Chapter 10:

"I have discerned a method of passing into the Vault of Dreams. I will proceed under cover of darkness. Wish me luck."

From the Diary of Merlinus Caledonensis; Earth, 537 Common Era. This entry was the last to appear in the copy he sent to Hogwarts. After this event, Merlin was never seen again. As far as the Wizarding World knows, these were the final words of the greatest Wizard of all time.


Harry felt an all-encompassing drive of freedom as he and Mak snuck through the halls of Hogwarts towards the Stone Gargoyle that guarded the Headmaster's Office. The fucking chain was finally gone from his arm (if accidentally), and he was going to pull the biggest "fuck you" to his captor humanly possible. He was going to steal from right out under the old man's nose.

Mak on his shoulder, he strode along the corridor adjacent to the gargoyle. He stopped at the corner, closed his eyes and took a single deep breath. He raised his hand and snapped his fingers. There was always a chance the Headmaster had forgotten to close the portal to his room after all. A highly unlikely chance, but that made no difference to Harry. Grinning, he turned the corner. The gargoyle was gone, a spiral staircase in its place.

Harry slid across the stone floor before leaping up onto the staircase. He took each step three at a time and reached the door to Evil Gandalf's office in seconds. He made no move to open the door, though. Instead, he repeated his actions from down below.

Even with his powers, he wasn't taking any chances. He held himself steady with one hand on the wall and leaned over the ordinary-looking desk mat to push the door open slightly with a gloved hand. Mak flew into the room, returning a few seconds later.

"No one is inside except the chicken, but that doesn't mean the paintings aren't watching. They look like they're sleeping, but who knows with those things." He pursed his lips, then straightened himself. He rubbed his hands together, building the static beneath his fingers, before spinning around in a circle. The static rushed over him like a wet blanket. His body felt as though he was submerged in water. The brilliance of the Charge Force – he could bend light around him to hide from observation. It was a taxing power, and one he was reticent to use, but this called for it.

He stepped over the mat and slipped into the room without disturbing the door. Without missing a beat, he pointed his finger at the flying crimson chicken and shot a concentrated lightning bolt from his finger.

A 'crack!' echoed through the room, the bird squawked and exploded into a funnel of ash as it was blown to smithereens. Harry smirked in self-satisfaction. Mak pocked her tongue out at it. A few of the portraits stirred, but, apparently, the Phoenix's periodic detonations were frequent enough not to warrant a response. Harry had done his research on the fucking things.

The mist on the top floor was gone. It had evidently been obscuring several more shelves of books, and what looked like a gigantic telescope. Another door off the side most likely went to Dumbledore's sleeping quarters.

Mak flew over to a large chest on the top shelf of the upper level, pointing at it. Faerie number one. It looked like the trunks used by students. Frowning, Harry carefully made his way up the short stairway and stood beneath the chest. No way he was going to get that down without his powers. Taking a deep breath, he reached out his hands and called the Fusion Force to him. He slowly lifted the trunk free of the shelf, straining as his invisible shell began to crack under the effort of using two powers at once. He lowered the chest to the ground as quickly as he could, before breathing a sigh of relief and diverting his energies back to the shell. It replenished, and he sagged in relief and exhaustion. He moved over to the trunk and opened the lid. There wasn't much inside. A jewellery box, a gold and red metal ring with a coat of arms he didn't recognise suspended in a ball of glass, and a silvery black blanket made of what he thought might be silk. Mak pointed to the blanket. He grabbed it and tucked it into his inner robe pocket. Harry thought about taking the other two things but then thought better of it. If he left the valuables, Dumbledore might be more confused. A thief would take everything. He closed the trunk and lifted it back onto the shelf – again with a serious effort that left his shoulders sagging afterwards. Mak flew to his ear and whispered to him.

"There's only one other thing in here. The hat on the shelf over there. The third artefact must still be with Dumbledore."

He nodded and made his way to the second shelf. The talking hat that was supposed to put people into one of the four houses was sleeping on its stand. Harry pulled on it, and it flew straight into his hand. No struggle with something so light, fortunately.

The hat jolted awake, and Harry cursed under his breath.

"Hey, now. What's this? Wait a moment! I'm being Hat-napped!" Harry wove a sound barrier around him as well, but he wasn't fast enough. Several of the paintings 'woke up', calling out, asking if other frames had heard something. Harry bolted for his final target.

"You there! How dare you… is that Design! You're an Imagineer! Impossible! The Pact of Truth…" Harry shoved the whining hat into a pocket, muffling the voice. Instead, he stepped up to Dumbledore's desk. Several books and loose papers were strewn across it. Funding reports… arithmatic analysis of colour distinction… a book about someone called Merlinus whose last name he couldn't pronounce… a blank book with a dusty leather cover. Nothing that screamed 'Important! Someone might go to great effort to steal this!' He needed to leave some sort of smoke trail for the Headmaster to follow. If an important document was missing…

Ruin and Preservation = Scadrial.

He stopped short. One of the documents seemed to be a map. An uncompleted map, with at least three large empty spaces and no landmasses or names he recognised. But one thing jumped out at him. In the dead centre of the map of bizarrely shaped continents was what he supposed could be Europe – if you looked at it at an odd angle – titled: "Expanse of Delusion – The Valley – Earth." Beneath it, with two lines pointing towards a point in the Southeast of England was another line of text: Imagination = The Vault of Dreams, Earth.

Imagination. Mak said the god of the Faeries was called Imagination. He looked towards the door, heart thumping in his chest. Sweat was beading on his skin. His shell of invisibility was starting to crack. He couldn't hold this! Damn it!

He grabbed the map and the stack of notes beneath it, tucked them into his robes with the still grumbling hat, and bolted through the door. He fell into an abyss – the stairs had retracted into the floor. Crap. He lost his illusion and slammed on the Fusion Force to halt his fall. His speed bled away until he was drifting down to the ground like a feather. His feet hit the floor, and he breathed a sigh of relief. Mak fluttered down beside him.

"Nice going hero," she said dryly. Harry scowled at her. He slid around the side of the gargoyle, which didn't seem to notice his presence, and adopted a confident and hurried gait. In his experience, if people thought you had reason to be doing something, they usually left you alone. He mounted the Grand Staircase and made his way towards the Gryffindor Common Room, humming quietly to himself at a job well done.


Daphne Greengrass, the Ice Queen of Slytherin, had a dark, dirty secret. She really liked spa baths.

It was an odd thing to enjoy admittedly, but she did. She loved the feeling of jets pushing into her back, massaging out aches and pains. She loved the weightlessness of floating amongst the bubbles. And she loved the solitude and serenity that accompanied it.

Unfortunately, spas were not something that were readily available to her at Hogwarts, so her favourite form of stress relief was denied her. That said, the Prefects Bathroom was a very suitable substitution, and Daphne's mother had known the password. She could only go when she was sure no one would catch her – as only the Prefects were supposed to even know about it, let alone use it – but she was a Slytherin for a reason: subterfuge was in her blood.

Daphne was quite proud of how on the edge of Slytherin politics she'd managed to stay so far during her years at Hogwarts. Her family wasn't a particularly powerful one, which kept her relatively hidden from the eyes of prospective betrothal hunters. Her father was quite proud of managing to stay neutral during the Wizarding War, and as a result, she was generally beneath Malfoy's notice. Those two factors combined created a sliver of space she could sit in, avoiding most people's attention, where she could just enjoy her life. She studied hard both her school subjects and her personal work, sent by owl from her tutor (she wanted to be a lawyer like her mother and father, and no subject at Hogwarts would teach that to her), and otherwise kept her head down. But that protection relied on no one having anything to hold over her. If she was caught on one of her night-time excursions… she didn't want to think what Malfoy might attempt to blackmail her into.

Hence her logic for taking a trip to the bath while everyone was too busy watching to see which muscle-bound idiots would be shot out of the Goblet of Fire. However, it seemed that she wasn't the only one who'd thought to sneak about while the rest of the school was distracted. As she rounded the Fifth-Floor corridor, towelling off her hair as she walked, she stopped short. Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Fucking-Lived, crouched on the landing ahead, his back to her. He was wearing ordinary school robes, and his gaze was fixed on something above him.

She sucked in a breath to give him a piece of her mind. Harry spun around – "how the hell had he heard that?' – and placed a finger to his lips before she could speak. He beckoned to her quickly. Her curiosity overpowering her urge to yell at him, she crouched down and walked softly to him, her own robes brushing the floor. When she reached the landing, Harry pulled her down beside him and pointed up. A level above, opposite the painting of a fat lady holding a wine glass, stood a man in filthy rags with matted hair and an emaciated looking body. He was pleading with the portrait to let him inside, but the Fat Lady was refusing him.

"Do you know who that is?" Harry asked her very softly, not taking his eyes from the figure. Daphne tried to get a closer look. There was a tattoo on his neck… Her eyes went wide in fright, her sense of panic skyrocketing straight for the moon.

"It's Sirius Black! I recognise him from the wanted posters!" She hissed, her voice cracking. Her natural Slytherin sense of self-preservation kicked in, and she tried to spin and run away, but Harry grabbed her arm in a vice. His face held a look of thoughtfulness.

"Don't go anywhere. I'm going to need you. What's your name?"

"Excuse me?!" She said as quietly and indignantly as she could manage while yanking her arm out of his grip.

"Your name," he demanded.

"Daphne, and you can't just tell me what to…"

"Listen. I'm going to go talk to him, or if need be, subdue him. But I want to question him, and I can't do that if Dumbledore gets to him first. Here." He pulled a bundle from within his robes and shoved it into her arms, ignoring her tirade. It was a roll of papers and a hat. A gag in the form of a silvery cloak had been tied around the brim. Who tied a gag on a hat? Oh, Merlin's beard!

"You stole the Sorting Hat!" She whispered in astonishment.

"He and I need to have a conversation. A very important one. Now, I need you to creep back into the corridor and stay there. When I call, come back out. Can you do that?" What the bloody hell did he think he was doing?! That was Sirius Black! Mass Murderer! They should be running for their lives! He could turn around and murder them in the blink of an eye!

Then she stopped and really thought about it. This was Harry Potter. She didn't believe half the stories about him, but she couldn't deny the pictures she'd seen with her own eyes in the Prophet, and the fact that he seemed so in command of the situation – utterly unfazed by the murderer he planned to confront.

Whether it was an effect of his presence, or something else, she wasn't sure, but she nodded her head.

"Good." Then he rose to full height and walked up the stairs, not even drawing his wand. Daphne scuttled back into the corridor but couldn't help peeking around the wall. He didn't trust Dumbledore, and he'd stolen not only the Sorting Hat but whatever this cloak was and several documents from the Headmaster's office as well, apparently all without being caught. Now he was going unarmed to speak to a prison escapee who was probably insane. Maybe, just maybe, those stories had some grain of truth to them after all.

"Mr Black, my name if Harry Potter. I'd like a word if you have the time," Harry called, stopping at the bottom of the stairs. Black, suddenly freezing in his arguing with the portrait, turned slowly around to stare at Harry with wide eyes. He didn't appear to have a wand either.

"James?" Black croaked, a look of utter glee crossing his face.

"I'm told he's my father, and that you're my Godfather. I'd love to speak with you," Harry said again. He took a step up towards the man, hands raised in the air. Daphne wondered how he could be so calm.

"No…Not James. He killed you… Wormtail, he took everything," Black muttered, the joyous expression becoming one of pain. She cringed. If that was what prolonged exposure to Dementors did to you, she almost felt sorry for him. Better to just throw him through the Veil.

"Wormtail? Who is Wormtail, Sirius?"

Black turned back to the portrait, muttering under his breath. Daphne could just hear the words.

"Inside. Need a password. Have to find him." Daphne frowned. They certainly sounded like the words of a madman, but not exactly the type of language she'd expected an insane murderer to say.

"Wormtail is inside the common room?" Harry asked, taking another step up. He lowered his hands.

"Yes," Black continued, "Find him. Show them it was him. Help Harry." He looked up at the Fat Lady, who looked partly petrified partly concerned. A sudden change seemed to come over him. He stood up straight and clasped his hands behind his back.

"Goldenlocks!" he proclaimed proudly. The Fat Lady shook her head softly.

"I'm sorry, Mr Black, that's not it either." Black slumped, his posture returning to the same state he'd been in before. Then he began to shake.

"Please open. PLEASE!" He shouted. His hand moved toward his pocket, and Daphne stifled a scream. The Fat Lady did not. She screamed so loudly her wine glass shattered, before bolting into the next frame. Harry was onto the man the next second. He flew, literally flew – whole body in the air – up the remaining stairs and slammed Black's head into the wall. He crumpled to the ground in a heap.

Harry lowered himself to the ground, but the damage was already done. All the paintings were yelling, and the Fat Lady was continuing her flight, hollering all the way.

"Daphne!" Harry called, voice rising an octave in what she could only describe as panic. Without thinking, she rushed to him. Harry picked Black up and slung him over the shoulder with seemingly no effort whatsoever. A kitchen knife fell from his robes, hitting the floor.

"Daphne," Harry said quickly, fright in his eyes, though his face maintained the outward calm. She was sure she didn't look as good. An alarm began to ring in the distance. "We have to hide him. And by 'we' I mean you."

"Me!"

"Yes. Dumbledore can't know I've got my shackle off, and he can't know I broke into his office. I need an alibi. I'll say I saw Black as he was attacking the Fat Lady and fought him until he ran off, but you've got to get him and those out of here." He looked her straight in the eyes, and she saw something in his deep emerald orbs. Was it desperation or determination? She couldn't be sure. Regardless, it was powerful, and, almost unwittingly, she found herself nodding.

"Do you have a place they won't think to search?"

"Yes. This way, quickly." She ran with him back down the stairs to the fifth floor. He didn't even break a sweat despite the fact he was carrying at minimum a sixty-kilo man, even if he was malnourished. She brought him to the Bathroom and spoke the password, leading them inside. Harry grinned, before locating a cupboard and shoving Black inside. He wriggled his fingers and the cabinet melted into the wall, a false one growing down from the roof to hide it. He stashed the hat, cloak and pages inside, then sealed it, leaving a tiny crack to allow air through.

"That'll do for now. Quickly, you need to return to your common room. Meet me back here tomorrow morning, got it?" Daphne nodded, and Harry pulled a silver manacle from his pocket. He sighed dramatically, before snapping it back on his wrist. Then he bolted out the door, leaving Daphne behind.


To Picky: Thanks for the praise! We really appreciate it! Harry is eating regularly, it's just that Ginny has to keep reminding him to do so. As someone who spent three years in boarding school, as bizarre at it might sound, if you often skip meals for long periods, you can simply forget that food is on offer when it's available. Also, remember that Harry isn't used to eating so much food, and it will take time for his metabolism to adjust.

As for Harry having a harem. It's not currently in the plans, though those can change as we haven't written the back half of this story yet. Regardless of whether Harry and Gabrielle get it on or not, Ginny and Gabrielle are going to develop a strong friendship – which will evolve into sisterhood – as the story progresses. Though neither of them feature in this chapter, the girls are the focus of the next one and the one after that, and it's here that you'll see their relationship start to progress. We aren't a big fan of love triangles – in most cases they feel forced and aren't very realistic – and have no desire to write one.

Finally, thanks for your congratulations, and we're very much looking forward to our Europe trip. And don't worry, we promise to be extra "careful." 😉

Regards, Ghost and Miracle.