Chapter 7: Camille
Dobby and I stop in a clearing a good distance from the dragons.
"Ok, so we need books." I say, sitting on a large rock. "Anything you can find on the snake language, a book specifically about dragons too." Dobby writes into a small leather-bound book.
"You could try to talk them out of eating you." Dobby suggests with a grin.
"I'm sure that'll go well." I remove my gauntlets and pick up a strange mushroom. "Maybe something about magical plants. I'm sure they're just as dangerous as the animals, if not more so."
"You can smoke those." He points the quill to my hand. "It's akin to tobacco for wizards, I'm surprised it grow here." He looks around the clearing.
"So what, is it a hallucinogen?" I ask, he shakes his head.
"Just a mild flavour if I remember correctly. It doesn't even pool in your lungs." He vanishes with his book.
I pull my pipe from my boot. I would never smoke cigarettes, It's more toxic than Nundu venom. I load the small mushroom into the bowl and tap the bottom. Self-lighting pipe. Whilst I never had much direct interaction with wizards, Dobby would often pinch magical good, the rucksack for example. I cross my legs and inhale the slightly spicy smoke, Dobby returns with a book as I remove my boots.
"This says it's called 'Parseltongue', the dark ability to talk to snakes." We swap book for pipe, he takes a puff and smack his lips together. "Hmm." The smoke leaves through his ears. "Not bad." He hands me the pipe again.
"Nothing about talking to dragons in here?" I flick a few pages. "The green house founder was the first documented case of this apparently."
"No surprise there." Dobby calls out, crouching near the brightly coloured mushrooms. "I think the different colours taste different."
"This says that magical spells can be used in parseltongue." I tell Dobby. The book, quite unhelpfully, doesn't list any spells. "'Spose nobody can speak it to tell anyone the spells."
"Maybe it can't be written." Dobby suggests, chewing on a blue mushroom.
"'Imagine you are talking to a snake'. That's how it's activated." I frown. "Hello?"
"Hello." Dobby says with a smirk.
"Imagine I'm talking to a snake?" I scratch my chin. "Some sort of magical mumbojumbo."
"Ah! You got it that time." Dobby picks up another mushroom and throws it to me.
"So I could just say words with this and they turn into spells." I look at my wand suspiciously. Dobby shrugs.
"Give it a go. Try to steer away from the words 'explosion' and 'fire'."
"Erm. Water." I hiss. A steady stream of water starts to flow from the tip. "Oh, that's handy." I watch the water seep into the ground.
"Can you make it stop?" Dobby asks after a while.
"Stop."
"English."
"Magical stop?" I wave my wand a bit.
"Pretend that your wand is a snake." Dobby suggests.
"Stop you bloody snake." The water stops pouring. "This wizard thing is easy. Maybe I get it to spray holy water from the flask."
"We never did try fill a water pistol with holy water." Dobby muses. I draw an empty flask from my pocket.
"Water." The flask starts to fill. "Ok. Stop." The stream cuts off. "What do you reckon? 'Refill tank' or something?"
"I don't know, I'm not the wizard." Dobby skims a stone across the pond.
"Uh, Refill magical tank?" The water starts to absorb into my wand, like a vacuum. "Squirt?" My wand begins to spray the water out. "Hey look, I can spray it."
"Sprayable holy water." Dobby laughs. "That's some Tristan level stuff there."
"We should probably get back." I note that the sun in starting to dip. "A few hours in a dark forest and not one demon slain. Must be a record." We start to wander back towards the castle. "Any other spells I could try?" Dobby frowns as he thinks.
"They used to scan their food for poisons, I don't know how that would work for you." He says. "There are all sorts of combat spells, they call 'em curses. Curses that cut, skin, burn, explode, bludgeon. Anything you can think of, or anything you can say."
"Anything more about the patronus?" I ask Dobby as he reads from the floating book.
"It's difficult and really rare." He reads. "Maybe save that for later." The castle comes in to sight and Dobby makes the books vanish. "Are you going to tell the others about the dragons?"
"I'm sure they can figure it out by themselves." I slide Excalibur back into it's scabbard. "Take my armour back and see if you can find out anything more about green house's snake guy." Dobby nods and vanishes along with my armour. Dinner looks like it's just begun in the hall.
"You went into the forest, didn't you?" Hermione asks me as I sit down.
"I had to make sure it was safe." I smile at her.
"And was it?"
"More or less. We smoked some mushrooms, threw some stones."
"Smoked some mushrooms?" I nod. "You're not what I expected."
"What did you expect? A dark lord slaying child?"
"Something like that. I suppose you have the 'knight in shining armour' thing." She glances at Excalibur.
"Now I just need a winged horse to carry damsels into the sunset." I laugh.
"People have written childrens books about you." She says. "'The Adventures of Harry Potter' series is quite popular."
"I wonder how accurate they are by mistake." I push away a goblet of sweet juice.
"By mistake?"
"Yeah, y'know. They say I heroically saved a young girl from a werewolf or something, in reality I did save a young girl, but the story ends in a less PG way."
"You've apparently slain werewolves." She says. "I've not actually read them, of course."
"Seriously misunderstood, werewolves are." I say. Hermione looks amused. "Class 5 magical creature for one day of the month and yet everyone treats them like dirt."
"Our defence professor last year, Professor Lupin, was, or rather is, a werewolf." She says. This catches my attention.
"Last year?" I look up at the professors. "What happened to him? Did everyone know he was a Wolf?" It's nigh impossible for werewolves to find word amongst wizards.
"Nobody knew until the end of the year, after his secret got out he quit as he knew that the parents wouldn't want him teaching." She says sadly. "He was the only good one we've had."
"What about bug-eye up there?" I ask.
"That's Professor Moody. He's a retired Auror." She explains in a slightly quieter voice.
"Aurors." I repeat. "I've heard of those." I was taught that the Aurors were military sorcerers, They used to attack Paladins apparently. It was only after I escaped that I realised that the New Order Paladins were the bad guys, murdering wizards all over the place. The few times I've run into Aurors usually ended with them trying to capture me, to no avail. They call me Lancelot for a reason. "What's the new guy like?"
"He's a bit..." She struggles to find the words. "Eccentric."
"I'm surprised he hasn't tried to kill me yet, or at least arrest me." I feel the freaky eye look at me and I turn back to Hermione.
"Why's that?"
"You've read that book on Paladins right?" She nods. "It's written by a wizard I assume, so that means he's made Paladins out in a bad light?"
"Pretty much."
"I'm not saying either side is right, but neither side is without it's flaws." I explain. "What I call New Order Paladins are those that call everything and everyone a demon and slays them. I follow the old rules, figure out if they are a threat and then deal with them suitably. Paladins have killed many wizards and wizards have killed many Paladins, even ended Gareth line."
"So they're enemies?"
"As a general rule, yes. I consider myself an exception as I don't go around hunting wizards, in fact I've never killed a wizard, well never one that wasn't a werewolf. That man was a foul Wolf and a foul wizard."
"So you think the Aurors will come in here for you?" Hermione looks towards the door.
"There are rumours about me, I'm sure and I think green house don't like me in particular." I smirk.
"They are the type to call the Aurors." She nods. "What will you do?"
"If a battalion of Aurors burst through the door to apprehend the mighty Lancelot?" She sighs and nods. "I'd have to let them take me. My armour would be on in a flash of course, no need for one of them to nick my neck with something."
"Just let them take you?"
"If I run, I'll look guilty. If I fight, I'll give them a reason to arrest me." I drum my fingers on the table. "I should probably turn myself in so they know I'm not the enemy. Maybe after I learn some magical spells tomorrow."
"Do you think it's a bit unfair that you have almost no knowledge of magic and you are competing?"
"I'll die if I don't do the tasks apparently." I laugh. "I'm hardly defenceless though."
"You are with the rest of the fourth years for lesson, right?" I nod. "We have charms tomorrow. It's sort of wizarding 101 when it comes to household and everyday spells." Deciding to keep my snake spells to myself, I nod along as she explain some basic spells.
"Bonjour." Fleur sits beside Hermione.
"Hermione was just teaching me how to be a wizard." I say.
"You're already as wizard." She says. "Just not a very good one."
"I'm hurt." I pout. They both ignore me and compare curriculums between the two schools as I eat a bread roll.
It's odd how well they get along, I can only assume that they had met before I arrived, judging by the way Hermione slid up to us. I suppose they are alike in the sense that they are somewhat withdrawn from their peers. Hermione is the bookish sort, that much is already obvious and Fleur's … abilities, I can see how it could be hard to make friends with either gender.
My eyes drift along the hall and fall on Dumbledore, currently sporting deep purple robes dotted with what appear to be stars. Besides him sits McGonagall, chatting merrily together. I can only wonder how many years they've been working together, long before I was born, no doubt. I look back to the students and lock eyes with a girl wearing the same uniform as Fleur. Blue eyes and wild brown hair, not exactly the prim and proper norm of Beauxbatons. She's looking at me with an expression of curiosity It suddenly strikes me that this girl is the werewolf that Fleur and I walked past.
"Fleur." I say, not looking away from the mystery girl. "Who is that?" I see Fleur turn out the corner of my eye.
"The one staring at you?" She asks after turning back. I nod. "That's Camille."
"Why is she staring at me?" I ask.
"You're staring at her also." Hermione points out.
"Yeah, but she was doing it first." I say. Camille, having apparently watched me for long enough, looks down and returns to her food. "That was odd."
"Don't kill her." Fleur says. "She's my friend."
"Eh? I wasn't going to kill her."
"Why was there any thought on killing her in the first place?" Hermione asks.
"She's infected with lycanthropy." Fleur explains. "The French Ministry are slightly more accepting of non-humans than the British."
"No kidding." I snort. "From what I hear, if the Ministry had their way, werewolves would be put down." I glance in Camille s direction again. "When was she bitten? She doesn't have the feel of a new born."
"Long before I met her." Fleur says softly. "She has a scratch that runs from the base of her neck to the small of her back." I wince a bit at that. Werewolf scratches don't heal. Ever.
"Won't be catching her in an open back dress I suppose."