"Libero!" I incanted, spelling Oliver, who'd gamely stepped into my ritual circle. I really needed to finish working on my project to make a focus that could cast soulfire-based spells (I'd started referring to them as the Apologies and everyone else told me to please stop). This one, in particular, wasn't that useful if it required a whole ritual working to perform.
"That's a rush!" the Scottish keeper said, eyes flaring silver, so at least I'd gotten it right.
"That's four for four!" Penny said, excited. We'd gathered in our favorite abandoned classroom for the testing, and had each been able to replicate the spell. "Now, let's see if it can do anything else we can test safely. Percy?"
"Confundo!" the Weasley prefect snapped out while pointing his wand toward me.
I immediately lost the thread of what was going on, until Penny cast, "Libero!" and the confusion ended as suddenly as it had begun. My eyes focused (though the dilation after the light flaring out of them left everything momentarily dark) and I gave her a thumbs-up. It really was a rush, my self-confidence and mental strength briefly supercharged enough to fight off the effect.
"Yay!" the blond Ravenclaw actually hopped in her excitement, sending her curly hair bouncing into the air. "If this is a general counter against mental effects, it will have so many uses!"
Percy nodded, "Simply working as a prophylactic against possible imperius exposure would have it get used, but if it generally clears any kind of mental impairment, it might wind up as a standard security method at the Ministry. Unfortunately, I do not believe we can easily test lesser compulsions."
"No' even any in your big repertoire?" Oliver asked him.
"They are extremely frowned upon outside of warding," Percy explained, "and that just to subtly redirect muggles and animals away from the warded site. I believe there is always a brisk trade in them amongst certain types of wizard, of course. But they are not taught even at the NEWT level curriculum."
"I'm sure when the Ministry replicates our spell, they'll test it in many more conditions," Penny shrugged. "We've got enough to make it worth their while."
"So you're done?" Oliver asked. "Got your application to the Department of Mysteries all set?"
"Extra credit?" she asked me and Percy. "I'd like to try to go ahead and create the other two. We've got another year and a half to work on it. Might as well pad the CV?"
Percy agreed, and I nodded absently. I'd been thinking about the issue of compulsions.
"Hit me again?" I asked her.
Penny nodded, confused, but cast, "Libero!"
While under the surge of the spell, I tried to blurt out, "My godmother is Bellatrix Lestrange." But the words wouldn't come. I tried, "You can't trust Maeve Malfoy," to the same result. Having a brain wave, I then tried to tell them, "Remus Lupin lives on Heath End Road in High Wycombe," and also couldn't force that out. And the feeling in each of the cases was extremely similar: my brain failing to connect to my tongue.
"Alright, Harry?" Oliver asked.
"I can confirm it doesn't let you break a fidelius," I told them, more frustration evident in my voice because I couldn't seem to explain what I was really trying to break. I'd had suspicions that my unwillingness to report on my godmother and her plots wasn't entirely natural, but now I'd had it confirmed in excruciating detail. I couldn't even seem to tell them what I'd really been trying.
"Interesting," Percy said, musing, "I suspect that is because the fidelius is not a compulsion to keep the secret, but an actual magical manipulation of how knowledge can be used."
"Good to know, regardless," Penny nodded, adding that to her notes.
We did some more testing and began planning to diagram the cruciatus curse, but my thoughts were elsewhere. As soon as we wrapped up, I got to our room ahead of Percy and Oliver, slipped Bob's skull out of my trunk and into my bag of holding, and moved off to another empty classroom. I took extra care to lock and silence the door.
Feeling safe enough to talk, I roused Bob and explained, "I can't tell my friends about my godmother or Maeve. Feels like the fidelius. Wait, why can I tell you?"
"The same reason I can be at Remus' house," the spirit of intellect explained. "I don't really count in the same way."
"So could I tell you that my godmother is Bellatrix Black-Lestrange and she's brought Maeve Malfoy into this world for nefarious purposes, and then have you tell Mathilda?" I reasoned.
"Nah," the skull drawled. "Not without giving me the ability to tell future owners your secrets, making Mathilda my owner, and still risking blowing my mind apart. Secret magic is complicated. Consider me basically like external storage for your own knowledge, as far as the magic is concerned."
I sighed, having suspected it wouldn't be that easy. "So why can't I talk about it? Nobody ever did a ritual like the fidelius involving my godmother's secrets."
"Well… they did," Bob hedged. "Think of her as her own secret keeper. Dumbledore could tell someone else Remus' address, and then they wouldn't be able to pass it on, even though they weren't there for the initial ritual. Only she gets a lot more leeway about what counts as a secret, especially when it's things told or shown to you in her role as your teacher." He paused for a moment, then his eyes brightened, "Also, did you say Maeve Malfoy?"
I realized I hadn't actually caught Bob up on what happened at the New Year's party. "Well, Malfoy almost certainly isn't her real last name. Impossibly attractive girl with white hair in dreadlocks. I'm pretty sure she's what came through and broke the Veil. Bellatrix transferred the rest of my debt to her to mean I had to keep her secrets, too. But she's already trying to get me to help her take over Hogwarts or something."
As soon as I'd given her description, Bob's eyeflames had started to tighten to pinpoints, and his voice wavered out, "Don't tell the Winter Maiden about me Harry, please."
"I wasn't going to… but why?"
"Her mother is probably still upset with me. If they don't know where to find me, it's better," he hedged.
"Okay, so, who is her mother? And who is she?"
"She's the daughter of Mab, the Queen of Air and Darkness herself," and I could feel him dropping in the capital letters.
I frowned, getting the picture that the crown princess of the Winter Court was walking around Hogwarts pretending to be a fifth-year. "I need to figure out why she's really here." Not that I thought she'd give me a straight answer if I asked her, particularly without incurring additional debt.
I wondered if I could subtly hinder her takeover of the school's ongoing popularity contest without being able to reveal any of her secrets. If she wanted to be the school's representative, the best way to thwart her plans would be to keep her from achieving that.
I just needed to socially outmaneuver an immortal fae princess in the middle of an ongoing basilisk attack. No pressure.
