With 12 reviews for the last chapter, I guess it was a good idea to edit my summary slightly! I'm so happy that everyone who has found this loved it enough to review! But anyway, on to the thank you s!
Anniacuru: my wonderful beta. *sends the Hermione from the cover of my diary*
Usernotavailable: Yay. Thanks for reviewing! *sends chocolate covered Harry*
FerretMalfoy: glad you love it so much, I know, it's awful when you miss all the author treats, I do it all the time! I don't actually know what Betty Crocker sprinkles are, but as you asked so nicely, and didn't ask for one of the main ones, *sends Snape and Blaise covered in BC sprinkles*
FallenAngel664: yes, we have to pity Snape, but then again, he will deal in his own way… *watches Gryffindor points rapidly decline…* *sends Draco covered in chocolate hundreds and thousands*
Taz: Kiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!!!! Draco has to thank his friendship with Snape for his extra room. I know it's not fair. Oh well, thanks for the review! *sends 7 singing chocolate frogs*
Spidermonkey-Demon: thanks for reviewing!!! Glad you like it! *sends your choice of Draco or Harry to you covered in honey* (tell me who you prefer in your next review)
Kimmy15: glad you like it! I have the animagi forms sorted out already, I just need to get there in the fic… *sends your choice of Draco or Harry to you covered in honey* (tell me who you prefer in your next review)
saiFong: need? Ok then, here's your next fix, hope you enjoy it *sends your choice of Draco or Harry to you covered in honey* (tell me who you prefer in your next review)
Kairi099: glad you like Snape, I love torturing him! It's fun. Thanks for reviewing! *sends your choice of Draco or Harry to you covered in honey* (tell me who you prefer in your next review)
Demon-Rose: glad you love it! Thanks for the review! *sends your choice of Draco or Harry to you covered in honey* (tell me who you prefer in your next review)
Dragon-Soul: Thanks! Glad you like it enough to put on your faves! I hope you like this chapter! *sends your choice of Draco or Harry to you covered in honey* (tell me who you prefer in your next review)
Sammi: Harry isn't afraid of age; but what he is afraid of is explained in this chapter. The beaver teeth and frizzy hair was Draco's impression of Hermione, and she is what his father would call a mudblood. Dishabille, the dictionary version is: the state of being carelessly or partially dressed. He and Draco had just had… so his clothes weren't exactly carefully put on! No worries about the mood, or the cynicism, which you weren't displaying. Don't worry about the questions, if you ever have any, just ask me in your review. I'll sort it out in my reply. *sends Draco with vanilla ice cream to cheer you up*
Whoeveriwant: Yay! *glomps back* Snape doesn't get drunk, he just tries to forget. I thought long and hard over the Bogart, I didn't want it to be too predictable... glad I wasn't! vanilla or chocolate debate is easy, I choose both and have a bar of Green and Black's white chocolate, which has vanilla pod in it. They are gorgeous,as are the boys! I agree with your choice though… I do like your name, mine was the same as my fictionpress one, but once I had written, I think it was chapter 11, I described Draco as the 'usually immaculate aristocrat' and I looked at it and laughed. Laughing at your own work should never happen unless it is really worth it, and so I decided to call myself that. Snape looks a bit like a raven, and a flamingo? I'll leave those thoughts to you… *hugs cuddly pleases* here's the update. I don't think anyone will find out what Cai said, but if you ask nicely enough, who knows!! Curiosity Did kill the cat; knowledge made him fat!!! Thanks for the review, I had better stop now before everyone else kills me for the excess of scrolling down! *sends an acacia honey covered Draco*
To everyone else, Enjoy!
Key
AN / prophesy / poetry
Draco thought
Harry thought
Stressed speech
Normal
~~~ = scene / POV change
Chapter 19
I wonder why Harry was afraid of ageing, thought Draco, as he trudged up the South wing staircases looking for some old history of magic classroom.
It's not as if he will ever get the chance of getting old; no, he'll die stupidly yet nobly in a stupid inconsequential battle... Unless, age was a metaphor for something else… Draco's mind was used to riddles and enigmas; he was tested as a child for fun. What else did the old Harry have? His wand was broken… Draco also prized himself for having a photo-perfect memory of things around him. Wand… old… he wasn't doing magic, he was alone, he was… helpless. As soon as he had said the word, Draco knew he had hit upon the right thing. His instinct told him so. A creaky step roused him from his musings though, and Draco resolved to think more about the weakness of weakness in the Boy-Who-Lived.
After Snape had sobered up from his multiple drinks to clear his mind, he had made Draco's detention alone, clearing the room, without magic. First, I need to find the bloody room however!
Draco walked up a creaky old staircase. But as he reached the top, it shuddered, and moved; abandoning him in an old corridor which looked like it hadn't been visited in at least fifty years. Where the hell am I? Thought Draco, as he scanned the corridor the stairs had deposited him on. He performed the point me charm. Draco was in the South tower. He looked at the stairwell and shrugged his shoulders. Lunch wasn't something he minded being late to. He had heard that Peeves was around here, terrorising the other ghosts. However, Draco had got into an argument with him earlier this week and was itching to show him a spell that he had learned which ghosts weren't immune to. No ghosts were there however.
Draco went up to a portrait on the wall, (the only portrait on the wall). It was of a woman. She was standing in front of a seascape, with gulls and a crack in the cliff behind her. "Hello," Draco said cautiously, he knew that most portraits at this school were arrogant things, and didn't want to upset perhaps the only person who could help him get out of this mess.
The beautiful woman looked at her. She was wearing a dress adorned with chrysanthemums. She looked irritated, "leave me alone! Alone, the spell was an accident; I didn't mean to get rid of… Sorry little girl, your boyfriend can't be turned into a frog or whatever you think he deserves!!!"
After her rant, Draco approached her again indignant. "you think I'm a girl? Do I look like a girl? Of all the stupidest things…" he muttered, "I am not a girl!!! I only wanted directions for another staircase."
"If there was one, don't you think I would be talking with another portrait downstairs!" she yelled, "paintings can talk to each other, but we can only jump to the one less then two metres away from the one we're in! I'm alone here! All alone..."
Draco knew this was true, but this didn't stop them, as all portraits were connected to the circular room, and they could travel from there. Now, either the portrait was lying, or the portrait wasn't connected, which he highly doubted. Draco should have gone then, but curiosity was generally his downfall. "Sorry to have disturbed you. How long have you been here?"
"Forever!!!" screeched the lady, "I was made to guard the library!!!" then she shut up, but it was too late, Draco had heard... his eyes brightened; any library worth protecting must have a spell section darker than the restricted section! With this thought, he ran along the corridor, ignoring the portrait's angry calls after her.
Draco reached a large door made of rowan wood. It was open slightly. Draco stepped into the room, realising that this was the library. He looked at the shelves; it was a natural instinct to peruse the books ingrained in him since birth. However, the books on that shelf looked like history books, and he wasn't interested in the sleep-inducing goblin revolutions Binns taught them. Now, if they had taken his suggestion and brought in Real goblins and made them fight to simulate them...
Still, he looked along the shelves, completely forgetting about getting back to lunch or Harry. I'm neither hungry nor horny. I can survive without them.
The books looked old; tatty and dusty. Draco took out the oldest he could see and opened its first page.
In an illuminated text was written:
"Ye who opene this text,
Will forgoe an anciente rite
You maye evene be hex'd
To forevere more lose youre sighte"
Draco was about to turn the page when he heard a sound behind him. Using the quick reflexes he had, Draco dropped the book and swivelled quickly, scanning the room for someone or something...
His silver eyes fell on a girl sitting on a flight of steps leading to more shelves. Draco assimilated her appearance expertly, she's scared, quivering like a squirrel, and she is probably lost herself. So she will be no help. Robes in bad condition; all crinkly. She is worried.
Draco approached her sneering, her appearance had given the impression that she wasn't particularly important in the scheme of things, and Draco rightly believed himself superior.
"You, how long have you been here?" he called out to the girl.
The girl was a quivering wreak; "a week, I was sorted into Hufflepuff, been there since I came..."
Draco groaned, "Here... the library!"
The girl looked around worriedly, "people use sticks to move things, and someone moved the stairs... I want my mum; she uses her hands to move things... do you?"
Draco looked at her disparagingly. He brandished his wand smirking, "you mean this?" the girl ran to another part of the library. "Oh well." Draco forgot her and continued to look at the book titles. Lunch be damned, I'm gonna look at these books!
He walked to a set of shelves made of some black wood, perhaps ebony. Looking at the spines, Draco noticed that hardly any had titles. This looks promising, Draco thought, all of father's books at home have no titles, and they're all spells... Draco lost himself for a while in his thoughts of home but shook them out of himself when he remembered the beating he had received from his father by opening one of the aforementioned books. He was 2 at the time; it wasn't as if he could even read!
Draco used the lower shelves to climb up to the previously unreachable. He looked at the books on the top shelf. None seemed interesting. He was about to climb down when one on the third shelf up (he was looking at the fifth) caught his notice. It was wrapped in a sheet of leather. He climbed down and unwrapped it.
Inside was a book with a black cover. It was pristine, probably because of the old leather protecting it. He opened it. Inside the cover was a single word: "legacy". Interest already hooked, he read the first page:
"purebloods are not as they seem; in England, those boasting a history of over 40 generations are all liars. Inbreeding is the cause of this. Using this book's knowledge however, you can edit your magical DNA to create new genes and stop this problem."
A piece of parchment wafted out of the middle of the book. It was yellowed, yet the writing was still crystal clear. It was in a neat yet elegant script, with the potions instructions the book gave. However, in the margins, were additions, changing the spell. At the bottom was a summary in the same hand. "with these changes, this potion can rob someone of their magic, leaving even the most prodigious of purebloods worse than a mere mud blood; but muggle vermin itself." it was signed, but Draco could only make out the first letter to be an 'M'.
'This is amazing!' Draco thought; editing spells this complicated to practically reverse the true meaning... and what a meaning! This shelf was evil, and Draco had every intention of returning here; imagine what you could learn! He thought gleefully. He replaced the book after reading the list of names who had taken the book out when this library was open to the pupils. 'Tom Riddle' came up over 15 times, but he seemed to be the last. Before that, Malfoy seemed the most popular surname. Draco wondered about the parchment, guessing (correctly) who had made it. Well, what do you know; one of my relatives was a genius!
He looked at the leather with more detail; it was a faded map of the school. On each room detailed, the leather had a slight bump, like Braille. He fingered the one labelled 'chamber of secrets'. I have to check that out! Thought Draco, imagining all the kind of things which could be there now. He began to roll up the sheet with every intention of stealing it from the library, but the bumps began to glow instead. He fingered the chamber one, hoping that it might transport him there. But it didn't. figures; the only cool thing I find quickly doesn't work! He took it anyway, but managed to hit the one labelled 'Fawkes' by accident. Immediately, he disappeared from that room, map in her hands.
Draco opened his eyes. In front of him was the headmaster, and he appeared to be in Dumbledore's office. He tried to look innocent, but Dumbledore saw through that… "Why don't you give me that map, Mr Malfoy" he asked. Draco didn't have much choice, so he handed it over. Dumbledore continued, "There are a great many places in this school which were not deemed dangerous once. Now, I believe they are. Books hatch ideas in eager students' minds, sometimes these are not very pleasant ones. I advise you to forget about going to that library again, Mr Malfoy, it might only bring trouble. Would you like a lemon drop?" Draco laughed at the quick change of subject, politely refused and told him of his now extinguished ambition to return. The Head looked deep into his eyes, but let him leave.
Draco resolved to go to the stairs as soon as he could. "Right," he thought, "next time I see a map, I leave it alone!!!!"