Chapter 46 - Names not given
"What do you mean, show me?" Iris asked hesitantly.
Myrtle gave her a grin, and then turned and jabbed her head at something sitting in the corner of the room—something which hadn't been there before. On one of the tables, there was a shallow round silver bowl, containing a swirling misty-white liquid of sorts. Iris took a hesitant step closer. "What's that?"
"That," Myrtle began, "is a Pensieve."
Iris' eyes widened. A Pensieve? Like the thing Neville and Hermione had been talking about?
"What's a Pensieve? I guess it's something about memories?"
Myrtle nodded. "That, it is. It's a magical device that can be used to view memories that another person has experienced in their past."
Iris took a breath. That's what this was? This almost sounded like the thing they had been using in history class, except, well, it looked very different. Was that how they wanted to expose the heir, then? Had they really found a memory of him? Or... were they just pretending, in order to lure the heir into a trap?
"In order to view it, all you have to do is dip your head into the bowl, and the Pensieve will do the rest."
That sounded easy enough. Iris gazed down at the thing for a moment and saw nothing but the inside of a large brick building. She raised an eyebrow, then looked at Myrtle, who was still smiling, and back at the still ajar door.
Then, she remembered the writing just beyond said door. "And this will show me some way to get more powerful, to grow stronger without training?"
"Indeed. It's the memory of someone who has done the same, showing how they did it."
Something about this seemed too good to be true.
"Is there anything else that a Pensieve does? What's going to happen if I do that?"
Myrtle gave her a smile and shook her head. "All it does is pull you into the memory, allowing you to watch through it from a different perspective, as if you were there yourself. But of course, you can't interact with it or change it, and none of the images can physically hurt you. It's all just projections."
Well, that seemed... fine, she guessed? Definitely different from the thing in Lupin's classroom though. Stepping up to the Pensieve, she placed her hands on the edges, took a breath and...
Harry. Yes, there was no choice here.
Iris leaned forward, and dipped her face into the liquid. Suddenly, it felt as if the ground lurched beneath her feet, and she was tossed head over heels into the bowl, falling down and down, past an infinitely stretching column of stone bricks, until at last, she tumbled to the ground.
"Wha— What's going on?"
Myrtle stuck her head in next to her and gave her a grin. "We're inside the memory. To be accurate, in southern London, 1940."
Iris' eyebrows rose, and she took in her surroundings. She was standing in a dilapidated brick building, more specifically in some sort of hallway containing several identical rickety doors. It was illuminated by the dying light of a single old iron furnace situated at the end of the hallway, just next to a window through which moonlight was shining into the corridor.
"And... how do we get back out?" Iris asked warily.
"Oh, simple," Myrtle chirped. "You just watch the memory all the way to the end."
Iris frowned. "And there's no other way?"
Myrtle shrugged. "Nope."
Well, it was probably fine. Iris turned as she noticed motion from the corner of her eye, and stared.
An old lady wearing a grey wool cardigan was bustling down the corridor, quietly opening and peering into several doors, until she came to a stop in front of the door where they were standing. It was as if the old lady was looking right through her, as if Iris wasn't even there. Which, she supposed, she wasn't. In fact, she was looking at the door, or rather, the faint orange glow visible underneath through the gap. The lady frowned, then opened the door and stepped inside. The room within was alight in a dull orange glow, emanating from a single naked light-bulb suspended in the center of the room. Below it, on a small, shabby bed, sat a boy. He couldn't be much older than her, maybe two or three years, he had a simple yet elegant haircut, was wearing clothes that would put what the Dursleys gave them to shame, and was writing in a book. A book that was eerily familiar. But Iris couldn't quite place where she had seen it before.
She stepped closer, entering the room next to the old woman, with Myrtle following behind her.
"Lights-out was half an hour ago," the old woman said in a stern voice.
"Just five more minutes," the boy replied in a flat voice.
The lady frowned, and replied with a clipped "Go to sleep." And with that, she flicked off the light-switch by the door, plunging the room into utter darkness, except for the faint shine of fire peering through the open door. Barely a few seconds later, even that was shut, as the matron left the room in a huff.
Iris blinked, trying to adjust her eyes, but before she could do anything else, a blue light shimmered to life, emanating from a small round ball clutched in the boy's hand. He then placed it down on his night-stand, and leaned back over the book. Iris' eyes widened as she recognized the thing. A moonstone lamp! He was a wizard. Well, obviously, given the fact that Myrtle was showing this to her, but...
"Who is he?" Iris asked in a whisper, as if afraid that he would be able to hear them.
"He... was my friend, a long time ago. My very first friend, in fact. And also my best friend. We went together to Hogwarts, you know? We were so close, he was always there for me, and... well..."
Iris leaned over to get a look at what the boy was doing. The book was still open, but he had opened a letter written on parchment atop it and was now reading it—or re-reading it, if the tattered state of the parchment was any indication.
We regret to inform you that due to the aftermath of last year's incidents, and the associated necessary repairs, the start of this year's Hogwarts term will be postponed by two weeks time. Please be notified that the Hogwarts Express leaves from King's Cross station at 11 am on the 14th of September this year. We apologize for the inconvenience, and wish you happy extended summer holidays.
Headmaster Armando Dippet
The ghost's face took a faraway look as she floated up to the boy, who was clutching the parchment in a death-grip—almost crumpling it yet again—before he placed it down, and resumed writing in the book. "Above all else, I trusted him to keep me safe. So, one day, when it came down to it, I placed my life in his hands."
Why was she telling her all of this? The silence stretched a bit, the only sound in the room was the constant gentle scratching of the fountain pen on the pages of the book. Yet, she couldn't help a small smile at the thought of a friend like that. It almost sounded like a love story of sorts...
She took a breath, and hesitantly asked, "And... what happened?"
Myrtle looked up with a bittersweet smile on her face, and simply replied, "He took it."
The smile on Iris face disintegrated over the space of a single blink. What?
"But that's a story for another time," Myrtle said with a shrug.
How did someone just shrug after admitting something like that? Ghost were supposedly pretty weird about the way they died but... She eyed the boy warily. He had killed Myrtle? "Why are we watching a memory of him, then?" Iris voiced the first thought that came to her mind.
Myrtle straightened up, and put on that expression again that indicated when she entered teacher-mode. "How much do you know about Names, Iris?"
"Like... yours and mine?" she replied with a raised eyebrow.
Myrtle grinned. "Like, capital-N Names."
Iris frowned, then she gasped as she realized what she was getting at. "You mean like... with goblins? And house elves?"
"Exactly like that," Myrtle nodded eagerly.
"Well, I know that they supposedly hold power of their own, and somehow pass on part of their skills, powers, responsibilities, and personality... And that they are unique, there can only ever be one with the same Name at a time. And also, that it is something that is only relevant to magical creatures that aren't related to humans. At least, that's the way Lupin explained it," Iris replied from memory.
"That's certainly an apt description. But do you know how they get their Names?" asked Myrtle, tilting her head.
"Well, he said that they aren't given, but either earned or taken, and apparently taken either from some deceased ancestor, or even by force from someone who is still alive..."
"Exactly," Myrtle grinned.
Iris stared for a moment, until comprehension dawned. What? There was no way that that was where this was going. "You... you're saying I should somehow take a Name?"
Myrtle shook her head. "The act of taking a Name is a privilege that is entirely closed-off to anyone but creatures of magic, I'm afraid. It is something about the way they are much more deeply connected to magic itself—basically made from it, and return to it after death—but nobody knows for sure. We just know that nobody bearing a human origin has ever managed to take a Name from someone else."
"Then what are you saying?" Iris replied, confused.
"What that doesn't apply to, is the act of earning a Name," Myrtle finally said.
Iris just stared at her in silence for a bit.
"Do you know how Names can be earned?"
Iris frowned. "Well, presumably, in combat or something? With one heroic deed or another?"
Myrtle snapped her fingers. "You were right on the money with combat. Although, there is very little heroic about it."
The ghost floated over to the bed, settled down next to the boy, and leaned her back against him.
"The act of earning a name requires defeating a human in combat. Or, more precisely, to kill them. But it's a bit more complicated than that. Because that's where Death gets involved."
Iris stared at her flatly. "Well... obviously?" she deadpanned. Was the girl really expecting her to kill someone in order to gain a Name or something?
"Death, as in, again, with a capital-D."
Iris blinked. What?
"You mean... like the reaper? As in... the guy in black robes, with a hood, skeleton head, a scythe, and maybe a book?"
"It's nothing as fancy as that. There's no Mr. Death out there, hunting the souls of all those who escaped him, or something like you'd read in books like those of the three brothers, no. But Death as an entity is very real. We don't know what it wants, what it does, what it thinks, or even if it wants or thinks. All we know is that sometimes, in places where lots of humans die, it shows up; most famously in the form of a Grim."
A Grim. Iris had read about that. A large black dog or wolf, something in between, that is apparently an omen of death. Or, apparently Death, with a capital-D.
"We don't know why it does that, or what it does there, but what we do know, is what follows. That being, Death... is something so far beyond our comprehension, that its mere presence warps the laws of reality. The laws of physics, even the laws of magic, everything stops making sense, it all goes all weird, and wonky. Basically, everything becomes... symbolic. And that is something that can be used to create a Name."
Iris' eyebrows went up far into her hairline.
"The legend says that if you take a life in front of Death itself, and claim it as your own, the Name does not get added to Death's ledger, but to your own instead."
Iris was holding her breath now. What Myrtle was talking about... this was something so far beyond anything ever taught at Hogwarts, maybe beyond anything that anyone should know, ever. And yet...
"I suspect in reality it is a bit more complicated than that, and there are probably other ways to achieve the same thing, but the easiest and most prevalent method seems to have been through the use of the entity known as Death. But what is generally agreed upon is that it is not without cost. In order to create a Name, a human soul is required. The soul gets used up, and converted into a Name, and that's where the Name gets its power. It is basically an after-image of the soul, carrying many of its powers, skills, talents, personality traits, responsibilities; yet it does not hold memories, or a consciousness of its own."
Iris breathed. "Does that mean that... all the Names of creatures... those once used to be humans? Human souls? That got killed by creatures and turned into Names at some point?"
Myrtle gave a wry smile. "The fact that wizards stand atop the magical food chain is a rather more recent development of the past two Millenia. Magic, as well as human history, is far older than that."
Iris tried to process all those revelations, but she still came up short. But before she could further think about this, one major issue with all this reared its head once again.
"You... you really want me to kill someone? To take their soul and... basically wipe it out in order to gain a Name?"
Myrtle just smirked at her. "What if I told you there was a way to achieve the same thing, without having to kill anyone else?"
That brought Iris up short. "That... that— Really? How would that even work?"
Myrtle grinned, got back up, and turned to look at the boy. "Just watch."
Iris watched, but before she could even further think about what she was seeing, the boy looked up from his book with a terrified expression.
What on earth? Had he somehow seen them, or—
Her ears perked up as she heard the reason for the boy's reaction. In the far distance, from outside, the unmistakable grating sound of an air-raid siren spooling up.
"Not again," came a terrified whisper.
The boy scrambled to the window, tore open the curtains and peered outside, Iris leaning past him to get a view of her own. The night sky was filled with not just stars, but shapes. And the shapes were moving. Searchlights flared up all across the city and pierced the dark sky, one after the other. The sound of air-raid sirens was joined by the distant hum of propeller engines. And screams.
There was a high-pitch whistling noise, screaming its anger and quickly descending in pitch, until—
The building across the street was engulfed in a fireball, and came crumbling down. And the explosion was far from the only one.
Distant, close, anywhere really, tremors and shockwaves rattled the area every few seconds, Iris' ears still ringing from the first impact, as she stared in terror at the scene unfolding before her.
The boy managed to tear his eyes from the window, and was now scrambling for his bed. He was clutching a wand like a lifeline, retrieved the book that was so very familiar, and together with a few trinkets—including a knife apparently—tossed it into his book-bag, slung it over his shoulder, and made his way for the door.
The door flew open and Iris was struck with a searing wave of heat. The noise only registered a second later, as well as the fact that everything was now flying. Including the boy. Iris watched wide-eyed as he impacted the brick wall—hard. Then he sunk to the ground, and lay still. The wall of the doorframe came crumbling and revealed the rest of the building laying in rubble. From the wreckage, the faint cries of other children could be heard, underlined by the irregular but unrelenting march of explosions from every direction.
This... something like this... the boy had to...
Suddenly, something registered in Iris' mind. A question she should have asked from the start, but which had disappeared in the fog of her sleep-deprived mind. "Myrtle?"
"Uh huh?" the ghost asked with a smile.
"How is it you have this memory? You need a memory from someone to look at it in a Pensieve, right?"
Myrtle's smile slowly morphed into a grin, that gave Iris the chills.
"Well, you see... I told you. I placed my life into his hands, and he took it. Something like that, such an act of sheer... domination... it leaves a mark. On your soul."
Iris didn't like where this was going.
"Just like I now carry a part of him constantly reminding me that my life belongs to him, he now carries a part of me, always reminding him of what he has done."
No, Iris really didn't like where this was going.
Myrtle floated up to the boy again and placed a hand on his chest. "And after he took my life, he wanted to preserve my soul, and by extension, his own. And so he bound me to the very book in his hands. His diary."
Myrtle's smile turned into an ear-splitting grin. "A diary that you have now been holding onto for the past semester."
Iris froze. "I... no! I've... I've never even seen it before!" she exclaimed, but something felt wrong about the words. The diary did seem eerily familiar. But she couldn't quite place it still.
"Oh, of course you haven't. Thanks to poor little Ginny, I gained enough power of my own for a sort of physical form... And as with most things Magic, all I had to do was to get you to agree to take me with you," Myrtle said with a cheerful smile.
There was no way.
"You... you are the Heir of Slytherin," Iris whispered.
Myrtle grinned. "Took you long enough. Well, almost, but not quite. Technically, he is. And I am, by extension."
Speaking of the devil, the boy to her feet stirred, his eyes came open, and he scrambled back to his feet.
"Annoyingly, unlike Ginny—and despite my best attempts—you refused to open your emotions to me and let me into your soul at every step," Myrtle pouted.
But then she perked back up. "But... you were only all too willing to come in here, into my... room, and keep coming back, again and again, with just the lure of juicy knowledge and power. And while you were in here, your body—out there—was left... unsupervised."
Iris still didn't know what to say, or think, she was just staring in horror at the ghost who she had almost thought of as a friend, and then the boy who looked so very small in front of all the wreckage he was staring at. Did that mean... she was doing something with her body? Right now? This was... this was bad! She had to find a way out of here! But... Myrtle had always tried to stop her from leaving, that meant... maybe she could leave, if she wanted to. But first... first she had to get out of the Pensieve. Was there truly no way other than to watch the memory to the end? Or was this another thing about her having to agree, or believe something, and not even attempt to leave?
The boy stared down the collapsed half of the building, and amidst the wreckage, Iris could make out several limbs, bodies, bloodied and squashed, and she felt like she was going to be sick. And then she froze.
Atop the rubble, exactly across from them, sat a large black dog. No—a Grim. Iris' breath caught in her throat as she met the purple eyes of the omen of death. Or rather, maybe just Death itself, if Myrtle was to be believed. But she wasn't sure if she still should believe anything that the girl had said.
The boy stared it down, trapped in its gaze just like her, as neither of them moved even an inch. Then, he slowly and carefully moved his hand into his bag, and withdrew it again, clutching something. Not his wand—the knife.
"Why?" Iris whispered; her hand clenched around her wand in a death-grip. "Why tell me all this now?"
Myrtle flew up right to her face and gave her an ear-splitting grin. "Oh, I just really wanted to see the look on your face, once you realized... just how much you've screwed things up this time."
The words stabbed right into her heart like a steel dagger—her rage at the ghost in front of her, and turned it around on herself.
This was her fault. Lupin, Ginny, Hermione, Neville, Tracey... It was all... her own fault. Again.
And now, Harry—
Her eyes widened, as she rewound what had happened, and the bloodied words on the wall suddenly took a whole new meaning. She hadn't taken Harry.
The message had been about herself.
Iris had to get out of here. Now more than ever. Who knew what Harry would do once he discovered her missing, or what... what she would do to Harry, if she really was controlling her body right now...
"Let me out!" she cried desperately. "I want to leave!"
Iris called out to the sky, willing the Pensieve to obey her, but nothing happened. Even repeating her command with the added yellow glow of the Control aspect had little effect.
She could still fix this, there had to be a way, she just had to get out of here. Once the memory ended she could—
"Death!" the boy cried out, his voice echoing through the silent air.
The words as shaky as anyone's facing Death, he spoke. "I offer you my name, and my life."
In that instant, it all made sense. The reason she had never questioned the boy's name. He didn't have one anymore. He had sacrificed it.
"For a new name, and a new life. One where I'm no longer powerless. One that lets me rule my own destiny, free of the muggle world. One that lets me escape... even you," he added, his voice barely a whisper.
With a trembling hand, he slowly raised the knife, its edge gleaming menacingly. He brought the tip to his neck, his resolve firm despite the shaking.
"If I can't have that... then let it all end now."
The boy swallowed hard, and with one smooth motion, he drew the knife across his throat.
A wet choking sound followed, and Iris felt sick to her stomach as she watched the boy fall to his knees, the bloodied knife clattering forgotten to the ground. With one final desperate look at the eerie gleaming eyes of the looming avatar of Death, he swayed, then toppled forward, and hit the puddle of his own blood with a heavy splat. The Grim still sat, completely unmoved by the whole occurrence, and kept staring straight at them.
The moment stretched and stretched, Iris' heartbeat like a clock ticking away inside her chest, until—
The Grim blinked.
Splat!
Iris whirled to look back. A footstep had fallen right into the puddle of blood surrounding the corpse. She looked up and up... and was met with the exact boy who had just sacrificed himself, stepping over his own corpse.
Except for his eyes. His eyes were a blazing red.
No.
Oh god, no. No, it couldn't be... him! She had to get out, she—
Iris knew what was coming, even without the gleeful grin from Myrtle floating next to the boy who should be dead.
"And with this..." he whispered, as he raised a hand, balled it into a fist, and opened it, inspecting his fingers as if for the first time.
"I shall henceforth be known..."
No, no, NO! Iris clamped her hands over her ears, attempting to drown out the words, desperately trying to avoid what she knew was coming, knowing exactly what awaited those who knew what she was about to learn, and yet—
The voice—seemingly defying all laws of physics—was still perfectly audible even through her covered ears, almost straight inside her mind, as he kept speaking in a whisper.
"...by the name Voldemort."
Silence.
Voldemort.
Iris' head began to spin.
V̷̭̂o̶͚̾ḷ̴̅d̶̯́e̶̝̊m̶̰̋o̶͍͐r̷͖͂t̶̙̊.
So simple. And so perfect. She wanted... She wanted to hear it again. To say it out loud. It made so much sense!
V̸̰͚̠̅͜͠ǫ̴͎͚̣̳̞̮̩̲̭͎̩̳͋̊͂͋̃͒̓̽́̄̄̌͗͜ͅl̶̞͔̻͔̦̜͇̝̺͔̪͓̜͖̐̇̊͋̄͑̌̅̽̈̍͐͠d̷̩̭̻̘̝̯̖̞̟͉̬͒̈́̌̈̈́͒͐͘̚̚̚͠e̷̢̨̺̯̗͚͈͝m̵̢̥̙̜̲͔͔͖͓̰̅̀̿o̸̡͉͖͉̗̗̖̪͋̈́͋̓͘͜͝r̷̫͓͚̀͜ͅt̶̨̨̢̡͎͍̰̮̞͈̰̳̠̿̑͛̏͂̐̏͜͝ͅ!̴̪̜̭̮̣̭̽ͅ!
Iris felt the ground convulse under her feet again, and she was dragged up and up, vaguely noticing that the memory was finally coming to an end, but it was far too late for her.
V̷̨̝̗̣͍̥̞̮̣̰̲̲̩͚̞̱̐̉͑̊͋̚ ̶̢̢̯̫̟̽́̈́͗́̕Ǫ̴̛͇̰̜̯̬̏͛͑͂̑́͊̔͌́́̇͋͊̍͘͜͝ ̸̧̡̧͖̻̘̥̪̻͖̠͇̦̈́́̓̾̍͗̃́̈́͑͌͌͗̿̄̈́̾̚͘͘͜Ḽ̴̡̡͉̬̣̜̠͇͉͈̮̰͚̮̬͓͖͛͌̈̈́̊̂́́̐̐̿̓͌͘̚͘͘͜͝ͅ ̵̢̛͍̆̈͗̂͂͋͋̆̍̔͌̕͘͝͝͝D̸͉͎̗͔̻̻̭͍̫̱̳̙̲̖̖̩̞̣̘̈́́͌̃̈́́̚͠ ̴̢̤̬͉̺͕͔͕͓̞͙̤͉͚̯̖͇̣̿͝E̵̝̩̳̟͎̱̫̲̲͈̗͗̔̃͋̀̊̕͠ ̴̲̠̭̘̄̏Ḿ̷̧̡̯̖͖̫̟̺̘̑̉̊͜ͅ ̶̡̡̛͍̲̮͍͈͎̲͋̍̆̉̉̿̀̍̇̏̈́̓̚͝Ō̵̺̔̌͋̀̔̓͊̏̈́͌͒̚ ̶̢̧̱͈͈͙͕̬̦̲̣̖͇͓̱̙͔̳̽̒͗̓͑̀̓̉͐̕͘R̷̢̢̡̼̝̮̲͓̭̣͎̼̟͉̼̆͆͛̌͠ ̸̡̜̞̠̰̈̐̇͊̍̏͛̿̏͂̉̉͑̈̑̋͠T̷̢̧̢̞̰͚͎͖͙̦̠̳̭̯̫̦͉̎́̿̄̓̑̇̋̎̈́͐̈̍̒̈́̀́̽̕