Chapter 10 - The Oracle of Scotos

"Your days are numbered," Harry said to the necklace, his voice less a threat than it was a vow.

Augustus interrupted his oath with a rather snarky comment.

"I suppose that was a rather successful test of my Amber-Manipulation theory."

"Oh, shut up," Harry shot back, annoyed. His body was starting to finally calm down from what Amber put it through, and he didn't need the painting to remind him of what happened.

"Well, all right then. I am so immensely sorry for pointing out that you were being systematically manipulated. Next time, I'll just let you go your merry way to your doom."

Harry ground his teeth. The worst part was... the painting had a pretty good point. "You're right," he said reluctantly. "Thank you, Augustus." He paused for a second. "I hope Amber ends up okay."

"Oh, I somewhat doubt it."

Harry frowned. "Why do you say that? Do you think her mind was hurt by wh..."

"I think," Augustus said with an uncaring realism, "that Hogwarts is many kilometers from the nearest muggle city. She has quite a trek ahead of her, without any food or water."

Harry swore... and then felt guilty. "Think she'll be smart enough to use the motorcycle I parked outside the front door?"

Augustus shook his head. "It would no longer work, since Hogwarts has come back to life."

Harry groaned and rolled his eyes. "Fine, fine! I'll be right back."

"Where are you going now?!"

"I'm going to escort her back to civilization. No sense in her dying due to my negligence."

Actually, now that Harry thought about it, going back to a mortal... muggle... town would probably be a good idea anyway. He could stock up on some supplies - no need to continually have to hunt for his food. And getting an air mattress was definitely on the docket - cushioning charms could only do so much.

Harry did feel a bit guilty about the method he used to return Amber to the muggle world. He grabbed a broomstick... but he couldn't have her simply ride on it with him. There wasn't room for that, and even if there were, he couldn't risk her falling off and dying. Nor could he hold on to her while flying.

Which left casting Levicorpus on the poor bedraggled woman (his charms studies were really paying off) - magically hauling her across the countryside at 110 kph, upside-down, through the air 10 meters above the ground. He had absolutely no clue how a Cannot-Acknowledge-Magic mortal would interpret this, but he guessed he probably didn't want to know.

Okay, it wasn't the nicest way a person could get back to the real world - and if he had thought about it for a few minutes, he would've realized he could've simply stunned her. But at least she wasn't going to starve. That had to count for something!

In less than an hour, he'd managed to haul her to Perth, where he dropped her off at the local constabulary. After a quick supply run (free, thanks to his powers of suggestion) he started his return flight.

When Harry arrived back at the castle, he once again sought out Augustus.

"Finally back?" the painting replied.

"Hey, don't get snippy. It wasn't her fault she got... hijacked?... possessed? ... and I would've felt bad if she ended up dying because of it."

Augustus shrugged. "There are billions of muggles."

Harry scowled but didn't reply; he'd learned by now that wizards (and apparently squibs) didn't have a very high opinion of non-magical folk.

"So what's our next step?" Augustus asked.

"Honestly?" Harry asked. "I'm going to let this whole 'frozen-time' thing sit for awhile. I was already on the fence about it before. And now I find out that this evil locket needs my magic for something - and it spent that much effort trying to manipulate me into 'fixing' that situation? If the evil spirit wants me to keep chugging ahead that badly, it probably makes sense to slow down and take a break."

"I guess that's reasonable," Augustus admitted. "Plus, I suppose the locket's pretty dangerous."

"It's not dangerous," Harry said, shaking his head. "It tried to get in my mind, but I managed to shut it out."

"No, no, I don't mean that. I mean, it's too dangerous to use."

"To use?"

"When that young lady was wearing the locket, she was able to comprehend magic."

"So?" Harry asked, confused. "You want me to find another mortal, er, muggle to try it on?"

"No, Mister Potter. The amulet made its wearer immune to one part of the enchantment that's been placed upon the world. A muggle can comprehend magic. What if, when worn by a witch or wizard..."

"... they become un-frozen," Harry finished. "Actually, that should be pretty easy to arrange."

Augustus sputtered. "But... the dangers of the spirit having a body that has a wand ar..."

"I'm not going to give them a wand," Harry said, rolling his eyes. "This school currently has a full-fledged battle going on within its walls. And more than that, it's all on 'pause' which lets me take my time in picking just exactly what I want to do. There are all sorts of students here that are disarmed, or trapped, or otherwise hampered. In fact, there's a pair of little boys down outside the Hufflepuff commons that were hit by some entangling vine spell - their wands are dropped safely down upon the floor. Putting the necklace on one of them should be incredibly safe, because not only are they without a wand, but they can't even move."

Harry magically floated Augustus along after him as he made his way down to the Hufflepuff entrance.

The two boys, who barely looked old enough to be going to school here, were in obvious struggle against a ghost-like plant that had entangled their entire bodies.

Harry mentally shrugged before wrapping the necklace around one of their heads.

The small boy seemed to... melt, to morph back into reality.

"Helllllppppp!?" he screamed - funnily, the last part of his scream came out more confused than panicked.

Harry nodded, then entered the boy's mind.

It was cozy - a warm wooded forest with light dappling through autumn leaves. The boy was looking at him curiously. The black mist was there as well, floating along the forest floor.

"What's that?" the boy asked him, pointing at the strange dark substance.

"A dangerous intruder into your mind."

The black mist tried to attach itself to the boy's leg.

The boy looked repulsed. "Ugh, get off of me!" After some vigorous leg-shaking, the mist wafted away... but Harry could see that a small little wispy patch of it was stuck to the hem of the boy's robe.

Harry nodded to himself, gently disengaging from the boy's subconscious. Without a word, he grabbed the necklace back from the boy, and watched as the student became frozen once more.

"Interesting," Augustus said. "What did you see in his mind?"

Harry relayed what he'd observed.

"That's incredibly good news."

"Yeah," Harry agreed. "It means we can give this necklace to someone - and as long as we don't let them keep it for too long, we can talk with them for real."

"Give it to Dumbledore," Augustus suggested.

"No," Harry said with a bit of firmness. Dumbledore, frankly, scared the crap out of Harry. It wasn't his appearance or the initial first impression. It was because he was a wizard that had the power to create such a powerful, world-altering spell. You had to tread very carefully around that much raw power, and as it currently stood, Dumbledore was in a nice and non-threatening position: frozen semi-existence.

"No," Harry said softly. "There's no reason we can't take our time and start out small..."

Three months later, Augustus and Harry were once again arguing. And, once again, it was about the focus of Harry's efforts.

"Why on earth would you want to talk with that old nutter?! She was a useless fraud before she applied to Hogwarts, and that was when she was actually sane. She went round the bend, ever since she was rejected and decided to call herself an oracle. You'll be lucky if you get a single coherent sentence out of that daft babbler - who, last I heard, lives in a shack in the middle of a bloody swamp."

"How can it hurt?" Harry shot back. "It's not like we're under a time crunch here. Let's say your right - worst case, I don't get any answers. So I continue working again the next day."

"You should be trying to figure out what those runes are! Not wasting time talking with drunk swamp hermits."

"I have figured out what some of those runes are!"

"By accident! You just happened to run across a few in your Runes books while you were studying! You're not even trying to get the rest."

"Like I said, we're not in a time crunch. I can figure those runes out ten years from now, because, guess what: everyone else is paralyzed in time!"

Augustus let out an angry breath but didn't say anything.

"Listen," Harry said firmly, "This might be important. From what I understand, the timing on what happened with the Scotos Oracle is pretty coincidental. She applied to Hogwarts, was rejected. She waits until July 31st - according to Hogwarts upcoming-student records that's the exact day I was born - and on that day she loses her sanity. And from that day onward, rambles nonstop about fate and such."

Augustus still looked like he wanted to argue.

"You might be right," Harry said, "Maybe I won't get any answers. But it'll only take a day to check it out. I'll be back tomorrow, and I'll let you know what happens."

Augustus let out a breath and shrugged.

Harry trekked out of the castle, mounting a school broomstick. By now, he'd learned how to pick out which ones were nimble, which ones were fast, and which ones were reliable. Nimble and Fast weren't important right now; the Oracle of Scotos didn't live far from Hogwarts, but they did live in a rather nasty Fens - swampland that would be a pain to try to hike through. Harry could care less about a trip taking an additional five minutes; he just didn't want to be stuck mucking around in a swamp.

He jokingly thought that it must've been narrative destiny that he left the castle when he did. Because it coincidentally meant that he arrived at the Fens due east of Aviemore between sunset and dusk, when all the reeds and scraggly trees cast shadows in ominous fashion. It had a literary dramatism that definitely wouldn't have been present if he'd arrived midday.

The oracle's hut blended in with the moss and grass around it; Harry nearly missed it from 100 meters above the ground, despite the bright searchlight shining from his wand. He quietly landed, tucking the broomstick against a firm clump of leafless brush.

"Oracle of Scotos: Omens and Fortunes Told," Harry said, reading the sign outside the hut.

Shrugging, he entered the cabin.

A woman, glowing and ghostly, sat immobile in a rocking chair. Her eyes were covered in the largest glasses Harry had ever seen - yet, strangely, they seemed to be littered with cracks and holes. Harry wondered why the woman didn't do a simple reparo spell to fix them. Her hair was scraggly and full of oil and dirt; it was clear that it had not been tended to - even by a simple bath - for at least several months before becoming trapped in time.

Harry looked down at the necklace in his hands.

"Here goes nothing," he said softly, before putting it around the necklace around the oracle's head.

"The thwarted one," she whispered in a raspy voice as she emerged from her stillness.

"I've come to talk with you," Harry said softly.

"Thwarted, spoiled, ignored and forgotten, threads of fate frayed and rotten."

"What threads of fate? Rumor says you talk about fate a lot."

"Seer sees, but hearer hears? Fate cannot stop the lost world's fears. Among those that time forgot, the immortal ones conspire and plot."

"Immortal ones?"

The oracle didn't seem to hear him, and merely kept muttering the same hoarse voice. "The Dark Lord did not know of the coming one, and through his ignorance has all but won."

Harry frowned; he didn't know what to say.

"Fate, fate, spurned by his life, now reality fractured and torn in strife."

"What can you tell me about my birth?" Harry asked, trying to figure out a way to get her to talk about something that might confirm or deny a theory that was plaguing him.

His two words seemed to agitate the frail woman further. "Thrice defying, delayed in their dying, giving birth to a wizard trying! Fate obstructed, detours conducted, stilled secret in which he's inducted!"

Harry leaned forward. "Who was defied?"

"Six tethers of woe, made from slain foe, trapped within a freeze without snow!" The oracle's hoarse voice took on an almost screaming urgency. "Trapped by a man who was meant to hear, but left before witness to fate's awful fear! The prophecy, the prophecy, the prophecy torn, by the unknown of July's end born!"

The oracle seemed to convulse in a fit, rattling the chair by her erratic movements.

... and then, suddenly, she sat upright with a semi-normal expression. "Hello, my dear," she said in a misty voice. "Have you come to have your fortune read?"

Harry raised an eyebrow. Her abrupt change was rather... odd. "Yes. What can you tell me about defying fate?"

"Oh, my dear boy," the woman said in an ethereal voice, moving her arms in an attempt to convey the same mysticism as her earlier trance. But right now, it just looked like a fake shadow, a pale imitation of the arcane by a talent-less fraud. "You can't defy fate... for whatever fate has in store..."

Harry tuned out her sideshow carnival act, his mind churning from her raspy omens from moments ago.

"... and so, as my Inner Eye can perceive, now would be a particularly good time for generosity in the financial sense."

The woman had reached the end of her spiel and was looking for some coin. Well, that was a bit of a sticking point: Harry had no money. So, instead, he took the obvious solution, and plucked the necklace back off her. She quickly once more became a stilled spirit.

If he was honest, he wasn't sure whether had fewer questions than when he came here.

Grabbing his broomstick, Harry made the journey back to Hogwarts.

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