Chapter 12: Find the Shadow
The next day, he woke up early in the morning again. His mind was on Cho, and on the fact that she wanted to help him with his search on the Shadow of Darkness. But now that he had woken up, he couldn't fall asleep again, he was not sleepy at all. His eyelids fought to stay open, so he decided to do as his body wanted and stay awake. But it was too early to do anything yet -- everyone was sleeping at that time...
He looked out of the window. The sun was shining on the sky, and Harry guessed that it was not even seven o'clock yet. He had two more hours until classes would start. So what could he do in this time?
It was only one place he could remember, a place that he liked spending hours at. He went out of the Gryffindor tower, on his way to the Hogwarts Grounds, thinking about spending his morning near the lake.
His worries were becoming less painful and haunting that morning... He was sure that he and Cho could find information about the Shadow of Darkness... It was no doubt in saying that she was smarter than Hermione, because she was in Ravenclaw, and that was a good thought...
As he was going downstairs, the silence was disturbed by a small movement that seemed close. Not more than five seconds passed until Harry found himself facing Snape himself... Having a talk with Snape was enough to destroy a pleasant morning, so he just decided to Ignore him and go downstairs. He had no idea of inventing an excuse for walking on the corridors before students were allowed.
"Potter..."
But Harry did as he planned, and didn't pay attention to Snape, trying to leave him behind.
"Potter, this is enough! Come with me!"
But, even though he didn't know why, Harry continued ignoring Snape and acting like Snape was invisible.
"Right. You may pack, Potter, I'll make sure that you'll be expelled! I've got TWO reasons to do so... not to forget all the rulebreaking you did in your previous years..."
Harry wanted to stop and talk to Snape, but a part of him decided to go to the lake. It didn't feel like any dark spell that told him to go -- he got used with the feeling by then -- more than once did he feel like he was controlled by something stronger than an Imperius, but he managed to fight it. This time he couldn't...
He heard Snape leaving the staircases and going to a hall that lead to Dumbledore's office, but by that time, Harry left the stairs heading to the Entrance Hall.
He slowly walked to the lake, looking at the bringht sun that was shining proudly in the sky. It was the end of September, and even though the winter was closing, it was not cold outside yet; though it was colder than the previous days. The grass on the grounds was starting to wither.
The only thing that remained the same, except the castle building, was the lake. It was the same wonderful water that reflected everything and the same place where Harry could relax and wait for hours without realizing how the time passed.
He sat on the grass near the lake and just looked at the castle, looking for any sign of movement. But nothing was disturbing the silence around it; the only sound Harry could hear was the water moving. Not any sign of wind, not even an animal moving in the Forbidden Forest...
His mind immediately went to the Shadow of Darkness again.
He couldn't decide what that spell was, mainly because he knew nothing about it... except the fact that the name sounded extremely familiar. He felt like the information about the spell was sitting on his tongue, ready to be said, but on the other part, they weren't even close.
And the fact that it was not mentioned in any book could mean only three things: either it didn't exist, it was so old that everyone forgot about it or maybe it was too evil for anyone to write and they wanted to hide it.
After giving a thought about every possibility, he thought he could never get it -- not alone, not with any help from his friends. He would need some help from outside, like Dumbledore... or...
Sirius!
Harry hadn't written to Sirius for a long time, and he was the best to ask about the Shadow of Darkness from all the people he knew... Harry didn't know why, but he felt like Dumbledore would not know anything about the spell --
His mind immediately stopped from thinking that. What could have made him think that Dumbledore didn't know it? Asking him was surely the best option there was.
The next ten minutes he kept arguing with another part of himself about who he would ask -- and then he decided that it was the best thing if he would ask both Dumbledore and Sirius... but that was after he finished searching the restricted section, that was for sure. He intended to find it himself, and only with a little help from his friends.
At last, after staying near the lake for about an hour, he heard something moving.
He had frozen -- what if it was the Death Eater again? He had no protection, and he didn't have his -- or better said, Avery's -- invisibility cloak with him...
Just praying that it was nothing bad, and that it was just a bird, Harry slowly turned his head back.
"Harry!" he heard a surprised voice.
"Cho!" he answered, assuring himself that it was nothing to be scared about. This reminded him of the summer, when something similar happened but the person who frightened him was Dumbledore.
"What are you doing here?" Cho asked.
"Well, just woke up a bit earlier today..."
"Do you have any idea why Snape is that angry? I've met him and he seemed so angry... hurried through the corridors, he did."
Harry was looking at Cho with a guilty face.
"What?" she asked.
"Well, it's me why he's so angry."
"Oh," she said, her voice fading a bit. SHe paused to think, and then continued, "What did you do this time, rulebreaker?"
"It's pretty obvious," Harry answered, "He found me on the stairs this morning."
"Well, if it was morning, well there is no rule about not walking on the corridors in the morning..." she said, looking at Harry, who didn't answer. "Or... was it something else?"
Harry didn't want to tell her that he ignored Snape when he told him to stop, but after a few seconds, he gave up keeping it secret and told her the whole story.
They sat together and looked at the lake, and both of them enjoyed it. And another question popped in Harry's mind...
"And what are you doing here?" he asked.
"Oh, well, I use to come here most of the days... I don't come here only when there is something stopping me." She then looked at Harry, and he understood that she came here because she liked the same feeling he got everytime he went to the lake and sat in fromt of him. "I like it very much," she added a little seconds after.
"Yes, I guess I know what you mean," said Harry.
Both of them enjoyed their little time near the lake, and when the time had come so they had to go to the Great Hall for breakfast, they walked to the castle, talking about the lake. Harry found out that Cho started visiting the lake in her third year, and then Cho brought, for the first time in that year, about Cedric.
"I used to meet him in this place sometimes," Cho said. "Last year... I spent many mornings with him near this lake... He used to have the same feeling when he came to the lake and watched the small waves done by the giant squid forming in its middle..."
Bringing the subject of Cedric brought back Harry's guilt about his death. He had forgotten him lately completely, but now the feeling was back. Despite Harry's mood, Cho didn't look sad when she talked about Cedric. That confused Harry a bit. If he felt bad because Cedric died, why would Cho not feel as he did?
That made Harry feel like asking her if she missed Cedric. But, when he gave a second thought about it, it looked the most stupid thing he ever considered saying.
They parted when they came in the Great Hall, because they had to go to their different house tables. They agreed that they would meet after the breakfast and that she would go and ask Flitwick if he could give permossions to four students. Even though it seemed a bit ridiculous, Cho just kept assuring Harry that there would be no problem in getting them.
When Harry found his usual seat near Ron and Hermione, and both of them gave him a suspicious stare. Being looked at as if he were forbidden to enter the Great Hall, he asked his friends, "What?"
Ron and Hermione looked at each other. They nodded, and then asked, "What were you diong with Cho at this time?"
"Er -- Nothing. We just met at the lake... didn't feel like sleeping and then I -- I met her there." Unfortunately, Neither Ron nor Hermione seemed to believe him. "Oh come on! Why would I lie to you?"
"Well, there may be reasons," answered Hermione.
"Well, there is nothing now." Seeing that Ron and Hermione still thought that he wasn't telling the truth, he tried to change the subject, and whispered, "Well, everything's set up. We'll meet Cho after we eat and then she will manage to get four permissions, for all of us. We'll find out what the Shadow of Darkness is, no matter what."
"I hope so," said Ron.
The breakfast seemed so long when Harry just wanted it to end. He couldn't not accept that he half wanted it only to meet Cho, but his primaty desire was to find what the Shadow of Darkness was. He told himself that, anyway, he would go to the lake the next morning, too.
"What did you do at the lake with Cho?" asked Ron.
"Talked."
"Well, ok," said Ron but with a voice that told Harry that he was unsure of that.
"Don't believe me if you don't want to," said Harry. He wasn't hiding anything, why would he do it? And why did Ron think that Harry didn't tell the truth?
"Oh come on, Harry," said Ron, "We know you like Cho -- it's obvious --"
"I did not deny that, know that I never did. But, damn it, Ron, Understand that we did nothing except than talked! She isn't my girlfriend!"
Seeing that ron still didn't seem to beliebve him, Harry got a bit angry and took his wand, not knowing what he was doing. "Serpensortia," he whispered, and then a huge snake was created by the wand, doing a back flip in the air. Almost everyone's vision turned to Harry and the snake. Ron's face immediately showed a look of terror, watching the snake cautiously. He seemed lost, that was Harry's time of setting the snake on him --
What was he doing?
That was the first question he asked himself.
He didn't want to attack Ron, or did he? Of course he didn't. That felt the most strange of all -- how could he WANT to attack Ron, without the familiar -- by now -- feeling of being controlled by somebody?
That was impossible. He still felt like telling the snake to attack Ron -- but all he told the snake was, "Wait." He had to fight himself before telling the snake to attack or to stay -- he had enough time.
When he convinced himself that Ron wsan't an enemy, and that he was his friend -- his BEST friend actually -- he told the snake, "Get out of the Hall and live in the forest until the spell effects are diminished." That was all he could say, not knowing a good snake-killing spell.
The thing that gave everyone a chill on their spine was the fact that in the way of going out of the castle, the snake had to pass right near Ron. Some teachers went forward to finish the snake but Dumbledore stopped them. He seemed to know what the snake was going to do.
Everyone's terror slowly faded off when the snake was heading to the double doors. After it exited the Great Hall, Harry started thinking of what he did. That was surely going to make him a lot of trouble. Almost attacking a student was not good at all, and lucky that he didn't tell the snake to do anything to ron more than hiss -- that couldn've expelled him with no comment.
But, still, in his heart, he still felt like wanting to do something to Ron. Being able to control himself, he sat on the chair, while everyone was still looking at him as if he was a flesh-eating monster.
Everyone continued their breakfast, the teachers did that too; no one was hurt in that time when Harry seemed to lose himself. "There's something fishy here," Harry could hear Ron whispering to Hermione.
"I know," said Harry while both Ron and Hermione jumped; Harry wasn't supposed to hear that. "You know, Ron, I didn't mean to -- it was like I was controlled by a darker part of myself..." and that was where Harry almost fell down to the floor. It was a very painful feeling, everything that happened lately pointed that he would turn out to be a dark wizard, and when he said about a darker part of himself, everything bad that happened lately in himself seemed to be recalled in his memory.
He forced a sit on the chair.
"No, you're not going to turn dark," he heard a comforting voice from his back. Who other could comfort him better than Cho did?
Harry saw Dumbledore sitting pleased and continuing eating at the staff's table.
"Come, let's go to Flitwick," said Cho, and Harry agreed.
Ron and Hermione looked at each other, nodded to themselves and said that they still hadn't finished breakfast. Harry knew that they didn't do that because of eating -- they didn't seem hungry anyway -- but to give Harry and Cho a few time to spend together.
Harry was starting to get annoyed when he saw that Neither Ron nor Hermione seemed to believe Harry when he said that Cho wasn't his girlfriend. Not that he didn't want her to be...
The both of them went to the staff table, where Flitwick was sitting and waiting for the breakfast to end. Harry let Cho go first, and then Flitwick said, "Good morning, Miss Chang! May I help you?"
"Yes, professor." Harry was praying that all four of them would recieve permissions. "I wanted to ask you if you will allow me, Harry, and his two friends to go to the restricted section." Flitwick looked at Cho quite confused, certainly asking himself what was Cho up to. "We're... looking for a dark spell that can't be found in any book of the normal library."
"If there is nothing about the spell, either it does not exist, Miss Chang, or it is so dark that students shouldn't know of it."
"We need to do it --"
"Maybe only for you, Miss Chang, but it'll be impossible to get you all permissions."
That was not going as Harry wanted it to be, and neither as Cho planned. It was his time to talk, or he would never find anything about the Shadow of Darkness.
"Professor," said Harry a bit more hastily and with a more convincing voice, "I need to know about that spell." Pausing a few seconds, he added, "It's vital."
"Maybe I know about that spell, try me," Flitwick continued.
"The Shadow of Darkness," said Harry even though he didn't want to say it. He wondered what Flitwick would say because he talked as if he was talking to one of the students.
"Ooohhhhh," said Flitwick, thinking. "Hmmmm I don't think I know of any spell like this," he said slowly. "I know how troubled you are, Mr. Potter, Dumbledore told me; for that, I will allow you two to go to the restricted section to start your search. I guess it's no damage if I'll tell Madam Irma Pince that you'll go to the library..."
"But, professor! It'll take the two of us too much time with the search -- Why don't you let Ron and Hermione come too?" asked Harry.
"Well, Mr. Potter, if you really want it that much, I'll do it. Come with me -- I'll talk to Irma personally. Follow me."
Harry called Ron and Hermione and they all followed Flitwick to the library, where Madam Pince was signing something for some new books. He called her, but when he told her that he wanted to allow four students in the restricted section, she jumped like burned.
"Filius, You know we cannot allow all of them in -- for a reason like that!"
"But, Irma, it's very important," said Flitwick, not giving up. "That may be vital to Harry Potter, it is about --"
"Well, well, good, I will let them in. It's not the same as allowing ordinary students in -- one of them is Harry Potter, Mrs. Granger is on top of each class, Mrs. Chang is almost like Mrs. Granger, and... well... their friend, yes, they may go."
Harry couldn't tell how eased he felt when he heard that they were allowed to go to the restricted section of the library -- he felt like hugging Madam Pince and Professor Flitwick because they allowed him to go. Then, together with Hermione, Ron and Cho, he started searching for an unusual book where he could find an unusual spell.
The search didn't start succesful, though Harry told them to not give up; and they didn't complain about that. Harry was sitting on front of a bookshelf, which he wanted to search entirely. Hermione took an entire corner of the library to search in, Cho searched in the entire library for titles that sounded more like the type of the book they were looking for, while Ron was slowly talking a book from a nearby shelf from time to time. But, still, none of them was even close to giving up -- everything was too good now that they were allowed to come in the library.
Everytime they saw any of the words "shadow" and "darkness", they would jump and think that they found it. But, even though they met these words in lots of books, they hadn't seen the words used together. And even though it looked so useless, they still continued searching, and Harry every now and then left his eyes from the books and looked at Cho.
"It is stupid searching for a spell that isn't recorded anywhere -- I bet Malfoy knew everything and sent us wrong information," said Hermione. Harry was very surprised about that, because it was not normal for Hermione to say things like that -- they hadn't searched the entire library yet.
They searched in the library for several hours. They had a break for lunch("At last, I'm starving," said Ron) and then they went back("Oh no!"). Harry didn't want to give up; not now when he managed to enter in the restricted section. Cho seemed to support him, and told Ron to "Just search and keep quiet". Hermione was acting more like usual self now, and didn't say anything about leaving the library.
That day was entirely spent at the library. Being saturday, they had nothing else beter to do, and this was the best thing they could do in the present.
Harry could keep hearing Ron talking to himself and asking what got into him. Harry admitted that it was not his usual self to spend an entire day in the library, but the memories of himself getting dark were very annoying.
"Do you think it is worth spending a few months searching for something that doesn't exist?" asked Ron when it was close to midnight. "This restricted section is... huge!!!"
"More than huge," added Harry, "But this is the only thing we can do now."
Seeing that Harry didn't want to give up, Ron stopped objecting and took a tome from a nearby shelf. But, instead of searching, he was just pretending to do it. Harry didn't want to tell Ron anything bad, to cause him have a bad mood again. It was just that day when Harry almost set a snake on him, and he didn't want to have problems with his friend.
That day passed with no other incident. Ron still didn't want to read anything, and Harry had nothing to say to make him read -- he knew everything he would do would be in vain.
When he was in his bed waiting to fall asleep, he remembered what he proposed that morning. He really felt like writing a letter to Sirius -- he hadn't written anything to Sirius lately anyway, so he just thought about what he could possibly write -- because nothing came to his mind except for the worst things, that would worry Sirius very much. Harry wouldn't blame him, though, because it was very strange to have a godson who worries that much of turning dark.
Thinking of that, he remembered the accident with Ron again...
And then he remembered how he felt like something dark posessed him. But that was just a stupid constatation, wasn't it? He was just too angry because Ron told Harry that Cho was his...
...girlfriend.
That brought Cho back to his mind, thinking that it wouldn't be bad of Cho would be his girlfriend; but he thought it was a bit... he didn't know how to tell the feeling he had, he just didn't feel like they were meant to be together. And Cedric... Cho surely missed him, how could Cho like Harry after all what happened only three months ago?
But that was a question with an answer that would soon appear...
The next day, he woke up early in the morning again. His mind was on Cho, and on the fact that she wanted to help him with his search on the Shadow of Darkness. But now that he had woken up, he couldn't fall asleep again, he was not sleepy at all. His eyelids fought to stay open, so he decided to do as his body wanted and stay awake. But it was too early to do anything yet -- everyone was sleeping at that time...
He looked out of the window. The sun was shining on the sky, and Harry guessed that it was not even seven o'clock yet. He had two more hours until classes would start. So what could he do in this time?
It was only one place he could remember, a place that he liked spending hours at. He went out of the Gryffindor tower, on his way to the Hogwarts Grounds, thinking about spending his morning near the lake.
His worries were becoming less painful and haunting that morning... He was sure that he and Cho could find information about the Shadow of Darkness... It was no doubt in saying that she was smarter than Hermione, because she was in Ravenclaw, and that was a good thought...
As he was going downstairs, the silence was disturbed by a small movement that seemed close. Not more than five seconds passed until Harry found himself facing Snape himself... Having a talk with Snape was enough to destroy a pleasant morning, so he just decided to Ignore him and go downstairs. He had no idea of inventing an excuse for walking on the corridors before students were allowed.
"Potter..."
But Harry did as he planned, and didn't pay attention to Snape, trying to leave him behind.
"Potter, this is enough! Come with me!"
But, even though he didn't know why, Harry continued ignoring Snape and acting like Snape was invisible.
"Right. You may pack, Potter, I'll make sure that you'll be expelled! I've got TWO reasons to do so... not to forget all the rulebreaking you did in your previous years..."
Harry wanted to stop and talk to Snape, but a part of him decided to go to the lake. It didn't feel like any dark spell that told him to go -- he got used with the feeling by then -- more than once did he feel like he was controlled by something stronger than an Imperius, but he managed to fight it. This time he couldn't...
He heard Snape leaving the staircases and going to a hall that lead to Dumbledore's office, but by that time, Harry left the stairs heading to the Entrance Hall.
He slowly walked to the lake, looking at the bringht sun that was shining proudly in the sky. It was the end of September, and even though the winter was closing, it was not cold outside yet; though it was colder than the previous days. The grass on the grounds was starting to wither.
The only thing that remained the same, except the castle building, was the lake. It was the same wonderful water that reflected everything and the same place where Harry could relax and wait for hours without realizing how the time passed.
He sat on the grass near the lake and just looked at the castle, looking for any sign of movement. But nothing was disturbing the silence around it; the only sound Harry could hear was the water moving. Not any sign of wind, not even an animal moving in the Forbidden Forest...
His mind immediately went to the Shadow of Darkness again.
He couldn't decide what that spell was, mainly because he knew nothing about it... except the fact that the name sounded extremely familiar. He felt like the information about the spell was sitting on his tongue, ready to be said, but on the other part, they weren't even close.
And the fact that it was not mentioned in any book could mean only three things: either it didn't exist, it was so old that everyone forgot about it or maybe it was too evil for anyone to write and they wanted to hide it.
After giving a thought about every possibility, he thought he could never get it -- not alone, not with any help from his friends. He would need some help from outside, like Dumbledore... or...
Sirius!
Harry hadn't written to Sirius for a long time, and he was the best to ask about the Shadow of Darkness from all the people he knew... Harry didn't know why, but he felt like Dumbledore would not know anything about the spell --
His mind immediately stopped from thinking that. What could have made him think that Dumbledore didn't know it? Asking him was surely the best option there was.
The next ten minutes he kept arguing with another part of himself about who he would ask -- and then he decided that it was the best thing if he would ask both Dumbledore and Sirius... but that was after he finished searching the restricted section, that was for sure. He intended to find it himself, and only with a little help from his friends.
At last, after staying near the lake for about an hour, he heard something moving.
He had frozen -- what if it was the Death Eater again? He had no protection, and he didn't have his -- or better said, Avery's -- invisibility cloak with him...
Just praying that it was nothing bad, and that it was just a bird, Harry slowly turned his head back.
"Harry!" he heard a surprised voice.
"Cho!" he answered, assuring himself that it was nothing to be scared about. This reminded him of the summer, when something similar happened but the person who frightened him was Dumbledore.
"What are you doing here?" Cho asked.
"Well, just woke up a bit earlier today..."
"Do you have any idea why Snape is that angry? I've met him and he seemed so angry... hurried through the corridors, he did."
Harry was looking at Cho with a guilty face.
"What?" she asked.
"Well, it's me why he's so angry."
"Oh," she said, her voice fading a bit. SHe paused to think, and then continued, "What did you do this time, rulebreaker?"
"It's pretty obvious," Harry answered, "He found me on the stairs this morning."
"Well, if it was morning, well there is no rule about not walking on the corridors in the morning..." she said, looking at Harry, who didn't answer. "Or... was it something else?"
Harry didn't want to tell her that he ignored Snape when he told him to stop, but after a few seconds, he gave up keeping it secret and told her the whole story.
They sat together and looked at the lake, and both of them enjoyed it. And another question popped in Harry's mind...
"And what are you doing here?" he asked.
"Oh, well, I use to come here most of the days... I don't come here only when there is something stopping me." She then looked at Harry, and he understood that she came here because she liked the same feeling he got everytime he went to the lake and sat in fromt of him. "I like it very much," she added a little seconds after.
"Yes, I guess I know what you mean," said Harry.
Both of them enjoyed their little time near the lake, and when the time had come so they had to go to the Great Hall for breakfast, they walked to the castle, talking about the lake. Harry found out that Cho started visiting the lake in her third year, and then Cho brought, for the first time in that year, about Cedric.
"I used to meet him in this place sometimes," Cho said. "Last year... I spent many mornings with him near this lake... He used to have the same feeling when he came to the lake and watched the small waves done by the giant squid forming in its middle..."
Bringing the subject of Cedric brought back Harry's guilt about his death. He had forgotten him lately completely, but now the feeling was back. Despite Harry's mood, Cho didn't look sad when she talked about Cedric. That confused Harry a bit. If he felt bad because Cedric died, why would Cho not feel as he did?
That made Harry feel like asking her if she missed Cedric. But, when he gave a second thought about it, it looked the most stupid thing he ever considered saying.
They parted when they came in the Great Hall, because they had to go to their different house tables. They agreed that they would meet after the breakfast and that she would go and ask Flitwick if he could give permossions to four students. Even though it seemed a bit ridiculous, Cho just kept assuring Harry that there would be no problem in getting them.
When Harry found his usual seat near Ron and Hermione, and both of them gave him a suspicious stare. Being looked at as if he were forbidden to enter the Great Hall, he asked his friends, "What?"
Ron and Hermione looked at each other. They nodded, and then asked, "What were you diong with Cho at this time?"
"Er -- Nothing. We just met at the lake... didn't feel like sleeping and then I -- I met her there." Unfortunately, Neither Ron nor Hermione seemed to believe him. "Oh come on! Why would I lie to you?"
"Well, there may be reasons," answered Hermione.
"Well, there is nothing now." Seeing that Ron and Hermione still thought that he wasn't telling the truth, he tried to change the subject, and whispered, "Well, everything's set up. We'll meet Cho after we eat and then she will manage to get four permissions, for all of us. We'll find out what the Shadow of Darkness is, no matter what."
"I hope so," said Ron.
The breakfast seemed so long when Harry just wanted it to end. He couldn't not accept that he half wanted it only to meet Cho, but his primaty desire was to find what the Shadow of Darkness was. He told himself that, anyway, he would go to the lake the next morning, too.
"What did you do at the lake with Cho?" asked Ron.
"Talked."
"Well, ok," said Ron but with a voice that told Harry that he was unsure of that.
"Don't believe me if you don't want to," said Harry. He wasn't hiding anything, why would he do it? And why did Ron think that Harry didn't tell the truth?
"Oh come on, Harry," said Ron, "We know you like Cho -- it's obvious --"
"I did not deny that, know that I never did. But, damn it, Ron, Understand that we did nothing except than talked! She isn't my girlfriend!"
Seeing that ron still didn't seem to beliebve him, Harry got a bit angry and took his wand, not knowing what he was doing. "Serpensortia," he whispered, and then a huge snake was created by the wand, doing a back flip in the air. Almost everyone's vision turned to Harry and the snake. Ron's face immediately showed a look of terror, watching the snake cautiously. He seemed lost, that was Harry's time of setting the snake on him --
What was he doing?
That was the first question he asked himself.
He didn't want to attack Ron, or did he? Of course he didn't. That felt the most strange of all -- how could he WANT to attack Ron, without the familiar -- by now -- feeling of being controlled by somebody?
That was impossible. He still felt like telling the snake to attack Ron -- but all he told the snake was, "Wait." He had to fight himself before telling the snake to attack or to stay -- he had enough time.
When he convinced himself that Ron wsan't an enemy, and that he was his friend -- his BEST friend actually -- he told the snake, "Get out of the Hall and live in the forest until the spell effects are diminished." That was all he could say, not knowing a good snake-killing spell.
The thing that gave everyone a chill on their spine was the fact that in the way of going out of the castle, the snake had to pass right near Ron. Some teachers went forward to finish the snake but Dumbledore stopped them. He seemed to know what the snake was going to do.
Everyone's terror slowly faded off when the snake was heading to the double doors. After it exited the Great Hall, Harry started thinking of what he did. That was surely going to make him a lot of trouble. Almost attacking a student was not good at all, and lucky that he didn't tell the snake to do anything to ron more than hiss -- that couldn've expelled him with no comment.
But, still, in his heart, he still felt like wanting to do something to Ron. Being able to control himself, he sat on the chair, while everyone was still looking at him as if he was a flesh-eating monster.
Everyone continued their breakfast, the teachers did that too; no one was hurt in that time when Harry seemed to lose himself. "There's something fishy here," Harry could hear Ron whispering to Hermione.
"I know," said Harry while both Ron and Hermione jumped; Harry wasn't supposed to hear that. "You know, Ron, I didn't mean to -- it was like I was controlled by a darker part of myself..." and that was where Harry almost fell down to the floor. It was a very painful feeling, everything that happened lately pointed that he would turn out to be a dark wizard, and when he said about a darker part of himself, everything bad that happened lately in himself seemed to be recalled in his memory.
He forced a sit on the chair.
"No, you're not going to turn dark," he heard a comforting voice from his back. Who other could comfort him better than Cho did?
Harry saw Dumbledore sitting pleased and continuing eating at the staff's table.
"Come, let's go to Flitwick," said Cho, and Harry agreed.
Ron and Hermione looked at each other, nodded to themselves and said that they still hadn't finished breakfast. Harry knew that they didn't do that because of eating -- they didn't seem hungry anyway -- but to give Harry and Cho a few time to spend together.
Harry was starting to get annoyed when he saw that Neither Ron nor Hermione seemed to believe Harry when he said that Cho wasn't his girlfriend. Not that he didn't want her to be...
The both of them went to the staff table, where Flitwick was sitting and waiting for the breakfast to end. Harry let Cho go first, and then Flitwick said, "Good morning, Miss Chang! May I help you?"
"Yes, professor." Harry was praying that all four of them would recieve permissions. "I wanted to ask you if you will allow me, Harry, and his two friends to go to the restricted section." Flitwick looked at Cho quite confused, certainly asking himself what was Cho up to. "We're... looking for a dark spell that can't be found in any book of the normal library."
"If there is nothing about the spell, either it does not exist, Miss Chang, or it is so dark that students shouldn't know of it."
"We need to do it --"
"Maybe only for you, Miss Chang, but it'll be impossible to get you all permissions."
That was not going as Harry wanted it to be, and neither as Cho planned. It was his time to talk, or he would never find anything about the Shadow of Darkness.
"Professor," said Harry a bit more hastily and with a more convincing voice, "I need to know about that spell." Pausing a few seconds, he added, "It's vital."
"Maybe I know about that spell, try me," Flitwick continued.
"The Shadow of Darkness," said Harry even though he didn't want to say it. He wondered what Flitwick would say because he talked as if he was talking to one of the students.
"Ooohhhhh," said Flitwick, thinking. "Hmmmm I don't think I know of any spell like this," he said slowly. "I know how troubled you are, Mr. Potter, Dumbledore told me; for that, I will allow you two to go to the restricted section to start your search. I guess it's no damage if I'll tell Madam Irma Pince that you'll go to the library..."
"But, professor! It'll take the two of us too much time with the search -- Why don't you let Ron and Hermione come too?" asked Harry.
"Well, Mr. Potter, if you really want it that much, I'll do it. Come with me -- I'll talk to Irma personally. Follow me."
Harry called Ron and Hermione and they all followed Flitwick to the library, where Madam Pince was signing something for some new books. He called her, but when he told her that he wanted to allow four students in the restricted section, she jumped like burned.
"Filius, You know we cannot allow all of them in -- for a reason like that!"
"But, Irma, it's very important," said Flitwick, not giving up. "That may be vital to Harry Potter, it is about --"
"Well, well, good, I will let them in. It's not the same as allowing ordinary students in -- one of them is Harry Potter, Mrs. Granger is on top of each class, Mrs. Chang is almost like Mrs. Granger, and... well... their friend, yes, they may go."
Harry couldn't tell how eased he felt when he heard that they were allowed to go to the restricted section of the library -- he felt like hugging Madam Pince and Professor Flitwick because they allowed him to go. Then, together with Hermione, Ron and Cho, he started searching for an unusual book where he could find an unusual spell.
The search didn't start succesful, though Harry told them to not give up; and they didn't complain about that. Harry was sitting on front of a bookshelf, which he wanted to search entirely. Hermione took an entire corner of the library to search in, Cho searched in the entire library for titles that sounded more like the type of the book they were looking for, while Ron was slowly talking a book from a nearby shelf from time to time. But, still, none of them was even close to giving up -- everything was too good now that they were allowed to come in the library.
Everytime they saw any of the words "shadow" and "darkness", they would jump and think that they found it. But, even though they met these words in lots of books, they hadn't seen the words used together. And even though it looked so useless, they still continued searching, and Harry every now and then left his eyes from the books and looked at Cho.
"It is stupid searching for a spell that isn't recorded anywhere -- I bet Malfoy knew everything and sent us wrong information," said Hermione. Harry was very surprised about that, because it was not normal for Hermione to say things like that -- they hadn't searched the entire library yet.
They searched in the library for several hours. They had a break for lunch("At last, I'm starving," said Ron) and then they went back("Oh no!"). Harry didn't want to give up; not now when he managed to enter in the restricted section. Cho seemed to support him, and told Ron to "Just search and keep quiet". Hermione was acting more like usual self now, and didn't say anything about leaving the library.
That day was entirely spent at the library. Being saturday, they had nothing else beter to do, and this was the best thing they could do in the present.
Harry could keep hearing Ron talking to himself and asking what got into him. Harry admitted that it was not his usual self to spend an entire day in the library, but the memories of himself getting dark were very annoying.
"Do you think it is worth spending a few months searching for something that doesn't exist?" asked Ron when it was close to midnight. "This restricted section is... huge!!!"
"More than huge," added Harry, "But this is the only thing we can do now."
Seeing that Harry didn't want to give up, Ron stopped objecting and took a tome from a nearby shelf. But, instead of searching, he was just pretending to do it. Harry didn't want to tell Ron anything bad, to cause him have a bad mood again. It was just that day when Harry almost set a snake on him, and he didn't want to have problems with his friend.
That day passed with no other incident. Ron still didn't want to read anything, and Harry had nothing to say to make him read -- he knew everything he would do would be in vain.
When he was in his bed waiting to fall asleep, he remembered what he proposed that morning. He really felt like writing a letter to Sirius -- he hadn't written anything to Sirius lately anyway, so he just thought about what he could possibly write -- because nothing came to his mind except for the worst things, that would worry Sirius very much. Harry wouldn't blame him, though, because it was very strange to have a godson who worries that much of turning dark.
Thinking of that, he remembered the accident with Ron again...
And then he remembered how he felt like something dark posessed him. But that was just a stupid constatation, wasn't it? He was just too angry because Ron told Harry that Cho was his...
...girlfriend.
That brought Cho back to his mind, thinking that it wouldn't be bad of Cho would be his girlfriend; but he thought it was a bit... he didn't know how to tell the feeling he had, he just didn't feel like they were meant to be together. And Cedric... Cho surely missed him, how could Cho like Harry after all what happened only three months ago?
But that was a question with an answer that would soon appear...