Jousting
As soon as Old Man Pelayo vanished, Lyra turned to the group, and said, "I really don't like him."
"I think that's an understatement," Tina responded.
"You know what?" Newt said, "I'm proud of the two of you." Everyone else looked at him with a bit of astonishment and confusion.
"Hear me out," he continued. "He was being rude and nasty, but you held your ground, didn't use any offensive magic, and Harry didn't stab anyone. You still are getting what you want and he is still getting what he wants." He paused for a moment, before continuing. "He has the opportunity to fix the situation by being more pleasant in the future and by actually working hard to gain the trust of the hoohoos. I think Tina and I will take the same approach after you leave as well."
Harry smiled, the Lamassu tooth was very helpful for situations like this. He would need to write to Eraydin to let him know the kind of magic Hamidreza's tooth had given him.
Lyra smiled as well but told Newt, "The hoohoos like the berries from the village, mangos, and the larger ones occasionally eat a dead mouse. You should stay away from the cave until they accept you."
"Old Man Paleyo can figure that out on his own," Harry said.
Nestor looked around, "Where did Whispers and Dougal go?"
The group looked around, and Lyra found them feeding some of the hoohoos in the crater, though to Newt and Tina, it just looked like they were holding out berries that vanished now and then. When they were done, they returned to the group and everyone returned to the beach.
As they finished dinner they started preparing for the trip over to the Valley of the Lampong. Tina loaded up a large camera bag, while Brandt seemed to be filling up his pouch with close to a hundred rolls of film and a blue orb the size of a quaffle. Newt had his notebook at full size in a shoulder bag and Dougal had a bag of his own, filled up with various snacks. Nestor provided everyone with emergency portkeys on necklaces that would activate on the command 'Babuyan' or if they fell unconscious. He told them that he should have provided these at the beginning of the trip and would do so in the future.
Harry was looking excited and had started to polish his staff and wand with a potion he said he had made to protect his staff back when it was made. By the time he was done, the white wood of his wand was almost shining and the antler on his staff was almost glowing without it being active. Lyra was loading up her bag with Whispers and the Lampong's favorite foods.
After the sun had set, Harry and Lyra mounted their brooms while the rest of the group just rode the large carpet along the coastline toward the northeast end of the island. The night was exceptionally clear and the stars could be seen perfectly in the night sky. As they passed the garbage beach, Harry pointed inland where there was a small light in the distance down in the valley.
As they started to get closer, and the light got larger, Brandt reached into his pouch and pulled out the blue orb. Tapping it with his wand it glowed and shot up in the sky to hover about two hundred feet above the ground, right over their heads. It followed them as they continued forward. They could see that the light was moving across the island, just like the light from Harry's staff, but nothing could be seen at the center of it yet. Harry held up his hands for everyone to stop, and Lyra circled in front of the rug, so they couldn't advance anymore.
He landed at the edge of the light and put down his broom, then drew out his staff. He focused for a moment then slammed it into the ground, creating his own light all around him. The amount of light that was created covered less than a quarter of the area that the other did. However, from the center of the brighter of the two lights appeared the Lampong.
The adults all stared at the enormous white deer. At its shoulders, it was nearly eight feet tall, with its head at least another three before its antlers grew off its head. The antlers were as white as its body, and each had multiple branches that were shaped like flowing rivers or white fire. Just like everything else on the island, it had grown substantially from the time that Harry and Lyra had arrived on the island, though the others did not know of that. Every part of the magical deer was perfect. It had no hard edges, every bit of it was curved perfectly as it moved with a supernatural grace toward Harry. As it got within thirty feet of Harry it stared at him and started to tap its front feet excitedly.
Brandt immediately waved his wand and the blue orb rose even higher into the air and started to drift over Harry.
As the Lampong did its tippy-taps with its feet, Harry started to jog forward, with his staff pointed toward the animal. Seeing him move forward, it lowered its head and charged Harry. The adults started to panic, but Lyra just smiled and held up her hands as they started to draw their wands.
When they were less than five feet from each other, there was a crashing sound, and two white shields that had been invisible in the great light collided together. Harry got knocked to the side and backward at the impact, but he rolled and got back up to charge again at the animal. They repeated their charges four more times before Harry lifted his staff in the air to signal a stop. The Lampong seemed a bit disappointed and started its tippy-taps again while it waited for Harry to be ready again.
Harry pulled out some jerky from his pouch and ate a few pieces, then tossed some over to the Lampong who sniffed it but didn't eat any.
Getting back up, Harry began to twist his staff back and forth on the ground before lowering it to charge the Lampong again. This time, when they collided, Harry did not bounce off but simply got pushed back, with his feet dragging on the ground as he leaned into the charge. Since they were so close together, the Lampong broke the charge and galloped away before turning around and charging at Harry again. With a full charge at a stationary Harry, he got knocked away this time landing on his backside.
The magical deer let out a throaty barking noise as Harry got up and rubbed his back. Harry once again started to grind his staff in the ground for a full minute before yelling out, "Wand!" which released it into his left hand. He held the wand against his staff near the top and aimed the entire thing towards the Lampong with his right hand and charged with a yell.
This time when they clashed, neither of them budged, but the Lampong then just lowered its antlers more and started to push forward with its strong back legs which started to make Harry slide backward, bit by bit until it raised the enormous antlers and tossed Harry high into the air.
Seeing him fall, Tina dropped her camera onto the rug and cast a softening charm on the ground below him. When he hit, he just got absorbed into the ground like quicksand and lay there for a moment in the dirt. When he looked up, he saw the Lampong looking straight at the group on the carpet and he jumped up to stand in between them. It simply walked over Harry and towards the group.
Lyra started flying higher and the group mimicked her movement floating up to about a hundred feet in the air. Harry ran around in front of the deer and put up his shield, which stopped the creature. He pulled out a handful of berries and threw them at its face. Distracted by the food, it leaned down to start eating. Harry took that opportunity to grab his broom and fly up to the rest of the group.
When he got up to them he asked, "So, what do you think?"
Newt began, "It is the most amazing first sighting I've seen of a magical creature in quite a long time."
"Did I make the list?" Harry implored.
Newt's notebook was open to a page that had a long list on it, and he gritted his teeth as he said, "Well, if I had to be honest, I'd say you're somewhere between number 15 and 25." Seeing the disappointment on Harry's face, he continued, "To be fair, the list has 213 amazing sights on it, and Lyra's dogfight was so high because of the emotion that was involved."
Harry frowned a bit but then Lyra perked up, "I've got an idea, I'll be right back." Then grabbing the necklace she was wearing called out, "Babuyan!" and vanished with a snap.
"She went back to camp?" Harry asked Nestor.
"Yes, what do you think she's getting?" Harry just shrugged, then floated back down to the Lampong who was finishing up the fallen berries.
Over the next thirty minutes, Harry just gave more food to the Lampong and ate some more jerky himself. The magical deer continued to try to get him to play, occasionally just pushing him over with its massive antlers, but Harry didn't engage it other than to pet its head when it leaned down. When Lyra returned, Brandt let off a small pop with his wand and Harry flew back up. Lyra had landed on the flying carpet and was standing there with a paintbrush and a jar of yellow liquid.
"The Giver and I finished the sticking solution I was working on," she said, displaying the jar. "Give me your broom, staff, and wand."
Realizing what she was thinking, Harry landed on the rug and passed them to her while asking, "Do you have a way of getting them off?"
"Yes, saltwater dissolves it," she told her brother.
Using the paintbrush, Lyra added a generous helping of the paste to the sides of Harry's broom and then put the staff on one side and his wand on the other, so there were two white prongs sticking off the front end. With the two of them attached, Harry tried to shake them loose, but they held firm. He mounted the broom and adjusted himself so he was comfortable with the added bulk of the staff running down the right side of the broom.
Brandt and Tina were taking a multitude of pictures of his creation and more as he floated down and past the Lampong to the far side of the clearing, activating his light as soon as he got there. The animal proceeded to tap its front feet before lowering its antlers and charging Harry. Harry also proceeded to charge, his broom accelerating across the meadow toward his opponent.
Their shields met head-on with a mighty clang that rang in their ears, and the Lampong started to get pushed back. Everyone could almost see the surprise in the great creature at the change in positions. However, maybe the creature had just been playing before, or maybe it was sandbagging Harry, but now, it just dug its heels in and pushed harder. It seemed to overpower the broom's thrust and Harry started to float backward against the forward momentum of the broom. After he had been pushed about twenty feet, the mighty white deer flung its head in the air and tossed Harry on his broom into the air where he spiraled around in circles, head over heels several times before stopping and hovering nearly sixty feet above the ground as he regained his orientation from the throw. Meanwhile, the Lampong made the victorious grunting noise again.
Harry flew back over to the group on the rug and excitedly asked, "What about now? Where on the list am I now?"
Newt smiled and said, "Probably between number fifteen and twenty."
"What's number fifteen?" he asked.
"A merfolk jousting tournament, riding kelpies," Tina answered. Seeing Harry and Lyra's confused expressions, "I'll explain to you later. Do you want to stay longer to play with it?"
Harry looked back down at the Lampong patiently waiting for him and dove back down to attack from above.
He continued to joust with the source of the power in his foci for half an hour before he seemed to slow down a bit and then stop in the middle of a charge and circle back into the air. Seeing him stop the charge, the Lampong did so as well and waited for him to resume, but Harry just landed and walked over to the magnificent animal and reached up to pet it along the top of its front legs. Knowing that playtime was over, it just leaned down and gave him a quick lick on the face, and trotted off toward the far end of the valley.
As Harry flew back up to the carpet, Brandt summoned the glowing blue orb that had been hovering over the valley the whole time back to him and stored it in his pouch. Harry dismounted on top of the rug and just lay flat on his back in the middle next to where Lyra was sitting with her broom. Without saying anything, Newt steered the carpet over to the water and back along the coastline to the beach where the ship was docked.
When they arrived, Harry got up and walked to the water's edge, where he dunked his broom in the ocean to unstick the wand and staff before taking a towel out of his pouch and drying everything off. When he turned back, everyone was looking at him.
"Thank you for that," Tina told him kindly. "Just because you didn't make Newt's top five, doesn't mean that wasn't absolutely incredible to watch."
Nestor agreed, "I've flown over the Lampong at night numerous times, but to see it do something other than just patrol the area was fantastic."
Newt smiled down at both Harry and Lyra and told them, "I have a feeling that one day, I'll have to make a whole new list just for things that have come out of the creation of Scamander House at Hogwarts."
Both of them were filled with happiness from his words and smiled before taking their things, and Whispers, then hopped on their brooms to start coasting back towards the village to sleep.
Once they were past the tree line, Harry pulled a handful of jerky out of his pocket and gave Lyra half, saying, "Our night isn't over yet, let's go see if we can kill the Creeping Death."
Harry and Lyra, with Whispers holding onto Lyra's broom tightly, sped through the trees, trying to stay out of sight until they got to the hot springs. Once they got there, they broke out over the tops of the trees and circled the mountain until they arrived on the far side. There was nearly a half-moon above them, so they could see the terrain fairly well but still cast the night vision charms on themselves as they got closer to the dreaded tree.
With the charm active, the red rocks that The Giver had placed around as a warning glowed to their eyes and the Creeping Death stood alone on its hill above the hidden graveyard below it.
They both stared at it from well outside both rings before Harry pulled out his staff and aimed the tip of the antler toward it. After concentrating for half a minute, he let off a magical pulse towards the tree, but it dissipated almost entirely before just blowing the leaves and branches around on top. The tree shook itself a bit like when a human got a cobweb on their face before returning to being motionless.
"Try your wand," Lyra told him.
Harry drew it from his holster and aimed it at the tree casting a small punch of magic that sped toward it and hit the trunk. The tree seemed to twist back and forth as if it were looking for an unseen attacker before settling back in place.
"You try," Harry told his sister.
Lyra squared off and pointed her wand toward the tree before calling out, "Incendio Orbis!"
A ball of fire, the size of a quaffle shot towards the tree where it exploded in the branches, covering them with fire. Both children cheered at the results. Whispers had been sitting further back eating some berries and chittered along with them.
However, the tree just shook itself like a wet dog and the fire went out. Then six vines shot out in all directions, one was heading straight towards them. Not taking any chances, Harry grabbed Lyra and fell backward onto the ground. All six vines didn't go past the red stones but just hovered around the tree, searching for whatever attacked it.
Whispers started dragging the two of them away from the tree and they inched back while staying laid down for nearly a minute before they dared to stand back up.
Harry looked at Lyra and said, "Ok, the goal is what I said before. A 150-foot vortex of flame, like the hoohoo patriarch shot at Brandt, before we try again."
Lyra looked back at the Creeping Death, which was still probing the area around it with its deadly vines, looking for them.
"Agreed," she said while nodding.
They hopped on their brooms and Harry took Whispers as they rode back to the village to sleep.
The following day felt like a whirlwind.
So much of it was just about packing up everything into their trunks that they had brought from Hogwarts, combined with organizing it with things they were bringing back to school from the island. Now that they had learned the preservation charm, they were bringing along a large number of potion ingredients, food, fruits, and anything else they thought might spoil. The Mango tree in Lyra's trunk even had a few boxes stacked next to it as they started to run out of space.
When the children finished packing, they made a trip to see The Giver. This time they made sure to walk as they had realized that if they flew everywhere all the time, it would be just as bad as when they were sitting around the Leaky Cauldron for so long, doing nothing. So they made the long hike from the Hidden Village to his camp with one of their trunks.
Harry brought along the snakeskin bag that he had been given at the beach party before they left the first time. When they arrived, he opened it up and placed a strange creature on the ground in front of The Giver. It wasn't magical at all, just one of the horseshoe crabs that lived off the coast of the garbage beach. Though this particular one looked a bit strange as if all the color in it had been sapped away.
The Giver examined it closely and slowly waved a glowing hand over it before declaring,
§It is still intact, and alive.§
§Keep it close.§
Harry nodded and told him,
§Just wanted to be sure.§
§We also wanted to make some blood bowls for speaking.§
§Brandt taught us how to make things last longer.§
§Maybe we can do it for the bowls so they will work while we are away.§
The Giver thought this would be an excellent experiment, and Lyra passed him a box with seven two-headed snakes in it. Harry killed the first one and drained its blood into two bowls as Lyra prepped the hoohoo feathers and ash. When they were complete, she also performed the preservation charm on it, causing the shiny, soap bubble appearance to form over the two bowls.
It took several attempts, but the Giver was finally able to end the charm on the bowl by puncturing the surface of the blood in the bowl with one of the horns on his staff. From there, they created six more sets of bowls with Harry and Lyra adding their bowls from the set into their trunk.
Lyra spoke to Harry who quickly translated to The Giver,
§Lyra wants you to tell us immediately if you have problems with the Wandmaker§
The Giver bowed deeply to Lyra and told Harry,
§Tell your sister that I want to thank her for giving me the fang that will be my new wand.§
Lyra smiled as she was given his thanks. At that point, the Usurper, who must have been away when they arrived, returned to The Giver's camp.
Harry addressed the kingsbane,
§We will keep looking for your adversary, but it is a very large castle.§
The Usurper wound itself into a coil and hissed back,
§I will try to be patient.§
§The Giver will keep looking through the memories for clues.§
That was all that needed to be said, so Harry and Lyra cast a combined levitation spell on their trunk and started to pull it back toward the beach.
Brandt was almost prepared to leave the island. He had numerous chests filled with samples of the flora and fauna from the island, three journals filled with notes, close to two hundred rolls of film, and three recording orbs prepped to go back. All of this was currently in a much larger crate that was waiting for Harry and Lyra's possessions to be added before it could be portkeyed back to Black Manor. From there, he could just have Darby deliver them anywhere in the UK.
He would need to have a very very long conversation with Lord Black upon arriving. Not just about the island, but about Mr. Potter, Miss Tonks, the Scamanders, and Lucius Malfoy. Just thinking about it made him hungry, as that meeting would take hours, and if written down, would probably last around half a chapter of a long book.
As he was thinking about everything that needed to be discussed, the children arrived back on the beach, pulling along Lyra's trunk. He helped them levitate it into the crate he had been preparing as Lyra asked, "When are we leaving?"
"I thought it would be best if we left late tonight. If you push yourselves to stay up when we get back, you can take a sleeping potion at the right time, and sleep until the proper time in the morning."
"What are we doing on Sunday?" Harry asked.
"We're staying at Elmswood Lodge tonight, and taking the Hogwarts Express back to school Sunday afternoon. Do you have anything you would like to do?"
"How long would it take to develop some pictures? I had told Cynthia I would go back to her tea shop, and I wanted to bring her the photo of Cynthia and Hannah, the Hidden."
"I'll have it ready by the morning," Brandt said with a smile. "I'll send a message with our trunks for the Abbots to expect you at their tea house late Sunday morning."
Harry thanked him and ran off towards the village while Lyra took off towards the far end of the beach.
By the evening, the crate had been filled up with all of their luggage and with a flash of light, transported to the other side of the planet by portkey to Black Manor. Nenita had come back to the island as well, so the seven of them, nine if you included Whispers and Dougal, were having dinner together.
Before they started to eat, Newt addressed the group, "I'm not a big fan of toasts or public speaking, so I'll keep this short. Thank you Harry and Lyra for showing me your home, this is a wondrous island filled with life, love, magic, and mysteries. Thank you to Brandt for taking care of Harry and Lyra. Thank you to Nestor for taking care of the island. I'm sure you already see the incredible nature of what exists here, but you'll probably learn more over the years."
He raised a glass of wine, and the others followed suit as Harry and Lyra toasted with mango juice.
As they ate, Tina spoke to the children, "As we mentioned, we are going to stay in the region for a few weeks. We will try to gain the trust of the hoohoos to prove the theory of trust-based invisibility. We're also going to visit some of the other reserves in the area to see if there are any similar stories about such an ability."
"How can we visit the other reserves?" Lyra asked, which got Harry's attention too.
Brandt turned to her, "Depending on the situation with your father, Miss Tonks and Auror Moody might be traveling with you over the summer. Depending on my responsibilities, Lord Black may ask me to join you too. We can help facilitate it."
Harry added, "Tristan will be around the area too! And we need to go to the dragons!"
"We will need to start planning your summer experiences, and soon," Brandt told him. "You seem like you will be very busy."
"The two of you have made my life quite busy too," Nestor commented with a chuckle. "Cesario and I are going to start looking into Mr. Gutiérrez's interest in the island along with our other responsibilities, as well as getting approval to start the investigation of the poachers that we agreed to."
Brandt nodded and said, "I assume someone alerted you to what I meant when I spoke about sending Bloodhounds to the region." Nestor nodded, as Brandt continued, "I was just trying to scare those who would try to hinder the approval, but it is not something completely out of the question."
Nestor nodded with a grim expression, "I will be sure to update you on the status of the situation as it progresses."
The remainder of the meal progressed and Nenita even prepared some of the halo-halo desserts that Than and Thao had made before. Harry and Lyra didn't say it, but they thought that the brothers made it much better. Dougal and Whispers didn't seem to care and continued to ask for more until they had run out.
After dinner, they made their way back to the village to spend time with their family before leaving. Mango and his group had shown up as well. They just relaxed and made sure to spend time with every Hidden, especially the new children. It felt easier to say goodbye this time because they knew they would be coming back. Whispers spent most of the time with his parents; Chief and Teacher. After a few hours, they headed back to the beach to meet Brandt.
When they arrived, Harry and Lyra said their goodbyes to Newt, Tina, Dougal, Nestor, and Nenita. When they were done, Nestor presented them with a bike tire that had been turned into a portkey, and after Whispers had been stuck onto Harry in his traveling grip, the portkey was activated and the four of them vanished.