Chapter 15 - Lethifold

Hermione was slowly losing her mind. How had things gotten this bad? Once again, she tried to call Harry's name, to no avail. This would never have happened if they had just stayed in their dorms... Or if she had kept her mouth shut...

She hadn't been sure what kind of plan Iris had, but she had let her drag her along anyway. She had been much more distracted by the Cerberus at the time. Said giant dog, which was still scratching at the rift in front of her, seemed like the least of her worries right now.

The moment she had seen the shadows, she had known this was a bad idea. Something had felt horribly wrong about the way they moved, grew and seemed to suck everything in, and then Iris had dragged her right into the eldritch maw of darkness. She supposed Iris had been right, it did seem like she was safe here, at least from the Cerberus, which still tried to get to her, but thankfully couldn't.

Still, this didn't make the place she found herself in any less unsettling. This wasn't supposed to be something that first-years could do, much less be so casual about. It looked like she had been right to be suspicious of her.

Her thoughts went back to Harry, who had worried her more than anything else. Several times now, she had thought that was it, had been too scared to move, but Harry hadn't, and he had managed to save her. Her heart had almost stopped when the Cerberus had gotten him. She had stood frozen, trapped in this hellhole, and wanted nothing more than to get to him. But by the time she had actually gotten herself to move, Iris had done something, created this bright blue light. It seemed to push against her, push her away from the rift, away from her escape. She had been forced to watch as the girl went and cast a spell she didn't recognize from the first-year spell book, nor from any of the others she had read—scratch that, she had heard about this spell, in Defense—which had caused a massive bright blue explosion of light and a resonating bang. She had watched transfixed as the wave of blue had impacted the huge dog, slammed it into the opposite wall and knocked it out, while the backlash had swept up both Iris and Harry, and had tossed them through the gaping shadow in the opposite corner of the room. Hermione had squinted, but she couldn't make out any sign of them. By the time she had thought to try and get to them, the rift in front of her had already closed. So she had sat there, alone in this horrible place, hoping for someone to come for her, for Harry or even Iris to wake up and get her out of here.

The more she was looking around, the more confused she became. She had quickly realized that she couldn't make any sound, which only served to make the entire experience more unsettling, couldn't really touch anything, and seemed to entirely consist of shadows herself. This whole place looked like the mirror image of the real world, except light and shadows were switched around, and the walls seemed less solid in some places.

Had it been a minute? An hour? Hermione had no idea. Still, there was no sign of either Harry or Iris. Were they still unconscious? Or maybe they needed help? She had no idea what to do.

Apprehensively, she tried to move down the corridor towards what had to be the door. She flinched. The giant dog was following her. He was scratching at the wall, at the rifts right where there was a shadow, or rather a light, in the shape of her body. Hermione didn't know if he would find a spot to get through to her, but she didn't want to find out.

She broke into a run. Down the corridor, past more rifts that seemed to grow increasingly sparse the more torches were lit in the corridor. Finally, she reached the double doors—and a lot faster than she had expected—and squeezed herself through. She could see and hear the dog slam against the door, but thankfully, it appeared to only open inwards. Hermione didn't wait to find out if the door would hold, and made her way to the staircase.

She had to do something; she couldn't just keep running. But what should she do in a situation like... like this? The obvious answer came to her like a gunshot. She had to find a teacher! Surely, they would know what to do.

Mind made up, she made her way up the very confusing staircase towards the staff wing. Somehow, it didn't matter if there was less or more light; the place appeared increasingly wrong, the more she explored it. Climbing another set of stairs, she spotted a familiar hallway that led down towards another wing. She stepped up to one of the gaps and peered through—yes! This was the teacher's wing. Someone had to be here.

Hermione broke into a run, desperately looking down corridors and through ajar doors, seeing only more shadow, and sparse images of the outside world, none of them betraying any human presence, least of all any teachers. She turned another corner, and spotted-

Relief flooded her heart. Through the rift in front of her, she could see the silhouette of the matronly figure of their Herbology professor, wearing a long yellow night gown and watering some plants in the corridor. Professor Sprout!

Hermione wanted to call out, let her know she was here, but realized yet again that her current existence was a very silent one. She ran up to the professor, towards the gap closest to her, and waved. Somehow the Cerberus had seen her, or at least was able to detect her, hopefully the professor would be able to as well. She skipped around, trying different angles, hoping to get Professor Sprout's attention. Finally, the teacher looked up, made to put down the watering can, and promptly dropped it.

Her face had become ashen, and she stared, directly at Hermione, her mouth moving but no words coming out. Then a whisper, "L-L.. Lethifold? H-here?!"

Hermione didn't know what that was, but she waved her arms again, hoping for the professor to realize it was her.

The professor had started shaking, she realized, and was now fumbling her hands inside her robes. Hermione paused, as she saw her withdraw a wand, fearfully aimed right at her.

With a shaking grip, the professor took a breath and stammered, "Ex... E-Expecto Patronum!"

In a single moment, everything went horribly wrong. All the rifts slammed shut, utter darkness enveloped her, and she felt a prickling sensation all over her skin, almost painful but not quite. She felt herself tossed off her feet, and tumbling down the corridor weightlessly, bumping against invisible walls, floors, doors, as she went and went, further and further into the darkness.

~V~

Harry groaned. Or... at least he tried to. For all intents and purposes, he felt like he was groaning, but no sound was coming out. That wasn't right. He slowly opened his eyes. Or had he? It was still pitch black. Well, mostly. Harry got to his feet—God that was a strange sensation—and looked around.

He was surrounded by utter darkness, except there were some things he could see. Little gaps in the air, that showed places. Small glimpses of other corridors, classrooms, and the like. He looked from one to the next, then turned. Behind him, there was a massive rift, and inside it—Iris!

He broke into a run, and found himself all too quickly in front of it. The girl perked up.

"Harry! I'm so glad! Uh... So this might be a bit difficult to explain..." she began, and squirmed in place.

Harry wanted to respond, wanted to say something, anything, but no matter what he tried, words didn't come out. Instead, he tried to reach through, to get to her, envelop her in his embrace, but again he was rebuffed. The rift seemed to let light pass, but there was some sort of invisible force pushing him back whenever he attempted to cross. After some fruitless attempts, he settled on awkwardly waving his hand.

She reached out with a hand towards the rift and did... something. Somehow, the rift seemed to grow wider, more vibrant. Through it, he could see colors in her hair and eyes that he hadn't realized had been missing before.

"Okay, you should be able to step through now," she said, and took a step back.

With apprehension, Harry reached out again, and pushed. He felt himself stumble forward, a tingling rushing through his body, as the light suddenly became unbearably bright, and then, as quickly as it had begun, it was over. Iris caught him in her arms as he stumbled out of the... whatever it had been.

"Iris! A-are you okay?"

"Me? I'm not the one who got tackled across the room by a giant freaking Cerberus! What about you?" came the indignant reply.

"I-" he winced, as breathing suddenly hurt a lot more than it had before he had stepped through the rift.

"I'm fine. Where's the Cerberus?"

"I don't know... I tried to get to you after you got knocked out, and cast a spell at it... I might have overdone it a bit, because it knocked me out as well, but we both seem to have made it in one piece, so..." she shrugged.

"What about Hermione?"

"Her? Oh. Uhm... I guess she's still up there..."

"What? We have to go save her!"

"No, I mean... I left her in the shadow realm... The Cerberus shouldn't be able to get to her in there... I hope."

Harry's breath hitched. "You left her... In there? What the hell is that place even? This... shadow realm? That was scary as hell!"

"Uh... Well, I don't actually know what it is or what it's called, Tracey dubbed it the shadow realm, and it seems to fit..." Iris began, squirming in place.

Harry raised an eyebrow, urging her to continue.

"It's like the flipside of this world, from what it looks like... Light where there are shadows, and the other way around. You can't speak in there or anything, I guess because shadows can't make any noise. Oh, yeah, while you are in there, you appear like a shadow on the wall over here... Except, well, a little different."

Harry frowned. That didn't sound like the kind of stuff you wanted to mess around with. Although, if it had saved them from the Cerberus, he supposed he couldn't really complain. What mattered was that she was okay.

"And how exactly do you get into this... shadow realm?"

"Well, I'm not exactly sure how I do it... pretty much just make the shadows grow until you can fit through?"

"...And how would anyone else get in... or out? Say... Hermione?"

Her eyes widened at that. "Err..."

Harry firmed his jaw. "We have to go find her."

Iris nodded.

And with that, they went looking. Asking a portrait for directions, it turned out, they had ended up on the second floor somehow. After a quick jaunt to the grand staircase, they made it back to the third floor, only to discover the dog was still very much occupying the corridor. Thankfully, there was a door in between them that only seemed to open outwards.

"I'll go and find her." Iris said firmly, and before Harry could protest, the shadows in the corner grew. Harry reflexively took a step back, but Iris was already gone, having entered the breach, until nothing remained of her except a fast-moving shadow on the wall. Harry stood around, twiddling his thumbs. He had wanted to follow after her, but his instincts had warned him off entering this... place... again. By the time he had realized that Iris might be in danger in there too, it was already too late, and the shadows had closed again.

He cursed himself for his indecisiveness, his hesitation. At times like these, he sometimes felt like she was so much older than him in a strange way. But then she went and did something harebrained again, and he felt like an older brother once more.

Minutes passed by, Harry growing increasingly weary and anxious. Finally, the moving shadow returned, and after seeming to grow a lot darker, tumbled out of the corner in the form of his sister. One look at her expression told him that something had gone very wrong.

"I-I can't find her... she's gone!"

~V~

The Distinction of Arithmantic Prediction and Divination.

She looked over to the next row and squinted.

Divisions of Significance, or why Seven refuses to be Divided.

What did that mean? Why would a number refuse to be divided? She wanted to reach out, pick up the book and read it. Yet, a second later, she realized again why that wasn't possible. Going to the library had been a bad idea.

All these books, dangling their knowledge in front of her, and here she was, unable to even touch them. Maybe, she could find an open book somewhere? But then again, reading just one measly page was bound to leave her feeling even worse at having to stop.

She wanted to sigh, but couldn't. She had wandered around the castle aimlessly, completely at a loss what to do, and terrified out of her mind. Her first and only idea had massively backfired. Whatever the teacher had done to her, she had no intention of experiencing that again. Somehow, she had found her way to the library, and as she had done every day for the past week, she had stayed, if for no other reason than out of habit. As she had wandered the shelves, the feelings of terror had slowly started to fade. Yet, she couldn't feel much else, either. Her feelings, her thoughts, the world around her, it all slowly seemed to blur into a dark and grey mess. Not that she minded much, it was much better than being half-way past losing her mind. It allowed her thoughts to wander, ponder over what had happened, and everything else.

She had no idea how long she had been wandering the shadows of these bookshelves. As all other feelings receded, she slowly got a niggling feeling that she had lost something along the way, that something was missing. On and on she went, looking at books, and wondering what they contained.

The girl frowned. She was feeling like... what was this sensation? A strange pull, an emptiness inside her. She was hungry. Except... Except not quite. It felt—well... different, she couldn't really describe it. Not that she really remembered what hunger was supposed to feel like. Whatever, books were more interesting. Except, well she couldn't read them. Her mind started wandering again, making up stories, fiction, and wild ideas about what they might contain.

There were sounds. Footsteps. Slowly, she blinked her mind out of her thoughts and looked around. Through some of the rifts, she spotted a figure running down the bookshelves, whispering something.

"-ione! It's me!"

What was he saying?

"Hermione? Are you there?"

Hermione? That... Was that... That was her name. Why?

She saw him pass a corner and turn into the aisle that headed right towards the rift she was standing in front of. His eyes found her and went wide.

"Hermione? Is that you?"

She froze, unsure what to do. She couldn't talk anyway, so what was the point?

"Hermione, it's me, Harry!"

Harry. Her thoughts shifted. As she looked at him, she realized that she felt something. Something other than curiosity, or hunger. Or was it? It was several things, actually.

One thing that stood out above all others was relief. She didn't quite understand it, but she felt like she was very happy to see him.

"Hermione, if it's you... can you... I don't know... wave your arms?"

She supposed she could. She raised one of her hands and awkwardly and jerkily waved it around. The motion felt odd, however it seemed to have worked. The boy practically sagged in relief.

"Okay, that's good. Don't worry, we'll get you out of here. Hold on, okay? Just wait here, I'll be right back."

Out of... here? Out of the library? Or did he mean...

Right. That's what she had wanted to do, wasn't it? Find a way out of this... this place. Somehow, she had forgotten about that. It hadn't seemed as important. But it had been. And also, she supposed she trusted him. He would know what to do.

The boy had run off, leaving her with her books. But he had told her to wait, so she waited. Her thoughts started drifting to the books again, but the boy remained in her mind for the moment. But now that he was gone, she noticed that something else had gone with him. That feeling of warmth, of... energy? Something like sweetness, except not a taste.

Some time later, footsteps returned. This time, there were more of them. Her eyes trailed the figures as they passed though rifts, closer and closer until they entered her aisle.

The boy was back, and a girl was next to him. There was something about this girl. She remembered her, and she remembered not trusting her. But then again, something about her made her feel... she didn't know. Something like kinship? Like she belonged. She couldn't say why, or what that meant.

"Hermione! Oh, great, you're still here!"

She looked back at the boy. Yes, she was still here. And she was curious what he was planning. But she did trust him.

The girl stepped up, and said, "Okay, I'll open the rift, all you have to do is walk through. Give me a second."

The rift? She frowned, and looked at the girl. Said girl was stepping up to the rift next to her, the one she had been looking through, put her hand up to it, and suddenly the rift yawned open, growing wider, vivid, less like a reflection and more like a doorway.

She reached out a hand, and hesitated. She... she didn't quite know what was going on, but she didn't trust this girl. She looked over at the boy, who seemed to glance at the rift nervously, yet nodded at her encouragingly.

"Go ahead, just step through, it's safe. I've done it too. It'll be over in a second."

She did trust him. So the choice was obvious. She stepped forward, and through the rift.

Her whole body dissolved in tingles, and with a bright flash of light, everything came back. Hermione cried out in relief? Joy? She didn't know. All the thoughts, emotions, everything she hadn't realized was missing suddenly came flooding back as that feeling of emptiness inside her dulled, the lingering feelings of despair overshadowed by her sudden onslaught of emotion.

She didn't even manage to fully get to her feet, before Harry approached her, and she instinctually pulled him into a hug. The tears came, and she didn't even want to stop them.

For what felt like minutes, she stood there, crying into Harry's shoulder, as her mind tried to catch up to what had just happened, yet failed.

She finally looked up, past Harry, and Iris, and behind her, down the aisle, spotted a man. She froze. Someone was standing there. Someone she didn't recognize.

"Impossible..." the man whispered.

At that, everyone noticed his presence, jumped and turned to look at him. He was wearing shabby robes, torn in several places, and brown hair was sticking onto his sweaty face. He seemed exhausted, out of breath, and his eyes held a haunted look.

"You... came back! I... I thought that was a myth..."

Three pairs of eyes stared at him, while he seemed to ponder something. Finally, he moved. He stumbled closer to Hermione, with an apprehensive expression, fumbled for a while in his robes, and finally withdrew something golden and held it out to her. Hermione held out a shaking hand and took the object wrapped in golden foil. It was... a bar of chocolate?

"Eat it, it might help."

Hermione held the bar of chocolate unsteadily in her hand. Who was this man? And why was he giving her chocolate?

"You'd all do very well not to mention what happened here to anyone. Very dangerous people are after this kind of knowledge, you understand?"

Hermione swallowed. "N-Not even the teachers?"

"I will inform anyone that needs to know," he said absentmindedly. He seemed to be staring at Harry, as if lost in thought. The moment stretched on and on, and the boy seemed to be shifting under his weary gaze.

"The sun is almost rising. You all had better get back to your dorms, before anyone catches you out of bounds, okay?" Everyone's eyebrows rose at that. He... was he letting them go?

He turned to look at Hermione intently again. "Eat. It'll help," he repeated.

Hermione took a reluctant bite, and a feeling of warmth filled her chest, washing away the lingering feelings of darkness and emptiness like they had never even been there. Slowly, a fleeting sense of normalcy returned, which she hadn't thought possible minutes ago. She couldn't help it, a small smile made its way onto her lips all by itself.

The man turned, and started walking down the aisle, before saying, "I'll see you in history class."

~V~

The next day passed almost in a blur. Iris had slept in, skipped breakfast and went straight to lunch. At the table, she was now getting mixed looks. Apparently, word of her duel with Warrington had spread, and people didn't know what to make of the story, how much to believe. The facts were, that to those in the common room, it had seemed like Warrington had fled their duel, when he had come barging into the common room looking terrified. But Iris hadn't shown up to gloat about it afterwards, so that left Warrington's word in conflict with his actions. Of course, the real story was even more unbelievable, so she wasn't even going to try.

Therefore, most people took a wait and see approach. Some were still hostile to her, others were ignoring her. Draco had shot her some dirty looks as she had shown up for lunch, seemingly disappointed for some reason.

Iris looked up at the teachers table and spotted the shabby man from this morning, sitting next to Professor Sprout and talking in hushed tones. He was looking very tired as well. Was he really their new history professor? He didn't seem very professorly to her.

Iris finished up her meal, while mentally going through her checklists once again. Well, she finally had cast a second proper spell, she thought. And this one could actually be useful. Maybe. She would have to have another chat with Flitwick and Vector, no matter how much she disliked the idea. Maybe they had another idea how she could go about combining colors. Also, she resolved to be much more careful with her... shadows. After what the professor had said, it really seemed like a bad idea for more people to find out what she could do. Also, she would have to make sure Tracey or Draco didn't tell. She glanced over at the girl, who was happily munching on her dessert, and over at Draco who was sitting with Pansy again. She probably didn't have to worry about Tracey, if she just asked her to. But Draco...

Frowning, she added a few research topics to her mental list. It was time to get to work. She had barely made it through her first week at a magic school, and had already had enough adventures for a lifetime, half of which she had only made it through by sheer dumb luck.

Still, if that was just her first week, she dreaded to think what the next weeks had in store for her.

A/N: Chapter art for this chapter if you type the URL without spaces. i . imgur .com (slash) vD98Q7i . jpeg