Chapter 8: Advanced Training Begins, More Power and Old Knowledge

The following morning, Harry awoke somewhat later than usual, as he had been very exhausted from the long day and even longer night.

But no matter how tired he was, when he remembered all that had happened the previous evening he couldn't help but smile. As he began reliving those events, he became aware that a certain part of his anatomy was expanding and pushing into something that it probably ought not to be, but at that moment in time, he was beyond caring.

Harry continued to lay there, not really doing anything, for several minutes until he felt Tonks begin to stir. At that point he opened his eyes and looked straight into hers. They smiled at each other, both inwardly glad that the other was showing no sign of regretting what had happened, leaned in and gently kissed, gradually becoming more heated.

Half an hour, and a fair amount more exploration of each other's bodies, later found them both enjoying a shower (at Tonks' insistence…some lame story about saving water) in the small bathroom that they had magically created off Harry's bedroom.

Harry would never know how Tonks had managed that one, but it would seem that she had cast a spell that temporarily made the Dursleys forget all about their third bedroom and the people occupying it, therefore they no longer needed to interact with the muggles at all…a vast improvement in Harry's opinion.

Eventually they managed to get around to getting clean and then got dressed ready to start the day properly.

Harry got out the five objects he had retrieved from Gringotts the previous day and expanded them to full size…all the while wondering exactly how these would help him. I mean, if he could actually use it, the staff would be an invaluable weapon, and it couldn't hurt to learn how to use a sword he supposed, but at the same time, a helmet, a shield and some body armour probably wouldn't be of much use in a magical fight unless they could deflect killing curses which Harry somehow doubted…but still, he had been told by the founders and merlin that he would need it all so he'd play along for now.

That's another thing Harry thought when are they actually getting here? It's not exactly as though I can go tell them I'm ready, is it?

No sooner than he had thought this, did the five spirits begin to shimmer into view before him.

"Good Morning to you, my child." Greeted the ghost of Merlin.

"Hi, I was just wondering…how did you know to come here now? I mean instead of five minutes ago or half an hour from now?" he asked.

Ravenclaw answered him, "We sensed that you were ready for our arrival. It is an ability that even for us was not easy to master, and since it requires you to be dead, you will hopefully be unable to learn it for quite some time, do not dwell on it."

"Umm…ok"

Tonks walked over to Harry, and said quietly to him, "Sorry, I'm gonna have to go now, I just remembered – Dumbledore set a meeting for his little bird club today and I want to see what he says about you. Could be fun! Will you be alright by yourself?"

"Yeah, I think I'll be ok. Let me know what's said later."

"Ok." And with that, she apparated out of the room.

"Well, while this is all rather touching, I was under the impression we were here for a reason." Began Slytherin "Did you retrieve the items we told you to get?"

"What? Oh! Yeah, they're over here." Replied Harry, walking over to where he had left them on a table.

"Very good. Now, when you picked them up, did you feel anything?" Asked Hufflepuff.

"Yeah, a sort of tingling sensation in my hands and sort of like a presence within them I guess would be the best way to describe it…it was strongest with the staff and to a slightly lesser extent the sword…what was that?" he finished uncertainly.

It was Merlin who answered. "I think it is time we told you a story, young Harry. As was explained to you yesterday, I was a seer in life. One of quite exceptional talent, if I do say so myself. And I foretold using my abilities that there would be a time when the five of us would return to instruct someone who would be the defeater of darkness.

"Now, none of that is new to you as we told you as much yesterday. However, what you don't yet know is the steps each of us took in order to help you. You see, each of us were masters of the arts of magic – though some of us specialised in different areas, we all shared that common latent talent. Now, knowing that it would one day fall to us to help you become the most powerful wizard you could possibly become, I devised an enchantment. The purpose of this spell was to allow each of us to, upon our deaths, seal our raw magical power within an object. Those are the objects we chose." He concluded, needlessly indicating the items.

"Ok, I think I'm following you so far….so you enchanted the objects and presumably yourselves as well so that when you died your magical energy would be transferred and stored in them? Is that right?" Harry asked, wanting to make sure he didn't get lost along the way with this.

Merlin beamed at him, "Precisely! Now, as to the purpose of that action. Well, we have no physical bodies anymore so it would be next to impossible for us to re-absorb that energy for our own use…however there is a fact about magical energy that was almost forgotten when I was in my youth, and is now completely unknown to all.

"I trust you know that each and every living thing on the planet, whether witch, wizard, muggle, beast or plant, has a unique magical signature?" at Harry's nod, he continued "Well, what you do not know, is that the magical signatures of people of the same lineage, that is to say members of the same family, are compatible with one another and the best matches are from direct decent along the family lines, as is the case with the six of us. Do you understand what this means?"

"I understand what you're saying, and you're right I didn't know any of that last bit. But I don't see where you're going with all of this."

"Ah, yes, another piece of the puzzle lost over the millennia since my own magical instruction. In my day, long before even these four were born, there was a ritual that could be performed by a Master Mage, that is to say a wizard such as myself with very high power levels and an equally high understanding of magic itself, which would temporarily allow one being to borrow and absorb into their own magical core some of the magic of another being so long as their signatures were sufficiently compatible, thus making the recipient temporarily stronger.

"When we found out about your future need, I looked into the intricacies of this process and discovered that, if it was done using the stored magic of a dead person, it could be made permanent. This means that we can now give you a massive boost to your magical abilities, literally making you the most powerful wizard that had ever been recorded, by giving you all of our magical power and any latent abilities we had, for example you would gain my gift for Seeing."

At this point Harry had to sit down before he collapsed. Five of the most powerful witches and wizards he had ever heard of had just given him a way of gaining all of their power to add to his own…well his chances of beating Voldemort and surviving had just gone from practically zero all the way up to "actually possible". But then a thought occurred to him.

"Umm…Don't get me wrong, I'm very grateful for this and everything, but before we do this I need to ask….will I actually be able to control that much power? I mean since I had all of my magic released I've only just been able to get full control back…and now you're saying we are going to add…what? Probably about 10 times more power?" he asked.

This time it was Gryffindor who replied. "You don't give yourself enough credit there Harry. In terms of raw power you are already slightly higher than I was in life, and although they are probably going to kill me all over again for saying this, I was the strongest in raw magic out of the four of us. And while it's true, merlin is naturally more powerful than you, it's not by much…all in all this will probably only give you maybe three or four times the power you currently have. As for controlling it, we will help with that. If you agree, we plan to tutor you every day for the next month…as that is the amount of time we are permitted to stay here and help you…you will learn from each of us on separate days and we will teach you everything we know that can possibly help you. Do you accept our terms?" he finished with a smile, letting Harry know that although they were discussing serious issues, they were friendly and genuinely wanted to help him out.

Harry thought about it for a minute. This is exactly what I need really…a massive power boost as well as personal training from the best there has ever been…that should probably be better than anything Dumbles pulls out of his backside, especially since he isn't really interested…well, really there's only one option.

"I realise that there is really no other way to do this, so yes, I accept your terms. How do we start?"

For the next five minutes, merlin explained the ritual, with occasional input from Ravenclaw. And then they were ready.

"One last thing before we begin," began Ravenclaw "of our number I was the last to die, though only by a few short years, and in some of my spare time I conducted extra research on this process, and developed it further. When you receive power from my helmet you will discover that you will also receive the sum total of my knowledge from approximately two days prior to my death. While you have that knowledge you will need time to process it. That is what I will work with you on, processing all the information I acquired during my life."

Harry merely nodded, once again dumbfounded that in addition to all of this power he would also be getting all the knowledge of one of the smartest witches ever to live, one who was actually famous for and founded a house based around knowledge…he guessed that after everything that had happened the past few days he should just give up being surprised about things anymore as it seemed like he was destined never to have a normal day again in his life for the foreseeable future.

The way merlin explained it, the ritual was pretty straightforward as far as Harry was concerned. All he had to do was a fancy bit of wandless magic while reciting a few phrases in latin…the only tricky part was that if he made any mistakes the object he was working on at the time was liable to blow up in his face with enough power to level a fair portion of the town to nothing more than dust…so no pressure.

Harry picked up merlin's staff, intending to begin with that when Hufflepuff spoke up, "I wouldn't recommend it. To give your body a chance to adapt to what's happening, it's probably a good idea to start with the item containing the least power…that is to say, the one from the person who was magically the weakest. In this case, that would be me.

"Rowena and Salazar were of similar power levels to each other therefore it shouldn't matter which of theirs you use second and third." She continued, "Fourth would be Godric's sword and finally, the most powerful among us would clearly be merlin. This is going to be a tiring process for your body anyway as your magical core is going to have to expand and adapt to the extra power…you might as well lessen the strain any way you can, my dear." She concluded with a smile.

Harry re-placed the staff and picked up the shield instead, conjuring a separate table to put it on with a wave of his hand.

Next he placed his hands on top of it, feeling and trying to sense the power that he knew was trapped inside.

Once he had managed that he spoke in a calm, powerful voice "Terminus Tutela", commanding the protection spells that had been placed on the object to preserve the energy to vanish, allowing him to continue.

Next, while trying to channel his own magic into the shield, he said,

"Agnito Meus Veneficus Quod Permissum Mihi Vestri Vox!"

This was the spell that instructed the enchantment on the shield to compare the signature of the trapped power (Hufflepuff's) and compare it to the castor's (Harry's) to see if they were compatible. The shield began to glow in a white light, this meant that it was working.

"Solvo Ut Mihi Vox Vos Habitum!"

He commanded it to release its hold on the power within. He began to glow in the same white light as the shield, confirming the process had progressed to the next stage.

"Penetro Mihi Planto Mihi Vestri Quod Fio Mei Redimio Nostrum Vires Pro Totus Infinitio!"

This was the spell to complete the process, it merged the two magics and changed the signature of the new one to make it match Harry's own. At this point the shield stopped glowing and Harry became even brighter with a white/gold aura surrounding him.

Eventually the light faded back into his body and he instantly fell backwards into the chair behind him, temporarily exhausted from the effort involved in the final stage.

"Wow, this feels great," he said "a bit tiring to get it, but the feel of the raw power within me is gonna take some getting used to, it's like a warm feeling in my whole body."

The five smiled happily…well except Slytherin who just looked slightly happy but didn't smile (he had a reputation to uphold even while he was dead after all)…glad that it had been successful.

Once again, Hufflepuff was the first to speak up, "I am glad that you were not hurt in the process and know you will make good use of my power Harry. However, now do you see why I thought it best to begin with the smaller transfers?"

Shuddering at the thought of jumping straight in at the deep end and absorbing what would probably be about twice the amount of power on his first try Harry merely nodded at her.

Next Slytherin spoke up "Come on, get back up, there will be plenty of time to rest once you have finished the job…you're not anywhere near done yet. It's best to do all of them at once because even though you will be thoroughly exhausted afterwards, it means that you only have to relearn to use your magic once, instead of five times…now if you would happen to derive some twisted form of masochistic pleasure from doing that then by all means we'll come back tomorrow and finish this, otherwise…GET OFF YOUR BACKSIDE RIGHT NOW AND GET BACK TO WORK!!" he finished with a growl, making Harry jump and at the same time wonder how this guy had ever been a teacher…then again, considering the current holder of the position of head of his house at school was Snape…a lot of things began to make a twisted kind of sense…

Choosing not to comment on this, Harry picked up the next item, coincidently, Slytherin's armour and placed that on the table after removing the shield.

Now that he had completed the process successfully once, Harry had a bit more confidence in his ability to repeat the act and instead of breaking it into sections, he did it all in one stage, as Ravenclaw had advised would be better once he got the hang of it.

"Terminus Tutela, Agnito Meus Veneficus Quod Permissum Mihi Vestri Vox" the armour glowed, "Solvo Ut Mihi Vox Vos Habitum" so did he, "Penetro Mihi Planto Mihi Vestri Quod Fio Mei Redimio Nostrum Vires Pro Totus Infinitio!"

This time the feeling within him was slightly more intense and his aura was noticeably brighter than the first time.

After a moment's rest, Harry began again, this time with Ravenclaw's helmet.

Everything proceeded as it had previously until Harry completed the final line…this time, not only did he feel the strange yet comforting warmth and glow brightly with magic but he also received a rush of information, all out of sequence as though he had just, in that split second, gone into a library and read every page of every book there totally out of order….a potion recipe, followed by a couple of runic equations followed by the layout of Hogwarts, followed by another potion, followed by information about the theory of magic itself...and so on. It was all very confusing for Harry, and if it weren't for his natural healing abilities he was sure he would have a headache worse than any in recorded history.

Eventually, he managed to block out the sensation along with most of the flow of information by using one of the techniques Tonks had taught him with occlumency…in this case, it meant the whole lot of the information went through his mind quickly one last time at which point his subconscious mind sorted it into categories and filled it away for later use along with all of his own knowledge…this was usually a method of increasing your ability to recall facts, but in this case it seemed as good a way as any.

"Are you alright Harry?" asked Ravenclaw, "I put an awful lot of information in there, I know it might be overwhelming at first but you will need most of it soon enough and that was the easiest way to give you it" she finished apologetically.

"No, I'm fine." He replied. "It was a bit much to cope with at first but I used some mind focusing techniques I know to help sort it all out a bit."

After a few minutes rest and a brief conversation with the other 5, Harry exchanged the helmet for Gryffindor's sword and began the process again.

When he completed the final part of the incantations, Harry glowed so brightly it was almost painful for the others to watch (if they were actually capable of feeling pain, that is). As well as that the feeling of power was greatly stronger than any of the previous ones.

Once the light eventually faded, and Harry had recovered somewhat, he asked them "What is that glow thing that happens at the end anyway?"

Merlin replied, "The glow surrounding you at the end is your magical aura, the brighter it glows the stronger the wizard, that is why yours gets brighter each time…you are getting stronger and it is reflected in your aura…the colour represents you as a person. Not so much personality traits as an insight into your soul…you, like I are among the very rare in that we have, or in my case had, a white aura. This indicates that you are pure of heart and could never possibly stray from the path of the light – it simply isn't in your nature. The gold flecks within it strengthen this impression, as the colour gold in auras has much the same meaning, only it represents more the strength of character than the purity of ones soul." He concluded with a fond smile.

Still fairly tired, and wishing he could sleep for a week, but knowing that he still had more to do, and like Slytherin said earlier, it was better to get it over and done with than drag it out, Harry replaced the sword with the staff ready to begin again.

This time, the feeling of power entering his body was so intense that Harry struggled to complete the final part of the incantation.

In fact, as soon as the final word left his mouth, he instantly collapsed from exhaustion and lapsed into unconsciousness.

The four founders spun around to look at merlin. Ravenclaw was the first to speak up, almost instantly. "What happened? Will he be ok? What's going on?" she asked frantically, genuinely concerned that they had injured him by having him absorb so much at once.

"Relax, my child, this is a side effect that often occurred when this process was common place. It is testament to his strength that he did not loose consciousness prior to this. Very few would be able to cope with even half of what his body had just endured. Allow him to rest for now, give him time to adapt. He will awaken when he is ready, not an instant before." Stated the ancient wizard, seemingly unconcerned for the young man before them.

Several hours later, Harry began to stir. When he first regained some level of awareness, his first thought was what am I doing on the floor? Then he began to remember all that had happened that morning.

The sound of a non-existent throat being cleared drew his attention to Merlin, who was the only spirit still in the room with him – the others having returned to where ever it is spirits go when they are not among the living.

"Welcome back, young Harry. Are you feeling quite alright?" he asked softly.

Harry considered this question for a moment…physically, he was fine, he even felt refreshed after the rest. Mentally he was still a bit confused, but knew that would soon pass as it was simply the effect of his brain having yet to fully rejoin his body in the realm of the conscious. However that wasn't the thing that was troubling the young man. No, what was unusual was the fact that several seemingly random items around his room, as well as merlin, were glowing in various colours.

"I'm not sure…I feel ok, but did I hit my head or something? Because loads of stuff looks like it's glowing when it shouldn't be doing that." He answered, deciding that it might be some sort of left over effect from what they had been doing earlier.

At this, merlin smiled widely, looking very pleased at Harry's answer. "Good! I had hoped you would gain that ability, I found it very useful in life.

"You of course remember our earlier discussion regarding the fact that all living things have a magical signature, yes?" Harry nodded, not seeing where this was going, and waited for the other man to continue, "Well, the same holds true for enchanted or inherently magical objects…wands, some books, moving photographs, talking mirrors…many everyday items such as that.

"Now, you may be asking yourself, what does this have to do with anything? Hmm? Well, as I mentioned in passing earlier when we discussed the process of the power transference rituals, as well as our raw power, you also gained many, if not all, of the latent magical abilities that each of us possessed. In this case, you are experiencing an ability gained from me, at least I assume that is where you got it as I don't recall the others ever mentioning having it, this is a very rare ability referred to simply as mage-sight.

"What it does is allows you to see the magical signature of an object or person. In the case of an object, as I'm sure you are seeing many of in this room, it will have a single colour for each enchantment places upon it and they will be built up in layers if there is more than one…the oldest will be the one closest to the object to your sight. In the case of a person, the inner ring if you like, will be that person's aura and surrounding that will be the colour representing any spells or enchantments placed upon that person at the time…anything from a tickling charm to an imperius curse will show, so it can either give you erroneous information or give you valuable strategic knowledge about your opponents in a battle scenario. Each spell on a person or object will have a unique signature, I will teach you how to recognise each one in time." The spirit concluded.

Harry decided that this was another one of those strange things that he was just going to have to learn to live with…after all, as merlin said, it could come in handy at times.

"So, what next then?" he asked, simply side stepping the issue for now.

"Well, you have had a hard day already, so we will begin your training proper tomorrow. As was mentioned earlier, each day you will be training with a different one of us and we will each be instructing you in a different area of magic.

"I will be teaching you the theory of magic and spell creation, as well as the use of mage sight and your elemental abilities and animagus transformations, which I believe you have yet to explore.

"Godric will be teaching you sword play along with warding and defensive magic as well as the use of runes.

"Salazar will be instructing you in the creation and brewing of potions as well as offensive magic and the mind arts.

"Helga will tutor you in divination…don't dismiss it, I'm not talking about that rubbish with tea leaves and palm reading you get taught now a days, I mean proper divination of old…she will also continue your education in herbology as well as increasing your knowledge of understanding and caring for magical creatures.

"And finally, Rowena will be guiding you through advanced conjuring, charms, transfiguration and enchanting objects.

"As you can tell, this is an awful lot of work to get through and we only have 28 days to do it in…well 27 now and 26 by tomorrow, as we can only return to this plane for one lunar cycle before we must return to what is beyond this world. We will be working every day unless you have something to do at that time that cannot be postponed. You will spend 5 days with each of us and the final day will be a test of sorts for you to put your new knowledge to use. Now, do not be fooled, you may only be getting five days with each of us and covering multiple subjects within that time, but each of us is among the best that has ever lived in our respective fields of study, and after our time is up, if you have worked hard, you will be well past the level of any of your peers, in fact there will be very few living who will be able to approach your level of knowledge and ability as much of our knowledge is of long forgotten arts. Once our instruction is complete I would recommend you spend some time acquainting yourself with the developments in magic since our time.

"Do you understand everything I have just explained? And do you wish to proceed? If you do then we will expect the highest level of commitment from you." The wizard finished sternly.

Harry didn't need to think about this anymore, he had time to realise that this was the chance of a lifetime and that he would be a fool to turn it down.

"I understand, and am willing to accept any teaching that the five of you can give me. I need everything I can get if I am going to win this war, and I fully intend on doing so." He finished with a determination that made the old wizard proud.

"Good. In that case, I will return tomorrow to begin our lessons together. I will be first, Godric will be your second instructor, then Salazar, Helga and finally Rowena, before I will return once again." He explained. "I suggest you rest for a while now and do not over exert yourself for the remainder of the day. Goodbye." He concluded before fading out of sight, leaving Harry alone in his room.

He went and laid down on the bed and tried to process everything that had happened over the past hours, as well as everything that was still to come.