Card the moon
Chapter 24 – Finding time
…
"But I thought you were having fun looping through time."
Harry looked at Luna and sighed, "I was."
In fact, he'd been having a blast, for a while. The first six weeks had been a riot, finding new ways to prank Snape, new ways to make a big bad youma cry like a little girl. It had been fun.
"So what's the problem?"
"I'm bored."
He could only torment Snape so many times before it got monotonous, apparently. Who knew? And cracking the youma had been a huge disappointment because she didn't know anything.
"We're sure it's the TIME card doing this?"
"Oh yes," Luna nodded. "Kero is quite certain."
"If Kero's so certain then why hasn't he found it yet?"
"Hey, get off my case would ya, I'm trying," the plushy hollered, after wriggling out of Luna's book bag.
"Some guardian."
"It's not his fault Harry," said Luna. "There's so much ambient magic in Hogwarts, it's very hard to find anything if it doesn't want to be found."
"And TIME is under Yue which means I have even less connection to it. So just keep your pants on, we're working on it."
"Not fast enough," said Harry.
The challenge was gone. He'd overcome every obstacle this day could throw at him and he was bored and that was bad. He knew it was bad because he found himself contemplating things, dangerous things, jumping off of towers without a broomstick things.
He'd never contemplated suicide before and it scared him that he was even entertaining the idea, time loop or no.
He needed to find TIME. He needed it to be tomorrow.
"MR. POTTER!"
Though judging by the look of the angry Scot baring down on him, it would have to wait till the next loop.
"Mr. Potter. I have just heard what you did to Professor Snape."
"Yes Ma'am," Hey, just because it was monotonous was no reason to stop doing it.
…
"Harry Potter sirs, is time to get up."
"Of course it is," it was a brand-new loop. "Dobby, I need to talk to Lore."
Dobby gasped at the old elf's name, "No Harry Potter sirs. It is not done. Can's not just talk to the elder."
"I have to."
"No, no, master mustn't. Is not done."
He didn't like to distress the elf, who distressed far too easily, but circumstances demanded action, however distressing it may be.
"Dobby," he whispered harshly, grabbing the elf's wringing hands, "look at me."
With great shame and reluctance, the elf turned his oversized eyes up to his 'great master'.
"Dobby, what day was yesterday?"
"Tuesday," the elf replied without hesitation.
"No," said Harry, "it was Wednesday. And the day before that was Wednesday, and the day before that, and the day before that."
"Master?"
"Ten weeks, Dobby. Ten weeks I've been living the same day over and over."
The elf's big eyes grew even bigger as the situation was explained, "What can's we do?"
"You need to go tell Lore I need to talk to him. Right now, he's the only one I can trust who might be able to help. I'm – going to go run around the lake, because looping time is no excuse for slacking according to certain felines."
…
It was later that day, within the same loop, after dealing with Snape, the youma, and his friends—actually it was much later that day when he finally managed to duck his various entanglements that he made his way to the kitchen.
Dobby was waiting just inside the portrait.
"Well?"
"He is waiting."
He figured he would be. Dobby may have held the old elf in high esteem, but Harry wasn't forced to view him through such rose-tinted glasses. In some ways he reminded Harry of Dumbledore, twinkling eye and all.
He would have gone to Dumbledore in not for the fear of what he might be. Luna had vetted most of the teachers, but she'd yet been able to get close enough to Dumbledore. Harry could not take that chance, not even for a loop.
One trip through culinary history brought them to the old campfire. Lore was scribbling inside a circle next to it with a piece of chalk.
"Ah, you are here, good," the elf said, as though he'd been expecting him for some time.
"Uh, yeah. I—I needed to talk to you."
"There is not time for talking."
"There isn't?"
"We must act Harry Potter. Time prepares to fold over itself again."
"You mean, you know what is going on?"
The elf shook his head, "The murmurs repeat, again and again. I could not make sense of it till this one came," he said, pointing at Dobby. "I have pondered the problem all day, and I think I may have a solution."
Best news he'd heard in weeks, "What do we do?"
"You have the artifacts with you, the one's like that which does this?"
Of course. He never went anywhere without them, "Here."
Lore looked over the cards, nodded, "These will do. Very good, yes."
He placed each of Harry's four cards at one point on the square inside the circle; LOOP at the head, THUNDER at the bottom, FLY and WINDY on either side.
"So, what is this, what are we doing?"
"Is ritual," said Dobby, wringing his hands fitfully.
"Is that bad?" as his nervousness seemed to suggest.
"Is illegal."
Oh! "But he's going to do it anyway."
"Of course," said Lore.
Of course, thought Harry. "But, why is it illegal?"
"For the same reason it is illegal for us to carry wands," said the old elf. "It is no matter. When time resets again none of this will have happened. That is why we must hurry, to find the culprit so our young wizard might give us back tomorrow."
The old elf had a way with words and took charge like few others Harry had ever seen. Directed to a spot just outside the circle, Lore took the spot opposite, raised his hands, and began to chant.
What he said was beyond Harry's knowledge, in fact it was beyond the knowledge of any man as he would later learn. The chant was in the language of those once called Hobgoblin. It was powerful, magical, just the sort of thing to use for a ritual.
Even unable to understand the words Harry could feel their effect. His skin tingled as the hairs on the back of his arms rose, the whole area charging with power. The cards glowed, manifesting in miniature their physical form.
THUNDER leapt into being while FLY became wings that attached to the lightning hound. WINDY blew gales that lifted the coupling who circled the LOOP, sniffing, before zipping up and out of physical sight.
What came next was disorienting. His own sight became blurred, as a new sight overlay his own. He knew it at once to be THUNDER and FLY as they raced around the school at dizzying speed. They sped past people and ghosts, Peeves doing something to a suit of armor, none of them payed him the slightest mind.
They weren't there, physically, nor in a state anyone could detect, and in this form, they scoured the castle from bottom to top, and there at the top, they found him. High up in the astronomy tower, an old man floated, holding a giant hourglass, its sands nearly run out.
For the first time something responded to their presence. TIME glanced and through THUNDER's eyes he could feel it, the pressure. It pressed down on him an infinite weight, infinite as time.
The last sand fell, and for the first time Harry was conscious of time resetting itself. It felt like a tugging at his foot.
"Harry Potter sirs, is time to get up."
"Yes Dobby, yes it is."
Motivation coursed through him. At last, the goal was in sight.
"Dobby, if you see Lore, tell him I said thank you."
"Elder," Dobby squeaked. "For what thank you."
"For helping me find tomorrow."