Time passed quickly for Harry, Luna had moved back into her own dormitory but she had started visiting him regularly. Sometimes she wanted help with classwork which Harry would gladly explain to her, other times she just wanted company, something Harry could easily understand.
At Dumbledore's repeated urgings Harry had finally agreed to talk to Lockhart about his teaching methods after several lessons of listening to the man just read aloud from his own books, Harry had chosen to strike right after lesson when he knew the professor wouldn't have any excuses to not talk to him.
"Professor Lockhart… I wanted to talk to you about your lessons"
"Ask away Harry! I will gladly answer any questions you have!" Lockhart said brightly, grinning widely
"Well you see… I have grave doubts you have ever actually done any of the deeds you claim to have done."
Lockhart's smile dropped instantly and he started fiddling with his wand anxiously, Harry eyed the wand suspiciously and surreptitiously increased his magical protection.
"Ahh, well what gives you that impression?" Lockhart asked slowly
"Apart from the fact you can't cast any of the spells you said you have done in your books?"
"Of course I can do the spells" Lockhart said defensively
"Prove it, in Year with a Yeti you said you can cast a perfect shielding charm, cast it now."
"I hardly think it would be appropriate to cast it now Harry…"
Rather than reply Harry swiftly drew his wand and started shooting jinxes at his professor, he deliberately slowed down the jinxes to make them move slower than normal. For a reason Harry hadn't yet figured out most wizards seemed to think that spells only went one speed and that only powerful spells went slowly, this was of course completely wrong and a spell can move as fast as the caster willed.
The only reason most people that did know, such as Dumbledore or Nicolas, didn't make all of their spells ridiculously fast was because the faster you made a spell move the more magic was used relative to the power needed for the spell. So a basic tripping jinx was easy to speed up or slow down while a more powerful spell like Reducto took much more magic to see any change in speed.
As Harry expected, rather than shield or move an object into the path of the jinxes, Lockhart instead tumbled awkwardly to the side and cowered in fear behind his desk.
"I must say, it's a good thing I'm not a werewolf" Harry said dryly
"Detention Harry! I will be speaking to Dumbledore about this!" Lockhart said shakily
"No, you won't. You will teach me all you know about defense, including every defensive spell you have heard of. In return I will teach you how to actually cast the spells you claim to know and won't reveal that you are in fact a fraud. How does that sound?" Harry asked cockily
"Harry, Harry… that sounds like a brilliant - Obliviate!" Lockhart quickly jabbed his wand at Harry and a dark blue spell shot across the room at him, it would have caught Harry by surprise if he wasn't expecting the man to try something.
When the spell got in range of his magical defense he began stripping the spell to shreds, he quickly identified the intent to erase his memory and began shoring up his own intent to remember. He hadn't quite regained his full power or speed back so he wasn't able to fully break the spell.
When what was left of the spell splashed against him and started trying to make him forget that the meeting had ever taken place he was able to use his occlumency to keep the hostile magic away from his mind and was able to destroy what was left before any damage was done.
Once done with the magic Harry turned to Lockhart and said "Do you want to try that again or have you given up?"
Looking up he was pleased to see Lockhart's face had lost all of it's colour and his hand was shaking at his side "How? Nobody has ever stopped it before… That shouldn't be possible!"
"Yeah well it seems there's a lot you apparently don't know, so do we have a deal?" To emphasize his stance Harry raised his wand threateningly
"Yes fine, we have a deal!"
"Excellent, I will be back tomorrow after the lesson, I would suggest you make a list of spells you need to teach and hand them to me before then."
That evening Lockhart passed Harry a list of spells on his way to the staff table, Luna looked at him curiously so he shrugged and shoved the note into his pocket "Extra work for defense against the dark arts"
After dinner Harry went to the library, he needed to look up the spells on the list and he could act suspiciously and hide what he was looking for, it would be the Gryffindor thing to do and would no doubt take forever. Fortunately for all involved Harry was a Ravenclaw so he just walked up to Madam Pince and handed her the list of spells.
"Professor Lockhart asked me to look into these spells, do you know of any books that might help me?"
Pince looked over the list carefully and nodded slowly "Most of these can be found in 'A defensive theorem' by John R Moon, if I recall correctly it was the set text for the fourth years, about three or so years ago I would say. The last few spells are covered in more detail in 'defending the dark arts' by Abraxas Malfoy, which is generally recommended for students in OWL year."
After thanking her Harry went to his normal study spot and summoned the books to him, he quickly skimmed through both and wrote down everything he could find about the spells on his list, he also recorded a few spells that he thought could be useful.
Now armed with the spells Harry returned the books and left for his workshop, once inside he checked the intent and incantation of each spell and kept trying until he could successfully cast each and every curse somewhat reliantly. For the stronger spells Harry often had to wait several moments between tries to recover some of his magic.
He didn't have anyone to test them on so he wasn't sure he was giving them enough power to be effective but as Lockhart wouldn't be using the curses on his students, the power of his spells didn't matter either. If any of the older students called Lockhart out on this he could easily claim there was no point wasting power on just showing the spells.
Most of the curses were just variations of the basic prank jinxes that the older years always taught to the first years, although some were the equivalent of weaponized charms, such as Petrificus Totalus which was the freezing charm but specialised to only work on a living being.
Harry awoke slowly the next day, he had no intention of going to defense that day so he allowed himself to sleep in. Once he had gotten up properly he ran through the list of spells one more time and went to the defense classroom under a notice-not, he waited until all of his classmates left the room before sneaking in.
"Good morning professor" Harry said, dropping the notice-not as he didn't think Lockhart would be strong enough to see through it. True to form Lockhart jumped about a foot into the air at Harry's 'sudden' appearance.
"Ah, Harry! I… I didn't expect to see you today."
"I said I would help you, but this also helps me since I can practice the spells. The first question I had for you is how exactly you get the idea to write your books, considering your reaction to me pointing out you are a fraud and the spell you tried to use against me was a memory charm... I imagine you steal other people's work by making them forget about it?"
"Err, well in a way I suppose you could see it that way… but really I see myself as just -" Harry cut Lockhart off before he could go into an excuse, Harry didn't care enough to be polite and pretend to listen.
"So you wipe their memories and take the credit for yourself, before you memory charm them do you just learn about their deeds or do you take their knowledge of magic too?"
"Well what sort of Ravenclaw would I be if I didn't learn all I could?! Never been able to cast the blasted spells but I wasn't going to let that knowledge just waste away in some wizard's head." Lockhart said indignantly, with just a hint of pride in his voice.
Harry found himself slightly appalled by the man's unremorseful admittance of stealing people's entire life's work but at the same time relieved at hearing that he now had access to possibly forgotten magic.
"Whatever, so first off I assume you remember the difference between a curse, jinx and hex?" Harry said absently
"I… think so. They're basically just different severities of spell right?"
"You are hopeless" Harry moaned "Okay, so a jinx affects the target instantly and leaves no lasting magical effect, such as a tripping or flipping jinx. A hex can take some time to have an effect and can be dispelled by a single charm, often a finishing spell like Finite, if it can't be dispelled then it's always either a curse or jinx. Take for example Stupify, it's a hex since it can take a while to make the target fall unconscious and can be dispelled instantly with enervate."
"So it doesn't have anything to do with deadliness?" Lockhart asked slowly
"Nope, almost every jinx and hex could be used lethally in the right circumstance, like hitting someone next to a cliff with a tripping jinx or someone allergic to milk with the butter mouth hex. A curse is simply a spell that leads the victim with an undesirable affliction that cannot be easily dispelled, so anything from the tongue tying curse to the torture curse."
"Does that mean the killing curse isn't actually a curse?"
"Do you see being dead as a desirable affliction?" Harry asked as if trying to get a small child to realise something simple.
"Oh, I didn't think of that… so I just tell the students the difference? That sounds easy enough"
Harry rolled his eyes "Yes, you should also ensure you are teaching the actual theory that is needed for the exams, I wouldn't mind you including any facts you have found out while making your books but don't just read them aloud. They have nothing to do with the subject and just make people resent you, I hope for your sake you at least know the theory needed for defense even if you can't do the practical."
"Oh yes, I'm quite brilliant with the theory, got an E on my NEWT defense paper!" Lockhart said happily
"Well at least I don't need to teach you that since I don't know most of the theory myself. Why did you take defense as a NEWT if you couldn't do the spells?"
"Well my father wanted me to follow in his footsteps of becoming an auror and with you-know-who around defense practically became a compulsory subject, I always thought charms was my strong point though… and potions." Lockhart looked away distantly as if remembering his own time as a student and Harry had to snap him out of it before he continued.
"Where was I? Yes I'm fairly sure I can teach you lot the theory, I just need a bit of help with the spells"
"Right, well the first spell on the list was the sunlight jinx, the incantation is 'Solis' and you draw a circle before jabbing your wand through the center of the circle. You want your arm to be in a straight line as you jab, if done successfully a straight beam of light will leave your wand, the width of the beam seems to always be half the size of the circle drawn in the incantation. Any ideas about what it could be used for?"
"Well I think it was Hector Strix who I heard it from, he used it against the Vorsma Vampire. He said it didn't quite kill the vampire as the spell only mimics sunlight but it did was severely weaken the beast, he then used a strong compulsion on it so that the vampire would only be unable to eat meat without thinking of sunlight."
"Very good, can you think of any other instances where the jinx would be useful? Without relying on what someone else has said"
"I suppose blinding an opponent… I guess it can't easily be blocked"
"Good, it is also fatal against devil's snare among most other cave dwelling plants. It has been theorised that it would also weaken werewolves as the sunlight would lesson the power of the full moon, but as nobody has been stupid enough to try it against a transformed werewolf we may never know."
"I can use that, link it into the wagga wagga werewolf…"
"Whatever, so what other spells did you learn from this Hector Strix?" Harry said impatiently, frustrated with Lockhart's limited attention span
Lockhart told Harry all of the many interesting spells and theory Hector had gathered before his unfortunate meeting with Lockhart. Most were defensive or offensive spells but there were still a few spells for transfiguration or charms and even a shortcut in a fairly complex potion.
So it went on, Harry would teach Lockhart a spell and make sure the man could at the very least demonstrate it without dropping his wand and then Lockhart would teach him mildly advanced magical knowledge.
Eventually Harry called a rest after teaching Lockhart the final fourth year spell, the basic shield spell Armum. It made a small disk of magic expand out from the wand tip, like a miniature umbrella and should be able to stop most basic spells and projectiles.
Some duelists had been able to overpower the shield which either made it expand much larger or reflect most spells back towards their caster, the difference depended on whether the duelist ended the spell with a flick or a jab, although Harry didn't understand why that would make any difference.
His only shield flickered feebly and the galleon Lockhart threw passed through the shield easily, Harry decided he had reached his limit magically and told Lockhart he would be back after dinner before heading off for a large lunch and then charms.
The afternoon passed much like the morning, Harry teaching and Lockhart learning. Having had time for his magical reserves to almost fully replenish he was able to cast most of the fifth and sixth year spells, he doubted they would stand up to any assault and his sword maker hex came out as a misshapen dagger, but they were good enough for Lockhart to successfully copy them.
Harry had noticed that Lockhart was learning the spells much quicker, it took the man the same amount of time to cast the sunlight jinx as the sword maker hex. This meant Lockhart had managed to go from the knowledge of a first year to that of a late sixth year in just one afternoon.
Just as Harry was about to move onto the next spell he heard a voice, it was the same bone chilling voice that he had heard before, the voice that had attacked Mrs Norris and Justin.
Without a second thought Harry dashed out of the classroom and set off after the voice, distantly he heard Lockhart call after him but he ignored the man.
The voice was getting louder and more distinct "Blood… want blood… need blood… must eat…"
Harry instinctively activated his mage sight to full power, stumbling slightly at the overload of information he was now receiving. He looked around frantically but couldn't see anything, it sounded like the voice was coming from right beside him, but he was at the edge of the castle so he knew there wasn't another corridor on the other side of the wall, which meant unless the person was somehow inside the wall he must be in the corridor.
Suddenly the voice veered upwards, causing Harry to sprint down the next corridor towards the nearest staircase. Luck seemed to be on his side as the stairs led exactly where he wanted, the voice seemed to have disappeared and Harry could only keep running down this new corridor until he reached the crowd.
Dumbledore looked up from the body when Harry skidded to a stop before him, the man shook his head slowly and meaningfully at Harry before flicking his wand and levitating the body away.
"Caught in the act!" Harry turned to see Ernie pointing at him fiercely, it seemed the boy had just arrived
"Idiot, Harry's only just turned up!" Ron said defensively
"He's the heir of Slytherin! The house known for cunning, he could have attacked Jackson and hid somewhere before running up. How else would he know where to go?" That voice came from an older Ravenclaw boy, who was glaring daggers at Harry
"Do you really think he is cunning enough to be the heir of Slytherin? He's not even of pure blood" Malfoy said coolly
"Really Draco? You're supporting this half breed?" Another boy said fiercely, this one dressed in the green of Slytherin.
"I'm not supporting anyone, I'm defending the honour of this house. If it was someone from the great house of Slytherin they would be far more ambitious than Potter could even hope to be. Why, if I was the heir I wouldn't just limit myself to mudbloods, I'd go for the half bloods and blood traitors too"
Harry quickly applied a notice-not to make sure no one noticed him before leaving the students to continue arguing and hurried after the headmaster, once
"Who is it this time?" Harry asked quietly once he had caught up
Dumbledore sighed sadly and said "Jackson Lake, fourth year Hufflepuff… Muggleborn"
News of yet another attack spread quickly, fear became evident in most of the students, with only the Slytherin's seemed unaffected. The next morning Dumbledore had suggested to the students that they should avoid traveling alone and to not wander the halls aimlessly.
Due to the state of fear, Lockhart's overnight progress in becoming a better teacher seemed to go mostly unnoticed, Harry overheard some of the older years complain about how simple the classes still were but they had admitted he was teaching the theory well.
Eventually Dumbledore gave Harry permission to start using his mithril again and he quickly began work on remaking his backup mithril bands, rather than make an entire band in one sitting over the weekend, Harry instead pushed any spare magic he had at night into all six of his bands.
It was a far slower system but it meant Harry was able to charge them more regularly, he also gave them the ideologies of weightlessness and compact density, Harry hoped that by making the bands dense they would be able to store more magic while taking up the same amount of space.
He wished he could make them into generators but the trouble was that the magic generated by them to go somewhere when it wasn't being used, by default this went into the mithrils size which wasn't an option. Other consistent ways to burn off the magic was light and heat, both of which would be obvious and potentially dangerous.
Which was why he was currently working on a way to transmit magic without a physical connection, scattered around him and Bathsheda were various mithril objects, all different shapes and sizes.
They had been coming up with theories over how to achieve this effect since his ban and now that he had been given permission to go back to work they had tried out each of the theories, the first had been a simple 'transmit magic' ideology which admittedly did transmit magic but only to anything touching it.
The trouble was that magic didn't like being exposed to the open air, one of the reasons wards needed almost constant power was because the magic was constantly being drained. Even spells suffered although the intent and will behind a spell helped decrease how much magic was lost during transition.
But casting the magic with the intent to move into another mithril object didn't work either, once it arrived at the receiving mithril it was for some unknown reason unusable. For the moment Harry had given up on the idea of transmitting magic over the air and had settled for what he called incorporeal wires.
Some of the ideologies on the wires were 'incorporeal, magical transmission, unnoticeable'. This allowed the wires would pass through anything, including himself, and transmit the magic over the wires. He then used the wires to connect all of his bands together so that they were one unbroken circuit.
Now he just needed a way to power them, he didn't want to use the gauntlet as the magic made from the Stone was addictive and he didn't want to become dependent on the power made from the Stone.
Instead he was making something he called the 'core', it comprised of three layers, first he started with a marble sized mithril sphere which he grew to the size of a beach ball, Bathsheda then drew the runes needed to turn it into a generator and quickly sent a freezing charm at the runes.
The freezing charm paused the runes which meant the sphere wouldn't grow until they were ready, now that the runes were on it Harry shrunk it back down to its original size and started the second layer, this wrapped around the sphere and forced it to shrink. Just before he let the layer begin its work Bathsheda would cancel the freezing charm, due to the nature of the mithril they would now forever fight each other and spend all their spare energy shrinking and expanding.
Once those two layers were finished the sphere noticeably shifted and kept expanding and retracting. Which was why Harry quickly formed the third and final layer, this one 'collected' the magic given out by the two layers beneath it. It also left a small gap between itself and the second layer which meant the slight changes that affected it before vanished.
The core was now about the size of a golf ball and gave off half as much magic as a normal mithril generator, but the core was much smaller and easier to move without putting Harry at risk. He then shrunk the entire core down to the size of a marble and stuck it onto the band around one of his ankles, he felt the bands grow slightly as they absorbed the new influx of magic but they soon settled.
This was the key benefit of the core, it could control how much magic was given off by changing how violently the two bottom layers fought. Both layers could be stopped by the third layer applying a freezing charm to the second layer which in turn froze the first.
The core would only activate when the band it was attached to began to shrink, as all of the bands were linked in series if one shrank then it meant they all were shrinking, so the core would activate and try to get the bands back up to their normal size.
All Harry had to watch out for was if any magic built up inside the core, Harry didn't want to know what would happen with a large build up of magic in a small enclosed space, especially when that build up was stuck to his leg.
I wasn't convinced this chapter was long enough but somehow it's around 4000 words long.
The next chapter will be Harry trying to figure out who the heir is, now that he has access to his mithril there's nothing holding him back.
Despite being on my computer much more I have somehow felt like I've had less time to write, since I normally write between my lessons but now I've got access to games... But everyone loves a good murder mystery!