CHAPTER 8:
THE DIADEM, THE RING, THE HALLOWS AND THE GHOST
The next day, Jenova, Aerith, Dumbledore and Snape went to the Room of Requirement as early as possible. Aerith wore a cape that functioned as robes over her standard outfit. Jenova, rarely one to be conventional, wore a large coat in a similar fashion(1). Dumbledore paced back and forth in front of the area (near a tapestry depicting some wizard trying to teach trolls how to ballet dance), and then, a door appeared. Proof, Dumbledore said quietly, if any be needed, that a horcrux was present, for he had been thinking that he needed to find the horcrux.
Jenova and Aerith looked around in wonder at the room that was revealed. A vast chamber, filled with all sorts of objects. But prominent amongst them was a bust of an old warlock with a wig, and a discoloured diadem1.
"There's the little bastard," Jenova said, striding forward, only for Dumbledore to halt her. Dumbledore and Snape then cast a few spells on the Diadem, before the former then gestured her forward. Jenova nodded, then gripped the object. Once more, her jaw distended grotesquely, and a black, smoke-like substance was drawn into her mouth with a howl. The Diadem, while still a little tarnished, seemed to become brighter.
"The little shit is still using Occlumency," Jenova snarled. "I can't get any more memories about the book."
"Maybe this will help," Dumbledore said, plucking from his robes a box. Jenova took it gingerly, and opened it to find a ring with a large stone embedded in it. The stone had a distinctive symbol carved on it: a bisected circle contained within a triangle, looking eerily like a cat's eye.
Jenova wrinkled her nose. "It stinks of more than a horcrux," she remarked. "Even without Voldemort's memories, I can tell this bloody thing is cursed."
"We tried removing the curses on the ring," Dumbledore said. "It was something of a trial to get it."
Snape snorted. "An understatement if I ever heard one."
"That symbol," Aerith said with a frown. "I've seen it somewhere before. It was in one of the illustrations of that book you gave Harry for his birthday."
"Indeed," Dumbledore said. "Once we have dealt with the horcrux, I will tell you."
"Well," Jenova said, peering at the ring, "what remaining curse is there on it?"
"A dark curse, presumably of the Dark Lord's own design," Snape said. "Virtually impossible to remove, save by it being expended. Anyone foolish enough to put on the ring will find themselves dying in a most horrible manner. Their entire body rots."
"Hmm. I wonder." Jenova suddenly seemed to split into two. "Well, this is going to suck," they said in chorus.
"Jenova?" Aerith asked. "What are you doing?"
"I'm performing an experiment. I think Hojo rubbed off on me more than I thought," the two Jenovas chorused. Then, one of them took the ring, and placed it on her finger.
She screamed in pain, her skin colour and hair changing back to what was normal for her. She clutched at the ring on her finger, snarling in anger. "Oh no you don't!" she snarled, before turning to her clone. "Do it!"
The original Jenova nodded, her jaw distending grotesquely again. Black smoke was drawn from the ring, while the Jenova wearing it gripped it with a manic grimace on her face. Aerith watched, with horror, as the flesh around the ring turned purple, and then black, beginning to rot. Even as her hand fell apart, Jenova grasped the ring in another hand. "Sore loser, aren't you?!" she screamed at the ring, even though it no longer possessed a horcrux. "You're like my son, you know that?!"
"Jenova," Aerith said, stepping forward to help, but the stricken clone waved her away.
"I'm absorbing the curse into this body!" the dying Jenova snarled. "Don't worry, I'm just losing these cells. My consciousness will return to the main source! Of course, it's more than a little painful." She began laughing, maniacally, even as the rot seemed to accelerate, and chunks of flesh began to fall from her body, melting into purulent goo. Then, she seemed to collapse into a steaming puddle of gunk, which itself evaporated into nothing.
All that was left was the ring.
Jenova grimaced. "Well, that was unpleasant to experience," she remarked too-casually, as if discussing a splinter being removed from her finger rather than the dissolution of one of her bodies. She walked over, and picked up the ring. "The curse is gone, though, along with the horcrux." Casually, she threw it over to Dumbledore, who caught it by instinct. "Now, you were saying? That symbol…Aerith's right. I saw it when I had a look through that book myself. There was an illustration at the end of The Three Brothers in that Tales of Beedle the Bard book. It was on a gravestone."
Dumbledore nodded. "The sign of the Deathly Hallows," he admitted.
"Wait, what?" Aerith asked.
"The Deathly Hallows is the name given to the three artifacts from the story of the Three Brothers," Dumbledore said. "The Elder Wand, the Resurrection Stone, and the Cloak of Invisibility." He then looked to the ceiling. "Blackboard, please?"
A blackboard and chalk appeared, and Dumbledore drew the same symbol, and then separated it into three parts: a triangle, a circle, and a line. "The Cloak," he said, pointing to the triangle. "The Stone," he said, pointing to the circle.
"And the Wand is the line," Aerith said. "I remember that story. One of the more intriguing ones. But you're saying that you think that they are real?"
"I know that they are real," Dumbledore said quietly.
Jenova frowned, before she said, "Your wand. May I?"
Dumbledore looked at Jenova, before reluctantly handing over his wand. Jenova scrutinised it, before her eyes widened. "Definitely elder wood…and there's a lot of power in this. So this is one of these Deathly Hallows?"
"I believe so. I obtained that wand after defeating Grindlewald during what the Muggles would know as the Second World War," Dumbledore said quietly. After some consideration, he admitted, "We were once close friends. We had wanted to quest for the Hallows, once."
"Must've been one hell of a falling-out," Jenova said, handing the wand back to its owner.
"It was," Dumbledore admitted, though he refused to be drawn further on the matter. "I'm surprised you didn't want to keep it yourself."
"Oh, I admit it's tempting. But it's better to develop your own power. Besides, if you can defeat someone who possesses the most powerful wand in the world, well, what's to stop someone else from beating you?"
"A wise answer."
"Well, an intelligent and pragmatic one," Jenova said. "I can see why you keep the existence of it secret. Every nutter who wants ultimate power would be after you."
"As fascinating as this is," Snape said, "we have breakfast to attend." He picked up the Diadem and toyed with it pensively. "I'll give this to Filius as soon as I can. A shame we cannot display the Locket in the same manner," he added pointedly.
"By the way," Aerith asked as they walked out of the Room of Requirement, "what do you think of the medicines I gave you?"
Snape looked at Aerith, before nodding. "Some are not dissimilar to potions I know. That Antidote, for example, seemed to be similar to a tincture of a bezoar. And the healing Potions seem to be an amalgamation of multiple healing potions I have worked with, although few have successfully combined them. But they are…interesting." Which coming from Snape probably meant 'absolutely fascinating'. "And the Muggles on your world are able to create these."
"Yes." Before she could say anything further, the distinctive form of Cait Sith was jogging up to them, a look of terror on his usually smiling face. He hadn't been happy when he was released from the luggage, so he went off to do some exploring of Hogwarts. "Hey, Cait Sith, what's wrong?"
"THERE'S A BLOODY HUGE THREE-HEADED DOG BEHIND ONE O' THE DOORS HERE!" Cait Sith screamed, leaping onto her shoulders.
Snape smirked, and Dumbledore chuckled softly. "Miss Gainsborough," Dumbledore said, "did you warn him about the third-floor corridor?"
"Damn," Aerith murmured quietly, knowing that she forgot, before she looked at Dumbledore. "A huge three-headed dog? Like a Cerberus?"
"The mythology of your world and ours must overlap somewhat," Dumbledore said. "But yes, it is called a Cerberus. Hagrid calls him Fluffy, I believe."
Aerith and Jenova stared at each other. "FLUFFY?!" Aerith and Cait Sith yelled at the same time.
Jenova, instead, just shook her head. Hagrid called a ravenous three-headed dog Fluffy? Still, a vicious monster dog would be an effective guard against anyone who wanted to steal the Philosopher's Stone. Just as long as it didn't have any weaknesses.
On the way down to breakfast, they encountered one of the ghosts. The Grey Lady, the House Ghost of Ravenclaw. She saw the Diadem in Snape's hand, and her eyes widened comically. "Where did you find that?!" she yelped in surprise.
"It's a long story," Snape drawled. "We've just freed it from a rather nasty curse, and we were about to hand it to Professor Flitwick. Why?"
The ghost looked uncomfortable, before she finally said, quietly, "It was my mother's."
All five present gave each other looks, and it was Dumbledore who spoke next. "Then you are Helena Ravenclaw?"
"I am," the ghost said quietly.
"Ah. I know only a little of your story, and I don't think any of these others know. And to think, you were the Grey Lady all this time. But we have just found that this Diadem had one of the most vile magics inflicted on it."
"By Tom Riddle," the ghost said quietly. Noticing their surprise, she elaborated, telling them her story in brief, about how she had stolen the Diadem, and how she was murdered by the Bloody Baron. She had divulged the location of the Diadem, hidden deep in Albania, to a young Tom Riddle, who had buttered her up.
After the ghost had finished, it was Aerith who broke the silence. "We were going to give the Diadem to Professor Flitwick. You…don't have any objection to that, do you?"
"It will be painful to see it again…but no. I do not have any objection. Better to have it here and purged of vile magic than lost or cursed." Her eyes flickered over to Jenova. "Ironic that the Calamity is the one to help us."
Jenova only wondered briefly how the ghost knew she was the Calamity from the Skies. Being of the generation just after the Founders, it might be that they remembered Jenova in some way. Or perhaps being a ghost helped her sense the Jenova cells within Jenova's body. "Let's just say that I have made it my personal mission to make sure Voldemort, the one you knew once as Tom Riddle, dies. Besides, I've mellowed. I am only a Calamity to my enemies, and they are considerably fewer in number this time."
Aerith, who had been considering the ghosts since last night, asked, "Is there any way I can meet more of the ghosts, Miss Ravenclaw?"
The Grey Lady looked rather startled at being addressed by her name for the first time in some time, before she smiled sadly, and said, "Helena, please. And Sir Nicholas is holding a Deathday party on All-Hallow's Eve. He holds one every year, though next year will probably be his grandest. Next year, it is five centuries since his death. I would suggest talking to him. But remind him to cater for the living if you do go: ghosts tend to let food rot, because they can only taste it when it smells strongly."
"All-Hallow's Eve?" Aerith asked.
"Halloween," Dumbledore said. "Do you have that back home?"
"Yes(2)." Aerith smiled at Helena. "Thank you very much, Helena. I will go and speak to Sir Nicholas as soon as I can. And I would love to talk to you again soon."
The ghost of Helena Ravenclaw seemed astonished, but nodded, smiling faintly, before leaving. "Well," Cait Sith remarked, "that was…enlightening. Two ghosts caused by the same events. You sure have a way with words, Aerith."
"She was a person once. In a way, she still is," Aerith said. "And I am interested by these ghosts. They remind me a little of the remnants of the Ancients we met in the Temple. Remember, Cait Sith?"
"Oh, aye. Actually, they looked a wee bit like Dumbledore, only shorter." Cait Sith looked at Dumbledore's robes. "Even got the violet robes down pat."
Dumbledore chortled, while Snape looked merely a little annoyed. However, in relatively good spirits, the quintet made their way down to the Great Hall, and breakfast…
CHAPTER 8 ANNOTATIONS:
Two more horcruxes down, Aerith and Jenova learn about the Deathly Hallows, and Aerith makes friends with Helena Ravenclaw. Oh, and Cait Sith has met Fluffy. Heh heh heh…
Now, in case you're wondering why Jenova, or her clone, died, I thought about Jenova actually destroying the curse herself, before deciding that was too easy. I thought it would be better to have the curse (which affects Dumbledore in The Half-Blood Prince) be a powerful but single-use curse. So I decided Jenova would once more split off a body (using the barest minimum of Jenova cells to do so in order to avoid wastage) and sacrifice it. It's not dissimilar in this manner to Naruto's Shadow Clones/Kage Bushin no Jutsu: her consciousness reunites once the body dies (it's not quite shared across bodies this time). It's still an unpleasant experience, and it shows just how dark and deranged Jenova is still inside that the clone laughs as she dies (this is partly because she's looking forward to inflicting the same pain on Voldemort, though I was partly inspired by Dark Bakura smiling during his 'death' at the hands of Dark Marik in Yu-Gi-Oh!, and the death of the first Greed in Fullmetal Alchemist).
1. I decided that the Diadem was more readily visible (than it is in The Deathly Hallows) because the Room of Requirement responded to a specific request: that Dumbledore needed to find the horcrux. So it brought it to full visibility.
2. I wonder how many actual holidays exist on the Planet. Because the same dates exist, I'm assuming a few of the same holidays exist as well, either as we know them, or in modified form.
No soundtrack suggestions for this chapter. Sorry.