A/N: HAPPY NEW YEAR to everyone!
Waldomier: you wrote I made a mistake, because I wrote Philosopher's Stone instead of Sorcerer's Stone. Just to inform you, Philosoper's Stone is the original name for the Sorcerer's stone – Rowling used Philosopher's Stone in the original British edition. Since I'm trying to stick to British English, I wanted to use the original name for the stone. Anyway, Harry cannot bring back his parents, because he can only bring back one person.
VeRyWiLdWiTcH: I'm glad I've given you a nice Christmas present!
moonys*gal: why don't you think he'll get it? You're a pessimist! Yesterday I had an exam at managing and I had to write examples for positive thinking. Well, you wouldn't be a good example, LOL!
Miss McIntyre: WHAT???? What makes you think Hungary is such a barbaric state? We are a democracy where human rights prevail! We don't even have death penalty, and no one gets his limbs cut off as a punishment! Have you mistaken Hungary for Afghanistan? Anyway, why would you like to see Draco in a pit with crocodiles? (just wondering)
SilverFirexz: read my answer to Verywildwitch! The same for you!
Anigurl88: sorry, the fic has to end soon (but there'll be a sequel!). No, the last word won't be scar. I have something much funnier in store for you!
mountainblossom: I never said Draco would show up in the pyramid! I only said you'd see him again. In the last chapter. The word you wrote as "imedietly" should be spelled as "immediately".
Meatball Head: no, the sequel isn't about Lily. She is only 1-2 years old in that one. The story will be about Harry, Hermione, Ginny, the others and… some new villains, of course.
PepsiAngel: you asked how I made up all that stuff. Well, it wasn't easy. I spent lots of summer nights without sleeping, thinking of the story-line, and then one night I got the idea of Snape bringing that recipe to Voldie on Dumbledore's order. I got so excited that I couldn't sleep at all that night!
sharliestar: you wanted to write "intertwine" :-) No, I'm never tired of answering reviews – it's fun! After the long, hard days of studying dull school stuff I sit down to my PC and answer them – it helps me relax.
Zenon Lee: I have actually forgotten about the Order of Merlin… and won't include it into the story, but you can imagine that they all got it! They deserve it, after all! About the sequel: it's in progress, though only three chapters are written, and I NEVER start to upload a story until it's totally ready, since I sometimes change things in the first chapter after having written the twentieth!
HP Blone Crazy Chick: write me your email-address and I'll write you how to upload your story on ffnet, okay?
Princess Backstreet: no, Neville didn't dream about Lily. Yes, Malfoy will be in it again. Three more chapters together with this one.
Super saya-jin gotan: you cannot kill one with the cruciatus curse, only with Avada Kedavra! (but a naked Trelawney would REALLY be terrible! :-)
Ariana Black: how did I come up with that? Read my answer to PepsiAngel. Besides that I have to give credit to my mother, without whom last chapter wouldn't have been as perfect as it was. I wrote 80% of it and she made the final touch, "refining" it. She is truly wonderful :-)
zzxm: what happened to Dudders and Milli? You'll see them again, be patient! Yeah, Ron really didn't have freckles in the movie, though I still found him bloody brilliant. The best actor of all.
IloveLinkinPark222: yes.
Ki-chan: thanks, I tried my best :-)
Jane: what? Neon green? Holy heavens! What would she look like with eyes looking like lightsabers??? (because Luke's saber is neon green) Lily's eyes are just plain emerald green. So, you got a computer for Xmas? That's great!
Sweet Princess Revenge: yeah, I think there can be "belated" Christmas. I remember when I was five, I got very ill right before Christmas and had to go to hospital. I was only released on 25th December (we in Hungary celebrate Christmas on 24th), and my family hadn't celebrated without me – they waited for me to come back from the hospital! Sweet, isn't it? So I guess there can be something like belated Christmas.
thebiggesthpfan: it's Nicholas, not Nickholas. Where did you read that Nicholas died 4-5 days after the stone was destroyed? Not in HP and the Sorcerer's Stone, for sure. Where then? I haven't read anything like that! About Dumbledore: I think he's always acting a little weird! How can he be willing to let Ginny or Cho die for Harry? Easily: he looked at the greater good: the loss of one or two lives was nothing compared to the death of millions (and Voldemort would have killed lots of people, had he not been stopped by Ginny's death). No, Harry can't save his parents: he can bring back ONLY ONE person with the torch.
teacherchez: bewitched me? Hmmmm… possible… :-)
Aya-Chan: I loved your little maths lesson, lol. My SW stories aren't worth reading – at least not AFTER my HP story. They are quite silly, IMHO, I'm ashamed of having written such sappy fics. No plot at all. (but I just didn't feel like taking them off ffnet – lazy, I am.) Anyway, feel free to email me!
jennyKT: yes, the bier look exactly like Snow White's :-) ((though Ginny won't be kissed to be revived – she'll be kissed afterwards))
Tsar: so, you don't want Harry to go back to school? Sorry, but he has to! He missed most of the last school year! (though he might be exempted from certain subjects like DADA, for example)
silverchocolate: complex imagination? Thanksssss (imagine a sound like the snake's in the zoo – just seen the movie in English! It's so much better than the Hungarian dubbed version!)
Cloudzi: no, the sequel won't be about Lily (she'll still be a small episode-character), though trust me to cook up something interesting for you in the sequel!
Mage: how did Voldie die? Well, as Dumbledore explained, a girl - deeply in love with Harry - had to sacrifice herself for him, and thus she'd bring about the destruction of the Dark Lord. (oh, and sorry for believing you were a girl! Really sorry!)
Toby Haine: I'll check out that story, thanks.
Chicory Tee: no, I don't play with Playstation. Never liked such stuff. Yes, I know the title of the fifth book, and can't wait for it! Will it come out during the summer?
X_Tow_Naga: the right word is "apparate". No, Harry cannot apparate right into the torch chamber – it'd be way too easy for him, wouldn't it? No, I haven't seen Thumb Wars, though it is surely very funny - what does Luke Skywalker look like as a thumb? Does he have blonde hair? And Chewie? Is he a furry thumb? And Yoda? Does he have funny ears? How can thumbs wield lightsabers? (this was a rhetorical question, but answer it if you can!)
lady nagini: truth be told I wanted to name my fic "HP and the green flame torch" at first, but then I changed my mind, because there were 5-6 stories on ffnet with that title, and I didn't want to copy anyone. (I haven't even read those fics). Anyway, I guess the actual title catches people's attention much easier, so it was the right choice to make, and I'm happy that I gave up the original title-idea.
Hermione/Nina/Ginny: OH, I'M SCARED NOW! (jk)
Lololo: you won't see Lily grow up – though you'll see her being 1-2 year old in the sequel. You asked the meaning of some abbreviations: btw = by the way, IMHO = in my humble opinion
Twink: you asked what was going to happen with Sunny when Harry comes back into her life. Well… I guess you are expecting great emotions, tears and jealousy. You won't get it. Sunny already has someone (you can say I'm totally crazy after having found out who that is…)
Okay, enjoy! (And forgive me for certain parts… I guess I've watched too much Indiana Jones and Relic Hunter…)
Chapter 32
The green flame torch
"…so I told him that he was famous enough to be photographed together with me. But of course he never became as famous as me, neither as handsome as me…"
"I see, Gildy." the girl chuckled, fondly examining the man's smooth features.
"Sunny!" a third voice yelled behind their backs.
They turned around to see a panting, excited boy with jet-black hair and those unmistakable glasses.
"Harry!" Gilderoy Lockhart and Anck-sun-Amun cried in surprise.
"Yeah… it's me." the newcomer gasped for breath. "I… I need your ring, Sunny."
"My… ring?" she raised an eyebrow.
"Yeah… that one with Adrien's thread." Harry nodded.
"Ariadne." the girl corrected. "Why do you need it?"
"'Cause… I've… I've got to go into the Great Pyramid." the boy explained.
"To use the torch?" Sunny asked excitedly.
"Exactly." Harry nodded. "Would you lend your ring to me? It's a matter of life and death! My fiancee… she's dead."
"Oh! Then she must be the girl who brought about the downfall of You-Know-Who!" Anck-sun-Amun perceived. "We heard about it yesterday!"
"Then will you help me?"
"Of course I will. But all I can help is give you the ring. I cannot go in there with you again." the girl replied.
"Yes, I know. Just give it to me." Harry gabbled, making nervous gestures.
"Here. Use it well. May it help you and your love." Sunny handed him the ring.
"Thanks." Harry took it and disapparated.
"He didn't even greet me!" Gilderoy expressed his indignation.
"Had I been in his place, I wouldn't have, either." she remarked. "You wanted to wipe his memory, dear."
"Ah, true." Lockhart shrugged. "I was such a bad boy… but I've matured since then. I've become more responsible and even more adorable…"
* * * * *
Harry made sure that no one (especially no Muggles) saw him, and stepped to the stone that had Isis' mark on it in the basement of the Great Pyramid. He knocked on it with his wand, and a secret gate opened with a hiss to reveal a dark passageway leading into the bowels of the building.
He had less than 20 hours until the gate would close for another 1000 years… there was no time to be wasted.
Harry entered the corridor, hearing the gate close behind him. He hoped he'd arrive back to it before it shut permanently.
He whispered Lumos, after tying the magical, unbreakable thread to a projection on the inner side of the gate, and started down the dimly lit corridor.
After eight or nine minutes of walk, the corridor narrowed to 30 inches in width.
The usually sandy ground got replaced by a floor made of bricks. All of them had signs engraved in them.
"Oh, heavens, I can't read the hieroglyphs!" Harry sighed. *Is this a trap? Am I supposed to step only on certain bricks? But which ones? On the eyes or on the serpents?* there were rocks with at least seven types of signs, but Harry was positive that either Isis or Apophys was the key to his riddle. *Oh, well… I have to risk… the torch can only be accessed by Parselmouths, so let's try the serpent mark!*
He tentatively placed his left foot on the nearest brick that had a snake-mark on it, trying to maintain his balance on his right leg as well, so that he could jump back if a hidden trapdoor opened for him to fall into.
The brick seemed to be able to sustain him, so he slowly placed all his weight on the left leg, now standing on one leg like a stork.
"Whew!" he let out the breath he had been holding, and looked for the next rock with the serpent mark.
He had almost crossed the narrow part of the corridor when he reached the last row of bricks from which he needed to choose one, in order to get out the 'minefield'.
"Okay, now, which one is the serpent?" he mused, pointing his wand downwards to illuminate the marks on the bricks. They were indistinct, as though the surface of the bricks had been washed away by a thousand-year-long flood, just like many bricks of the Great Sphinx.
Try as he might, Harry couldn't make out the signs. *Should I step on one of them, or rather levitate myself to the other side of the brick-field? Will I be cursed if I skip this?*
It was a difficult choice to make.
*Okay, fortune favours the brave.* he took a deep breath and stepped one of the bricks to the right.
It didn't sink to open a shaft – that was a good sign – and Harry managed to reach the end of the narrow part of the corridor… when he heard a whooshing noise.
"Aaaah!" he cried in horror and ducked as a spear bore into the wall just where his head had been a millisecond earlier.
"My gosh!" he clutched his chest to prevent his heart from jumping out. "Get a grip…" he whispered, "I'm still in one piece… though it was a near miss…"
He stood up, holding out his wand to illuminate the passageway in front of himself.
Soon Harry reached a fork, where he had to choose which rout to take. Some rats scurried under his feet, but he didn't care for them. He felt quite helpless: there was no sign on the walls to direct him, and to his greatest regret, there was no voice telling him the way now.
He reached into his pocket, pulling out his Moon Run Champion medal.
*In lack of coins, this will do. Heads or tails?* he threw the medal into the air, then let it fall on the ground to reveal the inscription 'Moon Run 1998'. "Tails, then." he breathed, pocketed the medal and started down the corridor to the left.
After twenty minutes he entered a lounge filled with eerie, blue light. Enchanting music came from somewhere, making Harry extremely drowsy. No wonder – he hadn't slept for about sixty hours.
"Cooome… coooooome…" a mysterious voice beckoned to him.
"Who's there?" he asked, looking around, seeing no person, only blue light and a bed with blue curtains. The speaker must have been hiding behind the curtain.
As Harry walked up to the bed, the curtains got magically pulled back to reveal a beautiful, exotic, Asian girl, lying naked on blue pillows.
"Cho!" the boy breathed, recognising her.
"Oh, yes, Harry, it's me!" the girl stretched out her hands for him, but Harry didn't budge.
"What are you doing here?" he asked, full of suspicion. "I heard you returned to China to open a McRice fast-food restaurant."
"But Harry…" she sat up, tossing her black locks behind her shoulder to expose her full breasts, "Harry, how could you ever believe that I left you? I always loved you… after Ced died, that is… you can't imagine how disappointed I was when I got to know about your liaison with Ginny Weasley… she never deserved you…" her voice was sweet, so was the scent of her nude body.
"Listen, Cho…" Harry began, but the woman stood up, stepping closer to him, her black-eyed stare diving into his green eyes. "You never, never really loved her…" she cooed, "it's me you loved… all along."
"It's you I loved…" he echoed her words.
"Good." she smiled, caressing his jaw-line, "And now… turn back… don't search for that torch… she isn't worth the trouble."
"She isn't worth…" Harry mumbled, mesmerised by her stare.
"Good boy… clever boy…" she pulled him closer for a kiss, but he suddenly cried out, jumping back from her embrace, massaging his ankle where a rat had bitten him just when Cho was about to kiss him.
"You damned rat!" he yelled as the small animal disappeared from sight. He saw stars from pain, but when he looked up again, his view was somehow clear again.
"You aren't Cho!" he exclaimed. "I don't know who or what you are, but the real Cho would never encourage me not to help Ginny! The real Cho never loved me, anyway!"
"Very clever." the woman nodded and changed into a serpent, and slithered away.
*It was a trap… and I almost fell into it…* Harry chastised himself. He was truly upset – he loved Ginny, not Cho!!! Not anymore, that is.
He saw a blue door at the opposite end of the lounge and walked over to it. The door was closed.
"Alohomora!" he said, but it didn't budge.
"Okay, then, open!" he demanded in Parseltounge, and the door slowly opened to reveal a small room with no corridor leading out of it. The room seemed to have only one door: that was the entrance and the exit at once.
In the middle of the room, there was a huge stone coffin.
Harry didn't see anything conspicuous on it – there were hieroglyphs, of course, but he didn't care for them, since he couldn't read them.
*Pity that Sunny couldn't come.* he thought bitterly. The girl would have been able to interpret all the funny signs.
He looked around once more to make sure that there was really no exit. He didn't see scripts on the walls, nor bricks that could have been pushed or turned to open a secret door. Nothing. Absolutely nothing, just bare walls and sand-stone floor.
*That coffin must have been put there on purpose.* Harry thought. *Maybe that's the solution… something must be in the coffin that will help me continue my way.*
He stepped closer, examining the cover of the coffin, trying to find out how to open it. Finally he chose to use the simplest levitation charm: "Wingardium Leviosa!" he pointed his wand at the coffin and its top shuddered, then lifted a bit, slipping to the side, falling on the floor with a thunderous thud that shattered the whole room.
Harry peered into the coffin and its inhabitant peered back at him.
The boy felt his blood freeze as a very unsympathetic guy, covered with bandages climbed out of his resting place.
Harry's mind reeled – trying to recall Professor Lupin's mummy-repelling spell. Shame that he hadn't paid better attention in that class back in November – but his mind had been on Ginny's pregnancy and its consequences, rather than listening to Ron's presentation on Egyptian curses and Lupin's explanation afterwards.
*If I die now, I'll never forgive myself for not paying attention to Lupin!* he swore as he backed against the door he had entered through. *It has to be here…* he groped for the doorknob, but all he felt was the wall.
The door had disappeared, and he was trapped in the room with a vicious mummy.
Too bad.
The mummy was gaining on him, its yellow eyes glinting, its bandaged hands threateningly in the air to strike down.
*What if it's just a boggart?* Harry mused. *Worth a try.* he pointed his wand at the mummy, imagining it stumble in its bandages, just like Parvati's boggart in third class.
"Ridikkulus!" he yelled, but nothing happened.
*No boggart, then.* he gulped, then with a sudden idea he levitated the coffin's top above the mummy, crushing it with the massive stone cover.
"Yesss!" he punched gleefully into the air, heading for the coffin to have a look at its insides. As he walked past the flattened mummy, something abruptly jerked his right leg from under him.
"Hey!" he fell facedown on the floor, trying to pull his leg free from the mummy's vice-like grip. "Let go!" he yelled, but the ugly fellow only growled at him. One could have guessed that it had no more sense than a mountain troll.
Harry struggled to get free, then pointed his wand backwards, shouting Rictusempra!. It had the required effect: the mummy doubled up with laughter under the coffin top, (anyone heard of a hysterically chortling mummy???) letting go of Harry's leg.
The boy jumped up, panting. While his attacker pummelled the floor with its bandaged fists, not being able to stop laughing, Harry ran to the coffin to peer into it.
To his greatest satisfaction, there were stairs leading downwards at the bottom of the coffin.
"No… heeheehee… you don't!…" the mummy giggled, throwing the stone from his back, heading for Harry, still viciously shaking from laughter.
"Aw… professor Lupin… why don't I rem…" Harry mumbled, then slapped his forehead. "That's it! Mankimummi Menacenomi!"
The spell took effect, and the attacker vanished.
Harry's way downstairs was free.
He illuminated the stairs with the small flame on the tip of his wand while walking down. He must have taken at least 200 steps when he heard something strange – a sizzling noise.
Another 20 steps later it became louder and another 15 steps later Harry stopped then jumped four steps upwards. He finally saw the source of the noise: the staircase ended in a corridor, the floor of which was covered with swarming black scarab-beetles.
Harry fought down the urge to shout – he didn't want to attract attention. (Though he didn't really think that the beetles were intelligent enough to recognise a human yelp.)
"Oh, well…" he mumbled, wrinkling his nose. "What are scarabs afraid of?… What did Ron say? Ah! Fire!"
He pointed his wand at the heap of disgusting beetles, saying Incendio!
In the next second the corridor filled with blazing fire and the beetles fled. Harry implemented an extinguishing charm and stepped down from the stairs.
As his legs touched the ground, the corridor shuddered, indicating a huge object making its way down the slightly sloping passageway.
"What the…?" Harry asked, but before he could finish the question, he already saw the answer: it was huge, round boulder almost of the same width as the corridor, rolling towards Harry.
"Oh, dear!" Harry exclaimed. He knew that if he didn't find out something in twenty seconds, he would end up as a pancake.
It was no rosy prospect.
"Impedimenta!" he yelled, only managing to slow down the boulder, this way gaining about eleven seconds before collision.
His mind raced with desperation. *The shield charm won't protect me against such a huge rock… nor would a patronus… if only I could change into a small animal now!*
But he was no animagus. At that moment – 40 feet away from the deadly boulder – it didn't occur to him to disapparate. Anyway, where should he apparate now – so close to his aim?…
…Because somehow he felt that he was close – not only to the rock, but to the chamber with the torch, too.
"Expelliarmus! Stupefy! Oh, no, it's not alive! Reducto!"
The reductor curse finally reached the required effect and the large rock burst into several pieces, stopping two metres from the boy. A bigger chunk, however, hit Harry in midsection, making him double up with pain. He almost lost his consciousness, falling to his knees. He was sure that at least three of his ribs had broken.
"I've… got to… stand up…" Harry gritted his teeth, forcing himself to continue his way.
He had to climb through the heap of littered rocks – with his broken ribs it felt like climbing the Mount Everest.
When he reached the ground again on the other side of the 'mountain', he was already seeing stars. His leg also hurt – the rat must have bitten a tendon, and the mummy's grip only worsened its condition.
He leaned against a wall to rest a bit – but the wall vanished from behind his back, and he fell backwards.
"Enough… is enough!" he hissed, hoping that his spine didn't break.
He tried to move his limbs – they all hurt, but it was a good sign: his backbone hadn't suffered a serious injury.
He rolled to his side, trying to prop himself with his arms to stand up… as he struggled, his stare fell on a pair of legs with huge claws.
He slowly lifted his head. He didn't feel like wrestling a dagger-toothed tiger in his present condition.
The legs with those enormous claws belonged to a sphinx.
"Ahem… hullo…" the boy greeted the half-lion, half-woman creature.
"Good day to you, too, young man." the sphinx smiled, her sky-blue eyes jovially glinting. "Don't be afraid, you don't have to fight with me. All you need to do is…"
"… solve a riddle." Harry finished the sentence, pushing himself into standing position.
"Exactly. If you can answer it, I'll make your way free into the adjacent room, which is the last one before the chamber of the Green Flame Torch. If you tell a wrong answer, I'll attack you. But if you keep silence, I'll let you go back the way you came here."
"Okay." the boy wiped his beading forehead, although even this small move made his chest ache as if being stabbed by a hundred lances. "Tell me your quiz."
Though it has two faces,
There's only one we know,
The other is hidden,
It's reluctant to show.
Although it seems tiny,
It commands ebb and tide,
Even the greatest light
It is able to hide.
"Well…" Harry furrowed his brow. "Two faces… not Professor Quirrel, is it?"
The sphinx gave him a questioning look.
"It wasn't guessing!" Harry added hastily. "I was just thinking aloud. Well… so it's tiny, but can conceal the greatest light…" he wished he hadn't been so tired to think. "The greatest light… the Sun, isn't it?" he looked at the sphinx for reassurance, but she only smiled (how typical of sphinxes, huh?)
"Well, the Sun, then… it can hide the Sun… and it commands ebb and tide… as far as I know, ebb and tide are in connection with the… Moon! Yeah!" his face lit up. "The Moon has two sides, but from Earth we can only see one! And it sometimes covers the Sun, making a solar eclipse!"
"Well done, young man." the sphinx nodded, and let him pass.
"Thanks." he smiled at the half-woman, half-lion, and entered the last room separating him from his destination.
There was nothing special in the room – only a transparent door could be seen in its opposite wall. Harry could see the green flames of the torch blazing through it.
Harry stepped to the door that was made of some kind of a crystal. "Strange…" he muttered." Last time the door wasn't translucent. Oh, well," he took a deep breath, imagining a snake, and said Open! in Parseltounge.
"It cannot be opened from outside." he heard a voice from behind his back.
He turned around to see a small, thin and bald man in a cloak.
"Wormtail!" he whispered.