Houses Competition. Slytherin. Transfiguration. Standard. Prompts: Ancient Runes Professor, Blue. WC: 2981
Muggledom+. In a world where Hogwarts is a normal boarding school, but the world is littered with magic that Hermione has no knowledge of. Until now!
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"When we interpret the runes from the seventeenth century, we must look at the curves. You see how the loop here is very particular – the curvature is so precise that–"
A knock sounds on the classroom door. I turn towards it, my voice frozen on a phrase I have regurgitated a dozen times. As the door opens, the classroom falls silent.
"Professor Babbling," I say, a half-smile forming on my lips. My heart thumps, shocked to find my old ancient runes teacher standing in the doorway. It has been years since I saw her last; it would have been at my leaving ceremony from Hogwarts, nearly ten years ago. "I'm in the middle of a class. What - if I may ask - are you doing here?"
"Professor Granger," the other woman greets me, disregarding my agape students. Her voice is grating as any elderly teacher's voice is– years of lecturing and muttering away at runes and rhymes will shred one's vocal cords.
I touch my throat instinctively.
"I must speak with you urgently," she says.
I've lost the thread of my lecture. I feel the eyes of my students burning into my skin, and I look again to my old teacher.
"The curvature of the loop," Professor Babbling says, finishing my lost phrase, "is so precise that you would need a magnifying glass to truly tell the difference between e and o, or betrayed and betrayer. The simplest of phrases become complex."
My chest squeezes tight and I smile weakly.
"Class, I am going to call it five minutes early today. Please submit your papers to me by Wednesday. That will be five hundred words on line curvature, and five hundred words on the birth of the umlaut. Next week, we can cover the use of the umlaut in modern foreign languages compared to ancient runes. Go and enjoy the sunshine."
The classroom shifts on its head and the students scramble for their belongings. Soon enough, I am alone with Professor Babbling. Her hair is a sheet of gossamer white, and her eyes are creamy, marred by degenerative disease or some other visual impairment. The keen blue of them is now hazy and her features are softened.
"How are you, Professor?" I ask tentatively, searching for an explanation.
"No time to chat. Here, take a look at this letter."
She splays out a scrap of fold-worn, yellowing paper over my desk.
Dear Bathsheda,
I write to request your presence and expertise at the site of the Guatemalan tomb you sought and found in 1956. Some new runes have come to light, and I wish to meet you on the 16th of May. Please bring any materials you had at the time, as well as any items you may have taken from the site.
Yours tenderly,
Gabriela Marquez
"May sixteenth?" I ask. "That's in two days."
Professor Babbling quirks an unusual smile. "Best we get going, then," she says, and turns on her heel, moving with a swiftness that belies her age.
"Where are we going?" I shout across the hallway, following my predecessor's hasty escape from the university. "I'm not sure I am required for this task."
Professor Babbling twists around. "We're going to Guatemala. I'll explain on the plane. First, let's get your things."
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Professor Babbling loops her rucksack onto her back and clambers out of the taxi. We've arrived at the airport - not the larger, commercial one, but the smaller airport, for cargo and planes of up to ten people. I stumble into the wind, adrenaline beginning to make its way through my veins.
Although I flew plenty as a child, there's still something inherently terrifying about a shuddering metal beast soaring through the clouds, seemingly unencumbered by gravity.
I try not to think about it as I clamber up the plane's rickety steps and take my seat. Professor Babbling chuckles at something I can't see before settling in beside me.
"Gabriela Marquez," I mutter, trying to soothe my nerves. "You know her?"
"An old friend," explains Professor Babbling. "We met at university – she was a maths scholar. I was in modern languages at the time. We lived together for a spell and travelled through Europe together, but our style of friendship wasn't exactly permitted at the time. Her family never approved, of course. One summer, I discovered their unfortunate fascination with ancient runes - especially that of the Aztecs. They enjoyed performing rituals -" her tone changed, "to call forth the times of old."
I give a hum of surprise.
"Before I discovered this, I always felt unworthy compared to her. I never understood why she wanted to be my friend. Then, one summer, we visited her family tomb. She asked me to translate the runes on it. I thought it was for fun, but something terrible happened. The walls cracked and gave way to a colossal cavern. She demanded we walk down it, intent on finding an artefact that her family had been pursuing for many years. Something called the Gigante Azul."
Professor Babbling shakes her head and shudders away an old memory.
"What happened?" I ask.
"She begged me to help her get through the tomb and steal the artefact within."
"And you did?"
"I was in love," Babbling explains, hurt. "She trapped me there and I saw something in her that day that I will never forget."
"So why go back?"
Professor Babbling sighs heavily as though this is the question she fears the most. Then I watch in complete surprise as she reaches into her jacket pocket and pulls out a shimmering gem. It's a peculiar shape. Looking closer, it seems to contain both the deep depths of the ocean and the darkness of the night sky.
"I have been followed for the last few weeks. I know it is the Marquez family, as well as some of their nearest and dearest." Professor Babbling shakes her head in frustration. "They want the gem. I do not intend to give it to them. Sixty years ago, I mistranslated something purposefully, and I stole this. Now I need to finish the job I started."
"And what was that job?" I ask.
"We have to destroy the artefact. The Marquez family possesses one half of it, and we have the other. If we unite the pieces, we can stop them from doing unspeakable damage to the rest of the world."
"Scary," I murmur.
"Indeed," Professor Babbling confirms. "Now, get some rest. We have a long trip ahead of us."
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I understand the plight of love; I have known it. Lovesickness courted me through school and followed me through university.
At boarding school, Ron Weasley and I were unlikely friends. He was the safe choice for a boyfriend. He would have been the safe choice for a husband, if I had felt the way he did for me. Unfortunately, I didn't feel the same. This disparity led to a series of awkward dates I felt I had to perform through.
Ron was always sweet to me, but it turned out to be nothing more than that. Plus, there was someone else I ached for.
I close my eyes as I feel the thrum of the plane. Fear threatens to engulf me, but I stave it off for now. The engines turn and suddenly we surge forwards. I stare upwards, almost hoping to see through the layers of plastic and metal to get a view of the sky - I hope to soar.
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I am shaken awake as the plane lands, careening into the static heat of Houston. I blink away the sleep from my eyes and stretch, skin sticking to the plastic seating, pinching at my pores. I turn sideways to look at Professor Babbling. She is sprawled out over the two seats beside me, her gossamer hair now a spider's web of disarray and her eyes searing periwinkle with focus.
She appears not to have been disrupted by the landing. Several notebooks are secured in her clutches, each with more illegible handwriting than the last, written in some code that I cannot decipher.
Momentarily, I am unsettled. This is the woman I have come thousands of miles with? What have I gotten myself into?
Then the cabin door opens, and the sweaty, sticky air fills with dust.
As we exit the plane, I catch Professor Babbling patting her pocket, as though to check that the blue gem has not moved from her hiding place.
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On the smaller plane to Guatemala, I am too hot and too restless to relax. Professor Babbling is unbothered, sleeping soundly beside me, snores wobbling like a death rattle that could only signify our impending doom.
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"This way," Professor Babbling says, pointing in the direction of a dusty bar in the corner of the plaza.
She crosses the road without looking and I follow, glancing in both directions to ensure I don't befall some terrible fate before we reach our final destination. Professor Babbling doesn't wait for me and the door practically slams into my face. I push against it with a heavy sigh and stumble towards the bar, my mouth dry.
Inside, the room is hotter than imaginable. The bar is sticky with drink and slick with melted ice. I push myself onto one of the tottering stools and catch the bartender's attention with a subtle nod. Professor Babbling won't notice, already preoccupied in conversation with a bespectacled man in the corner. I presume he is our point of contact for further instruction.
"Whiskey?" I murmur to the bartender, slightly out of breath.
"Smooth or smoky?"
"Either," I reply with a gentle smile.
He smirks, says, "Okay," and walks away.
I place my elbows on the bar and sink onto my forearms, exhausted. Perhaps we will find Gabriela Marquez in order to obtain the other half of the artefact? But what sort of 'unspeakable' damage could someone do with an old chunk of rock, pretty as it is? Although I may be a little intrigued by the fantasy of it all, magic isn't real.
The stool beside me squeaks and shifts as someone sits down.
"Didn't realise you were a whiskey girl, Granger."
I groan.
Blisteringly gorgeous, with white-blond hair coiffed as though it has never experienced frizz or temperate weather, Draco Malfoy's piercing blue eyes could always split my mind in half just by looking at me. My body flushes with heat, remembering years of my childhood holding onto a bitter-sweet crush on the Slytherin boy. Although my high school years were rife with Ron, I have always found Malfoy unfortunately pretty and exceptionally well-dressed. He was a bully at school; brutish, and rich beyond my comprehension.
Even when he was cruel, I was enraptured.
When I heard that he had joined me at Cambridge University, I wasn't surprised - his intellect is stellar, in spite of his attitude towards those lesser than him. Although we didn't interact much at university, we took many of the same classes, and often shared tables at the library, rarely speaking. When we did talk, it was often as an argument, though in my mind we held a tentative truce for the sake of our peers' sanity.
"What are you doing here?" I ask, my throat dry. My crush hasn't dissipated over the years, but at least he has improved as a human being.
Malfoy smirks at me, one side of his mouth upturned in mischievous delight. He raises his hand to the bartender and gestures to my drink, ordering a second whiskey before laying down a few coins to pay for both.
"My father is friends with the Marquez family, so I've been made aware of your little excursion. I wanted to see what you were up to. Thought you might fancy a drink together, after all this time."
There is something off about his words; he is not telling me everything.
"I'm not staying long," I say, gulping down half my drink, allowing the burn to sear through me.
"Then I'll tell you quick," he replies, his voice hushed. "Babbling isn't what she seems. Don't follow her into that tomb. I don't want to tail you all the way there, but I will. Don't make me try to protect you."
The irony of his warning is that he is trying to protect me simply by saying it.
He finishes his drink as I stare back at him.
"Trust me, okay?"
I nod, and he seems to take that as my word that I will not disobey his instruction.
"See you later, Granger. We'll catch up back in Cambridge, I'm sure."
Then he winks and disappears through the door. Light spills into the dim room, momentarily blinding me. I have half a mind to follow him, intrigued by his presence. Professor Babbling appears by my left shoulder, tugging at my sleeve and telling me that it's time to go.
"Where to?" I ask, finishing my drink and trying not to think about Malfoy's mysterious warning.
"The Marquez family tomb," Professor Babbling declares, already leading the way.
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The tomb is a few miles out of town. Hunger is eating away at me by the time we arrive, and the whiskey hasn't helped my thirst. Professor Babbling offers me a bite of a biscuit that she pulls from her trouser pocket, and I'm tempted to turn it down. My stomach grumbles in protest so I take it anyway. Professor Babbling is no longer looking at me. Instead, she gazes up at the stone structure before us, tracing her hands over the runes that decorate its frontispiece and muttering inaudible thoughts to herself.
"Read these to me," she says finally, turning around. She is clutching hold of the shimmering blue gem, fingertips pressed tight to the sharp edges.
I take a closer look at the runes on the wall and dictate them.
"Ah-yi-um-ao," I say. "Then ch-ai-ain-um-ao. Pull back and push forward to unveil the treasures within. Seems peculiar for a family tomb."
"No matter," Professor Babbling says.
She takes a wobbling step forward and a deep breath. Then Professor Babbling curves her arms inwards, as though pulling something vast from the air. She whips her arms back around her head with a strength I haven't seen from her yet. A gust of wind rushes past me and I stumble backwards. The professor doesn't move, staring at a single crack in the stone, a strange blue hue surrounding her like an aura.
Magic isn't supposed to exist. And yet, my eyes do not betray me - the gem, Malfoy's warning, Professor Babbling… What has the world been hiding from me?
"Come, come," Professor Babbling orders, as though we are still at the dawn of our adventure.
"Professor, what are we…?" I ask, but she ignores me. Her hands run over the runes lining the walls and she stumbles further into the darkness, alone. Am I to suffer the same fate as she, locked in, with only my mind to lead me out?
"Psst, Granger!"
Strong hands grasp my arm.
"Malfoy!" I scowl.
"I told you not to go in here," he hisses.
"Miss Granger?" Professor Babbling's voice calls out from further down in the dank darkness of the Marquez tomb. "Hurry along with a torch."
I tear my arm from Malfoy's grip. "You can either follow me or leave. I have to see this through."
"Granger, come on. You are smarter than this."
"Am I?" I burst out. "You've always called me intolerable and complained that you are far smarter than me. So, tell me, why shouldn't I do this? Why do I not deserve to understand this mystery?"
"Don't say that - you do deserve - you know, this isn't about all that!" Malfoy rakes a hand through his hair with an expression I can only detect as worry. "I can't let you in there. It's a trap."
"Then leave," I snarl in defiance, grabbing a torch from the wall that sets aflame with my touch.
I dive into the dark, leaving Malfoy behind. I swear I still hear footsteps as I advance, padding behind me, out of sight. I follow the huffs and puffs of Professor Babbling, desperately clinging to her for answers, finally finding her staring up at a wall of Aztec glyphs. She purses her lips, thinking, and then reaches out a hand, searching.
"Read to me," she commands. I do.
She pushes her hand against a nook in the wall, and it splits open.
The cavern inside is luminous, filled with intricate runes that cover every surface, telling a tale of disarray. Professor Babbling's hands shake as she pushes further inside, holding up her gem like a saving grace. Blue light sputters out in every direction.
"What does it say?" Professor Babbling asks, staring sightlessly at the walls.
Before I can admit my uncertainty, an unfamiliar voice speaks.
"Bathsheda, it is good to see you," comes a female voice, sharp and discerning.
A woman enters the fractals of light, tall and beautiful. I cannot read the expression on her face, but her hair… It is the same sheer white of Professor Babbling.
"Gabriela," Professor Babbling murmurs as though uttering a prayer.
"Did you bring it?"
"I did," the professor confirms. "We can…"
"We can," Gabriela agrees, smiling.
"Professor," I start, terror welling up inside of me.
Gabriela reaches into her coat pocket and pulls out a slim slip of gold. It bears several archaic dials, and a gap that could only resemble the shape of Professor Babbling's gem.
I know, instantly, that this is the second half of the artefact.
Professor Babbling reaches for Gabriela's hand and the two women hold tight onto one another, smiling, tear-stricken, into the storm they have raised.
In one swift movement, they unite the two pieces, and the world explodes in an ocean of blinding light. I am thrown backwards into the rough ground.
"Granger!"
I hear Malfoy's voice from a thousand miles away.
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Thanks for reading!