It started quietly, a simple humming of words, but then they made themselves into real words, eerily, until Harry could understand quite clearly.
"We know what it is you have come to seek,
But we have her not, the girl that weeps
But out from deep in the dark abyss,
A man came and said to tell you this:
'Where she is you'll never find,
Though you see it all the time
You've come to look in the lake, I see,
But hurry away; she is far from thee
The time is near, one teammate is lost,
You will not find her without great cost
You waste time, she waits patiently
Under the illusion you'll be there momentarily
Hurry, now, or risk being late
And sentencing her to a terrible fate.'
You must go now, time is not on your side
Just think of this: Where would he hide?"
Ron was already moving. "C'mon, Harry!"
"Ron, hold up," said Harry, looking at the merpeople who had just appeared around the corner. "How do you know all this?"
A merman quoted their song. "A man came and said to tell you this."
"What man? What did he look like?" Ron asked, swimming next to Harry, still holding Kelly limply.
The merman looked at this fellows and they started to have a whispered conversation, occasionally glancing at Harry, Ron, and Kelly. Ron was muttering intensely, clearly wanting to leave.
The merman who had spoken before turned back to them. "He is the one you are looking for."
"But what did he look like?" Ron persisted.
"He is the one you are looking for," the merman repeated.
"WHAT DID HE LOOK LIKE, YOU OVERGROWN FISH!" Ron yelled.
Harry winced. They were in trouble now; even Ron realized it.
"I… I didn't mean that…." Ron began, but was silenced.
"WHAT DID YOU CALL US!" the merman screeched, to several yells in protest at what Ron had just said.
"I… I said you looked really nice today…." Even Ron flinched at his horribly wrong lie.
"WE ARE NOT 'OVERGROWN FISH', THANK YOU VERY MUCH!" the merman yelled. "SCROUGE, WHERE ARE THE LOBALUGS!"
"Right here, Hersh!" the one called Scrouge yelled. He started passing out what were apparently Lobalugs to each of the merpeople nearby, while Harry and Ron just watched, unable to speak, and unwilling in case they offended them again. Harry and Ron did manage a look of disgust without the merpeople thinking it was offensive, for the Lobalugs were some of the ugliest things Harry had ever seen. They had a rubbery spout and some kind of sac, and that was all. Harry, not at all sure what these were, was quite surprised when one of them moved.
The merman who shouted the order to Scrouge looked at them. "You two, for insulting the nation of the merpeople--"
Ron made another very big mistake by contradicting him. "What nation? You guys are just--"
"SILENCE!" one merman yelled so loud and with such demand in his voice that Ron shut up instantly, taking a step back.
"I only meant--"
One of the merpeople turned their Lobalug toward Ron and squeezed the sac. A liquid-like mist that reminded Harry of something similar to a pensieve shot out of the sac in the Lobalug, which Harry now saw had eyes. The mist hit Ron, though for some reason it did not spread. Ron inhaled and gave a major cough, then started a coughing fit until he collapsed, Kelly falling with him.
"What? RON!" Harry yelled, racing over to him. "What's happened to him?"
"The poison from the venom sac," the merman who had shot the mist at Ron said. "It should kill him in a few minutes."
"NO!" Harry protested, standing up. "You can't! He's my best friend! You can't let him die like this! Have you no… no…" But Harry couldn't think of any words that fit for such a thing that they were considering.
"We can't, can we?" the first merman said, who Harry vaguely recalled Scrouge calling Hersh. "Would like to watch and see?"
"NO!" Harry yelled again. "You can't, you can't, you can't!"
"Watch us," a mermaid snarled.
"No…" Harry pulled out his wand. "Give me the cure."
"What cure? We have no cure, merely the weapon!" a rather aged merman who had not yet spoken said.
"But… but… there must be something…." Harry looked back at his best friend, his eyes wetting. "He can't just… just die. He already died once, he can't die again!"
Harry stared at Ron, who lay motionless, except for the scarce rising and falling of his stomach, which were becoming less and less by the moment. This couldn't be happening. He'd already lost Ron once when Amanda was still alive, he couldn't lose him again! The merpeople just weren't telling him something. There was a cure, he would find it! He would. He had to. He knew there was one, and he would find it in time, because Ron wasn't allowed to die on this trip. It was just to go save Hermione….
And Hermione would be dead soon, too. His two longest friends in the world would be dead within a few hours. It would just be him and Kelly, and she wasn't even telling him everything…. No. He would save Ron and Hermione. He would show everyone: Voldemort, his Death Eaters, these ugly merpeople who had threatened his friends. He would show them all--he would save both of them. He had to.
"Where's the cure?" Harry asked, and was amazed to find his voice was confident, commanding, and yet defiant.
"Did you not listen, boy, or is your hearing impaired?" a merman asked, unfortunately reminding Harry of Uncle Vernon. "We have no cure."
"Yes, you do," Harry said.
"No, we don't!" Scrouge said shakily.
"What if someone used these weapons against you? I know you have a cure, now give it to me!"
"Aw… is Potty Wotty having trouble finding an antidote?" snarled a voice behind him.
Harry didn't turn around immediately. He knew that voice, but Kelly couldn't be conscious. She definitely wouldn't say that in any case.
"Hello, Voldemort," Harry said.
The merpeople even flinched, and looked at him in amazement and suspicion.
"Hello, Potter," Voldemort said, gliding through the water. "How are you today?"
"Peachy," Harry said sarcastically. He turned back to the merpeople. "Where's the cure?"
"What's wrong with the girl?" Hersh asked.
"I BEG YOUR PARDON!" Voldemort exclaimed. "Wait… no, I don't beg for anything… I take it…."
"She's being possessed by Lord Voldemort," Harry said calmly as the merpeople flinched. "I trust you know who that is?"
"We know of the Dark Lord. He murdered many of our kind," a merman said, glaring at Voldemort.
"Well, the Malkinson's were annoying me!" Voldemort exclaimed.
"You are the Dark Lord!" one younger mermaid said.
"Yes… are you just now figuring that out?" Voldemort asked.
"You… you killed my mummy and daddy!" the mermaid screeched. She seemed about Harry's age, yet spoke like a child.
"Well, who were your mummy and daddy?" Voldemort asked in a low, dangerously quiet voice.
"Her parents were the Malkinson's," Scrouge said, eyeing Voldemort closely.
"Ah, yes, your uncle, I believe, came and took you away. Isn't that right?" Voldemort asked the mermaid.
"And he says you're a bad man!" the mermaid added.
Voldemort smirked. "I am a very bad man, indeed. Would you like to join me sometime? It's quite fun…" he lowered his voice, "…we might be able to bring your mummy and daddy back sometime…."
The Lobalugs were pointed at Voldemort now. A series of things ran through Harry's brain, but one caught his attention: If they shot at Voldemort, they would kill Kelly, and Harry would be alone.
"LOOK, I DON'T HAVE TIME FOR THIS!" Harry stormed as Ron gave an enormous cough, his breathing now barely anything at all. "GIVE ME THE CURE THAT I KNOW YOU HAVE, OR I'LL SICK VOLDEMORT ON YOU!"
"Ooh, sharp call," Voldemort said, "but you really think you can control me?"
"Dang skippy," Voldemort said in an un-Voldemort-like tone.
No one moved.
"What?" Harry asked, totally confused.
"Nothing!" Voldemort said, and Kelly went into a daze again, but it wasn't before an idea launched through Harry's brain.
Kelly was starting to fight back. Harry had just heard Kelly speak! Voldemort was losing his touch, or Kelly was getting a little too used to this. Voldemort hadn't been expecting it either; he'd fled at the realization. Kelly was overcoming him.
She fell to the ground. Harry swam over to her and moved her toward Ron, who was now in his last moments.
"Where's the cure?" Harry repeated.
Hersh looked irritated. "We have no--"
"It's in the storeroom," said the little mermaid who's parents were the Malkinson's. "Hurry and save your friend."
"Macy!" a mermaid chided in a motherly-like voice; she seemed to be the mermaid's guardian.
"He needs to help his friend!" Harry heard her say as he put his wand back in his robes and swam toward the stone building that looked like it might be a storeroom. "No more death!"
"Leave the storeroom alone!" Scrouge yelled, racing over to block his path.
"Look, I'm not even going to give you until three," Harry said, whipping out his wand again. "Move or I will thoroughly hex the lot of you except for the mermaid who helped me."
Scrouge considered this for a moment, but he was taking too long for Harry. Harry swam around him and continued towards the storeroom. The stone dwelling had seaweed all over it, and didn't look all that appealing. No one else raised objections as he neared the dwelling, so he swam inside.
The room was filled with all sorts of remedies that Harry wasn't sure even Madam Pomfrey knew of. Most had weird names, though some gave Harry clues to what they might be for. Dragonox sounded like an antidote to Dragonpox to Harry, and he was quite certain that Sorfungius was their cure to Scrofungulus. They were enclosed in bundles of seaweed wrapped together, the names of each antidote carved below it into the stone on which the seaweed lay. Harry was thankful the merpeople knew the alphabet; it would make finding the cure so much easier.
And then it hit Harry--he didn't know what the cure was.
Harry raced around looking for anything that might be the cure. Besear…Craspour… Drasnow on the left, Grungeous some ways later, Halocorpus (which made Harry think that they were going to kill the person if they swallowed it) soon afterwards, Saraphis, Talioompa, Vellonoting, Ximena, later on the right… nothing looked like it was it.
Harry was now panicking very much as he turned and started swimming in the other direction, wondering if Ron wasn't already dead. He would have jumped and hit the ceiling if he could have when he saw the little mermaid called Macy swim through, dragging Ron all by herself.
"Here…" she said as she laid Ron down. She looked at him oddly. "What's wrong?"
"I don't know what the cure is called!" Harry exclaimed, nearing the end of the rows again, now that he was swimming much faster.
Macy giggled, which surprised Harry. It was rather high-pitched and not quite what he had expected. "It's labeled as A Lobablug Cure, silly."
"Okay…" Harry started racing up the isles again, not paying any attention to whether or not he was going in the right direction alphabetically. Macy made some movement behind him, but he didn't care; he was just looking for the A's.
Ron gave one final, humongous gasp behind Harry.
"Oh God…" Harry murmured, not daring to turn around. "No…"
Harry swam even faster through the room, barely glancing at anything, just hoping the A's were nearby. He reached the end of the room and was horrified to find he was at the Z end.
Harry slowly turned around and closed his eyes, not wanting to the see the paling face of his best friend, who had just lost his life.