Disclaimer: Everything Belongs to J.K Rowling

Chapter 6: Dangers and Decisions

Hello Harry

Well done on managing the first task, even if your method was a bit unorthodox. Padfoot managed to steal a newspaper so I got the whole story. I hope your intents of murder won't be directed towards your old godfather.

About your question about the importance of privacy. I have always felt that sharing things with friends is something important. But how important it is, I don't know. I will just say, make sure you survive this tournament. Your secrets won't matter if you are dead. I have heard what is going on inside Hogwarts, just make sure you stay safe. I don't know exactly what your dilemma is. All I ask of you, make sure you survive, I don't care how. I don't care about what others think, as long as you live long and happily, I am content.

Please try and write to me more often, I know you must feel angry about everything in the castle. And trust me, I wouldn't want anything more than to be able to take you away from all of it. You and I both know that isn't possible though, just try to hold on.

Love, Snuffles

I put the letter down in my trunk again and sighed heavily. The letter must have been read about ten times by now, it didn't give me any answers I needed. He wanted me to do whatever I needed to survive, but exposing oneself like I would could also prove fatal. Especially to a girl who had shown she had no qualms putting me in mortal danger before.

I got up from my bed and met up with Ron and Hermione to go and eat dinner. For safety reasons, I walked with my treasured cloak beside them. It was Tuesday now, only Wednesday left before the big day. Several times I had felt like my decision was made and I had walked to the fourth floor. Just as I was about to enter, I thought of something and my mind was as undecided as ever.

We walked in silence down to the Great Hall, the torches flickered angrily in holdings and the shadows crept around the walls. The hall was almost completely full, the entirety of the Durmstrang and Beauxbatons visitors must have been eating then and as a result, the Slytherin and Ravenclaw students had been forced to sit at other tables. Some even stood up eating or sat squeezed next to each other, four people where it was space for two.

The Gryffindor table was furthest from all the visitors and therefore the least crowded so we actually managed to find three seats together and get a meal. Ron had just finished his chicken and taken a bowl of ice cream when the ice cream exploded in his face.

In a flash, wands were drawn all around the Great Hall. Apparently, the spell which had struck Ron's bowl had been intended for me and was fired by a Durmstrang student from the other side of the room. Impressive aim really, he was concerningly close to his mark.

Then all hell broke loose, the Durmstrang student began firing a new curse but was immediately shot down as a dozen spells of different colours struck his torso. Spells began flying violently around the hall and the exit was crowded as the Beauxbatons and younger students tried to leave the impending battle.

People fell like flies, several people lay unconscious in the middle of the room. Then the teachers arrived and tried to get control of the situation but they were quickly distracted as someone spelled all the dishes to fly towards them and attack them. In another context, seeing Snape being chased by fifty cakes would have been hilarious, but now I could only stare in horror at the scenes before me. Durmstrang students were fighting everyone they could see. I saw a bunch of Slytherins at the other end of the room fighting a group of female Durmstrang students in an intense battle. Cedric and Krum occupied each other as they both stood on the Huffelpuff table, duelling each other furiously.

I was broken from my stupor as a black spell just sizzled towards me, Hermione pushed me out of the way, saving me, but I was quickly on my feet again. A group was at the end of the table and was slowly taking people out to get to where we sat at the middle of the table. I saw Fred and George stand protectively in front of Ginny and protect her from the onslaught.

I fired an 'Expelliarmus' towards the groups but a shield was summoned and the spell dissolved into nothing. The person who had threatened me at the Gryffindor table last week was leading the charge and he grinned maliciously as he arrived in front of me.

"I have come to finish what I started," he drawled lazily and tried to smile menacingly.

"Do your best," I responded more confidently than I felt and lifted my wand to a defensive position.

"Stupefy," he shouted and a jet of red light seared towards me accurately. I summoned a shield and was about to retaliate, but I was forced to dodge and block constantly as he fired spell, after spell, after spell. I never got the chance to even make an attempt to retaliate. Eventually I slipped at a fork that had fallen to the floor and lost my balance.

The fighting had now stopped entirely in the room, everyone had their eyes glued toward the two pairs of duelers. I didn't really have time to think about the audience because I was constantly being forced further back by my opponent's constant barrage. My chances were dwindling each second and I was slowly but surely getting weakened. First, I was hit by something blue in my left arm which made my arm go all numb.

Soon after, I lost concentration and dodged a second too late and was struck by something red which made me fly into the teachers table. I groaned in pain, my ribs hurt horrendously. My wand flew from my hand and landed in the hand of the Durmstrang boy who now had a huge grin on his face.

"Not so confident now Potter, eh?" he jeered victoriously.

I tried to manage a response, but all I could do was cough up some blood. I vaguely noticed fighting around me but couldn't make out any details.

A loud bang resounded throughout the room and in the doorway was the silhouette of someone with a large grey beard, together with a bunch of red men.

I looked back towards the boy towering over me and saw a jet of brown light fly towards me before everything went dark.

-()-

I awoke as rays of sunshine hit me straight in the eye. The room was all bright and blurry; I fumbled to find my glasses on my bedside table. I panicked, there was nothing there. Without my glasses, I was useless, I couldn't see a mountain if it was right in front of me.

To my great relief, someone slipped my pair of glasses on me and I blinked and recognised the interior of the hospital wing. I searched for the person who had put my glasses on and found Dumbledore sitting next to me.

"Good morning Harry," he greeted solemnly, all trace of his usual demeanour gone. "As you understand, I can't speak to you much. You should know that the aurors have been involved in this, which means students from different schools shall be kept apart as much as possible."

I only nodded in understanding and winced as my ribs flared painfully.

Dumbledore noticed my expression, "Yes, Mr. Oblák managed to break three of your ribs, if it is any comfort, legal action has been taken."

That was good to hear, you couldn't start a war in the middle of the Great Hall without repercussions.

"I am afraid I will have to leave you now Harry," Dumbledre offered tiredly and left through the doors of the hospital wing.

My head fell back down at the stuffed pillows and I sighed tiredly. I had lost a duel against a seventeen year old. He hadn't been someone great at duelling, even Cedric had bested him earlier. The thing was, it wasn't even close. I was utterly outmatched by him, nowhere near even challenging him.

I had to fix this. It dawned on me that everything I had ever done was pure luck. I'd fancied myself as someone quite good at fighting and overcoming obstacles. It truly sunk in now that I wasn't, I always relied on someone else or luck.

"That has to change," I thought decisively.

My decision was made, I silently slipped out of my bed and changed to my regular clothes in the stall. My ribs flared painfully as I dragged my jumper over my head but I ignored it. Making sure that my cloak was drapped over me properly, map in hand and wand in my pockets, I snuck out of the hospital wing silently.

When I reached the entrance hall I saw two men in red robes stationed at the entry, reminding me of how the Queen's guards stood outside Buckingham Palace.

My feet guided me to outside the door on the fourth floor and it swung open, soundless as ever. I winced as I tried to stand up straight and took a deep breath.

-()-

It wasn't surprising at all that the girl sat in her usual armchair when I came inside. What was unusual was the expression of fury edged into her pretty face. She didn't say a word but forced me into the armchair and practically flung spells at me. Even if I wanted to protect myself from them, I couldn't have. They came and went so quickly I barely registered what happened. What I did notice was that the pain from my ribs subsided completely. I felt as good as new.

Then the girl sat down in her armchair again and waited for me to speak expectantly.

"There was a battle in the Great Hall, some Durmstrang students decided..."

"I know what happened," the girl interrupted irritatedly. "I want to know your answer."

I once again wondered how she knew of these things, she claimed she couldn't move outside of the room, but I wasn't too sure about that.

I sighed and looked inside the crackling flames. "I accept your offer," was all I said.

The girl gave me a smile, "Perfect, let us begin with the legilimency."

She sat down right in front of me and I shifted uncomfortably in my seat.

"Are you ready for this?" she whispered quietly. "I am very good at this so it won't take more than a few moments. I should warn you though, it will be uncomfortable and very disconcerting."

I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. "I am ready." I really wasn't.

The girl only nodded in confirmation with her mouth shut in a thin line. Her deep purple orbs stared straight into my eyes, not blinking once.

Perhaps I had taken this decision too rashly.

"Legilimency" she whispered and I was jerked from reality into the depth of my mind.

The amount of emotions and impressions was staggering. Somewhere deep inside, I felt that I shouldn't allow this. My subconscious fought back against the intrusion, but the flashes of memories kept on coming like an endless onslaught of wind.

At first there were flashes from my childhood with the Dursleys, I tried to grasp anything concrete but every time I felt myself find something she moved on to another memory. In mere seconds, I saw flashes of Hogwarts and my friends and then I was violently thrown out and back to reality once again.

I felt something cold press against my cheek and it dawned on me that I had fallen on the floor in the process. Picking myself up slowly, I managed to push myself back into the armchair with shaking arms and legs. It felt like I'd just been run over by a truck and then forced to run a marathon.

The girl was not still in her seat either though, but instead of falling to the floor like me, she had begun to pace the room, throwing me the occasional glance. It was quite worrying sitting there under her scrutiny. I had just revealed my deepest, darkest corners of my being and she didn't say anything. After what must have been several minutes of her pacing around the room and muttering quietly to herself, I found myself in need of asking if something was wrong.

"Didn't you like what you saw?" I asked grumpily.

The girl stopped abruptly and sat down in her armchair again with a comforting smile. "You're amusing, you know."

I glared at the gril venomously and ground out, "I just allowed you to see everything I've ever experienced and you call me amusing?"

She had the audacity to chuckle and I was very close to storming out and leaving her behind entirely. "There was a lot of important information about yourself you left out," she answered with a smile. "You were supposedly hit with a killing curse and survived. You've never told me this." She chuckled again. "It does align with your tendency to downplay your own doings, I suppose."

"What do you mean 'supposedly?" I asked grumpily. "You don't believe I got hit? I have even got the memory of it."

"A killing curse kills people," she stated simply. "But that is a discussion for later." She paused again and I waited patiently for her to continue. "I must admit, I greatly underestimated your skills. Seeing you do everything you've done throughout your years here was…brilliant."

I blushed slightly at her high praise, but praise wasn't something she gave lightly. I was going to savour every moment.

"You even found Salazar's chamber," she exclaimed excitedly. "Not even I was able to find it, although it makes sense why now," she muttered. "Anyway, I promised answers to your questions, so ask away."

I knew immediately what the first question was going to be, we must have beaten records over the longest time gone before introducing each other.

"What is your name?" I asked quickly. "Your real name."

"Rowena Ravenclaw, at your service," she answered with a small bow.

I stared at her incredulously for a long moment. "One of the founders of Hogwarts?"

"Do you know of any other Rowena Ravenclaw?" she asked with an arched eyebrow.

Fair point. Pictures and statues of her were everywhere in Hogwarts and all different kinds of books. In all of them, she was old though. When she told me, I could see the likeness between the pictures and herself and kicked myself internally for not noticing it sooner. Still, how the fuck did I sit in the same room as Rowena Ravenclaw a thousand years after her death?

"How are you still alive? You're a thousand years old…" I trailed off.

"Firstly, I am not really alive. Secondly, the magic involved is complicated beyond your comprehension. I don't say that to demean you, but it is by far the most difficult thing I've done and I've done a lot of difficult things," she explained honestly. "But in basic terms, I found a way to store my consciousness in this room and I am the physical form of that consciousness," she said and gestured to herself.

"Why would you do that? Were you afraid of dying?" I questioned curiously.

"No, not really." Rowena paused and frowned; she looked as if she wasn't certain about what she should say. "What I was afraid of was all my knowledge being lost. I found myself at the end of my life with no apprentice, no one who I had passed on everything I knew to. I have found out so many things in my quest for knowledge. All my work would have been for nothing if it disappeared together with me," Rowena explained sadly.

"I then decided to preserve my knowledge somehow and this was the solution. A book could never contain all the knowledge I possess. Not even a thousand books could," she told me seriously.

"Exactly how much do you know?" I asked with a pair of raised brows. "You say you know so much, but what exactly is it that you know that is so impressive?"

Rowena nodded in agreement. "It's a fair point, you will in time know all I know. I can't sit here listing things I know, it would take hours. So would it for everyone, not just me."

I nodded understandingly and pondered my next question. "What will you begin to teach me?"

"Depends."

"On what?"

"Whether you want to just survive the tournament or win the tournament." She paused dramatically. "So what will it be?"

"Is that even a question? Of course I want to win the tournament," I said automatically. "Did you even need to ask me that question though? You already knew what I would answer."

"I see, you have misunderstood what information I obtained from your mind,"

Rowena said with a frown. "I only know everything you remember. That means that I only know of the thoughts you had in memories you remember. I couldn't peruse your mind like a library and just find all the information and thoughts you've ever had. I looked at your memories and drew conclusions from that," she lectured. "Anything else would take more time and effort than either of us had."

"You could probably guess everything I will do though, right?"

"I was entirely certain what your answer would be, but the further from today we get, the less I'll be able to predict your intentions."

I hadn't considered that. In a few years time, I would be someone completely different from now and then I wouldn't be quite as vulnerable.

"You knew all the other founders?" I asked, changing the subject abruptly.

She rolled her eyes. "Obviously."

"What were they like?"

"They were brilliant. They are the only ones I was ever able to call equals, or superiors. Helga was the unofficial leader, I think she was the only one who could be considered normal," Rowena began fondly. "Godric was…. odd, one day he was charismatic and easy going. The next, a recluse and irritated at everybody. Salazar was the only one who could best me. He was a fighter, the things he could do in a fight…" Rowena trailed off, lost in memories.

"I always imagined Gryffindor as the leader," I declared.

The girl rolled her eyes again, "because he is the founder of your house?"

"No… perhaps?" I answered sheepishly.

"No, Helga was the leader, she dealt with everything that was needed and enabled us three to do our things," Rowena explained. "Us three were all…strange people, brilliant, but difficult. She enabled us to hatch our ideas and create this school."

I nodded in understanding. It struck me that I would most likely fail my history of magic exam if I answered with the truth.

"I've read the history books. They all make it seem as if Helga was a mere afterthought, just there, not doing it much. It is a disgrace," the founder said with an irritated look.

I could tell this was a touchy subject for her so I decided to change the topic, "How come you picked me of all people to be your apprentice? There must have been someone better in the thousand years between your death and now."

"No, no one proved that they were. You were the first. I've helped others before, but I immediately knew they weren't fit. You were actually the first one who I decided to see me more than once," she told me. "I'm sure there has been someone more talented and smarter than you in these halls, but as I said, that's not all I'm looking for."

What was I supposed to answer? I sure didn't know. Has Dumbeldore ever met her? Had Tom Riddle? I decided to talk about something else."Alright, so what happens now? When is my first lesson?"

"We only need to do one final thing tonight. Then, your first lesson is tomorrow."

"What do we need to do?" I asked in a little concern and anticipation.

I was slightly let down though as she conjured a very official looking paper out of thin air.

"We need to finalise the process which formally makes you my apprentice. I wouldn't want someone else to steal you from right under my nose," she said seriously.

I couldn't tell if she was joking.

I read through the offered paper quickly and understood that it was only really a paper where I pledged myself as her apprentice, nothing else. My signature was added to one copy neatly and I gave it to her before I signed my own copy which she had already signed.

"Then it is done," I said slowly. I exhaled slowly and relaxed in my armchair.

That wasn't too bad. I had expected this to be something difficult, but nothing had really changed between us after she had found out about everything I knew. Suddenly, a spell flew from Rowena's wand and I felt as if I'd been punched in the gut repeatedly.

"What was that for? Do you think that you have the right to abuse me, now that I'm your apprentice?" I demanded angrily as I rubbed my stomach.

Perhaps I had spoken too soon after all.

"You need to always be ready for an attack. Even now," the girl lectured, her previous relatively calm and approachable demeanour entirely gone.

"I'll keep that in mind. If you stop hexing me."

"I'll hex you for as long as you need it."

I scoffed at this and stood up to leave. "What a brilliant start to this new apprenticeship thing," I thought sarcastically.

"Before you leave," the girl continued. "We need to establish some ground rules."

"What are those then?" I asked, annoyed at her tendency to hurt me and ask me for something afterwards.

"First rule, you will call me 'master'. Nothing else, not Sir, not Ma'am. Master, if you fail to comply, you will find yourself regretting it."

"Okay," I accepted with a roll of my eyes.

"Okay, Master," she corrected sternly. "You won't get another pass."

"Got it… Master," I hastened quickly, not intent on finding out what the punishment was.

The woman nodded in approval and continued, "Second rule, you will do what I say. NO matter what. If I tell you to learn a spell. You learn the spell. If I ask you to blow something up, you blow something up."

"Alright, but if you ask me to kill someone or something like that, I'm not sure I will comply."

"You will comply," the girl finished firmly. "Third and final rule, you will under no circumstances reveal that I exist to anyone. I don't care if they cut all the limbs off your body. I don't care if it is your most trusted friend. No one shall know of me."

That was an easy rule to agree to, I had basically consented to the same earlier. Although I dearly hoped that I wouldn't have to lose my limbs to hold that promise.

"Good, see you tomorrow at four o'clock, I won't appreciate tardiness" the girl finished with a stern look.

I couldn't help but feel a little reproachful to all this. Just moments earlier she had been a nice but admittedly strange girl, now she had gone fulle teacher mode and was threatening me left, right and centre.

"Good night….Master," I said and left the room.

-()-

As I was lying in my four poster bed that night and listening to the tired snores of my roommates, I couldn't help but feel deeply contemplative. I had just taken a huge decision, one that would undoubtedly change the course of my life.

I chuckled to myself. If I'd been told a month ago that I would be Ravenclaw's apprentice and on course to learn off things no one else alive knew off, I would have called that person deluded.

But here I was.

I wondered what Ron and Hermoine would say if they knew. What would Sirius say? What would Dumbledore say? What would my parents say?

I hoped that my parents would be proud of me, I vowed as I lay in my bed that I would make sure that my parents were proud of me. Voldemort had told me in first year that he could make me see my parents, perhaps Rowena could do it as well. I scoffed, dead was dead. They had been gone from my life for almost thirteen years, there was no reason to bring them back now. I couldn't deny that I wanted to meet them though.

I tried to process all the information my new master had told me. That also raised the question: how good was Voldemort compared to Ravenclaw? My master seemed certain that no one was better than her, and I doubted that Voldemort could be better than her. I had never seen Voldemort in his prime; however, I had no idea what he could and couldn't do.

On the other hand, I didn't know anything about how proficient wizards and witches were back in the day. Had we regressed or moved forwards since then? Her displays pointed towards the former.

It was with thoughts of embracing my parents again and excited anticipation that I fell asleep. For the first time in a long time, I felt confident that I would manage whatever life threw at me.