The next few days, all of Harry's thoughts were consumed by the letter from Ollivander's friend. Since the incident that night with Daphne, Harry had barely even thought about snakes, nor had he used his unique brand of magic for anything bigger than lighting a candle. So, the following Thursday, he decided to sneak out of the dorms late at night to work on everything he had been putting off.
He soon found a large room in the dungeons that appeared to be a former lecture hall. It was a huge room with raised stadium style seating, which he had entered at the top of. The front of the room was a massive open area, with chalkboards lining the back wall. When he got to the bottom of the stairs, he dragged the teacher's desk away from the wall, along with a chair. He sat down, trying to figure out what to work on tonight.
He knew he would need to work on his magical control so that Ollivander's ritual could work. He also needed to start working on his Parselmagic, though he would have to figure out how to speak Parseltongue at will, not to mention how to write it. Finally, he had to figure out why his wand was behaving in such a strange manner. Deciding that without a snake the Parselmagic would be too difficult to work on, he decided to try to figure out why his wand was behaving so strangely.
Standing and drawing his wand, he brandished it across the room towards a blank stone wall, and cast. "Incendio!" A massive gout of flames launched from his wand, impacting on the wall and leaving a sizable scorch mark behind. A slight frowned marred his face. That burst of fire was significantly larger than anything he had seen produced in the classroom the previous week.
Shaking his head and regathering his thoughts, he aimed his wand again and cast, "Glacius!" A small shard of ice appeared at the tip of his wand, roughly eight inches long in the shape of an icicle, before launching at a high speed towards the wall. It impacted almost exactly where the fire had, shattering and spreading ice everywhere. Upon inspection, it actually managed to gouge out a small piece of stone, leaving a small indentation behind. Harry raised his wand again, concentrating as much as he could. He intentionally limited the amount of magic currently in his hand, then cast again. "Glacius!"
This time, only a pellet of ice was formed, and it bounced off the wall at a much lower velocity than his previous attempt. Harry grinned. Apparently, he could change the effect of a spell simply by concentrating. He raised his wand once more, flooding his hand with more magic than it usually had. "Glacius!" A spear of ice, fully five feet long, formed before him in less than a second, then launched at the wall almost faster than he could see. With a crash, it imbedded itself nearly a foot in the wall, with small pieces of stone and ice tumbling down to the floor.
Harry gaped at what he had just done. This spell was easily lethal, and yet Quirrell had thought it appropriate to teach first years. The other spells were nearly as bad. What could happen if a student got mad and decided to cast one of these at someone else?
Deciding that it would be best for him to become as adept with these spells as possible regardless of how dangerous they were, he moved on. Next was the wind spell. "Ventus!" A blast of air, similar in strength to the one he had cast in the classroom, launched at the wall, breaking a few stray chairs against it in the process.
After this many spells, especially the large ice spear, he decided to try the last one before heading back to bed. Recalling what happened in class, Harry once again withdrew the majority of magic from his hand. "Fulgus." Electricity emanated from his wand tip, reaching out with spidery fingers. As fast as it had reached out, one branch contacted the wall, and a loud crack sounded as a large amount of energy pulsed from his wand into the wall. Harry cocked his head. This spell wasn't quite an instant effect, like most of the other spells he had learned. Concentrating on exactly the effect he wanted, he raised his wand again, keeping his power low. "Fulgus!" The spidery fingers reached out again, but after travelling about halfway to the wall, they took a sharp turn to the left, towards the desks. A few feet later, they turned back to the right, before impacting on the wall. As before, just after impact, the lightning roughly tripled in diameter, channeling a significant amount of energy.
Harry grimaced as he felt more energy leave him. Though he could still perform magic, this was more than he had expended in quite a while. He decided he had done enough tonight, and was just about to leave, when he decided to try one more thing. He placed his wand in the center of the desk at the front of the class, then walked to the door at the back of the class. He raised his empty hand in front of himself palm up, then focused on his desire to have his wand back. There were two simultaneous flashes of light, followed immediately by two loud cracks, and his wand was firmly back in his grasp. Harry smiled, then turned and left the room.
The weeks continued to pass, and the weather continued to get colder, until it was difficult to be outside for even a few minutes without copious amounts of clothing. Harry continued to practice with his wand a few times a week, and was now able to control the power of his spells with barely a thought. He had even managed to cast Protego, though it did take much more focus and power to maintain. He had also started to try imitating these spells with his wandless magic. He hadn't come anywhere close imitating the shield spell, but he was having limited success with the elemental spells.
Eventually, October came to its conclusion. On the afternoon of Halloween, the Slytherins and Ravenclaws had Herbology together. After the first class, Harry had paired with Hermione since the first class, and today they were working on repotting some more Mandrakes. He arrived at his station, surprised that Hermione wasn't there. He guessed that she just got caught up in a book, so continued setting up. However, several minutes into the start of class, she had still not arrived.
"Anthony," Harry said to another Ravenclaw, "Do you know where Hermione is?"
"Er, I haven't seen her since Transfiguration this morning," Goldstein replied. "Lisa, have you seen Hermione?" he asked his partner.
"Well I heard Ron Weasley yelling at her after lunch today," she replied. "It got pretty heated from what I could hear, he sounded really mad."
Harry frowned. "What happened after they argued?"
"I think I heard her crying and running off, but I didn't see where to, sorry," Lisa answered, turning back to her Mandrake.
After the last class of the day, Charms, he still hadn't seen or heard from Hermione. He was starting to get worried, it wasn't like her to miss class. In fact, he couldn't think of something less like Hermione.
"Daphne, would you mind coming to look for Hermione with me? I'm kinda worried about her," Harry said as they walked towards the Great Hall.
"Sure. Where did Lisa say she saw her?"
"Just outside the Great Hall I think, arguing with Ron. We should peek into the Hall and see if she's there, then we can look around a bit," Harry said.
Just as he feared though, she was nowhere to be seen. The two Slytherins began walking around the first floor, checking empty classrooms and calling her name. Finally, near the courtyard, they heard sobbing nearby. Glancing at each other, they walked to the entrance to the girls' bathroom.
"Hermione?" Harry called out. "Hermione, it's me and Daphne. Can we come in?"
"Okay," she called back, her tone unsteady. Daphne led the way in. The room was covered in white tiles, with a row of sinks on one side, stalls on the other. Hermione was leaning over the far sink, eyes red and tear streaks on her face. She gave a weak smile to the pair.
"Hey, guys. How's the feast?" she asked weakly. Daphne immediately rushed to Hermione's side, embracing her.
"We couldn't go without knowing where you were," Daphne said quietly. "Are you alright? Lisa told us that Ron got in an argument with you, and we were worried when you didn't show up to Herbology."
"It was stupid, don't worry about it. We should get back to the feast," Hermione said with a sniffle.
"Come on, Hermione, just tell us what happened," Harry said.
"I don't know, he was just saying that Muggleborn like me should know my place, and that I needed to stop being a know-it-all. I shouldn't have let him get into my head like that, but I couldn't help it," she explained quietly.
Harry was furious with Ron, but did his best not to show it, knowing that wasn't what Hermione needed right now. "Hermione, Ron's an idiot. You really can't take anything he says to heart."
"I know, I know. It's just… a lot of people in Primary said the same sorts of things, and it just kinda hit me," Hermione said in a weak voice. "I'm just so tired of being treated like that."
"Do your housemates treat you like that, too?" Daphne asked quietly.
"No… to be honest, they treat me better than any of my classmates in the Muggle world," she answered.
"Well, just stick with them and us. You don't need to listen to just on person's opinion, Hermione. He's probably just jealous of you," Harry said.
Hermione turned to him with a watery smile. "Thanks, guys."
Thud.
"Did you guys hear that?" Harry asked.
"Hear what, Harry?" Daphne replied.
Thud.
"That sound. Like something really heavy fell over."
"I still don't—"
Thud.
"Okay never mind, I definitely heard that," Daphne said, a worried look on her face.
"What on earth—"
Thud.
Thud.
Tracey and Blaise were seated at the end of the Slytherin table, loading their plates with various delicious foods that were prepared for the feast.
"Blaise, do you know where Harry and Daphne disappeared to?" Tracey asked. "They were right behind us when we left Charms."
"I'm not sure, Harry's seemed distracted since Herbology. Maybe he—"
Blaise was interrupted by the sound of the giant doors to the Great Hall slamming open.
"TROLLS! There's trolls – in the dungeons! Thought… thought you ought to know," Quirrell gasped, purple turban askew, panic and fear in his eyes. He took several more steps down the aisle, before collapsing in a dead faint on the floor. There was dead silence in the Hall for several seconds.
Then, as if possessed at the same time, all four houses stood, and began rushing towards the doors. Before anyone could leave, though, there was a massive bang from the teacher's table. Dumbledore lowered his wand.
"All students will remain in the Great Hall," he said, his tone leaving no room for argument. "Minerva, Filius, Severus, with me. Poppy, please tend to Quirinius. All other teachers and prefects, please move to the front of the Hall. Younger students, move towards the windows. Quickly, please."
With nary a word, the entire Hall immediately began moving in accordance with Dumbledore's commands. Dumbledore and his group slipped out the doors, with several teachers moving up, wands out. Blaise looked to Tracey.
"Harry and Daphne…"
Author's Note: Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! Another chapter pretty quickly, and hopefully I'll get one more up before I head back to school. Thanks for all the reviews, happy reading!