"Hearing voices," Hermione began sternly "is never a good thing,"
"What if it means we just have a talent for divination?" Ed didn't actually disagree with her, he just enjoyed ruling her up. She made a face.
"You know that's just a load of balderdash," she huffed. She grabbed Ed by his charcoal robes and pulled him around the corner. They walked right into Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, completely unseen.
"I know it annoys you when people suggest otherwise," he bared his teeth at her. She debated whether it was supposed to be a playful grin or a snarling grimace.
"Have I ever told you that I hate you?" "Constantly," Ed barged his shoulder into the stall door to open it and they squeezed into the small space together. Simmering away in the pewter cauldron--a spare Ed had alchemically fixed up from the school's supply of dented, misshapen ones--was a liquid, halfway between green and grey, bubbling persistently but not aggressively in spite of being sat at room temperature. There was a silvery snake skin-like film dancing across the surface.
"Looks good," she knelt beside the cauldron and began fussing, pulling the cistern open and removing the thoroughly waterproofed ingredients they had stashed inside. A moment later, Ed joined, procuring a notebook from his inner pocket with a deft flick of the wrist. He removed a neatly folded piece of parchment from between the pages of the little leather-bound book. Hermione swiftly plucked it from his fingers and spread it out on the ground in front of them, trying to smooth out the sharp creases in the middle with little success. In smudged, blotchy black ink--like handfuls of night had been wrenched from the sky and smeared carelessly on the page--Ed had scrawled a series of notes and kept a checklist of what had been done and what had not.
They worked together in silence for about ten minutes, making progress as quickly as they could without compromising the mixture. Ingredients and notes were passed adeptly from gloved hand to freckled hand, barely a moment wasted on unnecessary pauses as brief seconds of eye contact said all that was needed in the moment. Then Hermione spoke. "It might be nice if Harry and Ron were here,"
Ed nodded "Too bad they have detention with Lockhart, I really need to teach them how to get out of that," Hermione responded with a stare, trapped somewhere between amused and disapproving.
With that, they lapsed into silence once more. It was peaceful only very briefly before Ed heard something again. He jolted upright quickly, posturing straightening as he pulled the back of his head away from the wall. He leant his ear against it instead and listened. It wasn't a sinister whisper, no hissed mantra declaring menacing intentions it was yet to fulfill, but instead a laboured, creaking protest. It came from the other side of the wall and gave Ed the distinct feeling that his bones were rusting and begin to groan within his body.
"It's in the fucking pipes!"
Ed was speaking more to himself than he was Hermione, but she was observant and inquisitive and certainly wasn't about to miss anything. "What?" she shook her head slightly, as if that would somehow clear it "What's in the pipes?"
"Whatever the fuck this thing is," he sounded confident that he was right, rather than confident that he had all of the facts. Hermione felt inclined to believe him.
"But what is it?"
With a maniacal grin that made Hermione doubt where she chose to place her trust he declared "That's the next step!"
Lockhart's detention was pointless and a little demeaning and Harry left it feeling an awful lot of what was potentially the precious little time he had been awarded by fate. His fast-paced gait matched Ron's long, meandering steps as they traversed the winding hallways, following them around in a pattern Harry was certain he knew but was certain he had never learned. Rows of portraits lined the walls, most smiling down at the boys from their position of poise, some scowling, some looking away entirely, engulfed in their own world of moving paint. Harry often found himself wondering what it was like within one of the frames, Joe it felt to run from one to the other, what happened in that moment you spent in neither frame.
Then they stopped.
Harry was roughly removed from his curious musings.
His knee-jerk reaction was "For God's sake, not again!" and maybe he should have felt guilty for it, but there was only one sensation coursing through his veins, pirouetting in dizzy spirals across his skin, wrapping his organs in noncorporeal chord and pulling it tight. If pressed, he would have called it apprehension.
Justin Finch Fletchley layed on the floor, limbs splayed awkwardly, face waxen and pale, but chest still moving. His palor was slightly yellowed, sickly, rather than the fresh, clean alabaster of the dead. Nearly Headless Nick was halfway between hovering and laying down next to him, limbs looking as though they should be dragging as they failed to interact with the solid ground whatsoever. "Wait here," Harry told Ron, wondering whether or not he was making a good decision whilst knowing he was definitely, at least, making the right one. "if it comes back, scream,"
Ron certainly wasn't the biggest fan of the decision Harry had made, but before he got the chance to voice his objection, Harry was already running down the corridor. The paintings watched on. Concerned? Curious? Entertained? Who was to say.
Harry could feel the stirring of the students the next morning, as glances and glares and unabashedly wide-eyed stares joined the mutters that followed him like an obedient dog behind its owner. Word of mouth spread across Hogwarts like wildfire, from one painting to the next, eventually meeting a ghost and then all the rest, touching a students ears and lips along the way. Eventually there wasn't a mouth that hadn't spoken the news, an ear that hadn't heard a dozen versions of the story, each slightly different from the last.
Harry wondered what versions of the story were being spread about the school that morning, like some contagious disease, but did not need to wonder where the rumours had begun. The paintings had eyes and what they saw was Harry Potter and Ron Weasley stumbling upon a scene of horror that coincidentally not one of their painted eyes had witnessed occur.
Harry wondered how much of the history of Hogwarts was written in blood, how much of it the paintings had seen, how many horrors were embedded deep within the cement between the worn stone bricks. He was sure there were answers somewhere: hidden deep in the restricted section, tucked under the tongues of the teachers, floating aimlessly about the entirety of wizarding Britain, some never spoken and never remembered yet still somehow important. But dwelling was for later--first came toast!
Hermione and Ed weren't there that morning. It immediately put Harry on edge, more so than the murmurs. Hermione and Ed were always the first people in the great hall every morning, and everytime they weren't Harry and Ron had been informed prior that they wouldn't be and what the reason for it was.
"Do you know where they are?" Harry asked as Ron shovelled a spoonful of his breakfast into his mouth. Ron mumbled something incomprehensible around his mouthful and shrugged. Harry guessed that was a resounding no.
"Still…" Ron swallowed loudly "I'm pretty sure I know where to find them,"
Harry nodded "The library,"
"What are you guys doing in here?" Ron slid into the seat next to Hermione, by no means grateful. The old wooden chair teetered, as though on the verge of falling.
"Research," she said bluntly. Ed didn't look up from his book.
"On what?" Harry asked. He raked his eyes across the open page in front of Hermione but absorbed almost none of it.
"The pipes," Harry wanted to ask for more information. He didn't.
A moment later Ed looked up from his book. Harry was almost certain he could see the words of the tome running across Ed's aureate irises as he turned to face them before refocusing his attention on the pocket watch he had deftly procured from a hidden pocket in his cloak.
"Its time," he said. He spoke softly, like there was sleep still lingering in his lungs. "The polyjuice should be ready,"
"Okay," Hermione clapped her hands excitedly as she stood over the small, bubbling cauldron. Since Harry had last seen it the liquid inside had grown thick and dark, the bubbles growing large before popping on the reflective surface "we need hairs,"
Harry and Ron made a face before procuring the short brown hairs from each of their pockets, secured within a small plastic bag. Ed grinned smugly at them from where he stood leaning against the stall wall. He was glad he didn't have to take part in the consumption of the potion. Especially as he knew of all that had gone into it. Ed pulled one out of his own pocket and handed it to Hermione.
"Milicent Bullstrode," he informed her curtly. She nodded her thanks before continuing to talk to Harry and Ron.
"Okay, great, we have everything," Ed spooned out ladles of the potion, sloppily pouting each into a cup he must have procured from the kitchen or great hall at some point. He handed them to Hermione who then passed one each to Harry and Ron. "The potion only lasts an hour so we need to keep track of time and work quickly," "Now," Ed's grin was maniacal and sent a trail of unpleasant shivers racing down Harry's spine, "I've got to go sort out our old Slytherins friends," he cracked his knuckles and the metal of the other hand squeaked.
"No violence!" Hermione ordered hurriedly as he made for the door.
With one hand on the door he turned back to face her, villainous smirk firmly in place "Oh but Miss Granger, that's quite literally what they pay me for back home,"
She shook her head. He frizzy hair fanned itself out across her narrow shoulders "Fine," she conceded "just don't be an asshole about it,"
Ed feigned surprise at her profanity, the very same as Harry and Ron were genuinely feeling "My dear Miss Granger, how pleasant it is to corrupt you," he broke out in one of the genuine, joyful smiles Harry saw grace his features very rarely, and sent a mock salute before he turned on his heel and waltzed away.
He returned a worryingly short time later, two pairs of robes draped over his arm, knuckles on his left hand split, claret leaking into the supple white fabric over them. He flung the robes at Harry and Ron who just barely managed to catch them. He then threw his left glove to the floor and showed Hermione the blood trickling steadily between the nimble fingers.
"I wasn't that much of an asshole," he, assured her. She gulped none the less. Metal hurt more than flesh but a lot of force was needed to do that much damage to the knuckles.
"Magic would have been the better way to go,"
"But how boring is it? I've already obliviated them, and healed the bruises, they're just going to be a little bit sore, probably think they slept funny. You nicked Bullstrode's robes the other week didn't you?"
Hermione pulled the más of fabric from the depths of her bag as if to assure him of the affirmative. "Good," Ed nodded "then drink up you unlucky bastards,"
Harry dropped the hair into the concoction and stated down in fascinated dread as he watched the liquid bubble grotesquely, still burnt umber in colour for a few seconds before it shifted slowly to an even more unappealing swamp green. With a grimace, he drank it.
A/N
Ello ello. I'm actually back after a somewhat reasonable amount of time!! It's a bloody miracle. I hope this is up to scratch and that everyone reading this had a happy holiday whatever that means for them. The reviews on the last chapter were lovely, it's great to see that there are people who stil care about this fic even after I left it for so long. Also, I got a comment on the Art of Opposites recently, saying that I called it the Philosopher's Stone rather than the Sorcerer's Stone in the description, I sincerely doubt that person is reading this (but hi if you are) but I figured I'd mention it for anyone who is reading this and isn't already aware: the Philosopher's Stone is the original UK title of the book (and I'm British), it was changed to the Sorcerer's Stone because they thought it would be more marketable to the average US reader.
All the best,
We'reAllABitOdd