Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters.
A/N: Aqui teniu el meu regal de reis XD.
Forest of Mystery.
After the four adults had had lunch together, the three teachers explained to Severus what each of them had done that morning with the children, which they then all went their separate ways. The Potions Master went to check on the children. Parvati was still fast asleep on her bed, and Lavender had joined her there. The morning hadn't gone very well for the brown haired girl, she had gotten very frustrated, and Bill hadn't known how to handle her. While being an older brother gave him a lot of experience, patience was not something he usually applied when trying to keep his wild brothers in line. Therefore it had been decided that Lavender would change places with Dean and continue learning with Remus, who would most likely know how to deal with her. Checking the other rooms for the children, he only found Harry asleep in his bed, but the other ones were empty. Guessing the other teenagers were around the house, he summoned a house-elf and asked about their whereabouts.
It seemed Neville had found his way to his indoors greenhouse and had cajoled Seamus into going with him. Dean and Ron were in the living room playing chess, and Hermione, not very surprising, was in the library. Remembering what they had talked about that morning, Severus decided to go see what she was up to. If the solution of Voldemort's demise was in the Forest, then they would be the ones to pull it off.
If it hadn't been for the stack of books lying on one of his usually tidy tables, Severus wouldn't have seen the girl. She was completely hidden behind two very high piles of books, and the Potions Master couldn't help but wonder how they managed to keep themselves upright. When he circled the table, he saw three books spread out in front of the girl. Looking over her shoulder, he noticed that two of them were about portkeys and how their magic worked in order to transport people to the place they wanted to go while the third book was Hermione's notebook of their theories about the Forest. The girl had insisted they should record everything that had happened while they were there, and Severus was sure that when everyone found out about their survival, the notebook would be turned into a book for everyone to read.
"How is it going?"
Hermione, who had been so absorbed in her notes that she hadn't heard the man approach her, jumped out of her chair and rounded to face him, hand already on her forearm where she used to wear her dagger. When she recognised him, she sagged in relief in her chair.
"Merlin, Uncle Sev, don't do that."
The older man shook his head. "For someone used to hear even the air moving, you sure seemed oblivious."
His former student glared up at him. "I was trying to concentrate on this book. Besides, you seem to forget that you seem to manage to move without moving the air. How you do that is beyond me, but if you were silent before we went to the Forest, now you're almost undetectable."
Snape's black eyes glinted in amusement. It had irked him the first few weeks in the Forest, that he couldn't approach any of the children without them noticing. After the annoyance had gone, he had worked on his movements to make them even smoother than they naturally were and, while he couldn't surprise the children if they were alert, he managed to sneak up on them when they were engrossed in something. Deciding to let the matter drop, he nodded towards the books.
"How are things going? Have you found anything yet?"
Hermione bit her lip and looked thoughtfully towards her books, not really seeing them as she thought how to best explain her thoughts. "The main problem about creating a portkey to the Forest is that you can't manage to latch it to anything remotely magical. Even when porting to the muggle world, the magic in the air is enough to stabilise the portkey's magic. The Forest keeps all the magic tightly bound to itself, to the trees and creatures that live in there so in the end it doesn't have a magic spot to focus on and that causes the magic of a portkey to go unstable and the portkey explodes"
Snape nodded, while he had never wondered about the theoretical workings of portkeys, what the girl said made sense. "So, what we need is a focus, right?"
Hermione nodded slightly. "Yes, but that's going to be difficult. It needs to be a strong enough focus that it nullifies the Forest's magical dampeners." Hesitating, the girl added the conclusion she had come to. "I don't think there's anything within the Forest that could work."
Snape, who was watching her every emotion, detected the trepidation in her voice. "There isn't, no, but something could be placed there."
Hermione gave a slight nod. "Some kind of focus stone that emitted enough magical power to stabilise the portkey's power."
Severus pressed his lips together. "Someone would need to go in there again."
The Gryffindor girl didn't bother to assent; it hadn't be a question after all, just a statement of fact.
Snape leaned against the table, careful to not upset all the books. "I don't like it."
His companion shook her head. "Me neither." She motioned towards the books. "I've been trying to find another way, but everyone agrees that for a portkey to work, it needs magic to focus on."
They both remained silent for a long while, trying to come up with some other solution, but nothing came to mind. Finally, Snape sighed and straightened up. "We'll talk to the others tonight. I don't like the idea of going back to the Forest yet since it's the best solution we've found till now to get rid of the Dark Lord, it would be stupid to just throw it aside."
Hermione stretched and nodded in agreement. "But, if we're going to do this, we should do it soon." At Snape's questioning look, she pointed to her eyes. "We're still able to see the portals, but for how long? Whatever it was that gave us the ability, we're no longer consuming it, so who knows if its permanent or that it will go away in time?"
The Potions Master nodded. "You have a point, there's no sense in risking it. We'll decide tonight."
With those parting words, the man turned around and left the library. After a glance to the books she had been using, Hermione started to put everything back in place, she hoped they would be able to manage to do this.
That same evening, when Kingsley, Bill, and Remus had retired to their rooms for the night, the children gathered in the living room. Harry and Parvati still seemed quite tired, but they had both insisted that the meeting be held that day, sensing it was important. They talked for a while about the morning, the different methods the three men had been using and how they had coped with them. Snape joined them about ten minutes into the discussion, shaking his head at finding them sitting on the floor in front of the fire.
"You realize that the couches are to sit on, right?"
And with a pointed look towards his charges, he sat in the middle of one, instead of the armchair he usually preferred. With muffled laughs, the Gryffindors stood from the floor and started to sit on the chairs spread through the room, with Harry and Dean claiming the places on either side of the Potions Master. Once everyone was settled once again, Severus nodded towards Hermione, who was sitting opposite of him, to start explaining.
They talked deep into the night, trying to come up with a feasible plan that convinced them all. Around three in the morning, Snape sent them all to bed, having made all the plans they could for now, they would need to start implementing them soon.
The next few days passed normally as they settled into a steady routine. In the morning, the children would spend their time with their teachers while Severus started brewing potions for the Headmaster. The evenings were mostly spent in the library, trying to find some kind of object that would be able to store and amplify enough magic to be sensed through the forest's barriers. They had already come up with some solutions to the problem, but they wanted to have different options before they ventured into the Forest. While they were sure they could get out again, none of them wanted to risk too many trips into their once prison.
Around mid October, Severus put a stop on their research. It was high time to act if they wanted to pull this off before winter started. If it started to snow, it would be unsafe for them to enter the Forest and they would have to wait till spring.
Knowing that at least Remus would have grave misgivings about them entering the Forest again, they decided to keep things quiet as they had done till then. After everyone had retired for the night, the teenagers and Severus gathered in the room Lavender and Parvati shared, papers and folders in hand. For a long while they argued about the different possibilities and in the end, they settled on the two that seemed the most probable of working. The first one, and the one they placed more faith on, was a modification of a power stone so that it wouldn't only store the power they placed on it but that it would also amplify that power. The main problem was that to make the magic stable so that it wouldn't overwhelm the stone and break it, they would need to bathe the power stone in a complicated potion. Severus had assured them that that wouldn't be a problem, so the only thing they needed to do was get their hands on the power stone. The second option was a complicated pattern of runes they would have to draw on the forest's ground in hopes that it would allow magic to settle on the point they were drawn. Theoretically, that should work, but they were afraid that if Voldemort portkeyed too close to the runes, he would be able to use his magic to apparate out of the Forest.
Once they had all agreed, they moved on the subject of who would go to the Forest to create the focus points, and who would stay in the Manor to create the portkeys. Much to Severus' dislike, the children had decided that he would be the one creating the portkeys, since he had done it before. That meant he would have to remain at the Manor, which he didn't like one bit. His protests fell on deaf ears, and he couldn't really fight against the logic of the decision. Unless they involved another adult in their plans, they would need someone who could make a portkey flawlessly. Grumbling under his breath, the older man sat back as the children decided that Hermione, Parvati, Seamus, and Ron would be the ones entering the Forest. Seamus and Ron were the two strongest boys in the group and would act as bodyguards for the two girls. Parvati, who had been the one to draw all the maps, would go along to guide them as she had done before. The fact that she possessed a lot of magic and that she had learned quite a lot with Kingsley also helped. Lastly, Hermione would go with them to draw the runes, as she had been the one to figure out the correct pattern that would allow them to reach their goal.
Harry wasn't very happy either about being left behind, but it had been decided that he would be the one placing the power within the power stones, and Severus was quite sure he wouldn't be able to leave so soon after expending so much magic. Neville, Dean, and Lavender didn't really care if they were left out, Neville's only petition was for the four adventurers to get as many seeds as possible on their way back so that he could continue with his studies of the plants that grew in the Forest.
An hour later, they each went to their own rooms, tired but satisfied that everything was planned out. Now they would just need to wait for Severus to make his potion, and then they would be able to get a move on.
To be continued...
A/N: Thanks for all reviews and thanks to Vinnie for her work beta-reading this.