"Setting my sister on me was low, Potter," Ron said, his wide grin telling a different story. They were walking back to the Gryffindor common room, their spirits high. They had slaughtered Slytherin something fierce. Harry's first game as Captain couldn't have gone better. Sure, this was partly due to the fact that Malfoy had indeed not played, and the fact that Slytherin starting chaser Vaisey had been injured and also couldn't play. The new Seeker hadn't been a match for Harry and whatever Ginny had done, or had threatened to do, to Ron and Dean, it had certainly helped. Ginny had outscored the Slytherin team by herself, resulting in an easy 250 to 40 win. But Ron played a great game and Dean looked like he had been playing for years.
With the entire team in tow, Harry led the way to the party. Ginny was limping slightly because she had purposefully crashed into the commentator stand, where Zacharias Smith had been an annoying twat for the entire length of the game. While Harry commended her for shutting up Smith, he wished she hadn't done it in a way that messed up her ankle again.
Nevertheless grinning widely, he led the team through the portrait of the Fat Lady into a raucous pre-party. The room exploded with cheers when the team came in and Harry received enough shoulder pats and stomps to last him a lifetime but he found he didn't mind at all.
An hour or so into the party Harry sat on a couch with a butterbeer in his hand, feeling like he was in the eye of a storm. All around him people were mingling and laughing but he had been left alone for a minute or so and took the time to just observe the moment. To his right, in a corner, some second-years were laughing with each other. Mia, his reserve seeker was there with Beatrice Spinnet, Alicia Spinnet's younger sister, in an energetic conversation with two boys whose names Harry thought were Leif and Mijan. A couple of steps removed was his reserve keeper Blake, shyly talking with a third-year girl whose name Harry didn't know.
He looked to his left side and was surprised to see Luna talking with Lily and Sophie. Mostly Lily though, as Sophie seemed to not contribute to the conversation. She seemed to just be happy observing the two girls. Harry had no idea how Luna had gotten into the Gryffindor common room but he suspected either Ginny or Lily, or possibly both, had let her in. Hidden away in an alcove Dean and Ginny were snogging, quite furiously if you asked Harry. He frowned, surely this was a bit much?
He shrugged internally and looked away and spotted Ron, Lavender and Parvati. Ron was red-faced and Lavender looked close to tears, Parvati giving her a one-armed hug while looking sadly at Ron. As he watched, Ron stood up and walked out of the common room.
Harry stood up and made his way over to them, giving a wide berth to where Seamus was acting as self-appointed wingman for Neville. They were currently talking to some of Ginny's dormmates. Neville looked a bit embarrassed but he hadn't walked away yet. The girls just looked amused at Seamus' antics.
Harry made his way out of the common room but couldn't see Ron anywhere, so he made his way back to get the Map, and the Cloak. As he walked toward the staircase, he was accosted by the black-haired girl from the train, Romilda Vane.
"Hello, Harry!" she said with a saucy smile. Harry grumbled a hello back and quickly walked past her, feeling her glare on his neck.
He grabbed his cloak and map. He opened the door to his dorm to walk back out again but stopped for a moment. He decided against going down visible, and instead, put on the invisibility cloak. This turned out to be a great idea, as he saw Romilda Vane standing at the bottom of the staircase, watching it like a hawk looking for a tasty treat. He cast a muffling charm on his feet and stealthily descended the staircase and sneaked past Romilda.
Of course, being invisible in a party atmosphere proved to be very difficult. Multiple times people looked at where he was, to then just shrug off whatever they had seen, heard or sensed.
He safely made his way out of the common room walked around a corner and removed the cloak. He opened the map and started looking for Ron. The last time he had to find his friend, he'd been in the Room of Requirement. The room didn't show up on the map but he looked anyway. His eye narrowed at the name he saw hanging around in the corridor. It was Goyle.
Harry stared at the little figurine representing Goyle and thought hard. Why was Goyle alone? And why was he in the corridor that held the Room of Requirement? Harry and Ron had made the conscious decision to not give away too much information about how the Room worked. Therefore, he wasn't sure that Goyle and Crabbe, and by extension Malfoy, knew about the room. Either way, it was suspicious.
Considering that the last time Ron had isolated himself he had eaten himself almost sick on snacks, Harry figured he might be in the kitchens. The map confirmed that idea and so he made his way there.
He entered the kitchens, seeing the five tables laid out in the same way they were in the Great Hall. Ron was sitting halfway on the nearest side of what would be the Gryffindor table, right where he, Harry and Hermione most often sat.
Harry sighed, gathering this wasn't a good sign.
He made his way over, shaking his head at an elf asking if they could help. He sat down on what would've been his seat, making sure he didn't sit where Hermione would have sat.
"You okay, mate?" he asked softly, "What happened?"
Ron didn't look at him but kept staring at the table.
"She tried to kiss me. Lavender tried to kiss me," Ron said. He spoke softly, completely devoid of his usual tone of voice.
"You didn't kiss her back, then?" Harry asked carefully.
Ron just gave him a fleeting glare that clearly said of course not, you idiot.
They sat in silence for a minute or two, until two mugs of hot chocolate floated their way. They looked up and saw Dobby, who waved. Harry waved back with a thankful smile and gave one of the mugs to Ron.
Ron stared at his mug. "Hermione didn't like hot chocolate," he muttered morosely. He turned his mug this way and that but didn't drink. "She didn't like stuff with too much sugar."
Harry knew this of course but thought it better not to mention that. Ron probably just wanted to talk about Hermione for a bit.
"That's what you get when your parents are dentists, I guess," Harry said.
Ron grunted, it could've been affirmative, it could've been hiding a sob.
Harry thought this might situation warranted for something stronger to drink than just hot chocolate. He waved at Dobby and asked him for something alcoholic that would be great to drink with hot chocolate. Dobby popped away and a bottle of Baileys appeared. Harry grabbed it and poured some into the hot chocolate.
Harry slowly drank, as did Ron eventually. Harry didn't quite know what to say or do. Maybe he didn't need to. Then Ron groaned loudly and pulled at his hair.
"This is all so fucked up," he said through gritted teeth.
Harry couldn't agree more, but he was at this point quite used to things being fucked up.
"There is only one thing we can do," he said gravely, putting on a very serious tone of voice.
Ron looked up in surprise, "What?" he whispered.
"We are going to un-fuck things," Harry deadpanned.
Ron snorted loudly. "Bloody hell, that's bad," he said, a fleeting smile making its way unto his face.
Harry just shrugged with a smirk, then continued. "No, but seriously. This is why we're training and studying. To make sure that this shit will never happen to anyone else."
Ron sighed. "Yeah, I know, but sometimes I just wish that we didn't need to, you know," he pouted, clearly understanding that was a moot point to complain about.
"You don't have to tell me, mate," Harry responded. "Now, what are you going to do with Lavender?"
Ron scowled. "Nothing."
"Did you say anything to her?" Harry questioned.
Ron shook his head. "No, I just walked away, I kind of panicked to be honest."
Harry nodded. "I can understand that. I had to use the cloak to escape Romilda Vane,"
Ron smiled half-heartedly. "Don't let Ginny hear that," he warned, "Otherwise Vane will suffer some bat-bogeys."
Harry shrugged. He wondered what Ginny would say to Ron at this moment. Would she say something about Hermione wanting Ron to be happy? Harry tried to picture himself in Ron's position. Would he want to get with another girl, if the girl he had loved had passed away? Both of them hadn't known about the other's feelings, so it wasn't like he would betray her trust or something like that. On the other hand, that would probably be exactly what it would feel like. At least, Harry would feel like it would have besmirched the memory of her, whoever she would've been. At the same time, he wouldn't be angry with Ron had he decided to get with Lavender.
"Just know that I'll support you, whatever you choose to do," Harry said seriously, wanting Ron to understand that.
Ron just nodded, not saying anything.
They were then interrupted by a pop and a distraught-looking Kreacher.
"Burglars in the Noble House of Black, oh how mistress will weep! String them up by their ankles, we should! This is what happens when Masters invites lowlifes and Mudbloods and blood-traitors into the Noble House of Black…"
Before he could ramble anymore, Harry interrupted. "Kreacher, is somebody stealing from Grimmauld Place?" he asked hurriedly.
Kreacher pulled his ear and croaked, "Master told Kreacher to stay at Hogwarts, Kreacher wants to protect the Noble House of Black but can't."
"Is somebody in the house right now?" Harry asked, hurriedly. Kreacher shook his head. "How do you know?" Harry continued.
"Kreacher always knows, oh yes," Kreacher muttered.
Harry scratched the back of his head and look over at Ron. "What do you think I should do?"
"You want to keep Kreacher at Hogwarts?" Ron asked, thinking hard. Harry nodded.
"Just tell him to go back to Grimmauld Place if he senses an intruder," Ron shrugged.
"Right," Harry nodded, "Kreacher, I want you to inform me and go to Grimmauld Place to protect it if you sense an intruder. Then come back and tell me who it was or what was stolen, all right? Then you can go back to working with the Hogwarts elves. Is that clear?"
"Yes, master. Can Kreacher attack the vermin?" the Elf said, a bit too eagerly in Harry's opinion.
"Can you capture them and bring them to Aurors?" Harry suggested instead.
Kreacher scowled. "Yes, Master," he said petulantly, and he popped away again.
"Are you okay, mate?" Ron asked quietly.
Harry raised an eyebrow, "Why wouldn't I be?"
Ron raised one back, "Because someone's stealing your stuff?"
Oh, right, Harry thought. It was his stuff now. He sighed, "I'll ask Dumbledore what to do, I guess."
"Right, always a good idea," Ron nodded.
Sometime later, they walked out of the kitchens together and in silence. The discussion with Kreacher had reminded Harry that it was Sirius's birthday tomorrow, November third. His godfather would've turned 37 if he'd still been alive. In combination with just having had Halloween, this left him in a sombre mood.
The joyful feeling of winning his first Quidditch game as Captain now completely gone, Harry pulled the cloak over him and Ron, they both had to duck to prevent their feet from showing, and silently they made their way through the afterparty, up to their dormitory.
- In her memory –
The next evening, after dinner, Harry took advantage of his first free Sunday evening of that school year. With that day being Sirius' first birthday since the Department of Mysteries, he had fallen into melancholy. He was grieving, he knew that, but was also scolding himself. The last eight weeks he had mainly grieved Hermione, at least that was what it felt like, and he blamed himself for not thinking about his godfather as much. He did realize he had known Hermione much better, so maybe it made sense, but still.
Not really wanting to speak to anybody, he told Ron that he was going to take a walk. It took some time to convince Ron that he'd be fine alone, at the same time making sure that Ron would be as well. He wandered around the castle, looking at the different portraits, and always keeping an eye on the map. He didn't fancy running into Malfoy again.
An hour or so later, seeing that the corridor in front of the Room of Requirement was empty, he decided to take a leave out of Ron's book and withdraw himself in the Room.
He summoned the Room without much thought and was therefore surprised at the scenery he found within.
It resembled the kitchen at Grimmauld Place, only lighter. The walls were cleaner and less dark, doubly so because there seemed to be more natural light. Well, not actual natural light, of course. Harry didn't even know whether the sky he could see through the window was real.
With a sigh, he sat down heavily in one of the kitchen chairs and called Dobby, who gladly gave him a warm butterbeer.
And so Harry sat, staring into his butterbeer, thinking about death and life, the future and the past, what could've been and what might happen still. So deep in his thoughts he was, he didn't hear the door to the Room open.
"Hello Harry Potter," said a vague voice. "Why are you sitting here alone?"
Harry looked up and turned around, and saw Luna looking at him, as always with her head cocked to the side when she didn't understand something.
"Oh, hey, Luna, I was just thinking about stuff. What are you doing here?"
"I saw a door and thought I'd peek in. There aren't that many of us that know how the Room works, so I assumed it'd be either you, Ron, or Ginny and Dean," she said.
"Wait," Harry said sitting up, "do Ginny and Dean come here?"
"Sure. Ginny never lets me come along, so I'm not quite sure what they do," Luna said, looking thoughtful.
Harry could imagine what they did and then shuddered when he did imagine it. He had seen enough of Dean as it was, he did not need to imagine the rest. Also, it was clearly a piece of news that Ron would be grateful not to know.
"What were you thinking about, Harry?" Luna said, looking at something just above his head. "There are some Furry Nester around here. Are you sad?" she flapped her hand around his head, trying to remove the invisible creatures.
Harry raised his eyebrows. So, a Furry Nester had something to do with being sad? Or did he just look sad?
Luna misread his expression as she was quick to try to set Harry at east.
"Ginny likes to say it's okay to be sad, you know," she said. "I'm glad she thinks that, I don't think she'd want to be friends with me otherwise."
Harry frowned. "Are you sad a lot, Luna?"
Luna shrugged. "I'm sad at least once a year, the day my mum died."
This was the exact kind of statement that made Harry question whether Luna was truly as in the clouds as she seemed to be. Sometimes he suspected that Luna knew better than most what bothered people, even if she herself said that she didn't.
"It's Sirius's birthday today," Harry explained nonetheless and with a sigh, "He would've turned 37 today. And it was Halloween, last week. The fifteenth anniversary of my parent's deaths. It's all just a bit much," he said to the table.
Luna gave him a sorrowful smile and sat down next to him.
"Do you want something to drink?" Harry asked, and calling Dobby when Luna said she would like something.
They drank in silence for a couple of minutes. Then Luna spoke up. "I'm sorry about your godfather, Harry." Luna reached out and grabbed Harry's hand. She had very warm hands and Harry couldn't help but feel comforted.
"You know," Luna said conversationally, "My mum's death was rather horrible as well. I saw everything. I still feel sad about it sometimes, but then I remember what my mother used to say."
She stopped talking there and her protuberant, grey-blue eyes were a bit brighter than normal. Harry didn't know whether she couldn't continue talking about her mother, or whether she had forgotten that Harry didn't know what her mother used to say.
"What did your mother use to say?" he prompted.
"Oh," Luna said, blinking a couple of times before she looked at Harry, now without blinking. "My mum always said that the things we lose have a way of coming back to us in the end, if not always in the way we expect," she explained. "I like to think it was her way of saying that whatever happens, we'll be together in the end."
Harry didn't say anything. He didn't know whether he believed in something like heaven. Luna seemed to read that into his silence, though, as she continued. "You heard them too, right? The voices beyond the veil?"
Harry had heard voices. Was it like the Thestrals? Could only people who had encountered death hear those beyond the Veil? He had also spoken with his parents in the Little Hangleton Graveyard, but he didn't want to get into that with Luna right now. He just nodded.
"That tells me that we'll see them again in the end. My mum, Hermione, Sirius, your parents, Cedric," Luna said with a tone of utmost conviction.
"I hope so, Luna, I really do," Harry said. He noticed that Luna was still holding his hand. He wriggled it free to run his hand through his hair and then smiled at Luna.
"You want to tell me about Lily?" he asked.
Luna blushed at that question, and then, quite excitedly, began telling Harry about Lily, in a way that only Luna could. Meaning, she started by explaining that she had at first thought the girl attracted Nargles and Hornless Snorkacks, because Luna always felt a bit silly but also happy when she was around. It was Ginny who had suggested that Luna might just be attracted to her, which would explain the symptoms.
Harry listened with a smile. It felt nice to see someone be happy in these trying times.
- In her memory -
That next week passed relatively quickly because Harry and Ron were looking forward to Thursday afternoon. The weather had begun getting increasingly worse since his conversation with Luna. Thus far it had snowed, hailed, and rained. The wind had been blowing hard, but not hard enough to disperse the almost constant Scotch mist, which had been painting the grounds in grey colours the entire week. The only thing they hadn't had yet, and the one thing Harry and Ron were looking forward to, was a thunderstorm. But there had been one forecasted for that Thursday afternoon.
That's why they were hanging around their dorm room now, waiting for the thunderstorm to kick into gear. They had discussed this part with McGonagall, who advised they take the potion while lying somewhere comfortably. To keep the process secret from their dormmates, they planned on charming the curtains shut and they debated on using a silencing charm, in the end deciding to go for it.
Now Harry and Ron alternated pacing and sitting down. They were just too excited to do any homework.
A half-hour of increasing nerves later, they heard the unmistakable low grumbles of thunder and they began seeing lightning outside.
They looked up at each other, faces pale in anticipation and hoping they had done everything correctly.
Harry grabbed the potion-storage container from under his bed and placed it on a side table.
"Do you think it's ready?" he whispered. Ron walked over to the table and picked up the container.
"Just to be sure," he said, and walked over to the window, opened it, and held the container out of the window.
Almost immediately lightning struck somewhere on the ground, resulting in a massive boom that shook the castle itself.
"Bloody hell!" Ron exclaimed, hastily pulling his hands back. Harry laughed at him.
"Shut up," Ron said, kicking at Harry's shins, and set the container down again.
"Well, let's see if that's worked," he said, and he opened the container. He reached inside and pulled out the two potion phials. Both included a blood-red liquid that was about a mouthful. It had worked.
Ron gave Harry his potion phial, knowing which was which because of the marking they had made in the container.
Harry accepted it and made his way to his bed. "Good luck," he said to Ron, who responded, "See you on the other side, mate".
Harry closed the curtains of this four-poster, charmed them shut and cast a silencing charm as well.
If everything had gone like it had supposed to do, he would probably be out for a half-hour or so. Harry breathed in deeply and then out again. He placed his wand against his heart, repeated the chant he had been saying every sunrise and sunset, drank his potion and laid back on his bed, waiting for something to occur.
He never knew when he fell into the trance, but suddenly he was.
Harry opened his eyes to a vast blue sky. He was lying on his back with something pricking in his shoulder. He sat up and looked around. He was on a rock plateau on the side of a huge mountain. The mountain wasn't alone, in the distance he could see this one was part of a mountain range, stretching as far as the eye could see.
Harry stood up and walked to the edge of the plateau. There was a sheer drop, and he could see that he was very high up. Over the edge he could see forests, grassland and far in the distance either a lake or a sea, he wasn't sure.
Harry frowned. The view was nice and all, being there on top of the world, but he was supposed to see an animal. He turned around to look around the rocky plateau. It wasn't very large, but there were a couple of nooks and crannies behind the rock formation.
After having looked around for a while, he spotted something of interest. At some places in the rocky wall, he saw something glistening. He walked to take a closer look. It seemed to be an outcrop of some sort, but what was it exactly?
Grabbing a rock, he began excavating some of the outcrops, only to gasp. It was gold! Or at least, it looked very much like gold. But what did that mean?
Harry looked around again. What was happening? Why wasn't he seeing the animal he had bonded with? Had something gone wrong?
He made his way back to where he had woken up and looked around again. He scratched the back of his head in puzzlement, not knowing what to do. That's when he noticed that the outcrops he had seen seemed to lead somewhere. They weren't just randomly placed as he had thought at first.
Following the gold outcrops, he began noticing that in some places the gold had been excavated from the rock. Maybe his Animagus form was a Niffler? He shook his head. He didn't care about gold, right? Maybe it just meant being rich. That made more sense.
The outcrops lead him to a small hidden corner behind a rock, and that's where he encountered another clue.
It was a burrow carved out in the mountain!
In it, he saw something that greatly resembled the Golden Egg from the Triwizard Tournament, only smaller in size. He approached the burrow and picked it up. It was an actual egg! At least, he thought so. He had never heard of a creature that laid eggs of pure gold before.
That's when he heard a loud, high-pitched screech. Hastily, he put the egg back and made his way back to the plateau. He heard the sound again and looked up.
Far above, so high he couldn't determine what it was, something was flying in circles. That was it then. This had to be his Animagus form! Harry smiled. Of course it would be something that could fly. That made total sense.
Anticipating the animal to come closer Harry made space by backing up a bit. But to Harry's surprise, the animal just kept flying in circles. For some reason, Harry had the creeping feeling that he was being judged. And he was found lacking. But why? What was it that he was lacking? Did he have to do something before he was judged worthy?
"But what do I have to do?"
Harry started from the sound of his own voice. He was no longer looking at the small speck in an enormous sea of blue sky, but rather at the scarlet canopy of his four-poster bed. He blinked. What had just happened? Had they done something wrong?
Feeling kind of groggy, he cast two finite's on the silencing and sticking charms and stuck his head out of this bed. Ron was sitting on his bed, grinning widely. No need to ask him whether he'd been successful, Harry thought.
Ron's smile slipped as he took in Harry, who was probably not looking as happy.
"What's wrong?" he asked, worriedly, "did it not work?" Then a smirk appeared on his face. "Or are you a flubberworm?"
Harry responded by banishing a cushion into Ron's face, but Harry laughed nonetheless.
"You go first, what are you?" Harry had thought about what animal Ron would be, just like he had thought about what animal he thought he was. Deryn Pugh's book on Animagi, Becoming the Beast Within, presented a small case study on the contributing authors. A careful study of one's personality, likes, and dislikes could give hints to which animal you might become, but as the book had warned, most people lacked the self-awareness to do so accurately.
"I'm a dog! A German Shepard! But I'm not that black and brown type, you know? It was more of a reddish colour. Makes sense, eh?" Ron said excitedly, messing up his hair like Harry hadn't already understood why that made sense.
"That's great!" Harry grinned at him, genuinely happy that Ron was so happy with the result of his trance. While he wasn't surprised that Ron would be some sort of dog, he still hadn't guessed it right.
"You?" Ron asked enthusiastically.
Harry grimaced. "It was weird, I'm not sure what happened. What did you see exactly?"
Ron looked a bit uncomfortable, "I saw a house, looked a bit like the Burrow but different. It felt familiar, you know? Anyway, I walked up to the house when I heard something barking and this reddish or brown dog came running around the corner," Ron looked away. "I think it was defending the house, and I got this feeling suddenly… it felt like the house would be where I… and my wife would live." Harry could see Ron blush, and he thought of a joke about Lavender but decided this wasn't the time.
"And then, I got this other feeling, it's hard to describe," Ron took a moment to think. "It felt like I was being judged by the dog? And then the dog started whining, wagging his tail and it bounded over to me! I gave it a belly rub. That's when I woke up," he concluded.
Harry made a contemplative noise. "Mine started out similar," he began, "I woke up on this rocky plateau on the side of a mountain range, overlooking huge grasslands. I looked around for a bit until I found this gold vein in the rock that led to some kind of burrow in the mountain. There was a nest there and some golden eggs?" Harry scratched himself behind the head. "Then I heard a high-pitched screech and looked up. I saw something in the sky, flying, which makes sense, but it didn't come closer," He frowned and continued. "Then, as you said, it felt like I was being judged but I got the feeling that I hadn't yet passed its judgement. But I'm not sure what I need to do…" he trailed off, looking confused at Ron.
"That's weird," Ron stated, clearly also not knowing what to do with that. "D'you think McGonagall knows what that's about?"
Harry shrugged, "Wouldn't hurt to ask, I guess, let's go?"
"Now?" Ron said, surprised.
Harry nodded. "I'm sure that McGonagall would want to know."
- In her memory –
McGonagall had indeed wanted to know, but she didn't have an explanation for what had happened with Harry. She said that the process of being judged was always a foregone conclusion, as far as she knew.
The next part of the process was to study your Animagus form. It would take an in-depth knowledge of the ins and out of the animal: behaviour, skeletal structure, muscle structure, nerve systems, vascular system, organ placement, every part of both the psyche and body. Only then could you begin to study the transformation itself.
What made the transformation so incredibly hard, however, was that it almost always had to be done in full. Only in rare circumstances did the human body line up sufficiently with one's Animagus form for the student to use partial transformation. McGonagall was clear about this in her warnings to Ron. Transfiguring your left hand into a paw might result in that paw/hand receiving too little blood and oxygen, or even none at all. As a result, it might die if left in the transfigured state too long.
Needless to say, trying to do that with more important body parts was even more dangerous.
While Ron had taken in these warnings with a sort of grim determination, Harry sulked. McGonagall had told him that the only thing he could do at this point was trying to figure out which animal he had seen, and what it could be that he had to do.
As McGonagall pointed out, Harry had seen multiple clues. So, it wasn't like he didn't have a form, there was just something blocking him from achieving it. Figuring out what the speck in the sky had been would probably help Harry understand what the problem was.
That meant even more time reading books for Ron and Harry. Harry did have two secret weapons, though. Between Luna and Hagrid, he was sure they'd figure out the animal in no time whatsoever.
Which is exactly why he invited Luna to come with him to Hagrid, after dinner on Monday. Ron had decided to stay at the castle, beginning his study of the German Shepard, by trying to figure out which books he would have to order. Even Hogwarts, with its impressive library, probably didn't have a book on the biology of German Shepherds or dogs in general. Immediately after their conversation with McGonagall, Harry had the great idea to ask Kreacher to locate the books that Sirius had used. He hadn't been a Shepard, but he had been a dog, so there would be enough similarities for Ron to make a start.
After Hagrid had let him and Luna in, he began explaining.
"The reason I wanted to talk to the both of you is that I need two experts on creatures, magical or otherwise," he started. Hagrid beamed at him, while Luna just smiled absently at him. Harry had discussed with Ron how he was going to explain his request, as he didn't want to mention their Animagi training to either of them. Harry was very fond of Hagrid but the man couldn't keep a secret. And Luna, well, he might tell her and Neville at some point.
"It's like a riddle. I have certain clues that don't make sense to me, but I'm hoping that you might understand them,"
"All right then, let's hear it. Me and Luna together, I'm sure we can figure it out. She's my best student after all," Hagrid said, with a huge smile toward Luna, who smiled her thanks.
Harry liked seeing them together. They were polar opposites in how they looked but inside beat a heart that loved all animals equally. Aside from looks, the greatest difference between them was that Luna didn't eat meat, while Hagrid did so almost exclusively.
"The clues I have are: it can fly, it lives around mountains, it has a burrow in the rock, and its eggs were golden. Does that ring any bells?" Harry asked hopefully.
"Did you see the animal itself?" Luna asked. Harry shook his head. Hagrid stood up and grabbed a copy of the Monster Book of Monsters, stroked the spine and opened it.
"Were the eggs actual gold or just golden looking?" he asked. Luna opened her bag to grab her version of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.
"I think they were golden? They were near a gold vein, I think, at least there were outcrops in the rock that contained gold," he explained. "I thought at first the answer was a Niffler, because of the gold,"
"Nifflers don't usually live in mountains, not anymore at least," Hagrid said. "They've moved toward cities," Luna explained, "Also, Nifflers can't fly," she added under her breath. She didn't look at Harry but Harry just knew that at least Luna knew he wasn't telling the whole truth.
"Do you know whether the creature still exists?" Hagrid asked.
"Come to think of it, I'm not sure," Harry said. Nothing in the books he and Ron had read had said that the creature couldn't be extinct.
Luna and Hagrid spent ten minutes debating different creatures both extinct and extant. Luna wasn't always helpful, as she mixed creatures that Hagrid knew with creatures that Harry was sure only Luna and her father believed in.
Harry started as he realized that Luna and Hagrid had stopped speaking and that Luna was looking at him with her head cocked to the side.
"Sorry, what?" he said stupidly.
"I said that I think I might have an idea," she said, "Every clue you gave is true for the Gryffin," she looked at him with a meaningful look, one that Hagrid missed.
"A Gryffin?" Harry asked, dumbfounded.
Luna gave him her book and pointed at an entry. Harry grabbed the book and read:
The Gryffin (also Griffin, Gryffon, Gryphon) is a magical beast (Category XXXX). A Lion-Eagle hybrid, it has the back legs, tail and lower body of a lion, and the front legs, head and wings of an eagle. They are fierce creatures and highly protective of their territory and kin. When not threatening their home or kin, powerful witches and wizards have been known to befriend them. Because of their nature, Gryffins are often captured by Goblins to guard their treasures.
The Gryffin finds its origins in the mountains surrounding the Levantine Sea. The first mentions and depictions of the Gryffin were found in scrolls dating back to the Achaemenid Empire. They build burrows in the rock, often close to veins or outcrops of precious gems or minerals. The eggs they lay differ in colour, their colour changing accordingly with the most valuable treasure or mineral surrounding the Gryffin's burrow. It makes its home high in the mountains, but always at the edge of mountain ranges. Magizoologists agree that this is because the Gryffin wishes to oversee its territory, which extends from the mountain range itself to the flatter lands surrounding it.
The current theory is that Hippogriffs came into existence when Gryffin habitat extended far enough to reach wild horse territory.
The Gryffin, being a mix between the eagle, the king of the skies, and the lion, the king of the land, is in folklore often considered the King of All Animals. As such, Gryffin caricatures are used as an ornamental element in heraldry throughout the world, signifying wealth, (divine) power, and wisdom. Godric Gryffindor was said to initially have chosen a Gryffin as the symbol for Gryffindor House, but Slytherin, Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw disagreed. The latter because she had already chosen an Eagle as the symbol for her House, the former because they disagreed with the symbolism.
Harry finished reading the entry and couldn't deny that everything did seem to click: the rocky plateau overlooking a vast grassland, the burrow in the rock close to gold outcrops, it could fly. He swallowed. The symbolism didn't escape him. Harry, a Gryffin Animagus, would fight to the death with Voldemort, the Heir of Slytherin.
"I think you're right, I think the animal I was looking for was a Gryffin," Harry confirmed to Luna and Hagrid. "Thanks," he added to a beaming Hagrid and a smiling Luna.
As Harry sank into his thoughts, Luna and Hagrid began to discuss Aragog, who was not getting better. Apparently, Luna visited Hagrid often, probably with Ginny, to talk about magical creatures.
Harry sighed. He had to prove something. He had to show he was worthy of becoming a Gryffin animagus. But how?
