Disclaimer: Harry Potter is owned by JK Rowling in at least 68 languages.
A/N: Runes and wards are usually spoken of as being "charged". This makes little sense since "charge" is a term relating to "eckeltricity". However, "charge" was used in earlier contexts derived from the French "charger" meaning "to load or fill", as I'm sure Hermione knows. Therefore, I have elected to keep it for clarity's sake.
Chapter 17
Bathsheda Babbling was a middle-aged witch with an impatient look about her. Her skin was dark, and her reddish-brown hair hung in bangs down to her sharply appraising eyes and limply down her black robes. According to Cedric and Roger, though, she was friendlier than she looked, and Hermione was surprised to learn from Fred and George (with much assurance that it wasn't a joke) that she was best friends with the batty divination teacher, Professor Trelawney. Perhaps opposites attracted after all.
There was enough interest that the special runes seminar was held in the Great Hall on a Saturday afternoon. Most of the attendees were pre-O.W.L. Ancient Runes students, of course, and there were only a few first years: Hermione, Harry, Ron, and a couple of Ravenclaws. Percy Weasley was sitting attentively in the front row, even though Hermione thought she had seen him making his prefect rounds at this hour.
A couple of minutes after the seminar was to begin, when it looked like no one else was likely to show up, Professor Babbling stood in front of some movable blackboards and addressed the group. "Thank you all for coming," she said congenially. "I'm glad to see there's such interest in non-standard magical topics. It's true that today's subject has little bearing on most day-to-day rune work, even in jobs that call for a lot of it, but I hope that it will be a good introduction into the wider world of what is truly possible with runic magic.
"I've never been very satisfied with the usual way of teaching Runes," Babbling continued. "The standard curriculum for the Study of Ancient Runes is to learn the runic language first and then the magical applications of it. However, I've always felt that an early introduction to the magical aspects of the subject would both generate more interest and make it easier to learn advanced runic magic later. After lobbying unsuccessfully for a change in the Board's curriculum, an early runes elective, and a rather ill-advised attempt at a Junior Runes Club a couple of years ago, I decided to ask Professor Dumbledore for permission to run a special seminar on non-Norse runes. If today is successful enough, I may be able to expand it into a series, or even a revived student club.
"For those of you who are new to the subject, runes are, in simplest terms, a form of magic writing. Runes can be written or inscribed on any object and are used to maintain spells that require more power, are longer lasting, or affect a wider area than is generally possible with ordinary charms or enchanting. Virtually all permanent wards are powered by runes, as are many of the systems the Ministry of Magic maintains, like the Floo Network and the Portkey Network. It may surprise some of the younger students to learn that portkeys cannot be created on a whim, but must have a connection to the large-scale magical energies of the land to function."
That did surprise Hermione. She hadn't read that much about magical transportation, but she was pretty sure that apparition required no such support—at least none that required Ministry maintenance. But then again, apparition had a more limited range if your name wasn't Albus Dumbledore. She jotted down a note of that fact for reference.
"Most of the work we do with Runes here at Hogwarts—and, indeed, most standard runic magic—involves the earliest form of the Norse runes, or 'futhark'." Babbling indicated the angular alphabet written on one of the blackboards. There were a few scattered giggles from the less mature students over the word. "However, any form of writing can be used for runic magic, even pictographs—even pictures, for which the art transitions smoothly into ordinary enchanting. Many ancient cultures developed their own ancient forms of runic magic based on their primitive writing system—Aztec pictographs, Egyptian hieroglyphics, proto-Chinese characters, and on and on. Indeed, some of the earliest evidence of magic in Europe comes from clay amulets inscribed with runic pictographs that are a thousand years older than writing itself.
"Now, some writing systems work better for runic magic than others. Part of this is based on intent, just like other forms of magic. For example, languages that are traditionally considered 'holy', like Arabic, Hebrew, and Sanskrit, tend to be more powerful. However, the science of the Norse futhark is by far the most developed. This is because the Elder Futhark has the property, shared only with cuneiform among common writing systems, that it is written exclusively with straight lines.
"The position and alignment of runes is very important for advanced runecrafting, as even a small misplacement can significantly weaken the enchantment. To do it properly, the precise arrangement must be computed arithmantically, which is easiest to do with straight lines, making futhark ideal for most purposes. But this is not the only possible method. Scholars of Arabic magic in particular take the opposite approach. Because the Arabic alphabet is so curvy, they write the words with extremely ornate calligraphy, which, in the hands of an experienced artist, can work just as well as arithmantically-aligned futhark runes. However, this is very much an art, and not a science—done largely by feeling and practice, rather like the difference between analytic and experimental spellcrafting." (Hermione had no idea what that meant, but she vowed to look it up later.)
"As it happens, the Latin alphabet—the one we use for the English language—is not particularly good for runic magic. While it is heavy on straight lines and is used for the roots of many incantations, the letters have different widths, and the kerning—the spacing between the letters—is inconsistent, which makes the alignment awkward. However, being able to write runes in one's native tongue can be useful for "quick and dirty" runic magic, when you need to enchant something quickly that doesn't need to last all that long."
Professor Babbling lectured for a while about how runes could interact with the ambient magic in a manner analogous to the wand motions for spells. The energy, or something like it, of the spells was very important to keep in mind. Ordinary enchanting, which they were already learning the rudiments of in Charms class, could cause objects to move about on their own without a constant input of energy, just like Fred's and George's charmed snowballs that they were still setting whizzing about. But the energy still had to come from somewhere, usually from the caster's wand, in which case the charms would wear off over time. For many charms, it was possible to draw on the ambient magic from the air for a more permanent result, but it could still be no more powerful than the caster.
With runes, however, this limitation was much diminished. Runic magic could draw much more strongly on energy from the air, from the earth (though the distinction wasn't entirely clear), from the material it was written on, if it was magical (like dragon hide, for example), or from living things in the area, again, especially if they were magical. This meant that the effects could be made permanent—or lost long as the physical runes did, anyway—and be much more powerful. They could also push that energy back out into the magical fields of the earth, affecting a much wider area than was possible with simple spells.
There was a whole library of spells to manipulate, activate, and charge runes in various magical media, but Professor Babbling bypassed all that to focus on the main point of the seminar. Using Latin letters, she said, was useful because one could write out the names of spells directly and charge them to produce a more powerful or longer-lasting effect than simply casting them. They would not be on the level of Norse runes, but they were much easier and faster to work with. With a few choice words or mixed-language runes (a more advanced topic for another time, she said), it would be possible to cast spells repeatedly and automatically, which had applications everywhere from Auror training to intensive care hospital beds. Of course, for normal applications, Norse runes would still be used, but in an emergency situation, Latin runes could be a lifesaver.
After giving a brief sense of how the usual runic spells must be modified when working with Latin letters along with the various shortcuts that could be used and their trade-offs ("all of which are far too sloppy to be accepted as normal class work"), she deemed the group ready for a small practically exercise and began handing out slates and chalk to the students.
"Once again, this is the simplest form of runic magic," Professor Babbling reminded them. "The slate and chalk are not magical at all. The runes are simply charged by your wands. This means that you will not get any more power out of the enchantment than you put into it directly, whereas a more magical medium will allow you more options. The transient nature of the medium will also make the magic itself weaker and less stable, but it is still an excellent tool for practice. For those of you who don't know, we frequently use slates to practice runecrafting, since the runes can be changed and corrected much more quickly and easily than if they are carved or written in ink.
"For this exercise, we'll be enchanting the slates to perform a simple Hover Charm," she said once everyone was ready. "Set the slate flat on the desk in front of you. Place the end of the chalk flat again the slate, not at an angle, so that you're writing with the whole end of the chalk. We want the letters to be nice and thick. Now, everyone write out 'LEVIOSA' in nice, big block letters—all the way across the slate. Try to keep the size and spacing of the letters equal for best results."
Hermione made mental tick marks on the slate to visualise where the letters needed to go and wrote them out with careful angles and her best mathematical curves. It wasn't perfect, but it looked pretty regular to her. Ron made his first couple of letters too big and had to start over, but he got it well enough. Harry wrote a little too small and only filled three quarters of his slate.
This exercise was really incomplete, she thought. Almost nothing of practical use used only a single runic word or group. The pared-down version of Wingardium Leviosa would only make the slate float in midair, not move around, and without any activation or deactivation runes, it would just continue to hover wherever it was placed in the air until the magic ran out. By itself, that was an interesting property: one could set it up anywhere in midair as if on a stand and leave it there. Hermione immediately thought of making a book rest that way. But the lack of control was a problem. In fact, with just the one word on it, the magic would continue to run down even if the slate was lying flat on the desk.
That was one reason that Ancient Runes was an elective, from what little Hermione had read. (The challenge of learning the language was no small matter either.) Even the simplest runic magic required a lot of pieces to do it right. It was as complicated as Potions and much less hands on. From the mystified looks on Harry's and Ron's faces, it must all have seemed very esoteric by wizard standards, but it actually reminded of Hermione of her dabbling in computer programming.
"For this simple example, we won't be using any of the specialised spells for runic magic," Professor Babbling said. "Another reason Latin runes are easier to work with is that a simple modification of the spell to be cast can be used for the runes. Now, in this case, the incantation is 'Leviosa Potentia', and the wand motion is the same with the addition of a flick down to touch your wand to the runes. Everyone try that now, and be careful to touch the tip of your wand on the chalk of the first letter. If you've done it correctly, you should be able to see the letters glowing."
Hermione performed the spell and was pleased to see all of her letters glowing, although the glow was less pronounced farther from her wand. To her surprise (not to mention his own), Ron got it to work on the first try. Harry only got his L to light up. Most of the Ancient Runes students found it trivially easy.
"Now when you've got it, hold your wand there. You should be able to feel the magic flowing into the letters. The younger students may not be used to this, so you need to concentrate on it. That's another reason we usually start Runes in third year—so that you've become more accustomed to feeling your magic. But for the time being, if you're having trouble, just focus on putting more energy into the spell. For a small, low power spell like this, a minute of serious concentration will easily power the runes enough for an hour of hovering. There are better and faster ways, of course, but this is more than enough for our purposes."
Hermione focused on the letters. She knew that very intense magic could be felt, but it took a lot of practice to refine one's magical senses. She could barely detect the energy flowing through her wand, but the letters did glow brighter as she concentrated.
"That's enough," Professor Babbling said after about a minute. "Let's see how you've done. Pick up you slate and release it in midair, like this." She let go of her own slate as if she were dropping it from about a foot over her desk, but it stayed floating in midair. All the students tried to do the same.
Immediately, there was a loud clatter as about a dozen slates just dropped to the desks. Some others sank slowly or drifted sideways until they collided with each other. Harry seemed disappointed as his flopped over and started swinging as if it were suspended only from the L. Hermione's own slate stayed put, only drifting slightly in the air, although it was tilted to one side. She looked over and saw Ron looked very pleased with himself. He had pulled off the enchantment nearly as well as she had.
"Good job, Ron," she said sincerely.
"Thanks…You too."
"Yes, very good work for first years," Professor Babbling said, pointing them out. "Five points each to Gryffindor." She also looked very pleased with the results once she had tutored everyone in what they were doing wrong, and she announced that she would try to schedule another seminar to teach how to add activation and deactivation runes in Latin. All three of the first year trio were interested, and Harry convinced Ron and Hermione to help him practice his technique so he would be ready for it.
After the stress of the first term, Hermione was pleasantly surprised when the spring term actually settled into a routine. There were no near-death experiences, no dangerous-sounding mysteries to solve, she was consistently getting enough sleep, and it was just classes, homework, and time spent relaxing with her friends. Oh, and integrals. Lots of integrals.
That was the hard part of calculus. Differentiation followed lots of nice, neat rules. Integrals kind of did in principle, but they were more complicated, and it took a lot of algebra to beat the equations into a shape where you could use them. In practice, you learnt a few of the rules and then looked up in a big table all the different formulae for the ones that had to be manipulated with lots of algebra. Hermione's calculus book had a few pages of those formulae in the back, but there were whole books of them to be found in muggle libraries.
In any case, Hogwarts was suddenly pretty much like a normal school, but with magic, which was to say, loads of fun for someone like Hermione, especially when she had several friends who were studious enough to keep up with her. This was the way things were supposed to be like, she thought, and she told Ron so one evening over a game of chess. (She played chess with Ron several times a week, and she was pretty sure she was improving. She even managed to beat him a couple of times, though he usually won out.)
Of course, when she said that, she must have jinxed it because in the next five minutes, Harry came in, panicking over Professor Snape suddenly deciding to referee the next Quidditch match, and then Neville flopped through the portrait hole, having been Leg Locker Cursed by Draco Malfoy. Well, the more things changed, the more they stayed the same.
The next two weeks were very nerve wracking. Snape was even meaner toward Harry than usual (with whichever one of his friends took the bullet and partnered with him dragged along for the ride). As disconcerting as it was, Hermione still couldn't find any explanation for what happened at the first match other than that Snape had tried to kill Harry, and with him refereeing, it would be the perfect opportunity to try again, and Hermione nor anybody else would have much chance to save him this time. She more than once told him not to play, but stubborn Gryffindor that he was, he wouldn't listen. She even tried to ask Professor Vector about it with an oblique question about Snape's fairness as a referee, but Professor Vector merely assured her that he would remain professional.
But the day of the match came, and Harry marched out with the team…and caught the Snitch inside of five minutes. She screamed like a hopeless fan-girl when that happened, jumping up and down and hugging Parvati in the row in front of her, much to the other girl's surprise. She didn't realise herself how much tension she was under about the match until it was over, and her friend didn't almost die…again.
In fact, the only people in danger in that match were Ron and Neville, who got in a fistfight with Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle. Honestly, Hermione had half a mind to hex Malfoy herself after what he was saying about the boys (now that she actually knew some hexes), but of course she would never do that…well, in public, anyway. She did, however, tip off Fred and George to prank him, much to the surprise of all of her friends. Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle all spent a day walking around with Weasley orange hair and green eyes like Harry's, complete with glasses stuck to their faces, and they were each Leg Locker Cursed at least once. Hermione had to stick close to her older friends for safety from them for the next couple of days, but it was worth it.
On the other hand, Harry did manage to come back from the match with some disturbing news. Ron and Hermione were all excited for the party the Twins were setting up when Harry showed up half an hour late and immediately dragged them off to an empty classroom.
"Harry, what's wrong?" asked Hermione when they were sure they were alone.
"I saw Snape going into the forest," Harry told them, "so I followed him on my broom."
"You what?" Hermione yelled. "Harry, you can't do that. It's forbidden—and dangerous—that's why it's called the Forbidden Forest."
"Listen to me," Harry hissed. "I had my broom, so I could get out fast, but I had to find out what Snape was up to. I heard him talking to Quirrell in the forest."
"Quirrell?" Ron said.
"Yeah. Snape said it really is the Philosopher's Stone that the dog's guarding, and he was trying to get Quirrell to tell him how to get past it, and then he said something about Quirrell's 'hocus pocus'."
"So Snape really is trying to steal it," Ron said.
"'Hocus pocus'?" Hermione said. "So there are other things protecting the Stone?"
"Must be," answered Harry. "Probably loads of enchantments and stuff. Those are the only two I heard, but I think Snape was talking about some others, too, and he was trying to force Quirrell to help him get past them."
"And Quirrell actually stood up to Snape?" Hermione asked nervously.
"Yeah, but I bet he won't for long."
"Not for long? The Stone'll be gone by next Tuesday," Ron said in horror.
"It can't be that bad," Hermione tried to assure herself. "If Dumbledore's the one keeping it safe, I'm sure he'll have given it more protection than that. I don't think Quirrell and Snape will be able to get past all of it."
"But Hermione," Harry said, "Quirrell's the Defence Professor and Snape wants to be. I'll bet they know more about the Dark Arts than anybody in the school. Maybe they could."
"Well, we still can't do much about it, can we? I mean, we're not even supposed to know about the Stone. And besides, Dumbledore's really smart, too. I'm sure he has things under control."
February wheeled into March, which was stormy and rainy, but at least the deep Highland snow was gone. Things were calm for a moment—the lull before teachers began gearing up for exams—and nothing much seemed to happen with Quirrell, except that the trio stopped making fun of his stutter. In the meantime, Hermione continued to visit the house elves every so often. She usually went alone, but they were still always happy to see her.
It was pretty clear that the house elves didn't get many visitors in their dorms, and no one ever showed much interest when Hermione asked them to come. Ron, as tolerant as he was, still exhibited the pureblood tendency of not caring much about elves, and most of her other magical-raised friends were similar. Out of sight, out of mind was how they seemed to think of them, which was fitting, since the elves really took pride in their ability to go about their work unseen. Harry was a little more interested, but he usually had Quidditch practice during the elves' downtime. Sally-Anne, on the other hand, just found them creepy. Fred and George visited a couple of times, too, but since the elves couldn't help them break the rules, they mostly stuck to grabbing snacks from the kitchens.
To some extent, though, Hermione liked it that way. She sort of felt like visiting the elves was her thing. Of course, it would be great if she could encourage wizards and elves to be friends more, but still, it was nice to have something she could do on her own, even though she already had the maths.
And so she found herself playing a game of chess with Tilly one afternoon while Harry was at Quidditch practice and Ron was finishing his homework. Hermione was pleased to find that Tilly was actually pretty good at chess—not quite at her level, but enough to give her some competition besides Ron—and she shared Hermione's love of unconventional moves. It seemed even the most conservative elves had a hidden depth of cunning, but maybe they had to to get by in this world. Her granddaughter exhibited this much more vividly, of course: Sonya was a real troublemaker by elf standards and, honestly, a bit of a card shark—one more reason to stick to chess.
Hermione picked up her castle and moved it into position. Since most of the elves had to make or scavenge most of their non-essentials, the chess pieces didn't move on their own (and were, of course, elf-sized). Tilly looked over the board and captured the rook with her queen, but that's what Hermione was hoping for. She checked Tilly's king with her bishop, forcing the queen of capture it, leaving enough room for her to move in her knight.
"And checkmate," Hermione said. "Good game, Tilly."
"Thank you, Miss Hermione Granger," Tilly squeaked. "Miss is a very good chess player. Tilly is thinking she should play against Professor McGonagall."
"Oh, Professor McGonagall plays chess?"
"Yes, miss. Professor McGonagall was Hogwarts Chess Champion when she was being a student."
"Really? I don't think they even have a chess champion anymore."
After the chess game, Tilly said that it was time for one of the elf children's history classes. She rang a bell in the corner of the Common Room, and little elflings streamed out of the long hallway and headed for the staircases up to the next level of the attic space. With a start, Hermione was reminded of her original reasons for exploring the space.
"Tilly," she called after the elf, "would it be alright if I sat in on the class?"
Tilly's huge grey eyes grew even larger and gleamed like sickles. "Miss Hermione Granger is wanting to see Tilly teach?"
"Sure. It's very interesting seeing how you do things up here. And actually, I've been meaning to ask you—I was wondering if you might show me around up here. I mean, it looks like you've got three floors here plus some little towers."
"Yes, Miss Hermione Granger," Sonya said from her side. "It is like having our own castle in the castle." She giggled at that, and the two of them started climbing—or crawling in Hermione's case, up the stairs to the "second" floor of the elf quarters.
It really was just like a miniature castle, Hermione realised. If the first floor held the bedrooms, the second floor must be the classrooms, and all the other essential facilities must be squeezed in around here somewhere. She pulled out a scrap of parchment and started making notes on the rooms.
"Is Miss Hermione Granger drawing our rooms?" Sonya asked.
"Well, sort of. I'm trying to finish my map. When school started last fall, I was getting lost so much that I decided to make a map of the castle. No one's really done that because things change quite a bit, but I just wanted one that was approximate, so I paced off all the halls myself. That's why I was looking for your dorms in the first place. I figured out what most of the other rooms were, but no one I asked knew you were up here."
"You is knowing where all the rooms in the castle is, Miss?" Sonya said in surprise.
"No, just in the places where students are allowed—and even then only the ones that aren't hidden. I was hoping I could figure out all of them, but I don't have time to find them and work them out."
"Sonya can help! We elves knows where all the hidden doors is and how to get through them."
"You do?"
Sonya's head bobbed eagerly.
"That would be great! Thank you!" Finally! she thought. I can finally finish my map! Hermione was so excited that she bent down and hugged the little elf, leaving Sonya looking like she was about to faint. Sonya had to go to her cleaning duties shortly afterwards, but she was grinning madly as she did. Elves definitely weren't used to that kind of attention from humans. Meanwhile, Hermione sat through the history lesson and once again learnt much more from Tilly than she ever had from Professor Binns. (Much of it she had learnt from the textbook, but the elf perspective was quite interesting.)
It was the following weekend that Hermione and Sonya finally had enough free time together to start exploring. True to her word, Sonya showed Hermione all of the doors where students were allowed and how to get into them—and conspiratorially mentioned to no one in particular about some of the doors where students weren't allowed (mostly storage for the less safe artifacts and such). House elves, Hermione had learnt, were quite good at reinterpreting orders to mean what they wanted them to mean. They really were clever creatures. In any case, the hidden doors were like many of the ones she already knew about, which only opened if you tickled them or asked them politely or could only be seen if you walked past them backwards on a Tuesday. The catch was that with the lesser-used doors, there were few other people she could ask about how to find them, so it really was a great help having Sonya along. There was even a hidden staircase that provided a shortcut from near Gryffindor Tower to the Great Hall.
She supposed she shouldn't have been surprised when, while they were out and about, Fred and George Weasley sauntered towards them, carrying arms full of she really didn't want to know what.
"Hello, Hermione," one of them said.
"Fancy meeting you here," the other finished.
"Hello," she said.
"You seem hard at work."
"Uh huh."
The Twins eyed her sketchbook where she was marking down all the doors and rooms. "By the look of things, I'd say you've taken up your mapping project again," one of them said—George, she was pretty sure.
"And you've roped an elf into joining you."
"She's the one with the cards, right?"
"Yes, sirs, I is being Sonya," the elf said.
"Sonya's been showing me where all the hidden doors are," Hermione explained.
"And you didn't ask us?" Fred said. "I feel a bit hurt."
"You had Quidditch practice. Plus, I want to make sure the information I get is accurate."
"Us? Lie to you?" Fred said with mock indignation.
"We would never do that," George said.
"Well, maybe omit some important details—"
"Like the impossibility of certain tasks—"
"Or what you might run into if you try them—"
"But surely not lie to you."
"Where's the fun in that?"
"My point exactly," Hermione said flatly.
"Well, have fun you two," said Fred with a grin and hefted his parcels. "We have work to do. I wish we could get that kind of help."
"Sadly, our pursuits are generally not quite virtuous enough for the elves," George added. "Good luck with your map. Perhaps we should compare notes sometime—make sure we haven't missed anything."
"Yeah, sure," Hermione said cheerfully. "I'll let you know when it's finished."