Author Note:
This chapter is a bit short but it has an action scene so I think it was worth putting in but other than this chapter is most filler.
Reviews
A.W
Nice ideas but its not that simple. Dumbledore won't wait for Damien to be a threat before taking action he's made that mistake before. And Voldemort isn't really Damien's problem they don't mean anything to each other Riddle might be a danger but he's a possible danger later Dumbledore is a here and now danger. He's a controlling chess master so he will work to bring Damien under his control over the next few years. You'll see what I mean in this chapter.
Worsfold15
Yeah he will go to a different world each summer so he'll visit four more magical worlds. Not sure what they will be yet as they need to be schools of some sort.
I was thinking about the College of Winterhold in Skyrima for a very cold summer holiday. Plus I could cover the Eye Of Magnus quest. I should have Longbottom come tag along for that one as he's Damien's sidekick.
Maybe I could use the Magic School from Charmed as the spells used in that show could be quite handy for dealing with some of Damien's problems.
My other idea was to have Damien apprentice under another Wizard but I can't decide who that Wizard should be.
I'm sure I'll think of some others once I do my research.
Guest
I'm glad its so well thought of.
douchiesnacks
Then your really about to hate him.
Lord Edric
Good point politicians are evil and worse in Order Of the Phoenix at Harry's trail he acts as Harry's lawyer!
The First Gothic. Book One. A Wizard In Training. Part 17.
The Forbidden Forest. Scotland. The Wizarding World.
I wondered if this was some sort of tradition if so it was a damn foolish one. No student should be sent into the Forbidden Forest for his first detention no matter what he'd done. Granted I was getting off light considering what I'd done but still this was either a damn foolish punishment or a deliberate attempt to get me killed.
Given that it was Dumbledore who had assigned this detention both possibilities could be true and even if this was just a way to scare students in such a way that they thought twice before doing something that would upset the staff again it worried me as it showed just how little the safety of the children attending this school mattered to the Headmaster.
The reason we were here was that my plan to exorcise Binns had succeed. Neville (who had surprisingly neat handwriting when given time to write slowly) had written a very formal looking letter tell Binns that he was being let go because the school governors had decided that History Of Magic would no longer be taught at Hogwarts.
As I'd suspected Binns reason for not moving on was indeed his job so having been fooled into thinking he no longer had a job his spirit had lost its connection to the land of the living and had moved on to the next great adventure.
That part of the plan had worked but I'd not taken into account one very important fact: ghosts can't open envelopes. So Binns had asked a student(which happened to be Granger) to open the letter for him so he could read it which meant Granger had seen the ghost move on and had known why or she had a least known enough for Dumbledore to figure out the rest.
If only Granger hadn't been there when Neville had dropped the letter on Binn's desk. We'd of gotten away with it. But she used empty classrooms to go back in time and had seen Neville leave a letter with Binn's name on it in the classroom.
Later that day the Headmaster had confronted Neville and I, while we were in the Great Hall, and he had demanded to know why we'd decided to get rid of Binns. Ginny and Luna had at once stepped forward to claim that they had helped Neville and I with the idea. That was noble of them but stupid.
Not wanting to get all the Outcasts into trouble I'd done some really quick thinking and told Dumbledore that the whole thing had been a prank in order to get a reaction of Binns who never seemed to responded to anything. I claimed that I had simply thought that we would end up missing a few History Of Magic lessons which I wanted to miss because they were incredibly dull.
Dumbledore might not have believed me but thankfully Flitwick did and he'd declared that what I'd done was just a prank gone wrong. Even the Deputy Headmistress had agreed stating that Fred and Georges Weasly had pranked a lot of people while at the school. The only real difference was that my prank had gone wrong were as there's tended to go right.
It also helped when Slughorn pointed out that no school rules had actually been broken. No signatures had been forged, no one had been hurt, and there was no law against assisting ghosts to try and move on. It was in fact considered a kind thing to do.
So in the end we'd lost quite a few house points and gotten a detention but given how many house points I'd gained so far this year not even my fellow Ravenclaws cared that I'd lost some points as I could starting earn them back pretty easily given how well I tended to do in class.
But despite most of the staff not really blaming us for what had happeend my group had still ended up in this blasted forest and I was worried. So far I'd heard a lot of things that suggested that my friends and I were in great danger. I'd heard howling which suggested that there were wolves in this woods (it wasn't the full moon so they would normal wolves not werewolves) and a strange scuttling noise made by a creature I guessed had more four legs.
I'd forgotten about the spiders.
While the other Outcast members chatted away about the unfairness of this detention (which given that we could have all been expelled wasn't that unfair) I kept a careful eye out for danger. Which was more than could be said for the half-giant gamekeeper Hagrid who was suppose to be supervising this little trip into the forest. The gameskeeper had a crossbow lowed but other than that he seemed unprepared for his trip. But Hagrid was a touch SOB and there wasn't much in the forest that would even think of attacking him. In contrast a bunch of teenagers would look like walking happy meals to some of the magical creatures hidden behind these trees.
"We should do something about Granger" Neville whispered to me as we walked "its her fault were here".
I shook my head and said.
"Bad idea we'd be prime suspects if anything bad happened to her. Let's just get this over with and then lay low for a while. Schools nearly over anyway".
The reason we were was that something had been stealing the school's supply of farm yard animals. We were here to find out what beast was doing that so it could be dealt with. A stupid thing to send children to do but since when did Wizards have any common sense.
As for getting Granger back well we could end up rather busy next year depending next if my plan to deal with Crouch Junior at the World Cup Final didn't go as planned so it wasn't worth wasting our time and energy on petty vengeance.
My mind wandered for a few moments as I wondered if any of the other Death Eaters might try and return their master to power but most of them were locked up. Those that weren't seemed to be benefiting from the status qua around here so I doubted they would try anything like restoring Voldemort to power, not unless they felt threatened.
I might of spent more time thinking on that subject but suddenly I heard a girl scream.
Acting without thought (not something most Ravenclaws would ever admit to doing) I leapt into action. A group of the giant spiders that inhabited this forest, acromantula if memory served, were running right at us. I got the sense that they were hungry.
Arania Exumai
My spell sent the led spider flying but the other acromantula didn't even seem to notice. They did notice when I fired off the blue coloured spell a few more times and sent more of the monsters flying away.
The rest of the Outcasts joined in using their own spells and they met with mixed success but thankfully for all of us Hargid's love of what he would call interesting creatures was not greater than his desire to protect us. In an impressive display of physical might the half-giant managed to wrestle two of the spiders at the same time buying us humans precious seconds which we used to run anyway while firing spells.
With no sort of plan or any verbal communication we worked as a team falling back towards the school. It was too dark to see each other unless a spell was being used still we all did our best to cover each other but the spiders kept coming.
During a lull in the fighting while the acromantula regrouped I had a few seconds spare to try and figure out why this was happening.
The school's livestock had been killed and dragged off by the spiders that was obvious now but why was this happening now it hadn't happened before? They might have used up their food supply in the Forbidden Forest by now, decades of population growth could do that, but in the books the acromantula hadn't attacked anything outside of the Forest, as far as I was aware, until the Battle for Hogwarts. So what had changed to make this happen?
I quickly realised that it must be because of the Chamber never having been opened. The spiders feared the Basilisk above all else and had it become active again it would of ensured that the acromantula would of stayed away but in this time line the Chamber remained sealed so there was nothing to keep the spiders away. If the acromantula got hungry enough they'd risk attacking humans and domesticated animals.
"Merlin there's hundreds of them" swore Neville "we need help!"
He was exaggerating there were only a few dozens a most but that was more than enough to finish us and we were all to tired to keep running, worse of all I didn't even think that we'd been running in the right direction
Suddenly I heard music in the form of a song only it was nothing a human mouth could produce it was to wonderful.
It was Fawkes, Dumbledore's phoenix who flew at the spiders but not before dropping the Sorting Hat on Neville's head who swore again before taking off the hat to find The Sword Of Godric Gryffindor in his lap. Of course! He was a Gryffindor and he'd called for help! Just like Potter would have done down in the Chamber.
My group's avian rescuer was a great distraction and Neville looked ready to fight now that he had a magic sword but I still didn't like our chances. Not that we had much of a choice we could die fighting or just die and if it was time for my life to end I wasn't going down easily.
After making sure Luna and Ginny were behind us Neville and charged forward. But it didn't seem to matter how many of the eight legged freaks I blasted with the Arania Exumai spell or how many Neville stabbed and slashed as more kept appearing. My wand work was proving less lethal than I had hoped and Nev was no swordsmen, so death looked certain.
Rather than run the girls joined in not letting us menfolk die to protect them. Between us lit the forest up as spells filled the air and in the confusion of all those sights and sounds I failed to notice that one of the spiders had gotten behind me.
I was about to get bitten but Luna jumped in the way and took the bite for me. She dropped limp onto me which made me fall over as in my exhausted state I had little strength left.
My wand hand was free and I was now filled with rage so I readied myself to use the Dark Arts but before the first curse left my wand something amazing happened. A pure white brilliance which turned night into day and hurt my eyes appeared the white light made the spiders turn and run as fast as they could.
I wondered who it could be that was saving us and as my eyes adjusted to the changing light level it looked like Gandalf the White had come to the rescue only I was wrong. It was in fact Dumbledore.
The Hospital Wing. Hogwarts School. The Wizarding World.
I must of blacked out because the next thing I knew I was jumping out of a bed, reaching for my wand on the bedside table and looking for something to curse.
"Luna!" I called out.
The Nurse made a shush noise and then waved me over. A curtain was pulled back to show Madam Pomfrey and Professors Dumbledore and Flitwick standing over Luna's sleeping form.
"Miss Lovegood will be fine" assured the school nurse "thanks to the Headmaster's Phoenix".
I must of looked as confused as I felt as Dumbledore explained.
"Phoenix tears can heal even the most horrific of wound and neutralise the most deadly of venoms".
The acromantula must of poisoned Luna that made sense as even regular sized spiders could kill humans with a bite. Granted such spiders weren't normally found in the U.K but there had been nothing normal about those arachnids.
"She was very lucky" said my Head of House to his employer "if your familiar hadn't gone to the forest you would of not have been there in time to save them, Headmaster".
I felt the urge to point out that it was the Headmaster who had sent us into danger in the first place but despite my tiredness and aching body I had enough sense to realise that maybe Dumbledore had sent the Outcasts into danger so that he could 'save us'. If that was so then he must want to earn my gratitude for some reason and it might serve me best to play along with that scheme.
"Thank you Professor" I said loudly enough to be heard but not so loudly that it might wake Luna up.
After I said that I at once started to plan the downfall of Albus Dumbledore.
Even if the old man hadn't purposely arranged tonight's events he'd still failed to do his job (again) which meant that he had to be removed from office and if had indeed put us in danger, and nearly gotten Luna killed, then he was going to die by my hand.
However before I dealt with Dumbledore I was going to deal with those spiders. I had no idea, yet, how I was going to do that but I'd find a way. I'd make them pay even if I had to burn the whole forest down around them.
"It was no trouble Damien" said the Headmaster in a friendly voice "and rest assured that there will no more detentions served in the Forbidden Forest".
I ignored the Headmaster and asked the nurse something.
"Are Neville and Ginny okay?".
Dumbledore answered for her.
"Both Mr. Longbottom and Miss Weasly are fine. In fact they have already been sent back to their dormitories".
Well that was good news. Luna being hurt was bad enough but one of my friends had died I didn't know what I would do. It was taking a lot of effort for me not to attack the Headmaster right in here in the Hospital Wing. If it weren't for Fawkes Dumblore would already be dodging Killing Curses as if she had died than everything good about me would of died with her.
"You however Mr Mason are not well" informed the school nurse "You are suffering from a bad case of magical exhaustion"
I didn't know what that was but I could guess.
"I've worn out my magic?" I asked with concern.
I'd not known that a Wizard could do that.
Pomfrey took me aside to explain.
"No you can still do magic silly boy. Magical exhaustion is caused by doing to much magic. You wore yourself out not your magic".
Well that made sense. Using magic burned calories just like exercising did so what I'd done was the magical equivalent of exercising until I passed out.
"Once you get some bed rest and a good meal inside you, you'll recover".
That was a great relief to hear because for a second or two I'd worried that I might of damaged my ability to do magic. I also realised that I really had no idea if was possible to damage a person's magic.
"Now go back to sleep" the Nurse ordered.
Seeing no reason to disobey I went back to bed and before sleep claimed me again I spent some time planning revenge.
I didn't care what it might cost me later those spiders were going to burn. The gods themselves would not be able to stop me. I was going to kill every last eight legged freak in the forest.