while it can be blocked by shields and wards, it's faster to cast than the classic 'Avada Kedavra' and it's easier to cast. I can't but think that the ability to instantly kill someone faster than the Avada should be illegal, even if it does have defenses (especially since those defenses aren't common nowadays)."
"It's funny," Harry said, releasing the dumbstruck Hermione, "But I didn't even start to notice all the dark magic in our library until you suggested I look for similar spells to the ones I was looking for, and then when we looked for what dark magic Ms. Price missed."
"I hadn't ever really just browsed the library before that." Harry mused almost to himself, ignoring the crowd of gaping Gryffindors listening in, "Ms. Prices' library search spells wouldn't work to find spells 'similar to' anything, they only find exact references. I probably should have realized that after it took so long to figure out the Basilisk back in second year. That book you eventually found didn't mention petrifying, so it didn't come up in a magical search for 'petrification'."
"No wonder there was so much dark magic," Harry realized suddenly, "Nobody ever read the books before putting them into the library. They probably just cast a few spells over the books searching for 'dark magic instructions' and gave it the okay when the spell came up negative. Of course the books don't explicitly state how to do it, but most of them sure as hell give enough hints for anybody with half a brain to figure it out. Most of them even give the Arithmancy formulae of the spells, and you were the one that informed me that with the Arithmancy you could reverse-engineer the incantation and movements."
Harry stopped, panting, as his rant ended.
"Harry…" Hermione started tepidly, as though afraid Harry was going to run away or explode if she startled him. "What…?"
Harry waved her off airily.
"Relax, I just needed to let some steam out since you wouldn't let me get a word in edgewise at the end of the last loop when you discovered the same thing." Harry smiled a bit, "You were quite livid."
"Harry, what are you …?" Hermione started, her voice dwindling away as she started to process his rant in more depth. She was so caught up in her own thoughts and observations on his rant that she didn't notice him drawing his wand, though the surrounding Gryffindors certainly did; drawing back in fear from the suddenly armed and crazy Harry Potter.
"Don't worry. I figured out how to cast the spell I needed to after reading through some of those dark magic variants, I just have to test it now. I wanted to use this loop to rant a bit, so I'll restart now that I'm done. Evito."
'Alright, test number one.' Harry thought to himself as he walked into the common room and over to Hermione. 'Stun activation of suicide spell.'
"Hey Hermione, could you Stun me please?" Harry asked with a smile, "I need to test something."
"Harry!" Hermione admonished, "I couldn't do something like that!"
"Even if it were for an advanced Charms project?" Harry questioned with a sly grin. She always ate that excuse up for why he was investigating suicide spells. "You can Rennervate me right after."
She chewed on her bottom lip for a moment, clearly conflicted, while Harry waited patiently.
"Well… Okay, but you have to be sitting down first and you have to tell what you are testing afterwards." She said finally, won over by the thought of advanced Charms.
"Okay!" Harry agreed as he pulled her through the common room and promptly sat down on a nearby couch. "I need a baseline first. You need to stun me without the spell."
"So… I just stun you now?" Hermione asked anxiously, looking around at the curious spectators.
"Yep!" replied Harry cheerfully. "Go ahead."
"Stupify." She cast timidly, a bit self-conscious at the attention.
Harry's vision went dark as the red light struck him squarely in the chest. What seemed like an instant later, his vision exploded into light as a rush of energy flowed through him, waking him instantly.
"Ahhhh!" Harry yelled as he bucked from the shock of his abrupt awakening, "That was different."
"Are you okay Harry? Did I mess up?" Hermione fretted as tears welled in her eyes, "I didn't hurt you did I?! You were so still and I knew I shouldn't have-"
"Relax Hermione." Harry soothed, "I'm fine, you did great. It was a perfect stunner, I just hadn't ever been Rennervated before and I wasn't quite expecting how it felt."
Harry resettled himself upright on the couch and drew his wand, casting the thirty second long incantation for his selected suicide spell. Hopefully it would go off when she stunned him and reset the loop.
"Alright, I'm ready." Harry said with another grin.
"What spell was that Harry?" Hermione asked, still a little uneasy after having stunned him the first time. "It seemed pretty long and I recognized the wording for a contingency spell in there. You know, one that activates when something else happens?"
"Yeah, I'm hoping that this spell will wake me up automatically when I get stunned." Harry lied easily. He had actually looked into that on one of his many library restarts as a possible way to surprise Dumbledore. He had discovered that Rennervate couldn't be made into a contingency like that- it was too reliant on individual circumstances like how you fell, what your injuries were, and how strong the stunner was. It was easy for the spell to adjust when you cast it regularly, but putting it into a mindless matrix to be released later was impossible.
"Go on." Harry urged. "One more time."
"If you're sure…" Hermione said unhappily. "Stupify."
Harry's vision went dark.
Harry opened his eyes and blinked several times as his drowsiness vanished. He stared up uncomprehendingly at the ceiling of his four-poster canopy for a moment, then he smiled, shark-like.
He had it. His first choice, Exonemesis Periculi, worked wonderfully.
He had thought it was too good to be true at first, with settable conditions for activation and an open-ended ability to actually identify caster intent while casting. This made it rather terrible as a spy spell, since most spies wanted to survive and their fear of death would confuse the spell, but for someone who was unafraid of death and willing to die for the sake of security it worked like a charm. And Harry really didn't mind dying.
It certainly activated under the conditions Harry himself had specified this time.
He only needed to test it a few more times to make sure that it would do what he wanted and figure out what limits the spell had. The book said it didn't have any, as long as the will to die was unchallenged, but Harry wasn't sure he believed that.
Harry rolled over and slowly drifted off to sleep.
"Hey Hermione, could you bind me please? I need to test something. Incarcerous should work."
"Hey Hermione, could you bind me please? I need to test something. Impedimenta should work."
"Hey Hermione, could you bind me please? I need to test something. Petrificus Totalus should work."
"Hey Hermione, could you grab my arm please? I need to test something."
"Hey Hermione, I'm trying to figure out the limits of a spell, could you jinx me please? Just do something simple, like Locomotor Mortis."
"Hey Hermione, I'm trying to figure out the limits of a spell, could you jinx me please? Use anything you want."
"Hey Hermione, I'm trying to figure out the limits of a spell, could you cast a spell at me please? Anything you want is fine, preferably something not meant to be cast at people."
Harry opened his eyes and blinked several times as his drowsiness vanished. He stared up uncomprehendingly at the ceiling of his four-poster canopy for a moment, then he reached for his wand with a smile.
'Today's the day I test my spell against Dumbledore.' Harry thought with a grin as he started casting quietly.
Exonemesis Periculi really was an amazing spell.
It really didn't have limits on the number of conditions one could place on the activation, only that the caster was actually willing to die if the condition occurred. Keeping all the conditions in mind during the casting would get more difficult the more there were, but that could be solved by consolidating conditions.
Harry had discovered that he could set the spell to go off if someone other than him tried to remove it, which was a godsend since that was probably the first thing Dumbles would notice and try to remove.
Harry had discovered that he could actually set the spell to go off from people speaking certain phrases near him- a wonderful backup for if he was captured and lost his wand.
He was as ready as he could be for Dumbledore.
His final setup was actually relatively simple compared to his extensive tests of the spell, consisting of the following activation conditions:
*Active Legilimency attempts
*Obliviation attempts
*Removal attempts by other people
*Being unconscious for more than an hour.
*And finally, the phrase: 'I gave battle in vain, I need to reloop.' being spoken in his immediate vicinity.
Yes, Harry was as ready as he could be.
He put his wand back down as he finished the spell and rolled over, going back to sleep.
Harry was smiling as he stepped out of the portrait hole for the first time in nearly six looped weeks. Today was the day that-
*SMACK*
Harry staggered as the palm impacted his face. This had never happened before!
He looked up in utter confusion to see a very angry wisp of a blond standing with her hands on her hips. The frown on her face looked totally out of place on her whimsical face.
"You utter git!" She declared.
'...what?'