Sirius crouched down beside Celine, who was engrossed in studying the map of the forest that he had bought. "So, care to tell me," he asked, his voice filled with curiosity, "Why did we have to come all the way to the other side of the Forest?"
Celine's eyes darted between the map and their surroundings, her focus divided. "Wait a second," she replied absentmindedly, "Yes... I think we're in the right place. Alright—" Her eyes lit up as she turned to Sirius. "I need you to go a couple of hundred meters straight in that direction. If I'm right, we might just find the answer to our question soon."
"What!" Sirius exclaimed in surprise, "You think Herpo's tomb could be here,"
"No. But something very close to that," Celine said before she started pushing him with a playful smile, "Now Go!"
"But Why do I have to do it alone?" Sirius asked sullenly, his earlier encounter with the giant snake was still fresh in his memory so he was a bit hesitant at the thought of venturing into unknown territory alone.
"Because it may be dangerous," Celine admitted truthfully with a careless shrug, "And I am too young to die yet,"
"You're a bitch you know that,"
"I do," Celine said with a shameless smirk, "Come on, you're the big bad, Sirius Black, the infamous notorious Right Hand of Voldemort. Witches all across Great Britain put their children to sleep with your name among other things... I am sure you'll be alright,"
"The obvious flattery is disgusting and insulting—" Sirius said before he snorted haughtily, "But I am in a good mood so I shall allow it HAHA," He laughed out loud to boost his confidence, but Celine only looked at him like he was an idiot.
Sirius coughed in embarrassment, before he immediately cast a disillusionment charm on himself, blending into his surroundings, along with the rest of his usual sneaking spell. Taking a deep breath, he started making his way towards the location Celine had indicated.
Left behind, Celine paced back and forth anxiously, her desire to accompany Sirius evident. However, she knew that her skills at remaining hidden were inferior to his. Besides, Sirius had an uncanny sense for danger that she lacked so she didn't want to unnecessarily complicate things by going along.
Fortunately, Celine didn't have to wait long as she heard Sirius arrive, huffing and puffing. As he dispelled the spells and solidified, Celine immediately noticed that something was wrong when she saw that his face was even paler than the time when he saw the Basilisk.
"Y-You!" Sirius pointed a shaky finger toward Celine and said in an accusatory tone, "You told me I would find the answer to our quest there, but you know what I found instead?,"
"What?" Celine asked, her curiosity piqued.
"NUNDU! A Fucking NUNDU!"
"I knew it," Celine breathed with a gleam in her eyes.
"You knew it," Sirius asked incredulously, his voice going high pitch, "You knew it and you still sent me. Are you out of your freaking mind? I almost walked into the Nundu's deadly invisible poisonous field and died and you're saying that you KNEW ABOUT IT!"
"Calm down, Sirius. Take a deep breath," Celine said in a soft voice while rubbing his shoulder soothingly, and when she saw that Sirius had relaxed a bit, she continued, "Now let me explain,"
She broke a small stick from a nearby tree and started to draw on the ground to illustrate her point, "While I didn't know you would encounter a Nundu specifically, I had a hunch that you would encounter a creature similar to the ones we encountered before—the Dragon and the Basilisk. You see, I believe this entire forest is... HERPO'S TOMB," she said, emphasizing her words as she finished her drawing.
"What?" Sirius asked, his bewilderment evident as he looked at the drawing. Celine had created a large circle on the ground and marked three equidistant points within it, labelling them as D, B, and N. In the centre of the triangle formed by these points, she had drawn a small box-like shape, "What do you mean?"
"Imagine this circle represents the forest," Celine explained, gesturing towards the drawn circle. Sirius nodded, urging her to continue. "The locations where we encountered the Dragon, Basilisk, and Nundu are marked as D, B, and N respectively," she said, pointing to the letters. "Now, if you connect these three points, you create a perfect..."
"Triangle," Sirius interjected with a realisation.
"Exactly," Celine affirmed. "And that means the place we are looking for, Herpo's Tomb, is smack right in the middle of the Triangle... Right Here. The Treasure Chest," she said pointing to the ugly box in the middle.
"And how do you know that?" Sirius asked after a while.
"Do you know about the Fidelius Charm?" Celine asked, observing Sirius closely. He nodded, prompting her to continue. "Well, the early version of the Charm was quite different from the one we know today. Back then, it wasn't as well-known or refined. The secret would be hidden in multiple places or objects, often in groups of three or seven, to enhance security—or so they believed Anyway I think the Tomb is hidden using that Fidelius Charm,"
Sirius raised an eyebrow, intrigued. "So you believe the secret is hidden with the three magical creatures we encountered?"
"Exactly!" Celine affirmed, a smile playing on her lips.
"And how do you suppose we get the "secret" out of them," Sirius spoke slowly as if explaining to a simpleton, "Because I don't know if you noticed or not but the Dragon wasn't exactly talkative when we woke it up and somehow I don't think it'll be amicable enough to just tell us the "secret" even if we could understand it,"
Celine's eyes narrowed, her irritation evident. "Stop air quoting," she retorted, "And as I told you the earlier version was a lot different and in those times the secret wasn't something like the name of the place like it is today, instead it would manifest as a physical object, like a key or a plate,"
Observing Sirius's puzzled expression, Celine sighed and rolled her eyes. "Let's say for example, you have a flat rock that serves as the key to your home. Now to cast that charm you would divide it into three pieces and hide them in separate locations, each protected by different enchantments and magical creatures. Only when all three pieces are brought together can anyone access your home or even see it, for that matter."
"But you remember that I searched the whole place around that Dragon thoroughly," Sirius said insistingly, "And I can assure you, I didn't find a single item there that even had an iota of magic in it,"
"Well I did think about that and the conclusion I came to is that...um..." Celine hesitated for a moment before she said, "That is because I think the secret is inside of those monsters so the only way I see of getting what we want to find the key is to..."
"Kill them?" Sirius asked incredulously.
"Yep," Celine said with a sheepish smile to a very speechless Sirius.
...
A few hours later, Celine sat outside the tent on a small rock, gracefully waving her wand over a pan placed atop a crackling fire. She skillfully prepared a rabbit soup, adding in a medley of freshly gathered vegetables. Cooking came naturally to her, having spent countless camping trips with her grandmother, who had imparted her vast culinary knowledge.
And while she wasn't as good as her grandma who could cook up a feast with just some meat and wild mushroom, she was good enough to satisfy their hunger in the wilderness. Celine looked at Sirius who was engrossed in reading a massive book on a rock a few meters away from her.
When Celine realized their quest required them to defeat the Dragon, the Basilisk, and the Nundu, she had initially thought their adventure would come to an end. However, Sirius surprised her by mentioning a possible solution and promptly produced the enormous tome from his bottomless bag. He had been absorbed in its contents for hours without interruption since then.
Curiosity piqued, Celine decided to inquire about the mysterious book. "So, what's that book you're reading?" she asked, catching Sirius's gaze as the aroma of the soup wafted towards him.
"It's a family grimoire," Sirius replied, snapping the book shut before joining her and ladling himself a bowl of soup.
"Of course, you would have a bloody Grimoire," Celine said with a roll of her eyes.
"Silence, you peasant," Sirius quipped, a joking smile playing on his lips. "What could you possibly know about the grandeur of the infamous Black family?"
Celine sighed, shaking her head at his stupidity, and took a sip of her soup after letting it cool for a moment. She couldn't help but express her relief and satisfaction at the taste. Finally, she asked Sirius, "So did you find any kind of solution in that Grimoire of yours?"
"Well... there were indeed a lot of solutions to our predicament in its pages. However, the problem is that they all seem to require some form of... sacrifice," Sirius replied a hint of hesitation in his voice.
Celine eyes widened before she said with a wry smile, "I suppose that's to be expected from the Black family."
"Hey now, don't disparage my esteemed lineage," Sirius retorted in feigned indignation. "They weren't all terrible. Take my cousin's sister Bellatrix, or Narssicca or my Regulus Black or... Oh, let me regale you with tales of my dear mother. Ah, what a remarkable woman she was. So loving, she would shower me with affectionate lashes and curses in our basement whenever she was even slightly annoyed during the summer holidays—"
"PFFRRR—" Celine accidentally sprayed the soup when she heard that.
"Why does everyone react like that when I mention my mother?" Sirius asked innocently, a mischievous glimmer in his eyes. "Ah, but those were the days, weren't they? I was truly devastated when I learned of her demise while in Azkaban..." he shook his remorsefully.
Celine stared at Sirius in disbelief as he reminisced, thinking to herself, 'Oh, Merlin, I'm stuck with a madman in the middle of a forest.'
"Hey, Don't look at me like that I am a perfectly normal person. In fact, I even have proof, my mum had me tested at St. Mungos," He said with a serious face.
Maintaining his façade for a few more seconds, Sirius eventually succumbed to laughter, unable to contain himself any longer. "Pffft... HAHA... The expression on your face... Haha," he managed to say between fits of amusement.
"You're absolutely incorrigible, Black," Celine said with a shake of her head, "And I was even starting to take you seriously...Don't even try it!" She stressed the last part with a forceful finger when she saw him open his mouth for the so 'No, I am Sirius,' joke that she'd already heard a million times by now.
"Let's get back to the topic," Sirius suggested, breaking the silence after a few seconds. "As I was saying, most of the spells in here require either the sacrifice of a few dozen Muggles or Virgin Witches—" He stopped mid-sentence, his eyes widening with wonder. "You're not..."
"Do you really want to ask me that?" Celine interrupted, her voice taking on a menacing tone as she raised an eyebrow, gripping her wand dangerously.
Gulp "No," Sirius quickly shook his head, retreating from the topic. "Anyway, there is a spell I found that could be helpful for us if we can cast it."
"So... what's the problem?"
"Well, the thing is, it's not exactly a spell but rather a small ritual," Sirius explained.
"A ritual," Celine repeated, her eyebrow raised in curiosity. "And what does it require?"
"According to the Grimoire, there are two ways to cast it: the hard way and the easier way," Sirius elaborated. "The hard way involves obtaining numerous exotic ingredients like Ashwinder Egg, Asphodel, Bicorn horn, and several others that would be difficult to find around here..."
"And the easier way?"
"Well, it's not exactly 'easy' per se, but it's comparatively easier for us," Sirius clarified. "For this method, we only need three ingredients. First, a feather from a powerful magical creature symbolizing the sky, the more powerful the better and we just killed that Gryffin not too long so we shouldn't have a problem with that, and the second ingredient is the scale or hair of the creature or person we want to bring the Wrath upon—"
"Wrath? Whose wrath?"
"Didn't I tell you the name of the ritual," Sirius inquired, raising an eyebrow. When Celine shook her head, he continued, "Well it's called "The Wrath of Heaven," and it's an ancient ritual that was used by wizards to bring down 'The Wrath' which is a colossal bolt of lightning on the home of anyone they consider their adversaries,"
"Damn!" Celine exclaimed, impressed. "The ancient wizards certainly didn't mess around, did they?"
"No, they certainly did not," Sirius agreed seriously, "Anyway, other than Griffin's hair, we're going to need the hair of the creature so we need to pick one of the three among the Dragon, Bassilisk and Nundu and I think we should pick the Nundu,"
"Why? Wouldn't it be wiser to pick the Basilisk and kill the most dangerous one of them first in case they wake up from their Hibernation,"
"That's a valid point," Sirius acknowledged appreciatively. "However, I'm not sure if the spell is powerful enough to breach the Basilisk's or the Dragon's defences so I think we should try it first on the Nundu which has the thinnest defence of the three. Besides, we can always avoid the poison if we fail,"
"If you say so," Celine shrugged, "And while it's a bit tricky I think we can get the hair of the Nundu if we use the Accio spell in the vicinity," She nodded to herself, considering the plan, before looking up and asking, "So what's the third ingredient?"
"Well it's this one that's going to be the trickiest," Sirius sighed, "We need a substantial amount of magic to compensate for the ingredients required in the first method and according to the Grimoire that's about five adult wizards worth,"
"Huh..." Celine looked puzzled. "So, you're saying we need three more wizards? Well, I guess I could ask a few of my curse breaker friends, but I doubt they'll work for cheap, and—"
"Ah—I think I have a better idea than that," Sirius interjected before she could go on.
"What is it?"
"I don't know if you've noticed," Sirius said with a charismatic smirk, "but I have a significantly larger magical reserve compared to the average wizard." He gestured toward Celine, who scowled in response. "So, I believe I should be able to provide most of the magic required for this ritual and you're not so bad either so if we use a piece of Magic from the Grimoire with the help of which you can pass on your magic to me in real-time... I think we're just going to be fine,"
"Why take the risk, though?" Celine asked, tilting her head in confusion. "It wouldn't take us too long to gather a couple of wizards or witches to assist us."
"Well, for starters, I don't think most of your friends will agree once they find out about the Nundu, not to mention the Dragon and the Basilisk," Sirius explained, and Celine reluctantly nodded in agreement. "Moreover, I don't want to risk exposing the existence of Herpo's Tomb to the entire magical world, especially Merlin forbids if they somehow discover that I am Sirius Black. And lastly, well... the ritual requires us to be completely..." Sirius trailed off, his voice barely audible.
"To be completely what?" Celine asked in confusion.
"Ahem..." Sirius glanced around evadingly a few times before he gathered up his courage and said in a small voice, "It requires us to be completely... N-Naked,"
"WHAAAAT!?"