A/N: Here's a bit of trivia for all you readers out there: Following logic, what year was Harry Potter born in? The answer and my evidence in my next posting.
Chapter 4
A Ghastly Evening
It took Ron all of about three minutes to realize he was no longer capable of speech and it took him no more than thirty seconds after that to realize he was incapable of making any sound at all. Lunch was marked by conversations about how delusional Andranos was, how much of an asshole he was, and the dishes shaking after Ron's fist soundlessly pounded the table in an effort for the rest of them to read the notes he kept scribbling out. Half way through the meal, Harry spotted Professor Moody walking through a side door, holding a raccoon by the scruff of it's neck, and straight over to where Dumbledore was sitting. He dropped it to the floor and pointed his wand at it, moments later Andranos rose from the floor. Moody had a few heated words with the headmaster before McGonagall and later Snape joined the fray. After a minute Dumbledore stood up looking more angry than he usually did but not exceptionally so. Snape, Moody, and McGonagall began barking at him in an obvious fury but in words Harry couldn't hear while Dumbledore stood with a stern look.
Andranos began to sporadically bark back at them but it had no impact on the verbal assault he was given. He moved his left hand to cover his right ear and whipped it away and held it above his head. He took in a deep breath and his torso lurched forward before a deafening roar filled the hall, sending everybody away from Andranos covering their ears. The roar paused for only a few moments as Andranos drew another breath. Suddenly, Dumbledore's head burst in to flames and as Harry looked around, everyone's hair was on fire. When the roar stopped, the fire on everyone's hair went out to reveal no damage, not even so much as a blackening. Andranos voice filled the hall as if a Howler saying, "If my intentions were as you insist, surely I would have done it a bit more clandestine," he paused for a minute to look at Moody," and if you ever do that again, worse things will happen to you. Now get the fuck out of my way Mood Man." The former Auror put his hand on Andranos' shoulder and said something Harry couldn't hear. The sorcerer's response to this was that he stretched both arms out in front of him, palms facing Moody, fingers pointed up. He then pulled his right arm back to his side with his palms still facing Moody and then suddenly jerked if forward. Moody flew across the room, rising up a few feet and slammed against the wall, sliding down when he hit it, apparently unconscious. Andranos jerked his head to look at Snape and McGonagall who immediately parted to let him through. He left the room with no further incident and was followed a few minutes later by Dumbledore.
That, coincidentally, is exactly the way to describe the rest of the week: no further incident. Neither Harry, Ron, nor Hermione saw even the slightest hint of Andranos. Even so, Harry decided to send a letter to 'Snuffles' describing in detail what he saw Andranos do, asking him for advice and generally what he should do about the situation. Yes, all was quiet, well, quiet as Hogwarts usually is. Hermione spent a lot of time in the library, surprise surprise, and when asked what she was doing, she said she was looking for references to sorcerers. On Saturday evening, after she threw a fit about not finding more than the meagerest bit about sorcerers, Hermione started pumping all of the wizard born kids in the Gryffindor common room for information.
There was a loud bang, which gave everyone a startle, followed by two more bangs. Three more bangs could be heard a minute later that was emanating from the entrance. Hermione went to open it muttering, "Now what has Malfoy done to him this time." Not more than two seconds after hearing the door creak open, there was a scream and Hermione came running back into the room and tripped over a chair holding her wand in her hand. A fetid odor filled the tower as a hideous…thing walked in. It was about four feet tall with grotesquely long arms and short legs. It's mouth was far too large to have ever closed completely and was filled with needle-like teeth. The tongue was whipping around inside and was obviously no more than an inch wide and at least a foot long, forked at the end. It had sickening gray skin that seemed to be covered in a thin slime, while its head, as well as its entire body was completely lacking in even the smallest trace of hair. It wore a feeble and worn loincloth covered in filth and in one of its clawed hands held a piece of parchment. The creature walked to the middle of the room and stared at the fireplace with it's dead, and hollow looking eyes and said in a wispy voice, "Paw…Ter. Gray…Jer."
Harry stood up and said, "I'm Potter." The creature turned and limped over to him. It pushed the parchment at Harry who took and read it aloud.
I would appreciate it if Mr. Harry Potter and
Ms. Hermione Granger please follow the
bearer of this note.
It wasn't signed, and it was written in what looked like Malfoy's handwriting. Hermione's immediately reaction was, "I'm not following this thing anywhere!" As soon as she said this, the creature grabbed Harry and latched onto his wrist, jumped across the room with Harry in tow and did the same thing to Hermione. It immediately bolted out the portal, dragging them behind him. Ron ran after it trying to throw hexes and curses at it. Harry shouted out for him to go and get help, but it was moving so fast down the halls the he didn't know where the help should come to. Doors flew by as the thing dragged them through the corridors and it became quite clear that it was carrying them to the dungeons. Ron set off to get help as he thought he saw McGonagall going through a doorway down the hall.
They eventually came to a stop in front of a door deep in the dungeons, the beast snarling as he stood in front of it for a moment before slamming it's head against the door three times. Harry could hear rustling inside before the door opened and Filch stuck his head out. He looked up and down the corridor and then down to them. Harry had wanted help but Filch was not what he had in mind. He and Filch stared at each other before an evil grin crept across his face, "Bit of a spot you're in, are you?"
"Don't just stand there Filch, let them in," a voice could be heard from within. "And you may go, see you Monday." The caretaker stepped aside to let them in and walked out of the room. "And shut the door!" The door shut behind them on it's own. "Be with you in a minute."
Harry looked around the room and was immediately reminded of the drug labs seen in movies. It had a huge granite table in the middle of the enormous room with beakers, flasks, condensers, burners and just about everything else one would imagine in a chemist's laboratory. They had bubbling liquids all through them, with steam bursting out in several places. At he foot of the table, there was a large chest that smelled strongly of dung right beside a large oven made of bricks. The walls were covered in shelves filled thousands of books and in those that weren't, there were all sorts of strange looking trinkets and devices. On the walls that didn't have any shelves, there were innumerable cages holding weird and exotic looking animals. Harry could have sworn he saw a skeleton hanging in the corner. "My god, Doctor Frankenstein is living in the basement," Hermione said as she glanced around. The creature that brought them there was standing just in front of the door, staring at the wall, stupidly.
Andranos walked in through another doorway with a white cream covering his head and a straight razor in his hand. "I see you decided not to heed my note," he said as he came over to them. He turned to face the beast, slapped it hard across the face and yelled, "Slave! Release Them!" It let go of them immediately and slunk off into a corner. Andranos walked over to a mirror and began to shave his head as he started talking to Harry. "Please, don't mind my Ghast, he wont do anything unless he gets really pissed off or I tell him to. Now the reason I asked you two to come down here, is that I would like you to tell me what you can about this world of yours. Particularly, tell me what you can about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named."
With a fire in her eyes, Hermione stepped forward and said, "I would have thought that you of all people would not be afraid to say his name, and why don't you just ask the Syltherins?"
"That's just the thing, I don't know what his name is. I've only ever heard people refer to him as He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and You-Know-Who and as for the Slytherins, let me see how I can say thins simply and effectively, they are a bunch of pricks."
This time, Harry stepped up and said, "His name is Lord Voldemort, and he is a Foul, Evil Dark wizard." He then proceeded to describe to Andranos, in as much detail as he could manage, about Voldemort's exploits. When he was finished, all Andranos said in response was "Hmmm. Shows promise."
Just then, Professor Snape burst through the door, didn't even notice Harry and Hermione standing in the room, charged right up Andranos and said in a fury, "What have I told you about letting that creature loose in the school! The headmaster is searching the entire building after Weasley burst into his office screaming about that thing bursting into Gryffindor tower and snatching two students!"
Andranos put two fingers up to his temple and mumbled a few words before Snape stumbled back, let out a yelp and ran out of the room. The sorcerer walked over to the door and pointed down the hallway before yelling, "Slave! Sic Him!" He started to make his way back over to where he was when they came in and said, "Thank you for the information, you may go now."
