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According to His Own Nature

Part 3 of 5: The Summer after Riddle's Fifth Year

Filius' lessons with Tom continued to proceed smoothly, and it wasn't that long before he began to wonder how he might possibly fill the time when Tom's apprenticeship came to an end. Few tournaments ever ran in the summer, and Filius was long past the age when he might be able to get away with making impromptu challenges. At least this problem was one which he wouldn't have to face for years to come.

Today, there was cause for celebration. On the Continent, Grindelwald's forces were being pushed back on most fronts, and it was rumored that a group of students calling themselves the Durmstrang Army had recently killed Rector Schimmelpfennig and other faculty members whom Grindelwald had installed. If true, it was a victory almost as grand as the landings at Normandy a few weeks earlier. Closer to home, Tom's O.W.L. results had come in and he had gotten top marks in every subject, as expected, though Tom was not sure he would be continuing all of his subjects into their N.E.W.T. levels.

"I won't say that Herbology is useless," he said as they sat for dinner, "but I have only so many hours in the day—they still won't give me a Time-Turner, did I mention that?—and there are extracurriculars which I'd like to pursue as well."

"Dueling Club, of course, but that can't be taking up all your time. What else do you have?" Besides midnight conversations with some delightful-sounding lady friend named Horila, anyway. Tom had clammed up on the matter as soon as he realized how often he had been speaking of her, but it was sufficient for Filius to know that his young apprentice could be interested in more than just dueling and magic. Oh, Tom had tried to say they were merely studying, but then why so much effort to meeting alone?

Filius hadn't been born yesterday.

"You could call it Hogwarts Studies, perhaps," Tom answered with a smile, and Filius wondered, given Horila's mental hoard of trivia on the Founders, whether that might be a sly euphemism for something more. "I might be able to return someday as a professor, but I can only count on having two more years to explore as much of the castle as I can. I'm still finding new surprises: secret passages, a tower that goes on forever, even a room that isn't always there when you look for it."

"Interesting. You may want to be careful when you explore the tower. There was a rumor in my day that a group of students had gotten lost in the Restricted Section a very long time ago and gone feral, but perhaps it was that endless tower which they were really talking about," Filius said, smiling.

Riddle nodded. 'I need to keep on with Study of Ancient Runes, at least, and probably Charms. Transfiguration, too, perhaps…" he said, and Filius got the sense that Tom was thinking about the needs of a single project in particular.

"Planning something, are you? I expect that it will be exciting."

"One can only hope. I don't know nearly as much about enchantment as I'd like, and magical objects can be so difficult to work with sometimes. It would be nice to be able to go to Hogwarts whenever you liked, wouldn't it?" Tom said, his tone wistful at the end.

"You won't find any disagreement with me," Filius replied. "It would be difficult to land a position soon after your graduation, but I wouldn't be surprised if this project of yours were able to convince Headmaster Dippet to hire you on. I would be willing to recommend you as a Defense professor, if that's what you have your eye on, but I think it would be a major loss to the art if you were to drop dueling before your career has properly begun. You have your whole life ahead of you anyway, so why not give dueling a go for two or three decades?"

"Thank you, Master Filius. You needn't worry. Even if nothing becomes of me on the dueling circuits, I would still like to gain some worldly experience before I hang up my traveling robes. Teaching at Hogwarts seems to be the sort of thing which traps people till old age, regardless of when they start."

"Speaking of dueling, I'd like to start you on some alternative styles of dueling this summer. My experience in this regard is limited, but I've been studying what I could this year in order to prepare, and even a little bit of practice might serve you well."

"If you think it could bear fruit then I could hardly deny you. What do you have in mind?"

"It isn't something that they teach at Hogwarts, but there's nothing to keep you from wielding more than one wand at a time," Filius said.

"How many, exactly?"

"Well, two would be the practical limit. Without three hands there just wouldn't be much of a purpose to triple-wielding. I did once hear of a wizard who held three in one hand, but that's the stuff of urban legends, you know, and I never met anyone who'd seen it done personally. So, two wands. Perhaps if demiguises had any use for wands, they might use three…" Filius shrugged. "The uses for a second wand are limited, anyway, because of the principle of visualization. It's nearly impossible for a wizard to form an intent for two separate spells at the same time. Nevertheless, it might be profitable for you to study the techniques of the Kovachev School, from Bulgaria," Filius said, and he levitated a child's toy wand over to Tom.

The toy wand dipped a bit in the air when Tom grasped it with his own spell. He looked at it with disbelief for a moment, then took hold of it with his hand and gave it a small jerk. A flurry of red sparks shot out of the end. "Am I to blind you with particles of light, then?"

"You'll lose the toy wand eventually, but I want you to think more easily of your off-hand as a channel for your magic. I've been watching, and you tend to use wandless magic only when you're forced to. You've grown reliant on your wand, Tom, and I want to break you of these bad habits which British education has forced on you."

"Reasonable," Tom said in a satisfied tone.

"Now, some of these forms that I'm going to walk you after dinner through may seem strange, but that's because everything has its antecedent. During the Early Middle Ages, one of the dueling styles of the time was what they called 'horntailing,' after the Hungarian horntail: In one hand you'd hold a wand, which was the dragon's fiery breath, while in the other you would wield a sword, which was the dragon's eponymous—and dangerous—tail. Nothing that was not once alive is suitable for focusing one's magic, but the Bulgarian warlord Mladen Kovachev found that some elements of horntailing were useful and adopted them for his two-wanded style, just as I suspect that you might be able to develop your own distinct approach, though you would probably have to travel beyond Europe for it to get any kind of a following. We Europeans are too attached to our wands," Filius said with a note of remorse.

"Could one combine both approaches?" Tom asked. "It's difficult for me to conceive of how one could design a sword that was suitable as a magical focus, unless one used parts from a dragon, but a bone knife should certainly be possible."

"Should be, and is," Filius replied. "In Hawaii there's a school that still teaches the art of using a shark-tooth sword, which is unorthodox and, in my opinion, produces results strictly inferior to what one finds with a wand, but I suppose that it is suitable for their practices. I've also seen bone daggers of various kinds and knives made from re'em horn, and heard legends of a witch who used a giant's thigh bone for a good staff or even a short sword, though it would be the first time I've heard of a Wizarding giant."

"There's a half-giant of that sort at Hogwarts," Tom said. "He's a couple of years below me, but he hasn't suffered for a lack of talent on his mother's side. I should hope that nobody harvests his femur anytime soon, though." Tom paused, his eyes directed to the side in that way that told Filius he was thinking of something, but wasn't sure whether it should be asked.

"Come on, Tom, what is it?"

"I was only wondering, what with this talk of multiple foci, and Grindelwald being, well, Grindelwald, and his sign being his sign..." Tom trailed off.

"That's a great interest to you," Filius said, taking pains to ensure that his tone was merely observational, and not the least bit condemnatory.

"He has been in the news for as long as I have known of the magical world," Tom said. "How could I not be interested in him, or his banner, or what the Hallowsbrand represented?"

"Fair enough, though you needn't pretend that you only have an academic interest in the matter. We're both duelists here," Filius said. "So, the Hallows, then. You were thinking that the Deathstick might not be the only magical focus among them, I guess?"

"Exactly. I was wondering if that might be what it means to be the Master of Death. The Cloak of Invisibility is probably made of some organic material. Invisibility cloaks usually are. Oh, but the Resurrection Stone…" Tom frowned. "Stones are stones."

"Perhaps. Just perhaps," Filius replied slowly, his own mind chewing on the idea now. "Of course, I've heard rumors that petrified wood and limestone are suitable elements for making a magical focus. I honestly don't know for sure, but limestone does have some interesting magical properties, which you'd probably want to talk to a potions master about, because I know very little on the matter." Filius nodded to himself. "That's your theory then?"

"Yes, but there are holes. I doubt that the Resurrection Stone is limestone, even if that's a workable substance—which I wouldn't be too sure of, since I don't think all limestone was once living, so there would probably be impurities scattered throughout. Really, the legends would probably have mentioned something about that, if the Deathly Hallows were meant to be used in such a way, and they certainly wouldn't have taken such odd forms. What are you supposed to do with a stone?"

"Scry," Filius said.

"I suppose, but I still think my idea was stupid. I wonder who made them, really, and for what purpose."

"I don't know much about the Cloak or Stone. Most of what I've learned has come to me by way of my profession as a duelist," Filius admitted. "It's hard to not trade rumors about an unbeatable wand, after all."

"If it were one, though, why not make more? I don't remember any story that said the Peverells were wandmakers."

"Do you think it was actually Death who made the Hallows, then?"

"No. And we know so little about them. All we have are legends, really."

Filius nodded. "I've heard it said that Ignotus Peverell incorporated goblin lore into the Deathstick. The implication, I think, was that goblins are too dangerous to be given wands, if they could make such a thing. Or that one must see death—or Death, the figure—in order to use the wand, because of the thestral hair that is its core." He sighed. "As you say, legends," Filius concluded, and when Tom turned the conversation to other matters, to runes and the repairing of magical objects, he thought that the boy's curiosity had been sated.

It would not take long for him to learn that he had judged incorrectly.