And Chapter Eight is up before the new year!
If anyone wants to see a New Year fic, leave a prompt in the reviews or pm me by 31st Dec. If you send me a prompt in time, I just might be able to write a short side-fic (maybe AU) and post it up by the end of the first week of January.
Pairings: Potential Hadria (FemHarry) x Tom Riddle, but more platonic than romantic, other pairings undecided.
(Does anyone want to pair Gellert with anyone? XD And no, not Dumbledore please. Suggestions of a companion/friend? so far have been Bellatrix, Luna or an OC. Will be collating all your suggestions and maybe do a poll when the time comes—which will prob be a long way from now).
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Anything not found in Harry Potter Wiki, Pottermore or in the books or movies are likely to be made up by me and do remember this is a fanfiction i.e. I'm borrowing the Potterverse and messing around in it so there may be intentional factual errors.
Beta: Happyfish
Chapter Eight: Back to School
"Vade in pace." Go in peace. —Latin Phrase (Roman way of saying "Goodbye.")
Gellert found himself rudely awoken one morning by a loud crash. The sound was nothing but ominous, considering the company he kept. It certainly said something that he still took his time getting out of bed. He wasn't too worried about what might have happened to Hadria—she seemed to be able to look after herself despite her alarming tendency of getting into trouble—and if anything in the house had been destroyed, well, it was probably too late to do anything about it. Unless it was a slow-acting sort of trouble, like a potion spill or—
There was the smell of something burning, and Gellert bolted into the hallway, only to trip and stop when he heard a loud and gleeful, "Gerwald! Guess what?"
Sighing, Gerwald found himself strolling into the kitchen, in no hurry now that it was clear that whatever it was, it was nothing too dangerous. He paused at the doorway, and stared, wondering when was he going to get used to anything that revolved around Hadria (it had been six years, so he wasn't feeling very hopeful).
"Hadria, that's Noh you're lighting."
Hadria looked up at her guardian and frowned a little. "Oh, um, yeah. Did you know when a Lethifold catches fire, the fire extinguishes by itself and leaves no trace of burning? It's kind of cool. I wonder if Fiendfyre will work since—"
"You shouldn't be conducting dangerous and potentially-harmful experiments on your pet," Gellert ground out. "And please, do not try using Fiendfyre. It's very dangerous and you're too young to control it."
"Okay… Now what was I going to… Oh, yeah! Right," Hadria muttered, none too concern and clearly distracted. Her face then lit up, eyes all but glowing with excitement. "Guess what? My Hogwarts letter is here!"
Ms H. Potter
The Little Sanctuary
Cornwall
The letter was exactly as she remembered it, except for the address which seemed to only include her room and the county they were living in, leaving out the actual address of their house. She wondered if it was vague in this way due to the charms and wards Gellert had placed upon the building when they first moved in a month ago, having relocated to England for convenience sake.
With the letter came a list of school supplies for first-years. She read it over, and though the words were the same, there was something different… Something very important: Hadria was different.
"Gerwald?"
"Hmm?"
"Students may also bring an owl or a cat or a toad," she recited. "I don't have an owl or a cat or a toad. But I have a Lethifold and a Jarvey… Snag, stop wriggling and just take a nap, you're making my clothes itch."
Gellert gave her a sideways glance. "Are you planning to smuggle them in?"
"You're supposed to be the responsible one and say no," Hadria snorted.
"Don't snort—"
"It's unbecoming, I know, I know. But I doubt I could disguise Noh well enough to get past Dumbledore, though I might be able to bring Snag in if Dumbledore's feeling generous."
"I'm sure you'll be fine with Snag. You're his Golden Girl. That Lethifold is a Dark creature so that might be pushing it… We'll just have to get you a magical trunk with more than one compartment so you can keep Noh in one of them."
"Really? You'd do that?" Hadria gave Gellert a disturbing look of pure adoration (which he could never tell how much of it was genuine and how much was for the purpose of buttering him up). He scowled back at her.
"I just do not want that thing staying with me when you're not around. It's your pet and you'd better take full responsibility of it. And your Grim had better not visit me unnecessarily while you're away either."
She laughed merrily and they entered Diagon Alley like that, one disgruntled blond wizard and a cheerful raven-haired girl.
They were undisturbed by anyone, as no one could recognise them as anyone famous—Gellert, because few remained who knew what he had looked like when he was young, and Hadria, because without her lightning-bolt-scar visible, all the public had on her were made-up stories and some vague guesses on what combination of her parents she'd be like. Gellert had cast Notice-Me-Not charm on themselves just in case anyway.
Their first stop was Gringotts, where they refilled their pouches without a trouble, followed by a trip to a shop selling magical trunks, where she spent some time choosing the right trunk—she didn't need one quite as ridiculous as Moody's (who needs seven compartments? A paranoid retired Auror, that's who), but she did require one where she could safely keep potentially illegal items. In the end, they got a five-compartment one that had a different lock for each, including a lock that responded to her magic the way a wand would, meaning that she was the only one who could open it.
That lock guarded a compartment in which she had placed her more questionable books (that Gellert had given her) as well as potions she had brewed that she was not supposed to have (such as the Felix Felicis). The pet compartment for keeping Noh (and possibly Snag but she still wasn't sure if the Lethifold would eat the Jarvey if left alone with him) was locked by a password in Parseltongue—the chosen word was appropriately 'Whisperer'. The library compartment (for regular books) required the answering of a riddle or question, similar to the Ravenclaw Tower, but she was able to set her own riddles and questions which meant that it might ask for something that only a time-traveller from the future could answer. The clothes compartment and the compartment for other items (such as regular potions and other assortments) were guarded by regular passwords—'Mithril' and 'Athelas' respectively, passwords she expected only Muggleborns with Ravenclaw tendencies could guess at.
Upon leaving the trunk shop, they went around Diagon Alley picking up Hadria's school supplies and packed them into the trunk they had bought.
At the clothes store, Hadria was disappointed that she hadn't been able to meet Draco Malfoy. She would have liked to see him again and compare him with the version she knew from before. She would also have liked to have him meet Snag and see if they end up competing over who can insult the other better.
(On a side note: Why did they need pointed hats? Nobody ever wore them. The only times she remembered fellow students wearing them were at the Start- and End-of-term feasts. What were they even for? The list said 'for day wear'. Day wear. When was the last time they updated the uniform section in the First year's supply list?)
After spending some time in Flourish and Blotts, which for them meant three hours, Gellert brought Hadria for a short detour into Knockturn Alley to get some books and items that they could not find in the Diagon Alley bookshops and Apothecary, and were of course, not in the booklist. It was Hadria's first time there as a customer, and it was a curious thing. Many things that she used to find creepy were now fascinating (aside from the old hags and other questionable people frequenting the area who still looked suitably creepy, as if they would like nothing better than to eat her up… Not that they could, even if they tried, but still).
Unfortunately, since the Pig Dementor Incident, Gellert had decided that it was unwise to let her get her hands on potentially dangerous items, be it Dark items or dangerous potion ingredients. Even if she could handle herself, there was no way he was going to risk the summoning of some ancient demon in an archaic Dark ritual or something. So Hadria had to pout and shuffle along when he refused to let her buy a shrunken head out of curiosity, nor did he allow her to even touch any Erumpent parts—tail, horn, exploding fluids and all.
When they passed by a shop selling bones and she had tried to go as near to the display window as she could without dirtying her face on the grimy glass, Gellert had merely dragged her along as if she was a misbehaving puppy. Though Hadria considered sneaking back to one of these shops one day, without even questioning if she could sneak away from Gellert or Hogwarts, the prices of most of the items there were beyond her budget even though the weekly pocket money she was given by him was quite a healthy sum and she had been saving most of it. (And she couldn't withdraw money out of Gringotts without Gellert knowing of it when he received the monthly statement).
Their next destination after leaving Knockturn Alley was to visit Ollivander's.
"We'll get you another wand—useful to have two on you, especially if one of them is illegal—then we'll get you an owl. I'll be expecting you to write back frequently," Gellert had said. Hadria was quite pleased to hear that, because it meant that she had a chance of getting her old friends—her wand and owl—back. That, and she would have two wands, which was uncommon but not unheard of, but what was almost unheard of was for the owner to be a child and the dormant Trace charm to be absent on one of them. (Probably because it was as legal as keeping pet Lethifolds—so unlikely that there probably wasn't even an explicit law against it).
Gellert had explained to her some time ago that there was a Trace charm on all legal wands sold in Britain. It only activates when two conditions are fulfilled: one, the owner of the wand is below seventeen, and two, had entered the Hogwarts express. The charm would then envelope the wand's owner, which meant that any magic cast by Wizarding folk around the wand's owner would be thereafter be tracked and monitored (and dismissed if mature Wizarding folk were in the vicinity), and the charm would only fail when the owner turned seventeen, because the nature of matured magic was different and the charm would slip off like summoning charms from The Invisibility Cloak. Obviously, the charm would also fail to activate if the wand's owner was already an adult. The loophole was that magical non-Wizarding folk, such as eccentric House-elves, could use magic around under-aged Wizarding folk and get away with it, leaving the young witch or wizard to take the blame.
(But the Trace on Gregorovitch's wands were tailored to activate only upon entrance to Durmstrang's school grounds.)
Which was how it led them to stand in the middle of the dimly-lit and dusty wand shop. The air in there was saturated with the magic that had accumulated from the natural magical radiation of so many wands, and Hadria briefly wondered if Ollivander was a bit odd as a result of overexposure to such magic.
The wand-choosing process was just as long as her very first one, and Hadria hoped she might get back her old wand. She had been rather fond of it. Wand after wand was tried, until the strange old man peered at her so intently with those odd pale eyes of his, his nose almost touching hers as he examined her. She could only stand there rather stiffly and wait for him to leave her personal space. When he did, he beamed almost creepily, and there was a silver gleam to his eyes.
"I thought that might be the case," he muttered to himself as he nodded mysteriously. He was soon eagerly rummaging through his wand collection again.
"Here, try this," he said, showing her another wand. It had a pale yellowish colour with a tint of sunset orange, like champagne, and the base of the wand—the handle—was fashioned into an irregular twisting shape that resembled tongues of flames.
When she picked it up, she could feel a familiar warmth spread through her hand, and she waved it once, producing a stream of golden sparks. There was a delighted applause by Ollivander and a quieter one by an amused Gellert.
"Oh, wonderful! Yes, very wonderful indeed. I had a feeling… How curious…" Ollivander said.
"What's curious?" Hadria asked, wondering if he would repeat the same thing he did the first time around. He did not.
"I have a very good memory, Ms Potter," he hummed as he carefully packed her wand back into its box. "I remember every wand I've made, every wood and core I've used. Your new wand—rowan and phoenix feather, twelve inches, reasonably pliable—was one I crafted a few years ago, relatively recent compared to most of my wands here. The phoenix tail feather in your wand is one of a pair from a particular phoenix who gave me just one other feather. Just one. And this other tail feather, curiously, resides in the wand that gave you that scar. Yew, thirteen-and-a-half inches. I remember it well… And a wand chooses its wizard, or witch, in your case, and… well, I think we can expect great things from you, Ms Potter."
Here he leaned in, and whispered into her ear. "Did you know, a few years back, one of my creations caught fire. Yes, holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple it was. The phoenix feather remained intact, of course, and with it, I crafted your wand. Hence the design of the flames, a mark of one born from the ashes, rather appropriate for a phoenix-feather wand, if I may say so. I chose rowan as the new wood, for it is a wood of protection and purity, and ideal for a dueller. Yes, I think we can indeed expect very great things from you…"
Hadria thought it was all very strange and suspicious and she could practically feel the Higher Entities' hands all over this, but she nodded politely and smiled as if there was nothing wrong at all with having powerful beings poking into her life like exasperating relatives.
They paid seven galleons for the wand and Gellert brought her to Eeylops Owl Emporium.
"How is it that whichever wand-maker you meet, you are bound to stir up abnormal reactions due to the wand that chooses you?" he asked her with a huff. It was a rhetorical question, though she answered it anyway with a cheeky, "I'm special."
He smacked her gently on the back of her head, and when she protested, he merely smirked and said, "Just making sure your head doesn't inflate too much."
Hadria had been told about her status in the Wizarding world when she turned ten. Of course, she knew this beforehand, but to Gellert's knowledge, he'd only informed her a year ago, as he didn't want 'her fame to get to her head' as he put it. She now had an egoistic mode, specially created just to annoy Gellert. He knew it was all just playful payback for letting her know about her fame so late, but he still got irritated by her occasional bouts of faux-narcissism anyway.
Once they were in the Emporium, Hadria automatically disappeared off in search of Hedwig. There were two snowy owls in the shop, one male, one female. The female one was slightly larger, with beautiful soft white feathers peppered with dark spots, a mean sharp black beak and glinting black talons peaking out from thick fluffy feathers. Her eyes were intelligent and a piercing golden yellow.
"A vicious one, she is," the shopkeeper said as he came behind her and inspected her choice. "Won't let anybody near her. I say take the male. Less fierce, lighter, and whiter too. Better choice for a little witch like you."
Hadria ignored him and reached out a hand to the regal bird, who eyed her dispassionately until she curtsied the way she had been taught. (She would never forget the precious memory of Gellert trying to teach her how to curtsy like a young lady. The demonstration had been priceless). The snowy owl then reached forward and gently nipped her fingers the way Hedwig used to do.
"There, she likes me," Hadria said with a brilliant smile at the shopkeeper who looked a little bemused.
"Right, then, I suppose, if your…"
"Guardian," she supplied.
The shopkeeper cleared his throat. "If your guardian is fine with it, that would be fifteen galleons. I usually charge twenty for snows, but she's been a troublesome one to take care of."
"Gerwald! Over here," Hadria called out and Gellert soon found his way to where she was.
"Can I have her?" she said as she stroked the owl who was now rubbing her head against Hadria's palm like a cat.
Gellert gave the snowy owl a once-over, and muttered, "Of all the owls in this shop, you just had to pick the most dangerous looking one."
"No, I picked her because she likes me," Hadria replied blithely.
He gave her a look. "That wasn't a question. And don't say you know because I know you do."
She pouted. "Why must you spoil my fun?"
"Because it's at my expense," Gellert sighed and paid the shopkeeper for the owl.
"What are you going to name her?" he asked as they left the shop.
"Hedwig?" Hadria suggested, but surprisingly, the owl glared at her.
"Not Hedwig?" The glare lessened.
"Fine. Uh… Hades? No? I guess not. It's a boy's name. How about Athena? Artemis? Hertha? Vesta? Fortuna? Circe's piglets! No, I wasn't planning on naming you that! Dammit."
Gellert only watched on amusedly as his ward grew increasingly frustrated with her name-fussy owl. It was always pleasant change to see her frustrated.
Then the Jarvey woke up amidst all the fuss, and peaked out of Hadria's outer coat. He eyed the bird of prey distastefully before snapping, "Noisy salted fowl." To which the owl barked threateningly.
"Snag!" Hadria exclaimed, hit with a desperate dash of inspiration. "Give me a name! Just one word to describe her."
"Jill-fowl?" Snag questioned and Hadria nodded, hoping that she'd interpreted him correctly and he didn't actually mean to name the snowy owl 'Jill-fowl'.
"Winterberry," the Jarvey retorted. "Bloody, bald and cold."
Hadria blinked. Did he just wish death upon her owl?
"Winterberries are blood-red and leafless in winter," Gellert explained, still amused (and it was also a nice change to have the Jarvey insult someone else, even if it was just a bird). "It is a species of holly."
"Winterberry?" Hadria tried, turning to the owl in the cage. The owl glared back in a way that suggested she was questioning her owner's sanity.
"Um, Holly?" Hadria tried again, and the snowy bird fluffed up her feathers and seemed to settle down for a snooze.
"Hey, is that a yes? Holly?"
The owl did not respond.
"… I'm taking that as a yes."
The next month or so was spent divided between reading her school books, playing with Snag and Noh and sometimes Scáth, and attempting to persuade Gellert to let her smuggle a broom into Hogwarts (and didn't she sound like Malfoy when she did that? But she didn't care). Gellert was quite peeved by her insistence of having a broom, as she had never showed any inclination to play Quidditch prior to the Diagon Alley trip, though he admitted they'd never used a broom before as they had never needed to, so if she had any love for flying on broomstick, they wouldn't have found out. But they had passed by a store in Diagon Alley advertising for the Nimbus 2000, and she had been pestering him about it ever since. She wasn't even asking him for the latest Nimbus model, but she wanted a good broom all the same, and one that she could use at Hogwarts.
In the end, Gellert agreed to buy her a Nimbus 2000, but only if she gets chosen for a Quidditch team at Hogwarts, mainly because he wasn't sure how much of it was an impulsive need to try out broomstick-flying and how much was real interest. He figured he'd buy a Cleansweep Seven for her for Yule that year anyway, if she still expressed interest in flying after her first lesson at Hogwarts, so that she could practice with it before Quidditch try-outs in second year.
By the time September First came along, Gellert was quite sure he wouldn't miss the brat. The excitement she exuded like a crazy octopus-like aura increased every day and he was soon very tempted to just dose her with the Draught of Living Death until the time came for him to Apparate her to King's Cross. The only reason why he had decided against it was because he didn't have the cure at hand and would be far too troublesome to brew.
"Gerwald, Gerwald, Gerwald Gerwald GerwaldGerwald—"
He silenced her with a flick of his wand. A glance at the clock told him that they still had half an hour to spare. Unfortunately, Hadria had chosen to pester him about leaving since an hour ago, breaking the silence every now and then (whenever she succeeded in undoing the Silencing Charm non-verbally and she was getting better every time she did it).
"What about your Pointed Hat?" he asked, as if she hadn't interrupted with chirping his name at shortening intervals.
Hadria made a face, letting him know exactly what she thought of it.
"I don't care if you find the hat stupid. Even if nobody ever wears it, its in your supply list," Gellert retorted, though he found the hat stupid as well. Pointed hats were no longer in fashion for everyday wear when he went to school, and were only worn on traditional and formal occasions. He didn't remember Durmstrang ever having such a hat as part of the uniform set. The only hat commonly worn was a black winter one made of matted woolly fur, for practical reasons.
The sullen dark-haired girl stretched out a hand and a black conical hat came soaring through the door from somewhere upstairs. She grabbed it from the air stuffed it into her trunk, giving him a prickly glare as she did so.
"Right. Your gloves? Dragon hide, silk, wool, and moleskin."
Hadria nodded as he listed all four. Gellert was still wondering why he bothered checking if she had packed everything. Anything she missed could be delivered by owl, and she was in such a hurry to get on the train, it would be a blessing to let her leave early. Yet here he was, going through the exasperating chore of slowing her down and making sure she was truly ready to leave.
"Extra boots? The black leather ones I—"
"Yes, yes. And socks too. Long ones, short ones, woollen ones. Can we go now?" Hadria cut in, having terminated the Silencing Charm with a silent Finite Incantatem.
Scáth chose that moment to emerge from her partially-closed trunk like black smoke and shadow spewing forth from the gaps before forming a dog-like spectre with glowing green eyes.
Gellert took one look at the sharp-toothed grin and said, "If I didn't know better, I would've thought you had a demon-summoning circle drawn in one of your compartments."
"I heard you lot and took the liberty of checking the trunk. You seem to have everything you need in there and more," the Grim said to Hadria, ignoring the blonde wizard.
"I knew it! I must have packed a bunch of—" Hadria started just as Gellert began saying, "Your definition of need may be different from—"
There was a short pause as they stared at each other.
Scáth looked between them and their sullen glaring towards the other for a moment. Then he shook his head and chuckled.
"The two of you are going to miss each other. I just know it."
And thus, the period before Hadria rejoins the Wizarding World we know comes to a close. This is kinda filler, sorry about that, but I needed to have this out before I start on the next thing: Hadria meeting the old crew.
Next up: Aboard the Hogwarts Express. Progress on profile.
And a reiteration of what I wrote before the chapter, in case some of you missed it or skipped it: If anyone wants to see a New Year fic, leave a prompt in the reviews or pm me by 31st Dec. If you send me a prompt in time, I might be able to write a short side-fic (maybe AU) and post it up by the first week of January.
That's all for now. Thank you for reading~! If you have any questions, comments or criticisms, please feel free to review or send me a PM.
Addressing guest reviews - To the nice Guest who reviewed every chapter of Danse Macabre (and Psithurism, and Crossing Over) on 8th Nov: Thanks once again for taking the time and effort to show your support! In reply to your reviews, whether Hadria becomes MoD in this reality is still debatable. But it is quite likely to happen. I'm glad to know you love Hadria, and yes, she's certainly going to liven Hogwarts up XD Now imagine if she sent Norbert home to Gellert. Fortunately or unfortunately (depending on how you look at it), that's not happening, since I think she has enough pets already. Maybe I'll write about it in an AU side-fic. Maybe. As for your last question, yes, you guessed it~! The prophesy mentioned in the previous chapter is going to be the 'official' one I'm following for this story.
To all guest reviewers out there, please let me know what's the best/most convenient way of replying your reviews (especially mass reviews) since I can't PM you guys. (Leaving a random name I can use to address you guys would help too. Otherwise I'll have to identify you by the date you reviewed on.) Thanks~