Once more, my beta-readers, fredfred and InquisitorCOC, deserve a huge thank you. Their help is invaluable.


Chapter 75: The Cure

St Mungo's, London, Wizarding Britain, Wizarding World, May 3rd 2006

As they followed Healer Grover to the storage room, Ron pondered the Head Healer's claim. The hospital was filled to capacity - that he was sure was the case. The population of an entire village needing medical treatment? That would put a strain on any health service. And Wizarding Britain only had one hospital.

But room wasn't the problem. Not when you could use magic to turn a closet into a ballroom. Trained personnel would be the bottleneck - Healers were in demand even when there weren't such crises, as their recruitment of Rosengarten had shown.

So why would they be sent to a 'spare storage room', and why was Healer Grover so nervous?

Ron cleared his throat. "Healer Grover?"

The wizard jerked before stopping and turning to face him. "Yes?"

"What's wrong with the storage room?"

"Wrong?" Grover replied quickly. Too quickly for him not to know the answer.

"Yes," Hermione cut in. "What's wrong with it?"

"And why didn't you just enlarge a closet or something?" Ron added.

"Ah… you're conducting an experiment; you need a chamber with strong protections, in case something goes wrong. We don't want to endanger the hospital - certainly not now when we have so many patients." Grover smiled weakly at them.

That sounded logical - but why was Grover so nervous?

"And a storage room has those protections?" Hermione raised her eyebrows.

"Uh…" Grover sighed. "It wasn't always a storage room. It used to be a ritual chamber."

"As I understand it - and I researched the matter while I was at school - rituals were replaced by wand- and potion-based treatments centuries before the Statute of Secrecy came into effect," Hermione told him.

"Which was quite a narrow-minded decision," wizarding Luna added with a pout. "Just because something is inefficient doesn't mean it's useless."

"So," Hermione went on, "why would you have converted a ritual chamber to a storage room instead of turning it into a curse-treatment room? The protections on the chamber must be very old."

Which, Ron knew, meant that they would be very powerful.

"Ah, yes…" Grover's smile grew even more forced. "But there were a few circumstances that made such a conversion impractical."

"Such as?" Hermione asked in a sharp voice. "We're about to conduct a very important experiment there. We need to know what's wrong with the room."

"It's haunted." The Healer sighed and hunched his shoulders.

"Haunted?" Wilkinson blinked. "You've got a haunted room in St Mungo's? That's… Why hasn't the Department dealt with it?" He frowned. "Although ghosts can't do anything to you, so that shouldn't be a problem for us."

"A ghost could very easily disrupt an experiment by distracting the wizard or witch conducting it at the wrong time," Hermione pointed out. "Potions come to mind as well."

"Oh, right. That would be a bother," Wilkinson said. "Although perhaps a silencing or privacy charm might work to prevent such interruptions. But we could also move it - or call an expert in dealing with ghosts. After all, we regularly move the ghosts of the departed out of St Mungo's, don't we?"

"This is a little more complicated." Grover sighed again. "The ghost in question is the remnant of a Healer who was conducting a ritual that went wrong and cost them their life. Multiple attempts to banish it have been made but without success - as far as I know, the ghost is somehow tied into the room's protections."

Ron glanced at Hermione. The way she winced showed that this was a bad thing. The way wizarding Luna and her father's eyes lit up showed it was also a very interesting thing.

"Oh! A ghost tied into old wards?" Luna beamed. "That's rare!"

"Indeed!" her father agreed. "I'm only aware of five such cases in Britain!"

"Five?" Wilkinson blinked. "I only know about three!"

"Two were in private manors which didn't survive the war," Mr Lovegood told him.

"Oh."

Grover winced. "Please don't tell anyone that I told you about it. The details, I mean. I wasn't supposed to tell you that, but…" He trailed off.

"You didn't want to be held responsible if the ghost disrupted our experiment, did you?" Ron narrowed his eyes at the man.

Grover's weak smile was answer enough. Not strong enough to stand up to the Head Healer even though he knew he was being set up.

"What exactly does the ghost do?" Hermione asked.

"Well, it seems to mostly… run experiments? We're not actually sure what it's doing," Grover replied. "There's a slight language barrier."

"Just how old is this ghost? St Mungo's isn't that old," Hermione said.

"As far as we know, they were one of Mungo Bonham's mentors. The founder of St Mungo's," Grover added with a glance at Ron.

"In the seventeenth century," Hermione said. "Still, that's not too far from modern English."

Grover sighed once more. "We haven't been able to identify the language. Not even Mungo Bonham himself managed it."

"Oh." Wizarding Luna blinked. "But didn't the Healer speak English as well?"

"As far as we know, yes - he wouldn't have been able to talk to Bonham otherwise, would he? But the ghost has never spoken a single word in English. At least as far as we know."

"And what kind of experiments does he do?" Hermione asked.

"We don't know. It's hard to tell - we can only see him and his clothes; we can't see what it's supposedly manipulating. Sometimes it's clear that he's brewing - or going through the motions, it's not as if there's an actual result." Grover sighed. "I'm sorry about this; normally, we would let you use one of our treatment rooms, but they're all being used around the clock ever since the incident."

Hermione scoffed. "More reason to not hinder us since we actually have a promising approach for resolving this situation."

"Well, the Head Healer…"

"...is an idiot, yes, we noticed." Hermione sighed. "Well, we won't let a ghost keep us from conducting the experiment. Let's go."

Grover cringed again and led them to the stairs. "It's in the basement."

"You've got a storage room without a lift connecting to its floor?" Ron asked. Weird, but with magic, it probably was...

"Err… we don't really use it as a storage room. That's just what's it called for, you know, our budget," Grover replied.

Ah. Ron shook his head behind the Healer's back. Once again, he had proof that Wizarding Britain wasn't very different from his own country. The stories Percy and Dad had told him about what departments did for their budget! Although those weren't literal ghost stories...

They went down two flights of stairs - old ones. Worn stone steps and walls that wouldn't have been out of place in the Tower of London's basement. He spotted dust on the ground as well - this wasn't a location anyone regularly frequented.

Which made him tense slightly. He didn't expect an ambush, but as Moody had drilled into him: Constant vigilance! They were isolated, out of earshot of the rest of the building, and the Head Healer obviously didn't like them. And the only witness who knew where they were going was an older witch missing a leg - easily dealt with by wiping her memory. If Grover was killed, he would also be the perfect scapegoat.

He almost snorted. Perhaps he was a little paranoid. What would be the motive? Would the Head Healer really attempt to murder them - and she'd need accomplices for that - over some professional antipathy? If she were a dangerous dark witch, wouldn't the Aurors have found out already? And if she were a dark witch and had managed to keep it secret, would she risk her cover in a fit of piqué? She wouldn't have had a lot of time to plan this in advance, after all.

They reached a massive old wooden door - with metal bands strengthening it - and he dropped the thought. Time to face a ghost.

Grover fumbled with some antique-looking keys, and Ron saw Hermione tap her leg with her wand, probably one moment away from opening the door with magic. Unless the protections would prevent that. Old protections were more powerful, she'd explained.

Grover finally managed to get the door unlocked and opened it. The squeaking noise from the hinges made Ron clench his teeth. Another sign that this room wasn't used. And it was almost empty, too - there was only one barrel and one crate, stashed right next to the door, and Ron was certain they were empty or filled with rubbish. He didn't see a ghost, though.

"Poor ghost. How is he supposed to learn English when no one is talking to him?" Wizarding Luna must have had the same thought.

"Err… ghosts cannot learn new languages," Wilkinson said. "They're just imprints of a dying wizard or witch's consciousness."

"That's not true! The ghosts at Hogwarts learn the students' names! They speak English! And they learn new things all the time! I've read The Quibbler to them, and we discussed the articles!" wizarding Luna protested.

"Well, that's probably due to them being at Hogwarts. It's such a magic-rich place, the normal rules often don't apply."

Wilkinson was talking out of his ass, in Ron's opinion.

"Really? I never found any case where the rules were different at Hogwarts compared to the rest of Wizarding Britain," Hermione said.

"Except for the curfew rules. And the hallway rules. No such rules in the Ministry," wizarding Luna added, nodding a few times.

Ron had to suppress a giggle at that - that could've come from his Luna.

"Well, did you study the ghosts as well?" Wilkinson asked.

"Did you study them?" Hermione shot back.

"I'd certainly like to study this one," wizarding Luna's dad said.

Ron looked ahead. The room was empty, wasn't it? But the others all nodded. Oh. Muggles couldn't see ghosts, could they? Although if he squinted, he could make out a hint of an eerie glow…

"Oh, I've never heard this language before!" Wizarding Luna's dad was positively beaming. "How exciting!"

"It sounds a little like a monkey," wizarding Luna said. "A happy monkey."

"You're right!" Wilkinson added. "The chittering does remind me of a monkey. Though I wouldn't say they're happy."

"They would be screeching if they were unhappy," wizarding Luna retorted. "Perhaps the wizard was a monkey-tongue? Or would that be a monkey's paw?"

"That's something different," Hermione told her. "But I've never heard of any magical talent that allows you to talk to monkeys."

"Oh, you don't need a magical talent to do that," wizarding Luna replied. "Monkeys are quite smart. It'd just be more convenient for you to speak in their own language, I think."

"I don't think they have a language, though," Wilkinson said.

Ron pressed his lips together. Everyone could see and hear the ghost except for him. Typical.

"They can communicate, but I don't know if it's enough to qualify as a language," Hermione pointed out.

"A magic monkey language, like Parseltongue," wizarding Luna told her. "Lost when the last wizard who could speak it died in a ritual accident before he could father children. What a tragedy!"

"Oh, yes - do you want to write the article, Luna?"

"Oh, I'm very busy - you can write it, Daddy!"

"Alright!"

"We haven't confirmed that this is a magical language," Hermione objected.

"But we haven't confirmed that it isn't one, either," Mr Lovegood retorted. "And the evidence points toward it being a language. Why else would the wizard speak it?"

"He could've been cursed," Hermione speculated. "Unable to talk in an intelligible manner."

"A Monkey-Tongue Curse?" Mr Lovegood perked up. "That's a fascinating idea!"

Ron had the distinct impression that The Quibbler would somehow present both theories as true in the next edition.

"Please… don't mention the ghost," Grover spoke up. "It's a sort of embarrassing secret of the hospital. We don't want researchers and the curious to visit."

"Don't worry! All our sources will be kept anonymous!" the older wizard assured the man.

"Yes. Protecting your sources is crucial for any journalist who is searching for the truth amongst the government lies."

For a moment, Ron thought Luna had taken the place of her counterpart. But no - Luna wouldn't be able to see or hear the ghost either. Although… if he closed his eyes, he could almost hear something high-pitched. Like if someone had… He blinked. "What if he's not chittering, but merely talking very, very fast?"

Hermione frowned. "Wouldn't someone have tested that already?"

Grover cleared his throat. "Ah, we didn't, uh, do many tests, I don't think. Not in the last few, uh, decades or so."

"You locked up the poor ghost down here, all alone!" Wizarding Luna glared at the Healer.

"We couldn't exactly let him roam, could we?" Grover protested. "And it's not as if he seems to mind it. He's ignoring us, isn't he?"

"I would ignore my captors as well!" wizarding Luna shot back. "That's perfectly natural."

"Did you actually lock him up, or did he never leave the room anyway?" Ron asked.

"Who knows? It's been centuries," Grover replied.

"That's the kind of attitude that leads to Basilisks growing to monstrous sizes in your basement," Wilkinson told him with a frown.

"Are you honestly comparing the Chamber of Secrets to St Mungo's basement?" Hermione sounded incredulous.

"The principle is the same," Wilkinson replied.

"And the poor Basilisk didn't hurt anyone until Voldemort took control of her!" Wizarding Luna shook her head. "With that sort of attitude, I'm worried about whether or not we can trust you with Snappy!"

"Which is why we're here," Hermione said. "And as interesting as this ghost is, we have an experiment to run."

"We're still waiting for our test subjects," Mr Lovegood corrected her. "We can't conduct the experiment without them."

"So, while we wait, let's investigate Mr Ghost a little more!" Wizarding Luna cheered. "He must have been so lonely here!"

"He's still ignoring us," Grover pointed out.

"That's because it's probably stuck in a routine," the witch retorted. "Animals who are kept in small cages often develop such behaviour. It's very, very sad."

"That's why there are strict regulations about the size of pet cages," Wilkinson added. "Though I'm not aware of any regulations for ghosts. Or cursed ghosts."

"The ghost isn't reacting to us at all," Hermione replied. "That's not normal behaviour."

"It's stuck in a routine."

Ron frowned. "Like a broken hologram?"

"An apt description, yes," Hermione agreed.

"Is it actually a ghost?" Ron asked. "If it doesn't behave like any ghost that you know?"

"What else could it be?" Grover replied. "It is intangible and glows and floats!"

"An animated mirage," Mr Lovegood said.

"A projection," Hermione told Grover.

"A manifested thought," wizarding Luna added. "Though that would also cover a ghost. But there's a theory that an imperfect imprint would result in a ghost without sapience."

"Whether or not ghosts are sapient beyond aping human thoughts like a portrait hasn't yet been decided," Wilkinson pointed out.

"By the Ministry. Fortunately, sapience doesn't depend on acknowledgement by the Ministry, or most of Wizarding Britain would lack any sentience," wizarding Luna said, "what with their history of inefficiency and ineptitude!"

"Hey!" Wilkinson protested.

"Present company excepted, of course," Mr Lovegood quickly said.

"That remains to be determined," wizarding Luna corrected her father.

*Hey!"

She really had it in for Wilkinson. Ron wondered about the story behind that. But this wasn't the time to dwell on that. It wasn't the time to focus on some random ghost, either - but as long as the test subjects hadn't arrived yet, he couldn't see the harm. It kept both wizarding Luna and Hermione too busy to worry or let something slip. Or butt heads with the Ministry.

"We need a recorder so we can record the ghost and see if it's actually sped up English," Hermione said.

"Can you record ghosts?" Ron asked.

"With magic, yes," she replied.

"Ah." Was this a case like with the Dementors, where muggles couldn't see them, but wizards could, even through the same cameras? Or something else?

"I can go and fetch a recorder from the Ministry," Wilkinson said. "We just had a banshee case where we needed proof of the target."

But before the man reached the door, it opened, and another Healer - this one a middle-aged witch - led two witches, both younger, inside and then promptly left again.

"Ah! Our test subjects!" Mr Lovegood exclaimed. "Miss Smith and Miss Storndotter?"

The two witches, who had been staring at the Dream Eater and, presumably, the ghost Ron couldn't see, turned to face the wizard.

"Stormdottar," one of them - blonde and rather petite - corrected him. "We've been told that you can free us from these nightmares the Healers insist aren't serious enough to deserve priority treatment." The glare she sent to Grover showed that she didn't share this assessment.

"That's what we're here to find out," Hermione said. "You've been informed that this is an experimental treatment?"

"Yes, yes," Stormdottar replied with a frown. "I don't care as long as I can finally have a good night's sleep again without dreaming about being devoured alive by Chocolate Frogs and Ice Mice." She scoffed. "And I could do without having to explain again to some inexperienced Healer that I haven't had any traumatic experiences with either sweet."

Ron winced. If the Healers were looking for trigger memories when the nightmares were actually fragments from someone else's memories…

"Yes," the other witch spoke up. "I wake up every night drenched in sweat because of nightmares! This has to stop!"

"What happens in these nightmares?" Grover asked, which earned him another glare. "It might be relevant to the treatment."

"Not to our knowledge," Hermione corrected him. "Were you informed of the details of the experimental treatment?"

"We've read the article, yes," Smith said. She nodded emphatically, but she was glancing at the nearby Dream Eater, Ron noticed.

"As long as it works," Stormdottar repeated herself, "I don't care what you do. I was about to drink a pint of Dreamless Sleep and damn the risks!"

"Is that sufficient for the Ministry and St Mungo's?" Hermione asked.

Wilkinson nodded, as did Grover - though the latter did so with much more reluctance.

"Good. Then let's start. Ignore the ghost, please," Hermione said, waving her wand to conjure two simple beds.

"It's not a ghost," wizarding Luna said.

"We haven't tested that," Wilkinson retorted.

"And we won't. The ghost isn't part of the experiment," Hermione explained. With a glance at Grover, she added: "But the hospital was unable to procure another room for this."

Stormdottar sniffed. "Gran always said that standards had slipped ever since her father quit the hospital."

Grover's polite smile grew even more strained.

Hermione, though, was all business. "Please lie down in the beds and relax. We'll use a potion to send you to sleep."

"And then Snappy will gobble up your nightmares!"

Wizarding Luna's enthusiasm didn't seem to reassure the two witches, but they still did as they were told.

Grover handed each of them a vial of a sleeping potion. Stormdottar downed hers at once. Smith looked at it, then at the Dream Eater, before grimacing and drinking it.

A moment later, both witches were asleep.

"Alright, Snappy!" Wizarding Luna raised a finger, then pointed at the two sleeping witches. "Their nightmares are your meal!"

"Are they dreaming already?" Wilkinson asked.

"I don't know. We haven't exactly tested for that," Grover replied.

"Typical," wizarding Luna said with a sniff.

"There was no reason to research such things. Not until this sudden crisis. And we're too busy to study those things right now."

"Perhaps you wouldn't be so busy now if you had studied such things. It's this attitude - this view that everything has to be useful and profitable - that cripples research and progress!"

That was a quote of Ron's Luna. Fortunately, before she could repeat Luna's views of government in general, Snappy started to float towards the beds. In which the two witches were starting to groan and move.

"They seem to be having nightmares," Grover stated the obvious. "And the animal must have…" The Healer trailed off as the Dream Eater started to feed, lowering itself down on to Stormdottar's head.

"Merlin's beard!" Grover muttered.

"Fascinating," Wilkinson added.

Once again, Ron saw the glowing translucent figures appear and vanish in the small vortex. A minute later, the witch started to relax, and the Dream Eater switched to Smith.

"Yes, Snappy, eat it all up! That's a good Dream Eater!" Wizarding Luna cheered as the other witch relaxed as well.

"It seems to be working," Hermione commented, "though we have yet to determine if this was just a temporary treatment."

Ron nodded. Time to wake up the witches, then make them fall asleep again.


"In conclusion, the first results are quite promising, though we haven't been able to verify that the effect lasts longer than a few hours," Hermione summed up a few hours later in the Head Healer's office.

"It could be a temporary suppression of the nightmares," Grover said before the Healer Brown could say anything. "Like potions of Dreamless Sleep."

"That's not true!" Wizarding Luna shook her head. "Snappy ate the nightmares! There's nothing left to cause a nightmare!"

"It ate memories?" Brown said, eyebrows raising.

"Dreams," Mr Lovegood replied. "Nightmares, to be specific. Not actual memories. It's theorised that Dream Eaters actually eat the trauma - the traumatic effect, not the memories - that cause nightmares."

"Eating trauma? Who came up with that?" Brown snorted derisively.

"I worked on that theory with Dancing Bear of the Sioux Tribe. She's a noted specialist for Dream Eaters and mental curses," the wizard told her.

"An American shaman." Brown openly scoffed.

"Snappy's from the New World," wizarding Luna said. "So, of course, the native wizards and witches would know best about his species."

That argument, sound as it was, obviously didn't move the Head Healer. "In essence, you haven't actually proven that the creature has had any significant effect."

"We've proven that having it eat the nightmares had a much better and longer lasting effect than the potions of Dreamless Sleep you were using before!" Hermione snapped.

"As a temporary measure while we work on an actual cure;" Brown countered.

"And you were trying to use Obliviation to cure the patients, weren't you?" Hermione narrowed her eyes. "That's the same method - removing traumatic memories - just less precise and potentially damaging to the patient's long-term memory."

"Yes! Snappy eats nightmares, not memories;" wizarding Luna said. "Although he probably also eats memories of nightmares. We're not sure about that, but it would make sense."

"Unless there's an emotion-dampening effect from his feeding," her father added. "But that could be explained by removing the trauma from the actual memory."

Ron wondered what an actual psychologist or psychiatrist would think of the whole thing. He was no expert, but it sounded all a little… well, magical.

Which was par for the course, of course, when dealing with curses.

"So, we can treat more patients, as long as Snappy won't overeat, and see how they fare," wizarding Luna said.

"Not in my hospital! It's far too dangerous! No one knows what long-term mental effects this… creature… will cause!"

"I've been feeding him for weeks without any problem!" wizarding Luna pointed out.

"And I was doing the same before Luna," her father added. "With artificially induced nightmares, of course."

Unsurprisingly, the wizarding Lovegoods didn't manage to sway the Head Healer. "My decision is final. Now take that creature out of my hospital!"

"You're being unreasonable!" wizarding Luna protested. "You can't stop us, anyway - we can treat people anywhere as long as we have the beds for them!"

"Get out!"

"Before we go," Wilkinson spoke up, "there's another matter to discuss."

"What?"

"The so-called ghost in the basement," Wilkinson explained. "It might not be a ghost at all, and, therefore, a potential new magical creature or effect, which needs to be studied by the appropriate authorities to ensure it's safe around patients."

"It's in a warded and locked room!"

"So were most of your current patients," Wilkinson retorted. "I'll have to inform the Department of Mysteries about it."

Brown sagged in her seat.

Ron was pretty sure that meant she had no chance of stopping the Ministry where the ghost was concerned.

Which was good - it would keep more Unspeakables busy. Though it would also keep them closer to the Dream Eater - although they would have probably investigated the creature anyway.


The Rookery, Ottery St Catchpole, Devon, Britain, Wizarding World, May 3rd, 2006

The wizarding Lovegood house really did look like a rook - the chess piece - Ron noticed after they appeared on the ground in front of it. And it was… tilted to the side. Like the Tower of Pisa. Only worse. He remembered wizarding Luna mentioning something about her home being 'a little crookedy', but he hadn't expected that it would be so bad.

None of the others commented on it, though, so he didn't speak up either as he followed them to the door.

"Come in, come in! Don't mind the mess!" Mr Lovegood cheerfully waved as he opened the door and revealed a round, cluttered room which was aligned to the leaning walls, not the floor. But the wizard stepped into the room without hesitation - and then stood as if gravity had changed direction.

Ron took a deep breath and entered himself. The room was bigger than the tower-like building was on the outside, and the walls were lined with shelves full of knick-knacks, with much of the floor covered in other oddities. Something moved near the ceiling - something small. A bat? He couldn't tell from the floor. But the Dream Eater floating into the room must have scared it off or into hiding - Ron caught a blur shooting to the back of the room, followed by something falling shut.

He glanced at Hermione. She didn't look annoyed - she seemed resigned. No, more fondly exasperated or something. She smiled wryly as she nodded at Mr Lovegood. "Thank you for hosting us."

"Don't word about it - it's the least I can do."

"It's still generous," Wilkinson said.

The wizard wasn't looking around nor did he seem surprised - he must be familiar with the place, Ron deduced.

He also caught wizarding Luna frowning at Wilkinson. He really had to ask her about this before it blew up in their faces.

And here was an opportunity to do so: Wilkinson followed Mr Lovegood down to the basement "to check up on the animals". As soon as they had closed the door behind them, Ron approached the witch. "Hey."

"Hmm?" She turned to him, her frown turning into a smile. The kind of smile his Luna wore when she was trying to hide her true feelings.

Well, best to get it over with. "You don't seem to like Wilkinson very much."

She scowled in return. "He works for the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. They're the worst of the Ministry!"

He nodded - that fit what he knew of her, and of his Luna's attitude towards the government in general. But… "Your father seems to like him."

She scoffed. "Daddy's too trusting. Wilkinson claims he wants to change how the Ministry treats magical creatures, but he still works for them and enforces their policies! That's duplicitous!"

"That's normal for the Ministry," Hermione cut in. "If you want to reform the Ministry from within, you'll have to enforce laws and regulations that you might not agree with."

Luna sniffed. "Harry and Ron have been working on that for years, but the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures hasn't changed much. They still treat magical creatures as animals merely because they can't speak!"

"Ah." Ron nodded. "But what could Wilkinson do to change it?"

"Quit, of course! One less Ministry goon to oppress the minorities! The Ministry can only enforce their unfair policies if we all let them - and help them."

Yeah, that sounded familiar. Ron didn't like remembering that particular argument with Luna. "What alternatives to working for the Ministry does he have?"

"He could become a Magizoologist, like Daddy. Or an activist for better treatment for magical creatures! Instead, he keeps talking about making changes without ever making any."

"Not everyone is willing to abandon safe employment to follow their ideals," Hermione pointed out.

"Which is why the world's in such a terrible state!"

Before Ron could reply, he heard Mr Lovegood and Wilkinson on the stairs. "...and as you saw, all creatures are kept according to Ministry regulations."

"I'll note that," Wilkinson said as he entered the room behind wizarding Luna's father. "The basement is safe and big enough to treat patients there."

"And the sight of so many magical creatures should help soothe them," Mr Lovegood added.

Wizarding Luna nodded with a smile, and Ron and - presumably - Hermione held their tongues. If the basement looked even remotely similar to the Lunas' habitat, then Ron wouldn't feel particularly reassured.

"Unless it excites them," Hermione said, "and makes it harder to sleep."

"We'll give them a potion anyway." Wizarding Luna made a dismissive gesture with her hand. Then she blinked. "Do we have enough?"

"I can get more from the Ministry," Wilkinson said with a smile. "I'll be right back."

He stepped outside, and a moment later, Ron heard the tell-tale sound of Apparition.

"He didn't even ask how many we need." Wizarding Luna huffed.

"I'm sure he'll bring enough - Snappy can't eat too many nightmares, anyway, can he?" her father replied.

The witch kept frowning even as she nodded.

After a moment, Hermione spoke up: "So, let's prepare the room for treating patients."

"It's almost ready - we just need to conjure beds."

And, Ron mentally added when he descended the stairs into the basement, a few walls. Strong, sturdy walls so the huge Hippogriff standing in the centre of the room wouldn't be able to get to them, should it feel hungry or want to 'play'. He couldn't see any form of restraint on it, either, and his gun felt pretty inadequate faced with a ton of claws, beak and muscles. At least Hermione had her wand and would be able to…

"Buckbeak?"

...beam at it?

The Hippogriff bowed its head.

"It is you!" Hermione walked towards him with a wide smile on her face, bowing in return halfway to the creature.

"Buckbeak?" Ron asked, trailing behind her. The room was the same size as the Lunas' base, he noticed, and he could see the same kind of habitats lining the walls as they had in the other world.

Hermione quickly turned to face him. "Bow to him, like I did. Hippogriffs are very proud."

Ah. Ron slowly bowed - without taking his eyes off the creature.

"We saved his life in our third year when Malfoy tried to have him executed after framing him for an attack," Hermione explained. "I didn't know he was living with you," she told the Lovegoods.

"Oh, he doesn't live here - he just likes visiting," Mr Lovegood said. "I think it's the treats we have for him."

The way the Hippogriff nodded, it - he - not only agreed but obviously understood the wizard.

"How does he enter and leave?" Ron asked, looking back at the stairs.

"We've got a tunnel in the back," wizarding Luna explained. "You don't think that we'd lock our guests up, do you?"

"Of course not." Even if that would make sense - the snake he could see coiled up in a corner looked as if it could swallow a man whole without unhinging its jaw.

"Oh, you look good."

Hermione was ruffling Buckbeak's feathers and petting his back.

Ron felt both out of place and a little jealous.


By the time Wilkinson returned, they had at least moved Buckbeak to the back and set up four beds surrounded by dividers. Sturdy dividers, solidly anchored in the ground - or magically stuck to it, at least. Ron would've preferred a solid roof - or a cage - but no one else seemed to share his concerns. Not that he had shared them in full - that might've made the Hippogriff angry.

And perhaps attracted a few of the other creatures eyeing the new addition to the basement from their habitats.

"Don't worry about Voly, he's just curious," wizarding Luna said, waving at what looked like a mole the size of a grizzly bear peering at them from a tunnel to the side. The thing waved back.

"Ah. That's a Voracious Mole, right?"

"Yes!" She beamed at him. "We've got the biggest colony of them in Britain! If you're lucky, you can see them hunt stags in the woods."

"Stags." They hunted stags. "Don't tell me that they lie in wait below the ground and then catch their prey and drag it into the tunnels that they've dug."

"You've seen them hunt already? Where? If there's a Voracious Mole in the wild, we need to check up on them to ensure they're in good health! And find them a mate, if possible."

The wizarding Lovegoods were breeding them? Ron looked at Hermione, but she was focused on the beds and walls. A little too focused, in his opinion.

"Come! I'll introduce you! Voly! Look! This is Ron - the other Ron. Not the Ron you already know!"

The creature looked even bigger up close. And those claws looked like they would allow the thing to dig through concrete. Reinforced concrete. Or bedrock. And the Erymanthian Boar would've been jealous of those fangs.

Ron tensed up as the creature sniffed at him, then tilted its head and chuffed.

"Oh, he likes you!"

That was good. Probably.

The creature sniffed him again. A huge drop of drool landed on his shoe.

That wasn't good.

Fortunately, the first patients arrived before Luna could present him to the rest of the pack "in their maze".

He wondered if the Weasleys knew that half a dozen bear-sized moles had tunnelled under their home and Quidditch pitch.


"...and just lie down here on the bed before drinking the potion," Hermione said.

"Is this safe?"

"This isn't the first time we've done this. It might not take, but it won't harm you," she told the older wizard.

"I didn't mean the, uh, Dream Eater." The wizard - Brian Barnuckle - nodded towards the Voles crammed into their tunnel.

"They won't enter the basement without permission," wizarding Luna said. "They're very well-behaved."

"Ah." Barnuckle didn't really seem reassured but nodded anyway. He looked pretty desperate, too - and quite exhausted. "Well then…" He drank the potion and fell asleep before his head hit the pillow.

Almost as quickly, the Dream Eater started to feed. By now, Ron was almost used to the sight.

"Remember, Snappy, don't overeat - tell me at once if you're full," wizarding Luna repeated herself for the third time in half an hour.

The creature didn't react in any way that Ron would have taken as communication, but the witch looked satisfied anyway.

Ah, well - as long as it worked… He wandered over to Hermione, who was waving her wand and scribbling down notes. "How are things?"

She huffed. "I'm just recording a few data points. This is where I really miss being able to use a computer."

"You could invent one," he suggested, half-seriously.

"I might have to."

She sounded serious.

"You don't have to do everything yourself," he told her. "That's what friends are for."

"None of them knows, not in detail at least, what I'm doing," she retorted. "I've got documentation, of course, but…"

She trailed off with a sigh and shrugged. "Teaching anyone what I've done would take longer than constructing a computer of my own. I think so, at least."

Ron thought that that sounded a little too… not vain, but a little arrogant. He didn't mention that, though, as he watched her cast spells and note down their results. This wasn't the time for that discussion.


"...and if we go by that, Buckbeak was defending his honour when he attacked Malfoy after being mortally insulted," she told her friends.

They didn't look very impressed, though. Ron frowned. "I'm not sure the duelling code applies to Hippogriffs."

"It was never limited to wizards and witches," she retorted. "And there are precedents - Veela and Sirens defending their honour, for example."

"They're different from Hippogriffs, though." Ron shook his head.

"That doesn't mean Buckbeak can't defend his honour!"

"Hermione. Do you really think the Wizengamot will vote to acquit him for attacking Malfoy for that reason?" Harry asked.

She sighed. "The odds are low, I know. But it's the best argument I've found. Anything else is just a death sentence." She clenched her teeth. That despicable excuse for a wizard was trying to get Buckbeak killed just to hurt others. How low could you go? Well, no matter how low it was, Malfoy would dig himself even lower.

She blinked. Oh. That might work. If the law didn't work, you had to break it. Buckbeak was being held in a paddock, after all, near Hagrid's Hut. Close to the Forbidden Forest. All they needed was an alibi. They wouldn't even need a tunnel for the jailbreak!