Sweat clung to Sherlock's shirt as he navigated down the street.
There was a mouse on a neighbouring girl's doorstep. She must've gotten a cat. Sherlock rolled his eyes a bit. Cats didn't do much, she'd have to keep it in her dorm, and they shed horribly. Hogwarts had an owlery, and owls sent mail. A much smarter decision, Sherlock thought, than a cat, or, Merlin forbid, a rat.
He would get his letter soon. He was disappointed upon not receiving it on his tenth birthday, for surely he could handle it, but Mycroft was adamant.
It had rained recently. Dried earthworms stuck onto grey sidewalks.
Two children ran down the street, immediately hushing their giggles upon seeing the brooding little boy walking alone. When he passed, the whispers started up.
Make new friends, he thought irritably. He didn't need friends. Mycroft didn't have friends. Neither did Eurus.
Oh, you'd think she did. But she didn't have friends, Sherlock knew, not really.
Sherlock passed an ice cream shop. He had once seen an elderly woman on the bench outside it, who shook her fists and cursed with a raspy voice. She was a widower (ring, but all other things leading to solitary), no pets, and had a child going to Hogwarts (letter tucked in pocket), but when Sherlock rattled these off she merely smiled with crooked teeth, adjusted Sherlock's coat, and fixed him with such a look that he stopped much earlier than he would've, and strode off, slightly miffed.
Later on, Sherlock found missing in his coat three Sickles.
That night, Eurus had told him if he could deduce what she'd done that day she'd give him a prize. She had gotten some ice cream. When he told her this she smiled an eerily familiar smile and handed Sherlock three silver Sickles.
Sherlock couldn't pin her down, she was a butterfly that flew off the board, no matter how many thumbtacks Sherlock pushed, and it drove him insane. He could not read her, and anything he did was merely because she wanted him to.
Suddenly Sherlock's increasingly agitated stride was caught mid step, foot catching on a piece of mud, dried after the rain—he put his hands out and tumbled onto the pavement.
He cursed and swept down his jacket, glaring at nothing in particular.
His glare quickly turned to a look of surprise, directed at the fence.
Fall forgotten, Sherlock placed a hand on the picket. How had he not noticed it before?
Pressing his head against the side of the fence, he squinted at it.
There was something behind the fence. A raised surface, only slightly jutting out, only seen from the awkward angle Sherlock was in.
A button.
Suddenly his childhood instinct took over, and without taking the time to think, to sift through the possibilities, Sherlock reached out and touched it.
Something yanked in his stomach, and all of a sudden there were no fences, no ambient noises of the street.
A room, obviously designed for secrecy, Sherlock standing right smack dab in the middle—within a millisecond of taking this in he immediately pulled out his wand and cast an invisibility charm (courtesy of Mycroft, "because it could in handy"—and it did).
Six people, kneeling in a circle, hands together in the middle. Thin streams of what looked like fire weaved round their wrists. A house elf stood near, touching a wand where their hands met.
"—urantae?" they finished the sentence together.
"I will," they said collectively, after a pause.
And that was all he heard.
In an instant he felt something violently grab his arm, and there was another tugging in his gut, and the scenery changed again.
Oh bloody hell, thought Sherlock as he took in his surroundings for the second time.
"Brother dear," he started, but was interrupted.
"Sherlock, that was foolish," Mycroft said, and for once his voice wasn't soft and silky. "If I hadn't seen—"
"What was that?"Sherlock demanded.
Mycroft fixed Sherlock with a cold, hard look. "That is no business for a ten year old."
Sherlock glared. "In that case, I think we should let Lestrade in and begin with the Unbreakable Vow."
It was simple, really, driven from some brief straightforward deducing, past information, and the fancy loafers from the crack on the bottom of the door—but it was wonderful, that split second when surprise could be seen on Mycroft's face. Sherlock would relish that moment, add it to his (pitifully minuscule) mind palace album of Moments He Beat Mycroft.
"You heard my brother," Mycroft said, quickly regaining his composure. "Come in."
The door opened, and Greg Lestrade walked in, fidgeting with his wand and biting his lip.
Mycroft and Sherlock kneeled down onto the embroidered carpet and placed their hands together. Lestrade walked closer and placed the wand on top.
"Will you, Sherlock Holmes, promise never to repeat that word, that spell, you heard in the room, said by those six occupying it before they said "I will", to anyone?"
Specific there, brother dear, Sherlock thought, amused, before responding with a drawling, "I will."
The same fire wove around their hands.
Mycroft stood up and mockingly brushed off his newly-pressed trousers. "Mummy will be worrying," he said shortly.
Sherlock bowed his head ever so slightly. He took out his wand and held it over his head.
"Are you—" Lestrade got out, looking at ten year old Sherlock with apprehension. But Mycroft sent him a cold look and he shut right up.
"Sherlock will do just fine," he said softly, casting his gaze back to him.
Sherlock felt his eyes soften just a tad before he twirled his wand and apparated back home.
Furantae.
That was it. Sherlock was almost certain. A spell. Latin, from furantur—to steal.
Hours of scouring through Mycroft's textbooks weren't all for naught.
"promise never to repeat that word," he had promised. Well, he wasn't repeating urantae.
Sherlock frowned, fingered his wand nervously, and pointed it at a butterfly on his corkboard above his bed.
"Furantae," he said softly.
For a split second he panicked, as surely the vow was broken, surely he would die—but the only sensation was something like an electric shock racing down his arm and crawling up his spine. It was magic, he was sure of it—strong magic.
The whisper-thin butterfly wings (delias eucharis) trembled ever-so-slightly.
To steal. Furantur, furantae. Spells usually had some deviation from its core word. Perhaps he could not steal something he owned (or, something he had already taken).
It popped into his mind. His fingers suddenly clenched around his wand.
Sherlock bit his lip and looked at his closed door, though it, right turn, into the other room. Of Eurus.
Treasure Island, first edition. For her ninth birthday. Sherlock had seen mummy and father talking to Ms. Trover at their daycare ("classical muggle literature, stimulates the brain".) He had seen them taking the "train" to London.
He had managed mere minutes of rapid skimming before Eurus had whisked it up into her room, where it would remain.
Sherlock doubted she even read it. It sat from the first day to now, in her second drawer. Sherlock didn't dare touch it, every time he had the thought, he'd remember the snitched chocolate frogs and secret skims of her textbooks, the next day finding his hair falling with the touch of a hand, the neighbours reporting Sherlock outside in the middle of the night, kicking their neighbours cat. Eurus would surely do something if she found Sherlock with her book.
But if Mycroft was so adamant, even going as far as an Unbreakable Vow, surely the spell must be quite powerful?
And he wanted it so badly. Countless times had he summoned up his recollection of those pages, reciting them to near memory.
The yearning surged up now, like a wave.
Eurus headed out every evening, for walks and secret meetings and stranger things. Surely, with some planning…
He could almost see the maroon cover, feel the soft leather bound spine, turn the pages into another world. With just one word, one spell.
Sherlock was coming.
An immediate invisibility charm.
(Magic is forbidden, my dear. A few more years.)
It was okay. Mycroft wouldn't tell.
Sherlock was in front of the door. He'd expected the room to be empty, for her to be outside, as per usual days. Not today. Sherlock had been acting different today, more nervous, more furrowed brows and fiddling with his wand. He was up to something.
So she stayed in, and here he was. Not much of a surprise.
The handle turned to reveal a pale but lock-jawed Sherlock. His hands were clenched around his wand, he was very nervous, but his eyes were bright with anticipation, and they led straight to the second drawer.
Oh. Treasure Island. What a bore. Exaggerated and childish.
She'd allow him to look at it. But perhaps another hair shedding jinx would do. Sherlock had been utterly distraught.
Sherlock pointed the wand at the drawer, through the unseen Eurus.
"Furantae," the whisper came shakily and suddenly riddled with uncertainty.
A searing pain came over her body. A sword of flame was tearing her apart, ripping and twisting her organs. She screamed, and when she held her hands to her head, sinking down to the floor, she saw her body shimmer into view.
Her consciousness drifting away, she watched the other's face morph into horror, and screamed again. Sherlock Holmes, in a split second, turned and bolted.
Forbidden Forest. Come.
Only this, and nothing more.
John's eyes darted across the paper, picking up the tiniest of details, the pressure of the quill, ink splatters, the ways the i's were dotted—but all for naught. Even if he could identify the writing, there was a good chance it was forged.
John stayed silent for a long time, tearing at the inside of his cheek and looking at the note so hard his vision went blurry.
It seemed like five minutes had passed before he finally made a decision.
"Mike?" John said quietly.
"Yeah?" he heard him raise his voice over the running water of the shower.
"I'm, just gonna go out for a bit. Get some fresh air. It's been a long day." It wasn't a lie. Plus, he often went out during nights—he liked the stars.
"Alright, mate. I'll see you then."
"See ya," John mumbled. He folded the note and put it into his pocket. Then, he gave Andromeda one final rub on the ears, and headed towards the (griffin) door.
He padded down the halls in his slippers. More than once he looked back, heart skipping a beat, almost hoping to see a shadow of some kind. Perhaps, a familiar tall figure with a navy-blue wool jacket. Perhaps it was his doing. But there was no shadow of friend nor foe nor stranger, only John's dark flickering shadow stretched down the halls.
He shivered and cast an invisibility charm.
The heavy doors opened with a tiny creak, and John stepped out into the brisk April air.
If a person were to see him on this moonlit path, they would think he was wandering in a daze, maybe even sleepwalking. But this was far from true—John's head was whirring with a thousand thoughts.
He stopped just short of where the clearing ended with a row of towering trees.
Forbidden Forest, he repeated in his head. Well, there was the forest—what now?
Worrying a corner of the note into shreds, John shifted his weight between his feet and took an almost longing look behind him. Nothing. Nothing seemed to be a very pleasant choice, he thought, shifting his weight from his heels to his toes now. He took a slight step back.
But his fingers clung onto the note like a life sentence, and he almost immediately took the step back to the forest.
Gryffindor, he thought firmly, and headed into the woods.
His steps were almost automatic, walking without thinking. Keeping his head up, eyes alert, ears prickling at the faintest rustling of the leaves, a hoot of an owl.
An intersection.
A tiny black flower lay in the middle of the path to his left.
He kept moving, feeling no less apprehension, perhaps more, than before.
More intersections, more black flowers.
After a couple minutes and around four or five flowers, he came to a halt.
John was standing in front of a large cave. A very familiar large cave.
A familiar voice floated into his mind: Scared, Watson?
"Yes," John hissed, to nobody but himself, and walked in.
… absolutely gorgeous. Flawless.
A part of him was horrified, completely petrified, at the thought of a student, or worse, a professor, seeing him in this state, almost skipping and beaming with joy. But it was being overpowered by the part of him that was causing him to do so.
A hippogriff! Such a unique patronus, no wonder it was John's.
He realised he had devolved from simply holding Sir Lock (alas, the name stuck) to nestling it in the crook of his arm, the other holding his violin and bow.
Bloody hell, if anyone were to come down the hall…
He cast a disillusion charm and took a quick turn. Another shortcut he remembered.
He moved aside a portrait, revealing a tiny doorknob.
If it weren't for the past events, if he wasn't in his overjoyed state, he would've noticed the portrait was just the slightest bit crooked, the doorknob the tiniest bit smudged and unpolished.
But his mind was still full of patronuses and happiness and John, that he shifted the stuffie onto his violin and grasped the handle. There was a yank in his stomach like a fishing string, and in an instant Sherlock knew what it was and he knew the trap, but it was too late.
As Mycroft Holmes sat in his office, watching Sherlock play the violin for John through a crystal clear screen, he felt a strange sense of pride.
Of course, he thought with amusement, there were unnecessary chords and too many ornaments, but Sherlock never could resist a touch of the dramatic.
As the music picked up from the crescendo in the same tune but major (rather cheap technique, but he supposed it done the deed well), Mycroft watched Sherlock, his faint smile and his look to John.
He felt another tugging guilt, for he was certainly treading on very private matters, but he waved off the feeling—it wasn't like he didn't have a reason.
When John Watson arrived in his office, when Mycroft learned of his name, he had reeled with a force he had experienced very little in his life.
Watson. He knew that name. And, after seeing their parents, he was certain.
How it happened, he didn't know.
But there was no time for digging deeper. The months that followed proved no time for personal cases. Tragedies, deaths, robberies. Caught up in dozens, Mycroft was, for the first time, overwhelmed.
John Watson, meanwhile, revealed that he knew nothing of the things Mycroft knew had happened. Memory wiped. And so had his parents. They had no idea of their past.
They had no idea they were supposed to have perished in a fire.
But there was once again no time to think more of this.
Forbidden Forest. Come.
There were more reasons than just the note and its contents that alarmed Mycroft.
He would've known of it. Anyone coming into the room would be detected. But he had no idea where and how the note appeared.
And then Sherlock touched the portkey (that he also didn't know about), and John entered the Forbidden Forest, and all his screens suddenly buzzed and displayed nothing.
Author's Note:
Apologies for this very confusing mystery. I am trying my utmost best. When you leave a review you make my entire day.
I'm going to leave you with this:
Furantur—to steal.
Magicae—magic.