A Study in Magic
by Books of Change
Warning/Notes: This is a BBC Sherlock and Harry Potter crossover AU. The HP timeline and BBC Sherlock's timeline has been shifted forwards and backwards to match up. One major BBC Sherlock character's gender has changed for the sake of the plot. The story was planned and written before season 2 (but incorporating elements of thereof as much as possible). Readers beware!
Chapter Twenty Three: Hidden History on a Wall
It was Tuesday evening in Muggle London. The Lestrades' flat was full cheerful talking and devoid of Detective Inspector Lestrade, who stayed as far away from home as possible whenever his wife hosted Small Group. The guests were enjoying dark chocolate covered pomegranate morsels. Ellen Lestrade was nursing baby Elise, wincing here and there when Elise didn't suckle properly.
"Soooo— Greg and Julia have been calling each other three times a week," said Ellen brightly. "It's sooo sweet, and Harry is so good about it. I love him."
"That's good to know," said Jacqueline wearily. "He's been a little tinker otherwise."
John groaned. "What is he doing now that he isn't telling me?"
"Skiving," Jacqueline reported. "He won't go to My-Colleague-Who-Shall-Remain-Anonymous' classes, and threatening detention doesn't work."
John's eyebrows rose. "Really. Well I know why. The last time I talked to him, Harry was ranting Back-Pain was making him participate in all of his 'travels' re-enactments, and he's usually cast as the village idiot. That's when Haemorrhoids isn't reading large passages out of his own books. I'm tempted to cheer him."
"Please don't. You're our most solid line of defence," pleaded Jacqueline. Then she sighed. "I'm starting to really understand what they mean by the power struggle against students: I want Harry to go to class and show his teachers respect, but forcing him isn't going to change his heart and that's the important thing."
"Ye-ah," said Becky, making a sharp chopping gesture. "You know what, that's exactly it: I keep trying to change my students' behaviour, but their attitude? Even if they do what you tell them to, you can tell that they don't care—" a point for emphasis, "they want to dip out—" another one, "and they're not listening," final point.
"But how do you address this?" said Jacqueline. "I can't just let it go. There are deeper character issues at stake. J, how would you punish him?"
"I usually tell him how disappointed I am," said John. "I expected this, this, this from you, but you did this, this, this instead. You're better than that, etc. I don't have to yell—it's more effective when I'm calm and serious."
"And he just listens?" said Becky in disbelief.
"Yeah," said John. "Harry might bend a few rules and rebel here and there, but he never disobeyed me outright."
"Ohmygosh he's amazing," said Becky in wonderment.
"That's because he cares about what you think," Joanna pointed out. "If he didn't care, he wouldn't listen."
Jacqueline nibbled on the side of her left forefinger pensively.
"I don't think Harry and I have the kind of relationship where he'd take my disappointment seriously," she said. "The Headmaster does, but this isn't you-need-to-go-to-the-headmaster's-office level trouble—yet. There's Harry's Head of House, of course, but I'm afraid she's going to just emphasize the rule breaking, and not the heart."
"Wait, I'm confused," said Amy. "Are you saying Harry goes to all of his classes except the one Back-Pain teaches?"
"Uh-huh."
"And he's doing fine at his other classes?"
"Yes."
"Why would he do that?" Amy asked. "I mean, everyone skips class at one point, but why just skip that one?"
"What if—he's protesting?" said Ellen as she burped Elise. "Like, 'I'm not wasting my life with your poo'."
"That's definitely his attitude towards to Anonymous, but he doesn't do that to S, and arguably S gives him more poo," said Jacqueline.
"It's not arguable, he is," John growled.
"I think it depends on his definition of poo," said Ellen thoughtfully, "like, he can at least endure S since he's, like, actually teaching stuff, but Back-Pain doesn't really teach you anything so why bother?"
"So we're back to square-one," said Amy, grinning slightly, "How do you convince Harry to go to class even if the class itself is useless."
There was a thoughtful pause.
"J," said Jacqueline. "What are the character traits you emphasize on Harry?"
"What do you mean by character traits?" asked John.
"Treat others as you want them to treat you; work hard; listen well. You know that sort of thing."
"Don't give anything or anyone the honour of ruining your life. Be kind and courageous. Embrace hard work. Think. Otherwise: Carpe Diem."
"I think Harry's using clause 'don't give anyone the honour of ruining your life' to rationalize his skiving," said Jacqueline, "which is interesting because he's probably using the same clause to grit his teeth and go to S's classes. Well. I think I know what to do now."
"What are you going do?"
Jacqueline told them. John whistled.
"And to think you were worried about going too soft on the kids," said John.
-oo00oo-
As one of Harry Potter's best friends and the male of the two, Ron Weasley could easily lay claim to understanding Harry the best in Hogwarts. It wasn't hard, usually, as Harry was a pretty straightforward bloke: he liked helping people, adored his mother shamelessly, liked having fun, could be mind-bogglingly stubborn at times, and had extremely low tolerance for pointless activities.
That didn't mean there weren't times Ron wondered what was going inside his funny little head.
He completely understood when Harry refused to show up for Defense Against the Dark Arts after Lockhart forced him to play the role of a simple villager from Transylvania, a yeti with a head cold, and a vampire who was unable to eat anything but lettuce after Lockhart was done with it for three lessons straight. It was bad enough you had to sit through a class that taught you nothing, but not having the option of doing something else and always singled out for the most humiliating role-plays was just too much to ask to anyone. Nevertheless, Professor McGonagall put Harry in detention. Harry returned around dinner the next day smelling strongly of polish after spending the afternoon polishing the silver in the trophy room without magic.
Ron started to feel baffled when Harry still refused to show up to class after this. He marvelled at Harry's nerve when Professor McGonagall called him up to her desk after Transfigurations, her mouth a horizontal gash on her face, and Harry just looked stubbornly back. Hermione's shrill and dire warnings that lasted the entire day didn't move him and Professor McGonagall's berating and removal of house points didn't move him either.
Then sickly little Miss Jackie called Harry aside when he and Ron showed up for music lessons.
"I'll be arranging your detentions, Harry," said Miss Jackie. "You know why you're having them."
Harry shrugged. Miss Jackie leaned forward with her hands clasped under her chin. She looked solemn and grave.
"Please tell me why you're doing this," she asked.
Harry kept his glance sideways and didn't say anything. Ron switched from nervously watching Harry to Miss Jackie, wondering how the stalemate would end.
"J told me," Miss Jackie said quietly, and Harry twitched at the mention of his Mum, "that she wants you to be kind and courageous. Now I know being kind consistently is quite difficult, especially when you don't see the point of it, but I thought for the sake of J if nothing else you'd treat Professor Lockhart differently."
"Like how?" Harry asked mutinously.
Ron never thought Miss Jackie was capable of showing such terrifying levels of cold disappointment as she did at that moment, even for a second.
"For you to have the courage to confront Professor Lockhart in the open with well thought-out objections, and not disregard him as subhuman trash," she pronounced.
Harry caved like wet paper. He looked down, ashen, like he'd received several body-blows to his stomach.
"Harry, I want you to understand that this is not okay," said Miss Jackie, her terrifying disappointment gone like an illusion and now just looking stern. "I won't presume to know why you're refusing to go to your Defence classes. But the flagrant disregard and attitude of rebellion in which you're doing it — frankly, you look petty and immature. I know J taught you better than this, and I know you can do better. So I refuse to allow you to continue."
"…I'm sorry," Harry mumbled. "I'll stop. I—"
"I'm not the person you should be apologizing to," Miss Jackie interrupted.
Harry, if possible, looked even more sickened. After studying him for a moment, Miss Jackie leaned back and heaved a little sigh.
"After your lesson, you and I are going to see Professor Lockhart," Miss Jackie declared. "You will apologize. Then I am doing to tell you what you're going to do for the next three weeks."
"Three weeks!?"
"Three weeks of detention with me for the three weeks of class you skipped," said Miss Jackie flatly. "It's either that or helping Professor Lockhart answer his fan mail."
Harry blanched. "I'll take the three weeks."
"Good. Now move along, Ron. You're having the other me today."
Ron spent the next hour practicing Mozart under the Other Miss Jackie's scrutiny, distracted and more than a little fearful of the frail woman he honestly thought was an easily-embarrassed doormat.
Harry returned to the Gryffindor tower a few minutes after Ron got there looking oddly at peace. Harry told Ron and Hermione that Miss Jackie had cut-off Lockhart right after he apologised, putting on her Iron Lady face and saying: "I'm rather curious as to why you're singling out Harry to play the role of the hapless villager or the equally hapless opponent in your re-enactments when you have so many other students and roles available." Lockhart was incapable of answering that question and the ones that followed. Thus Harry was able to leave with his dignity intact and the promise Lockhart will stop his 'preferential treatment'.
"So what are you doing for detention?" Hermione asked, sounding friendly now that Harry had repented.
Harry made a funny half-smile, "I'm helping Miss Jackie build an electric generator."
"What!?" both Ron and Hermione exclaimed.
"I'm serious," said Harry, looking dazed. "She has all the blueprints drawn up and materials ready, and Dumbledore gave her the go ahead. I'm helping her set up the turbine starting tomorrow."
Hermione opened and closed her mouth. "But Miss Jackie's a pure-blood witch and a music teacher. How does she know anything about electricity?"
"Google?" said Harry, before adding, "Miss Jackie only moonlights as a music teacher. Her real job is a systems engineer. I reckon she knows as much about electronics as she does music."
Harry spent every evening for the next three weeks having 'detention dates' with Miss Jackie. Creating an electric generator from scratch turned out to be a dreadfully complicated business. For one thing, Miss Jackie couldn't do any magic except her cool cloning spell. This meant Harry had to do all the necessary charms and transfigurations. Sometimes this required him to spend long hours in the library researching spells or asking Flitwick or McGonagall for advice. Also, Harry had to learn 'Algebra', 'Geometry' and 'Physics' in order to correctly calculate the amount of electricity the turbine was generating (Ron stopped trying to understand after the word Algebra). Every spare moment Harry was working, carting books or assisting Miss Jackie, which made it very clear to the other Gryffindors he was being thoroughly punished.
Hermione was the only other person besides Harry who didn't think so.
"He's learning loads," said Hermione jealously one evening while Harry was out assisting Miss Jackie. "Serious loads. No one tried to make an electric generator in Hogwarts before. If it works, it might even make history!"
Ron recalled the pearly-white turbine, made to look like a windmill for aesthetic purposes, the coils and long wires. For an historic object, it sure looked ugly. Hermione's response to the project was predictable and expected, because she was weird like that, but he couldn't even begin to understand Harry's willingness to do all the work when he wasn't weird like Hermione. Okay, so perhaps avoiding Lockhart was reason enough for Harry, but Ron still couldn't wrap his brain around it. Wasn't it better to suffer only three hours instead of three whole weeks?
"Maybe you should start skipping Defence Against the Dark Arts, too, so you can join Harry in detention," Ron said.
"But it's important!" said Hermione, scandalized.
"How? I don't remember learning anything except not setting pixies loose."
"Well, there's the Homorphus charm," said Hermione, floundering. "I don't think I read about that elsewhere and … and the babbling curse and …"
Ron grinned as Hermione tripped all over herself trying to justify Lockhart. It was kind of cute.
"C'mon, just admit it," said Ron. "You think Harry is learning more useful and fascinating stuff than whatever it is we're learning from Lockhart."
Hermione screwed up her face, like admitting the truth was physically painful. Ron laughed.
"If you want to get involved, you could just ask," he said. "I'm sure Miss Jackie won't mind."
That was exactly what they did the following afternoon after lunch. They joined Harry at the music room, which was where the magic-powered electric generator was being built, and found Julia Lestrade, Hagrid and, for reasons unknown, Argus Filch and Mrs. Norris there besides Miss Jackie, who was more than happy to let them join.
"Come on in," said Miss Jackie cheerfully. Ron noticed she looked paler than usual despite the borrowed colour from the peach jacket she wore. "Please sit down and I'll explain the progress we've made so far."
They sat. Miss Jackie gestured the structure that looked like a windmill tipped to the side. The blades were turning energetically despite the lack of wind, and a plastic Muggle device connected to the wires hanging at the end of the pole appeared to be measuring something. Its tiny gray screen showed the characters: 400RPM; 1kW.
"We're basically using the centrifugal force of the windmill to, uh, generate electricity," said Miss Jackie, faltering a bit when she noticed Hagrid and Ron's utter confusion. "More simply put, magic turns the windmill, windmill turns the magnet—" she pointed the hub, "—magnet disrupts the electrons inside the coils and sends it down the wires. That's how we're generating electricity."
"You've used the cartwheeling charm to turn the windmill. That's clever," said Hermione, nodding in approval. "I suppose you put it on as a fixture?"
"Yup," said Miss Jackie, "Harry worked it all out in a day. Then he added a permanent chilling charm inside the hub to dissipate the heat created by friction. Julia here whipped up a lubricant potion to grease up the shaft. Mr. Hagrid transported all the required materials and helped me solder the joints. He even offered to raise the structure."
"Don' mention it," said Hagrid gruffly, clutching a pink umbrella Harry was pointedly not looking at. Miss Jackie smiled as Hagrid picked up the windmill like it weighted nothing and made it stand on its four legs.
"Thank you so much," said Miss Jackie. "I really didn't want to bother you again after doing so much already, but when I tried the levitation charm, it um …" She raised a trembling fist to imitate an object feebly rising to the air before dropping to ground like a rock. "…I couldn't do it."
"Ah, well," said Hagrid. "I don' have great shakes in magic meself, and sometimes tis better to do it by hand."
"I know. Still, I'd love to be able to do it," said Miss Jackie wistfully.
Miss Jackie then drew a diagram of an atom to explain what an electron was and why they were critical to generating electricity for those who had no Muggle background (electricity was simply the flow of electrons—who knew?). Then Miss Jackie showed them all the charge controller she'd built. Ron felt his head blank-out as Miss Jackie explained the purpose of each individual component. He understood the purpose of the controller, though: Since automation charms like the cartwheeling spell had the tendency to get tired or too excited depending on the mood, the controller was there to monitor the voltage— a measurement of electricity— of the batteries in the system, and send the power from the turbine into the batteries to recharge them, or dump the power into a secondary load if the batteries were fully charged, thus prevent over-charging and destroying the batteries.
"It's like making sure your water supply tanks aren't bursting at the seams," Miss Jackie remarked. "If tank A is full, move outlet to tank B; if tank A still has some space left over, keep outlet in tank A."
Once she finished explaining the progress and provided enough background info, Miss Jackie went over today's agenda: making a barrier that would stop the stray magic in the air from destroying the electronic equipment. It was the trickiest part of the building process, but it did address something everyone in Hogwarts wondered at least once.
"I wondered why Harry's phone works when by rights it shouldn't," said Miss Jackie as she fumbled around some sheets of rice paper variously smeared or drenched in dark-red ink. "But before I could answer that question, I had to ask why magic is often accompanied by light and sparks. This seemed to imply magic effects the electro-magnetic spectrum in some way. If this is the case, it's no wonder radio and complex electronic devices like TV and laptops don't work in Hogwarts: the magic-charged atmosphere is creating EM pulses everywhere, so any device running complex circuitry will short itself out. The same goes for power grids. But that made answering the question of why Harry's phone works even trickier: not only does the device have to work, but the signal has to transmit too, but those are precisely the things that wouldn't work because of the stray magic interference."
Ron's brain felt like a wrung sponge from just absorbing that. Hermione was frowning like she didn't quite understand, and Harry's eyebrows were set an obtuse angle. Julia alone looked alert.
"So you're saying electronics need nice even waves running on narrow channels to work, but stray magic keeps crashing over those channels like a hurricane," she said, using her left arm to simulate an even stream and her right hand to mime crashing waves.
"I couldn't put it better," said Miss Jackie. "Also, the intuitive way in which Harry's phone works implies magic is the reason why the phone is working, but magic by its nature would do the exact opposite. What then is the key?"
Everyone just stared blankly. It was very novel experience, seeing Hermione look so clueless.
"If magic is not directly interfering for or against the phone," Miss Jackie continued, "could it be that magic is somehow stepping aside to create a magic-free space? Magic is the only power in the world that has a form of sentience. If there is a way to make magic recognise 'thus far, and no further,' then of course phones would work."
"So you think Harry's phone has a natural magic-free barrier?" said Hermione sceptically. "But the only difference between Harry's phone and everyone else's is that John owned it for at least a month, and John isn't a witch." She brightened a bit, "unless she's a witch raised as a Muggle like you? I've read there are rare cases of witches or wizards who manifest magic very late in life—"
"No," said Miss Jackie. "Dumbledore checked the admission books dating back to J's birth, and her name isn't on it. My father checked J on two occasions and detected not a smidgeon of magic ability. She's 100% Muggle."
"Oh," said Hermione, crestfallen. Then she brightened up again, "How does your father detect magic ability?" she was always very eager to learn more about Grandmaster Shin, whom Harry mentioned three weeks back.
"I'm glad you asked that," said Miss Jackie. "Let me ask you lot a question first: If you connect two water cans of equal capacity at the same height, one having more water than the other, what would happen?"
Hermione shot her hand up. Ron, Harry and Julia stared at her, bemused.
"Water flows from the can that has more water to the can that has less, until both cans have equal amounts of water," she answered promptly.
"Correct. Five points to Gryffindor," said Miss Jackie, grinning. "The water can example is a demonstration of the equilibrium principle. It happens to energy just like it happens to water. Now, magic is a form of energy. What would happen if your magic came in contact with a container that has less magic than you?"
Hermione's eyes went wide. "It would flow into the container that has less magic!"
"Exactly. And that is the essence of wands," said Miss Jackie. "On a purely energy level, witches and wizards have a hard time controlling magic without a wand because they simply have too many outlets. Holding a wand gives them a focal point. Of course, reality is not that simple. As I mentioned before, magic is not merely energy. It has sentience. So, for magic to flow from one source to another, the two sources have to cooperate. A wand, which has less magic than a human being, still has the ability to refuse and rebel thanks to its powerful magical core. A person who has a lot of power could possibility overrule a wand's intentions, but the wand would only do so under protest."
"So my wand doesn't work because it hates me," said Julia, scowling at her wand like she couldn't believe it could be so petty.
"I wouldn't say hate," said Miss Jackie gently. "If the wand reflects its original owner … well, Cecilia was very independent and had a hard time warming up to people, but very loyal to the selected few."
Julia continued to scowl at her wand, muttering one would think the stupid thing would warm up to its previous owner's daughter at least. Ron on his part grumbled over Charlie's old wand he was forced to use, thinking about all the difficulties he could've avoided if only he had his own wand. Sometimes it really sucked to be youngest son.
"Going back to my father, he detects magic ability with a simple paper talisman," said Miss Jackie, lifting up a plastic bag that had a square sheet of rice paper that had a black lines running parallel to all the edges inside. "The lines light up when someone who has even a minuscule amount of magic ability touches it. There's enough magic stored in this thing that only the smidgen automatically transferred by contact is enough to fire off the spell. My father increases the required transfer amount to gauge how much raw power a child has."
Miss Jackie let them experiment. When Harry, Ron, Hermione and Julia touched the paper, the black lines burned gold. When Hagrid touched it, the lines lit up, but the light was dimmer. For Filch the lines didn't light up at all.
"How come Hogwarts doesn't use this?" asked Hermione hastily when Filch turned purple.
"Magic isn't something you can measure in discrete quantities," said Miss Jackie. "That makes standardized measurement virtually impossible. Hogwarts uses a similar 'magic enough' test for admissions, but my father's test goes further than that—you could, possibly, determine person A is more powerful than person B because A lit up four talismans and B only lit up two. But any test trying to measure a person's aptitude has the danger of trying to measure too much. You might end up like a person who's trying figure out which child has more athletic ability based on the size of their muscles or how quickly they can recover their breath; the measurement will tell you something about their athletic ability, but not as well as actually training the child."
"So it's not a reliable test," said Hermione.
"Heavens no," said Miss Jackie. "But don't tell my father that. He never accepted this point of subtly."
"So how does all this relate to creating a magic-free zone?" asked Harry, "The way you put it, it sounds like magic will always rush in to fill the gaps."
"The same way you wrap rubber around wires and connect circuits to the ground to prevent electricity from wreaking havoc," Miss Jackie replied. "You insulate it or ground it. We need something that doesn't possess magic and won't attract it either."
Harry frowned. "Is there such a thing?"
"If by definition a Muggle or a Squib is someone who neither has the ability to generate or use magic," said Miss Jackie, "Could it be their very person is a magical insulator or a grounder?"
All six jaws dropped.
"I wondered why Hogwarts always had an honourable resident Squib," said Miss Jackie, giving Filch a small bow. "The practice dates back to the four founders, but no explanation was given in the history books. But if you think about the physical properties of magic, you could postulate magic will act more erratically in magic-rich environs without a Squib or a Muggle to ground it down. In other words, you may owe it to Mr. Filch for your ability to harness your magic so quickly and well here in Hogwarts."
The four students plus Hagrid stared at Filch in horror. Filch gaped opened-mouthed at Miss Jackie, looking rather comical with his eyes popping out, until he whirled around to puff out his chest and pound a fist on it.
"HEARD THAT?" he howled, his eyes bulging alarmingly and spit flying everywhere. "You brats only get to do any magic at all here because of me! ME!"
"Yes, Mr. Filch. I can't tell you how grateful I am that you're here," said Miss Jackie sincerely, much to Ron's palpable shock. "Mr. Filch kindly donated a bit of his blood so I could create an anti-magic barrier—which just a glorified sheet of paper painted in ink mixed with a bit of his blood. And yes," Miss Jackie said at Ron and Hermione's shocked faces. "I used blood because human blood is a powerful magical substance—or anti-magical substance in this case."
"But using human blood is Dark Magic!" Ron protested.
Miss Jackie blinked at him.
"That would mean around eighty percent of Oriental Magic still being practiced today is Dark Magic," she said. "Many magic practitioners in Asiatic countries don't use wands, but mix their own blood in ink to create what is popularly known as fuda or paper talismans as they're sometimes called. Is that what you're saying?"
"No," said Ron quickly, because obviously that was what he was supposed to say.
Miss Jackie gave him a crooked smile.
"I should also mention, until the Roman Republic triggered the first magical renaissance, magical beasts weren't creatures you could approach or capture without seriously endangering your life. That's why dragon slaying and unicorn capturing was such a big deal. It wasn't until 200 A.D. did wands with magical creature cores gain predominance in Europe. Until that point, the only substance powerful enough to allow a witch or a wizard to channel their magic that was also readily available was blood. So for the longest time blood was the only feasible way for witches and wizards to properly use their magic. Of course, there were people who thought the more blood you used, the more powerful the wand would be."
Ron swallowed as the implications fell into place. Harry, Hermione and Julia looked no less disturbed.
"Muggles don't fear us without reason," said Miss Jackie quietly. "We have several thousands of years of human blood sacrifice history to answer for. Muggles are still digging up mass graves of children sacrificed in order to create blood-based wands in Carthage, and you'll find archaeological remains of similar sites all around the world. We know better now—it's not about the amount of blood used, but the power of the blood's owner—but it's understandable a lot of witches and wizards think blood magic equals Dark Magic. I find it intriguing History of Magic doesn't even mention this, but cover Muggle persecution of witches and wizards at great length."
Miss Jackie glided over to her desk, which was hidden almost entirely under stacks of books and music scores.
"The development of magic as civilizations became more, well, enlightened is interesting too," said Miss Jackie, tracing a finger down a book spine. "A popular proverb in magical communities of early first and second century A.D. is 'befriend thy magic but not thine wand' or another variant: 'thy magic thine friend forever, the medium never ever.' Blood wands were still the dominant way at that point in history. The proverb vanishes in Europe when the magical-creature core wands became more readily available, but it is still taught in many Oriental Countries. I grew up learning it, too. But I digress."
She turned to face them.
"I'm not saying it's okay to use human blood for benign intentions, because I honestly don't know and frankly I'm biased," said Miss Jackie. "What I'm trying to say is this: don't jump to conclusions.
"That said," said Miss Jackie, clapping her hands and holding them together. "Let's test my little theory on the anti-magic properties of non-magical blood. I could be just spewing hot air, and what I'm trying to test doesn't come even close to what happens to the things Harry's mother holds onto."
They gathered around the charge controllers (Miss Jackie made several). They were tied together by a long ball-chain John had owned. Miss Jackie slapped a rice paper sheet covered in blood-ink on one of them, don thick gloves, connected the wires on the windmill to the charge controller and moved the controller outside the ball-chain.
The controller promptly spewed massive sparks and static before emitting billows of smoke.
"Backup one!" barked Miss Jackie, before Ron could properly feel let down or maliciously amused. She kicked away the smoking controller without a second glance, "Hurry!"
Harry moved the next controller in line. Miss Jackie covered most of its casing with the paper talismans. The second controller lasted longer than the first one, but it, too, started to smoke and spark up.
"Backup two!" Miss Jackie shouted.
Every stare inch of this controller's casing got covered in paper. Ron, Hermione, Julia and Harry jumped in to help. Once they were certain the case was completely covered, they moved the controller out of the protective ring.
Nothing happened—at least, nothing visible happened.
"Voltage and Wattage looks good," said Miss Jackie, checking the needle-gauge on top of the third controller. "Now the true test."
She whipped out Harry's phone and its charger cord. She plugged the charger into the outlet connected to the controller's battery, and the phone to the charger.
The phone started charging.
"YES!" they all shouted. Ron punched the air and Harry pumped both fists. Hermione and Julia were hugging each other, squealing.
"Ohmygosh, that was amazing!" cried Miss Jackie, high-fiving everyone including Filch and Hagrid, who's giant hand knocked her down to the ground. "Thank you so much!"
-oo00oo-
Miss Jackie's magic-powered electric generator caused quite a stir in Hogwarts. Many students came to see it and were amazed when they found Miss Jackie working on her laptop as calmly as you please. Professor Burbage started bringing her Muggle Studies students for practical demonstrations of Muggle technology. Professor Flitwick and Professor Dumbledore were deeply interested in learning how the generator worked and paid many visits. The one down side was that Filch became quite insufferable, at one point threatening to resign if he didn't get permission to hang the students up by their ankles as punishment. Hagrid confided to Harry, Ron and Hermione that Dumbledore simply showed Filch the list of Squibs that volunteered to replace him, and that shut the caretaker right up. Still, this didn't stop him from threatening to lock up students in the old dungeons for 'not showing proper respect.'
"Did she have to tell Filch he's important to Hogwarts?" grumbled Ron as they headed to the Great Hall for the Hallowe'en feast after receiving such a threat.
"It's only fair," said Hermione. "I thought it was really nice of her, giving him respect."
"Too bad he doesn't know how to take it," Harry said. "How much longer do you think it'll take for her to figure out how to create a proper magic-free zone?"
Miss Jackie wasn't happy that the entire casing needed to be covered with anti-magic talismans in order for the controller to work, thus spent almost every moment of her non-music-teaching time this past week trying to improve it.
"Won't you get in trouble at your real job?" Hermione asked.
"Duplication spell," Miss Jackie reminded her as she drenched some gauzy netting in the blood-ink solution (white this time). "I usually send my clone when my workload is low—or I'm working on something more interesting."
"Nifty that," said Ron, while Hermione looked torn between admiration and disapproval. "If I could duplicate myself, I'd send my clone to do all my classes."
"Sorry, Ron, but you'd get caught very soon," said Miss Jackie. "A clone can mimic you, but it can't do any magic."
Ron's face fell. Hermione, on the other hand, looked interested.
"Why?" she asked.
"The books don't say," Miss Jackie said, "and I only know because some idiot drew inspiration from a Muggle graphic novel about incorrigibly conspicuous ninjas and experimented. I think it's because my duplicate isn't truly alive. Only things that have life in it have usable active magic."
Julia's eyes went wide. "And the idiot was…?"
Miss Jackie pointed her thumb at herself. The four of them laughed.
"So what happens when you banish your clones? Do you receive all their memories?" asked Julia.
"No," said Miss Jackie regretfully. "My clone is independent from me. Whatever memories my clone gains are lost when I banish it — unless I harvest the memory."
"How do you harvest your clone's memory?" asked Harry.
"Like this."
Miss Jackie pulled out a rice paper sheet full of symbols from her jacket pocket and slapped it on her ever-present clone's forehead. Something that looked like silver vapour started pour out its eyes and seeped into the paper. Once the paper turned completely silver, Miss Jackie lifted the sheet and brought it to her face. The silver liquid on the paper vapourized again and flowed into her eyes and nose.
"There, all done," said Miss Jackie, like she'd done nothing more interesting than blow her nose. Then she frowned. "I'm making you practice Mozart, Ron? I thought I'd cover more contemporary stuff … oh, dear."
Ron got to play contemporary stuff in his lesson afterwards. Playing them was about as hard as Mozart, but they were a lot easier on the ears. He would've concentrated better if Miss Jackie (the real one) wasn't puttering around in the background burning old televisions. She was still burning them by droves when they paid a short visit a few hours ago to check her progress. At least she didn't look discouraged—in fact, she seemed to enjoy the challenge.
"Well, research projects can take a long time, can't they? Especially when you're trying something unprecedented like mixing magic and science," said Hermione reasonably. Then she looked up, "Oh, Julia!"
Hermione ran ahead to catch up to Julia, who was walking ahead and reading at the same time. Julia marked her page, adjusted her glasses and smiled. "Hi, Hermione."
"Ooh, are you done reading that?" said Hermione eagerly, checking the title (The Anatomy of the Wand).
"Not even," said Julia ruefully. "It's hard to read something when you have to look up a word in the dictionary for every three sentences."
"Does it help, reading the theory?" asked Hermione, referring to Julia's effort to befriend her Mum's old wand.
"No," Julia groaned. She pulled out her wand from her robe pocket at glared at it. "I should just flush you down Moaning Myrtle's toilet, for all the good you do."
The wand, of course, didn't say anything back. Julia had taken to shouting dire threats at her wand to vent her frustration, which, in Ron's opinion, did nothing to improve relations and only made her look mental. Ron said so once, and Harry dryly retorted his wand percussion therapy had a similar effect. Since then Ron contented himself to joining Harry in sniggering quietly behind her back.
Unfortunately, Julia had very keen ears. "What are you laughing at?"
Ron felt himself turn red in his effort to stop his laughter. Harry had no such problems and sported a perfectly straight face (how?). Julia still glowered at both of them before joining the throng of Hufflepuffs at the Great Hall.
The teachers had really outdone themselves this year for Hallowe'en. Besides the usual live bats, Hagrid's vast pumpkins were carved into lanterns large enough for three men to sit in it and Dumbledore booked a dancing troupe of skeletons for entertainment. The food was exceptional; even Harry didn't lose his appetite over the pork chops and sausages as he usually did, and happily devoured the grilled marinated beef ribs, Vietnamese spring rolls and jacket potatoes. Oddly enough, it was Ginny who picked at her food, and didn't stay for the puddings even when Harry asked her to try some.
"Dunno what's up with her," said Ron as he forked a large piece of chocolate cake with orange icing. "It's weird seeing her so quiet. Normally she never shuts up."
"Do I make her nervous?" asked Harry, between bites of his favourite treacle tart.
Ron shrugged. George leaned over and winked at Harry.
"Oh, no, Harry. You've been quite the gentleman to her."
"But here's problem," said Fred. "She wants to spend more time with you, but you're always so far away…"
Harry rolled his eyes and let out an aggrieved sigh as Ron, Fred and George chortled.
Ron, Harry and Hermione and Ron's brothers except Percy lingered long over the desserts, laughing and talking, until McGonagall dismissed all the students. It had been a wonderful evening. Ron had only one, small sliver of regret, and it was that there was no Quirrell to burst through the doors announcing there was a troll in the dungeons. He by no means missed Quirrell or the troll, but he did miss that sense of adventure and excitement from last year.
Ron was thinking of his four-poster bed upstairs when he realised the milling body of happy and well-fed students wasn't moving. There appeared to be a blockage from both ends of the corridor, and there was a disconcerting quiet that was spreading through.
"What's going on?" said Harry, trying to peer around the mass of jostling bodies.
They weeded their way through the crowd. Hermione gasped and pointed when they reached the very front.
"Look!"
Something was shining on the wall ahead. As they moved closer, squinting through the darkness, they noticed the foot-high words daubed on the wall between two windows, shimmering in the light cast by flaming torches.
THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED.
ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE.
"What's that thing—hanging underneath?" said Ron, hearing the slight quiver in his voice.
As they edged nearer, Harry almost slipped. There was a large puddle of water on the floor. Ron and Hermione grabbed him and hoisted him back to his feet, eyes fixed on the dark shadow beneath it. All three of them realised what it was at once, and leapt back into the crowd.
Mrs. Norris, the caretaker's cat, was hanging by her tail from the torch bracket. She was stiff as a board, her eyes wide and staring.
Ron, Harry and Hermione stood motionless and disbelieving as more students kept pressing forward to see the grisly sight.
Then someone shouted through the quiet.
"Enemies of the Heir, beware! You'll be next, Mudbloods!"
It was Draco Malfoy. He had pushed to the front of the crowd, his cold eyes alive, his usually bloodless face flushed, as he grinned at the sight of the hanging, immobile cat.
-oo00oo-
For a few days, the school could talk of little else but the attack on Mrs. Norris. Unlike what they'd initially feared, Mrs. Norris had been petrified, not killed. However, Dumbledore was unable to reverse the transfiguration. They would have to wait until the Mandrakes Professor Sprout had procured to fully mature to brew the Mandrake Restorative Draught. Unfortunately, the Mandrakes had only just started teething, so it would take several more months until this could happen.
Filch kept the incident fresh in their mind's by pacing around the spot she'd been attacked, as though he thought the attacker might come back. Ron had seen him scrubbing the message on the wall with Mrs. Skower's All-Purpose Magical Mess Remover, but to no effect; the words gleamed as brightly as ever on the stone. When he wasn't guarding the scene of crime, he was either skulking red-eyed through the corridors, lunging out at unsuspecting students and trying to put them in detention for "breathing loudly" and "looking happy", or slumped in a chair sobbing into his hands in front of Miss Jackie, who poured cup after steaming cup of tea for him. Ron would've felt sorry except—well, it was Filch.
Ginny was deeply disturbed at Mrs. Norris' fate. Ron figured she was upset because of her great love for cats.
"But you didn't get to know Mrs. Norris," Ron said bracingly. "Honestly we're better off without her." Ginny's lips trembled, so he quickly assured her: "Stuff like this doesn't happen often at Hogwarts. They'll catch the maniac who did this and get him out of here in no time. I just hope he'll have time to Petrify Filch before he's expelled. I'm only joking—" He added the latter when Ginny blanched.
The attack had a profound effect on Harry and Hermione. It wasn't unusual for Harry to suddenly go quiet for hours or Hermione to do a lot of reading, but for about a week Ron didn't hear a peep from Harry and Hermione did little else but read. Asking Harry why he wasn't talking was about as effective as asking a statue to speak without magic, so Ron hung around his siblings, assuring a thoroughly alarmed Ginny that Harry was just having a very long silent spell, and waited for him to get out of his latest funk. As for Hermione, she explained herself soon enough: She had been trying read up the legend of the Chamber of Secrets. Unfortunately, everyone else wanted to read it up too, so all the copies of Hogwarts, A History, the only book known to have written on the subject, had been checked out by the time she went looking for it. Her own copy was at home to make room for the Lockhart books, and there was a two week long waiting list. Just when it looked as though they'd have to wait for two weeks for answers, Hermione did something that never happened before: she put up her hand in History of Magic class to ask a question.
Professor Binns glanced up in the middle of a deadly dull lecture on the International Warlock Convention of 1289 when this happened, looking amazed.
"Miss—er—?"
"Granger, Professor. I was wondering if you could tell us anything about the Chamber of Secrets," said Hermione in a clear voice.
Dean Thomas, who had been gazing out of the window with his mouth hanging open, jerked out of trance; Lavender Brown's head came up off her arms and Neville Longbottom's elbow slipped off his desk. Professor Binns blinked.
"My subject is History of Magic," he said in his dry, wheezy voice. "I deal with facts, Miss Granger, not myths and legends." He cleared his voice, making a small sound like a chalk snapping, and continued, "In September of that year, a subcommittee of Sardinian sorcerers—"
He stuttered to a halt when he realized Hermione's hand was waving in the air again.
"Miss Grant?"
"Please, sir, don't legends always have a basis in fact?"
Professor Binns was looking at her in such amazement at this point, Ron was sure no student had ever interrupted him before, dead or alive.
"Well," said Professor Binns slowly, "yes, one could argue that, I suppose." He peered at Hermione as though he had never seen a student properly before. "However, the legend of which you speak is such a sensational, even ludicrous tale—"
But the whole class was now hanging on Professor Binns' every word. He looked dimly at them all, every face turned to his. Ron could tell he was completely thrown by such an unusual show of interest.
"Oh, very well," he said slowly. "Let me see … Chamber of Secrets…"
Professor Binns told them about Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw and Salazar Slytherin, the four greatest witches and wizards of the age, who founded Hogwarts over a thousand years ago (precise date uncertain). For years they worked together in harmony, seeking out youngsters who showed signs of magic and bringing them to the castle to be educated far away from prying Muggle eyes during a time witches and wizards suffered much persecution. Then a rift grew between Slytherin and the others because Slytherin wanted to be more selective about the students admitted to Hogwarts. He disliked taking students of Muggle parentage, believing them to be untrustworthy. After a while, there was a serious argument on the subject between Slytherin and Gryffindor, and Slytherin left the school.
"Reliable historical sources tell us this much," said Professor Binns after a brief pause. "But these honest facts have been obscured by the fanciful legend of the Chamber of Secrets. The story goes that Slytherin had built a hidden chamber the castle, of which the founders knew nothing. Slytherin, according to legend, sealed the Chamber of Secrets so that none would be able to open it until his own true heir arrived at the school. The heir alone would be able to unseal the Chamber of Secrets, unleash the horror within, and use it to purge the school of all who were unworthy to study magic."
There was an uneasy silence as everyone continued to watch him, hoping for more. Professor Binns looked faintly annoyed.
"The whole thing is arrant nonsense, of course," he said. "Naturally, the school has been searched for evidence of such a chamber, many times, by the most learned witches and wizards. It does not exist. A tale told to frighten the gullible."
"Sir—what exactly do you mean by the 'horror within' the Chamber?" asked Hermione.
"That is believed to be some sort of a monster, which the Heir of Slytherin alone can control," said Professor Binns in his dry, reedy voice.
The class exchanged nervous looks.
"I tell you, the thing does not exist," said Professor Binns, shuffling his ghostly notes. "There is no Chamber and no monster."
"But sir," said Seamus, "if the Chamber can only be opened by Slytherin's true heir, no one else would be able to find it, would they?"
"Nonsense, O'Flaherty," said Professor Binns in an aggravated tone. "If a long succession of Hogwarts headmasters and headmistresses haven't found the thing—"
"But Professor," piped up Parvati, "you'd probably have to use Dark Magic to open it—"
"Just because a wizard doesn't use Dark Magic doesn't mean he can't, Miss Pennyfeather," snapped Professor Binns. "I repeat, if the likes of Dumbledore—"
"But maybe you've got to be related to Slytherin, so Dumbledore couldn't—" began Dean, but Professor Binns had enough.
"That will do," he said sharply. "It is a myth! It does not exist! There is not a shred of evidence that Slytherin built so much as a secret broom cupboard! I regret telling you such a foolish story! We will return, if you please, to history, to solid, believable, verifiable fact!"
Then within five minutes, the class sunk back into its usual torpor. No one spoke again until the bell rang and everyone left the History of Magic classroom to enter the teeming corridors.
"I always knew Salazar Slytherin was a twisted old loony," Ron told to Harry and Hermione as they fought their way through the crowd to drop off their bags for dinner. "But I never knew he was the one who started all this pure-blood stuff. I wouldn't be in his house even if you paid me. Honestly, if the Sorting Hat tried to put me in Slytherin I'd've taken the train back home…"
Hermione nodded fervently. Harry said nothing. He just worried the inside of his mouth as they were shunted along in the throng. On their way, Colin Creevey pasted by.
"Hiya, Harry!" said Colin, happy as always to greet Harry for any excuse, for as many times as possible.
Harry vaguely waved a hand at Colin's direction. Ron wondered why he bothered; he'd've ignored the annoying firstie within the first week.
"Harry—Harry—a boy said in my class that you solve mysteries! Are you…?"
But Colin was so small he couldn't fight against the tide of people bearing him towards the Great Hall; they heard him squeak, "See you, Harry!" and he was gone.
They made a turn and found themselves in the corridor where the attack had happened. They stopped and looked. The scene looked exactly like the night they discovered the writing on the wall, except there was no stiff cat hanging on the torch bracket, and an empty chair was leaning against the wall bearing the message: The Chamber of Secrets has been open. The corridor itself was deserted.
"Can't hurt to have a poke around," said Ron, waving at the scene.
They dropped their bags in the corner and started searching for clues.
"Scorch marks!" said Ron. "Here—and here—"
"Come and look at this!" said Hermione. "This is funny…"
Hermione was pointing at the top most pane of the window next to the message on the wall, where around twenty spiders were scuttling, apparently fighting to get through a small crack. A long, silvery thread was dangling like a rope, as though they had all climbed it in their hurry to get outside. Ron looked away and took several steps back the moment he realised it was spiders Hermione was pointing out.
"Have you ever seen spiders act like that?" Hermione said wonderingly. "Have you, Ron? Ron?"
She looked over her shoulder and frowned at Ron, who tried to recover his breathing.
"I—don't—like—spiders," he said tensely.
"I never knew that," said Hermione, looking at Ron in surprise. "You've used spiders in Potions loads of times…"
"I don't mind them dead," said Ron. "I just don't like the way they move…"
Hermione giggled.
"It's not funny!" said Ron fiercely. "If you must know, when I was three, Fred turned my — my teddy bear into a great filthy spider because I broke his toy broomstick … You wouldn't like them either if you'd been holding your bear and suddenly it had too many legs and…"
He shuddered. Hermione was still on the verge of laughing. Harry looked deeply sympathetic, though, and it suddenly occurred to Ron perhaps Harry's weird pork-phobia was like his deep hatred for spiders.
"Remember all the water on the floor?" said Hermione, thankfully changing the subject. "Where did it all come from? Someone mopped it all up."
"It was about here," said Ron, walking a few paces past Filch's chair and pointing. "Level with this door."
He reached for the brass doorknob to open it, until he realised what room the door belonged to. He withdrew his hand as though he'd been burned.
"Can't go in there," said Ron gruffly. "This is a girl's toilet."
"Oh, Ron, there won't be anyone in there," said Hermione, coming over. "That's Moaning Myrtle's place."
"Who?"
"Myrtle's a ghost haunting one of the toilets in here," said Hermione.
"She haunts a toilet?"
"Yes. It's been out-of-order all year because she keeps having tantrums and flooding the place. I never went in there anyway if I could avoid it; it's awful trying to have a pee with her wailing at you. Anyway, let's have a look."
Ignoring the large OUT OF ORDER sign, she opened the door.
It was the gloomiest, most depressing toilet room Ron had ever seen. Under a large, cracked and spotted mirror were a row of chipped sinks. The floor was damp and reflected the dull light given off by the stubs of candles, burning low in their holders. The wooden doors to the stalls were flaking and scratched and one of them was dangling off its hinges. Hermione put her fingers to her lips and set off towards the end stall. When she reached it she said, "Hello, Myrtle, how are you?"
Harry and Ron went to look. A squat ghost of a girl was floating above the tank of the toilet, picking a spot on her chin, wearing the glummest face Ron had ever seen, half-hidden behind lank hair and thick, pearly spectacles.
"This is a girl's toilet," said Myrtle, eyeing Ron and Harry suspiciously. "They're not girls."
"No," Hermione agreed. "I just wanted to show them how—er—nice it is in here."
She waved vaguely at the dirty old mirror and the damp floor. Hermione was never a good liar.
"Ask her if she saw anything," Ron whispered at Hermione.
"What are you whispering?" said Myrtle, staring at him.
"Nothing," said Ron. "We wanted to ask—"
"I wish people would stop talking behind my back!" said Myrtle, in a voice choked with tears. "I do have feelings, you know, even if I am dead—"
"Myrtle, no one wants to upset you," said Hermione. "Ron only—"
"No one wants to upset me! That's a good one!" howled Myrtle. "My life was nothing but misery at this place and now people come along ruining my death!"
"We wanted to ask you if you've seen anything funny lately," said Hermione quickly. "A cat was attacked right outside your front door on Hallowe'en. Did you see anyone near here that night?"
"I wasn't paying attention," said Myrtle dramatically. "Peeves upset me so much I came in here to kill myself. Then, of course, I remembered that I'm—that I'm—"
"Already dead," said Ron helpfully.
Myrtle gave a tragic sob, rose up in the air, turned over, and dived headfirst into the toilet, splashing water all over them and vanishing from sight, although from the direction of her muffled sobs, she had come to rest somewhere in the U-bend.
Harry and Ron stood with their mouths open, but Hermione shrugged wearily and said, "Honestly, that was almost cheerful for Myrtle. Come on, let's go."
She had barely closed the door on Myrtle's gurgling sobs when a loud voice made all three of them jump.
"RON!"
Percy had stopped dead at the head of the stairs, prefect badge agleam, and an expression of complete shock on his face.
"That's a girl's toilet!" he gasped. "What were you—?"
Ron was about to say they were just looking around searching for clues, but Harry opened his mouth first.
"I really needed to pee."
…And just like that Harry started talking again. Percy was so thrown off he momentarily forgot he was angry.
"Get away from there," Percy said gruffly, striding towards them and starting to bustle them along, flapping his arms. "Don't you care what this looks like? Skulking around here while everyone's at dinner, especially you, Harry, after not talking for a week… Ginny seems to think you've been bewitched, I've never seen her so upset, crying her eyes out. You might think of her, all the first years are thoroughly overexcited by this business—"
"You don't care about Ginny," said Ron, feeling his ears reddening. "You're worried we're going to mess up your chances of being Head Boy—"
"Enough!" Percy said tersely, fingering his prefect badge. "Go to dinner or I'm taking off points! And no more troublesome behaviour from you or I'll write Mum!"
And he strode off, the back of his neck as red as Ron's ears.
-oo00oo-
Ron, Harry and Hermione ensconced in the music room to avoid Percy that night. Ron savagely practiced on the piano, missing the notes he normally had no trouble hitting out of his anger, Hermione worked on her Charms homework and Harry pored over his phone. Finally, frustrated at the mistakes he kept making, Ron slammed all his fingers on the keys and fumed. Hermione, surprisingly, didn't tell him off and shut her copy of The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 2.
"Who could it be, though?" she asked quietly, as if she was restarting a conversation they'd started earlier. "Who would want to frighten all the Muggle-borns out of Hogwarts?"
"Let me think," said Ron in mock puzzlement. "Who do we know thinks all Muggle-borns are scum?"
He looked at Hermione meaningfully. Hermione looked back, unconvinced.
"If you're talking about Malfoy—"
"Of course I am!" said Ron. "You heard him—'You'll be next, Mudbloods!'— come on, you've only got to look at his foul rat face to know it's him—"
"Malfoy, the heir of Slytherin?" said Hermione sceptically.
"Look at his family!" cried Ron. "The whole lot of them have been in Slytherin! They could easily be Slytherin's descendants. His father's definitely evil enough, being a top You-Know-Who supporter and all. They could've had the key to the Chamber of Secret for centuries! Handing it down, father to son…"
"Well," said Hermione cautiously, "I suppose it's possible…"
"But how do we prove it?" said Ron darkly.
"Let's back up a bit," said Harry, speaking as if he never took a break from talking. "The heir of Slytherin can open the Chamber of Secrets and control the monster inside. There's definitely a monster involved, seeing as Mrs. Norris was petrified and even Dumbledore couldn't cure her immediately."
"Makes you think the attack was done by something not human," Hermione agreed.
"And while it's possible Malfoy has the key to the Chamber of Secrets, he's iffy on the controlling monster part," Harry continued. "Remember how much trouble we had with a baby dragon? The monster's got to be somewhere on the same level. How do you tame a monster anyway? There's definitely something we're missing."
"But you can't deny he has some hand in this," Ron argued. "Otherwise he wouldn't have said what he did on Hallowe'en."
"True," said Hermione. "That's what we need to find out. It's going to very difficult, of course. And dangerous— very dangerous. We'd be breaking fifty school rules, I expect…"
"If, in a month or so, you feel like explaining you'll tell us, won't you?" said Ron irritably.
"Alright," Hermione snapped. "The quickest way to find out is questioning Malfoy in the Slytherin Common Room without him knowing it's us."
"Impossible," Harry said as Ron laughed.
"No, it's not," said Hermione. "We just have to take a bit of polyjuice potion."
"The potion that lets you turn into someone else?" said Harry, eyebrows raised. "Hermione, you do realise it's a N.E.W.T. level potion, we don't know how to make it, and we probably won't even have the right ingredients even if we had the recipe?"
"We can figure out the details after we get the instructions!" said Hermione, waving off Harry's argument impatiently. "Snape said the recipe is a book called Moste Potente Potions and it's bound to be in the Restricted Section. We'll need a signed note for that."
"Who's gonna give us a note?" said Ron. "Hard to see why we'd want the book if weren't trying to make one of the potions."
"I think," said Hermione. "If we make it sound as though we're just interested in the theory, we might stand a chance."
"C'mon, no teacher's going to fall for that," said Ron. "They'd have to be really thick…"
"Or I could ask Malfoy and save you all the trouble," said someone.
They all looked over their shoulder. Julia was standing at the entrance, hugging her bag.
"How long have you been here?" Hermione squeaked.
"Why are you here anyway?" Ron demanded.
"Since Harry mentioned it's possible Malfoy has the key to the Chamber of Secrets, and I come here every evening," Julia replied in order. At Ron's scepticism, she cocked an eyebrow. "Aunt Jackie is my Aunt."
"Why would Malfoy answer your questions and not be suspicious?" asked Harry, frowning.
"He keeps trying to talk to me," said Julia simply. "I keep my answers short and civil. Sometimes I even talk back."
"You're friendly with Draco Malfoy?" said Ron incredulously. "Don't you realise he's a foul, nasty little—"
"I know Malfoy is a disgusting toe rag, you don't have to convince me," said Julia.
"Then why are you civil to him?" Ron argued.
"What does me thinking Malfoy is a disgusting toe rag have anything to do with how I should treat him?" Julia argued back. "Look, you want to know if Malfoy has a connection to the attack on Mrs. Norris, right? I can help you on that, and you don't have to risk breaking fifty school rules if I do. Maybe I'll luck out and the Q&A will give me an excuse to tell him to piss off the next time he tries to talk to me."
Harry looked as deeply put-out by this as Ron was. Nevertheless, he didn't push the issue.
"I want to listen in when you do," said Harry gruffly.
"He usually tries to chat up when I'm in the library. It's not very hard to eavesdrop in there," said Julia.
"Let's stick to phones and not risk detection," said Harry, scowling at his phone. "I have an earpiece and wireless microphone you can use. And no, don't ask. You don't ask 'why' for this sort of thing when Sherlock Holmes is your guardian."
"That reminds me, we should tell Sherlock about the Chamber of Secrets," said Hermione. "If anyone can figure out what the monster is and who's controlling it, it's him."
"Done it already," said Harry. "We'll have to wait a bit though. He overworked himself for a case in the Continent, so John confiscated his phone and duct-taped him to the bed."
-oo00oo-
Final Notes: Lockhart ended up being called Haemorrhoids and Back-Pain after I typed My-Colleague-Who-Shall-Remain-Anonymous once. I never thought I'd excavate my old electrical engineering textbooks and read them for any reason, but apparently I can for fanfic. The magic-powered electric generator takes its inspiration from wind-powered electric generators. I figured it's more feasible for a second year. I've intentionally overlooked the fact the windmill itself could act like an antenna without proper EM immunity and just focused on the charge controller.
Sherlock doesn't make it to Hogwarts, sorry. I tried to reason with John, but John said NO. But he'll definitely show up in the next chapter.