THE HIGH PRICE

by peverell.magic

The ash began to bury his legs, enveloping him in its soft, warm embrace. Harry wrapped his arms around his knees and buried his face in them, allowing the world to drift into the distance.

43. CHAPTER 43: THE ENIGMATIC DEPARTMENT

CHAPTER 43: THE ENIGMATIC DEPARTMENT

The delicate golden and red hangings in the room swayed gently, responding to the subtle breeze seeping in from the slightly ajar window. Above Harry's head, the frame bore a record of countless scratches, each one a testament to the passage of time. From beyond the ornate, gaudy curtain that separated his bed from the rest of the room, there was a muffled rustling of clothes and sheets, a sound that hinted at life stirring within.

A familiar voice, belonging to Neville, pierced the tranquility of the room. "Did you manage to make any headway with your essays after I retired to my bed?" his words flowed through the hangings.

Harry, groggy from sleep, started the arduous process of donning his robes, fighting against a faint but persistent ache that seemed to have settled in his limbs. He considered the day ahead. "Today," he thought, "will be a quiet day."

Neville persisted, reminding him of the impending deadline. "It's due after lunch," he reminded Harry.

Harry reassured him, albeit with a hint of sleepiness still in his voice, "I'll finish it during Transfiguration." He made a futile attempt to tame his unruly hair, pressing it down with both hands. However, as he let go, the tufts sprang right back up, defying his efforts. "Breakfast first," he decided, resigned to his hair's wayward behavior.

In the common room, Katie was seated in one of the chairs, her feet basking in the warmth of the nearby fire. She greeted Harry and Neville with a mischievous giggle, her eyes playfully fixed on Harry's unruly locks. "Morning, Harry. Morning, Neville. Nice hair, Harry."

Harry, still grappling with his wayward hair, smiled and thanked her for the compliment. In the process of smoothing down his hair, he accidentally dislodged his bag from his shoulder, and his Astronomy books spilled onto the floor. "It's just going to be one of those days, isn't it?" he sighed.

Without missing a beat, Katie sprang from her chair, retrieved his fallen book, and handed it back to him. Then, she took the lead as they headed towards the Great Hall for breakfast. Harry considered the idea of making use of the mealtime to catch up on some reading. "Might as well hold onto it and do some while we eat," he thought. "As long as Katie doesn't spill anything, I can add an extra inch or so."

Neville, walking alongside, was still curious about Harry's academic plans. "Planning to get some done during breakfast?" he inquired, eager to know how Harry intended to balance his academic responsibilities with the demands of daily life at Hogwarts.

"Yeah, I reckon I can squeeze in a few inches on Callisto's craters before we head to Transfiguration, and then I'll finish up on Ganymede," Harry mused, contemplating his astronomy plans for the morning.

Neville nodded in approval, his own memories of Owl year astronomy resurfacing. "That should get you all the way."

Katie chimed in, her tone nostalgic. "I remember my Owl year astronomy. George and Fred developed the punching telescope that year; I'm convinced it ruined the entire class's grades."

Curiosity piqued, Harry couldn't resist asking, "Is that why the three of you were always wearing eyeshadow?"

Katie's cheeks flushed with a tinge of embarrassment. "No. I might've been trying to catch someone's attention, and Alicia and Angelina sort of emulated me."

Harry grinned, teasing her playfully, "Well, I did notice."

Katie's blush deepened. "Who said it was you?"

Raising an eyebrow, Harry replied, "I knew it. It did make you look cute."

"Cute?" Katie scrunched up her face in disbelief. "I didn't want to look cute; it was supposed to make me sexy."

Harry chuckled. "It didn't work."

Changing the subject, Neville pointed out, "Oh look, first-year Hufflepuffs."

"No, Nev, don't encourage her," Harry warned, but it was too late. Katie couldn't resist the opportunity to have some fun and began casting corridor jinxes after the unsuspecting first years.

"She'd been so well-behaved until you reminded her," Harry chided. "Barely an attack in the last few days."

The first-year Hufflepuffs managed to escape into the Great Hall, and Katie stopped, waiting by the entrance, her mischief satisfied.

"Bad Katie," Harry scolded her with a playful wag of his finger as they found a space to sit. "You're supposed to have been reformed."

Katie shrugged, sipping her orange juice. "No real Dark Lady ever reforms. Once you've chosen something, you've got to stick to it, especially if it's something important to you."

Harry moved her goblet to the opposite side of her plate, away from his essay. He scanned the table for papers but found only a single copy of Teen Witch Weekly. "Which I will never read. Ever."

Katie gathered the essentials for her sandwich - toast, butter, and a plate of crispy bacon. As she assembled her meal, Harry couldn't help but eye her sandwich ingredients.

"If you touch my sandwich again, I'll castrate you with this," Katie threatened playfully, brandishing the butter-smeared knife under Harry's nose. "Bacon thief."

Neville chimed in with a mischievous smile, "Won't that just lead to you being disappointed later, Katie?"

Katie turned crimson but decided to bite into her sandwich instead, a sly smile playing on her lips.

Harry laughed. "And finally, after weeks of being teased about Hermione, Nev gets his revenge."

Deciding to focus on his academic task, Harry withdrew a quill and a vial of ink. He pondered, "Now, what rubbish shall I write about Callisto?"

He turned to his friends for assistance, his expression one of hopeful inquiry. "Either of you know anything about Callisto? Literally anything will do."

Katie, ever the provocateur, sought to make light of the situation. "What's it worth? I'll take payment in sexual favours…"

Harry chuckled, shaking his head. "Not from me, you won't. Especially not after you've threatened to castrate me with that knife."

Neville, perhaps feeling a bit more benevolent, made a proposal. "You have to come to the next DA meeting and teach the Patronus Charm."

Katie nodded in agreement. "That or the sexual favours."

"Fine," Harry relented, pointing his quill at Katie. "To the DA meeting. Not whatever twisted fantasy you're coming up with over there."

She pouted playfully. "You can only resist for so long, Harry!"

Neville couldn't help but shake his head in amusement. "You two are a weird pair. Anyway, Harry hasn't been to a meeting since the first one, and it's almost the beginning of the Christmas Holidays."

Harry, genuinely interested in the progress of the DA, inquired, "Have they all got the hang of Shield Charms?"

Neville nodded in affirmation. "Everyone's capable of casting most of the OWL-level spells. I've been getting them to practice dueling with each other."

Harry commended Neville's approach. "That's a good idea."

Neville, however, admitted with a grimace, "Patronus is next. Hermione keeps bugging me about it."

Harry offered his assistance, noting, "I'll come and teach it, then. But first, about Callisto?"

Neville provided some useful information, "I wrote a whole paragraph about its naming and how old it is compared to other satellites. Try and use lots of long words to stretch things out. Ron, for some reason, repeated the word 'the' twice every time he needed it to make it longer. He claims that nobody ever notices."

Harry couldn't help but be curious. "Has anyone?"

Neville admitted with a hint of amusement, "Hermione noticed straight away. She made him rewrite it last night before you came back from detention."

"That's a shame," Harry remarked, brushing away the crumbs that had landed on his essay. "I would've quite liked to see what Professor Sinistra did."

Katie, sharing an anecdote about their astronomy professor's sternness, replied, "She gets very strict when anyone disrespects her subject. I heard that at the end of our OWL year, she collected all the punching telescopes that Fred and George made, mixed them in with the others, and then gave them a detention separating them for all the disruption they caused."

Neville, ever the voice of reason, interjected, "I think that was just a rumor."

Katie shrugged and took another bite out of her sandwich, inadvertently scattering a few more crumbs onto Harry's essay. "Maybe. Still a good story, though."

Harry, not too pleased with the new additions to his essay, jokingly threatened, "I will steal it if it goes on my essay…"

Katie, finishing her sandwich in several bites and washing it down with orange juice, leaned closer to Harry. She gazed into his face with curiosity. "Are you really wearing pieces of plastic in your eyes, Harry? Hermione was telling everyone that must be what you'd done if you weren't wearing glasses anymore."

Harry explained, "They're called contact lenses. It's like wearing really small glasses on your eye."

Katie couldn't help but comment, "That's kind of weird. But you do look better without them; nobody will mistake you for Myrtle's descendant now."

"Thanks," Harry replied, with a grin. "You do remember we dated, right?"

Katie mustered a weak grin. "I try not to think about it, actually." She shifted on the bench and changed the subject. "You two should probably go. You don't want to be late and then get caught writing an essay for Sinistra in McGonagall's lesson."

Harry, taking the hint, tucked his essay back into his bag and got up. "I'm still an inch or so short."

Katie couldn't resist one last cheeky remark. "Don't worry, Harry. Not every girl's obsessed with length. Girth's important too!"

Harry choked on his words. "What?"

Katie maintained an innocent demeanor, beaming at him. Neville, turning a bit red, chose that moment to extricate himself from under the bench. "I'm still here, you two."

"Well, I'm not. I'll see you later, degenerate Katie," Harry retorted, heading toward the Middle Courtyard.

Katie gave him a wave but accidentally knocked her goblet over everything nearby. "Damn it!"

Harry couldn't help but remark, "Narrow miss that," as he and Neville made their way to their next class.

Neville added with a chuckle, "She has a thing for forgetting where she's put her drink, doesn't she. Normally, I'm the clumsy one."

"You still are, Nev. Last time we had Potions, you nearly knocked over our cauldron and melted a desk. Katie just hates goblets for some reason," Harry recalled.

Once seated in their next class, Harry organized his homework beneath his classwork and sighed. "Right. One last inch or so, and I'm done." He tapped his quill on the desk.

Neville, who seemed to be struggling with a doubling charm, whispered, "Run out of ideas? This doubling charm thing seems tricky…"

Harry shared his frustration, "I feel like I'm trying to explain what's in the teacup to Trelawney. It's painful."

Neville responded with a smile, "It's probably a Grim. Astronomy isn't that bad, though. The only things Trelawney ever predicted successfully were Hermione leaving her class and me breaking her teacup."

Harry couldn't help but recall Trelawney's actual prophecy about Pettigrew's escape, but he chose to keep it to himself. Instead, he sliced a thin sliver of parchment off the top and bottom of his homework and stuffed it back into his bag, satisfied with his efforts. "That'll do."

Neville then shared an interesting tidbit about his Gran's friend, Griselda Marchbanks, who was on the Wizengamot and head of the examinations board. "I heard her tell Gran that the Divination OWL exam is her least favorite because the students just make stuff up, and they have to pretend it's right because there's no real way of checking. She said the only real prophecies are in some mysterious department of the Ministry."

A jolt of cold ran through Harry. "What department?" he inquired, his interest piqued.

However, before Neville could respond, Professor McGonagall began distributing bottle caps of Ogden's Whiskey for the students to practice the Doubling Charm. A faint whiff of alcohol reached Harry's nose when she placed his on the desk, making him wonder about the class's preparation for underage wizards.

"The Department of Mysteries," Neville finally explained. "It's supposed to have loads of weird bits of magic nobody can explain in it, but only the Unspeakables are allowed down there because of how dangerous things are."

Concerned about the implications of being caught snooping around such a place, Harry asked, "Do you reckon they'd send you to Azkaban for getting caught down there?"

Neville considered it, replying, "Probably, if it's as high security as it sounds."

As Harry thought about the mysterious department, he recalled Fleur's aspirations to work at the Bureau d'Énigmes, which sounded remarkably similar. He silently chastised himself for not asking her more about it earlier.

Neville summed up their conversation with a simple, "Sounds interesting."

Professor McGonagall's stern voice broke in, reminding them of the purpose of the class. "Mr. Potter and Mr. Longbottom, I severely doubt that you're discussing the Doubling Charm, so I suggest you get on and start practicing," she called out.

With the spell Gemino displayed on the board, Harry decided to give it a try. He muttered, "Gemino," while flicking his wand at the bottle cap, imagining a second one appearing beside it.

To his delight, a second bottle top formed, though the letters were somewhat blurred. Harry placed it beside the original and noted that the colors weren't quite right.

With determination, he thought, More focus, and I'll have that down with a bit of practice.

Neville attempted the spell as well, casting it beside Harry. Unfortunately, he caught the tip of his wand on the desk, and the bottle caps began multiplying, showering onto Neville, who was bent over trying to retrieve his wand.

Professor McGonagall swiftly intervened when Neville's attempt at the Doubling Charm went awry. "End the spell, Mr. Longbottom."

Neville quickly muttered, "Finite."

The professor seized the opportunity to educate the class. "That's the perfect example of the as-yet unexplained mystery of this charm. If the caster is interrupted before the spell ends, the item continues to multiply. More practice, Mr. Longbottom." With that, she moved on to address Ron's magical mishap, which had transformed his shirt into something resembling a button mushroom.

Harry decided to give the spell another try, successfully producing a perfect replica of the bottle cap. He couldn't help but think, "I should really just stop coming to lessons." His thoughts drifted to the acorn necklace concealed beneath his robes. "I wish I could just leave and go to France," he mused, a sense of melancholy welling up within him. "Hogwarts no longer feels like home. The willow tree is where my heart is now."

As he considered a way to escape from class, he turned to Neville and asked, "Can you tell Professor Sinistra that I'm feeling ill?"

Neville paused, bottle caps scattering everywhere in his attempt to cast the charm. "Bloody hell. Finite."

Harry provided a vague explanation, "Of a sort."

In truth, Harry was feeling homesick, longing for the comfort of the willow tree and the warmth of Fleur's presence. He handed his homework essay to Neville and watched the clock, counting down the minutes until he could leave.

When the soft chime of the clock signaled the end of the class, Harry hastily packed his things and made his way to the hidden chamber. He splashed through Myrtle's bathroom, clutching the acorn in his hand, and closed the entrance behind him.

Whispering the incantation, he turned the acorn necklace into a mirror, revealing Fleur's face on the other side. A gleam of worry shone in her blue eyes as she greeted him with a soft, "Harry?"

Harry felt a rush of warmth, a profound sense of relief to see her. "I just needed to talk to you," he confessed. He couldn't help but admit, "I missed you."

"That's an interesting coincidence," Fleur responded, her voice trembling. "I ought to talk to you, too."

Harry assured her, "I'll be at the willow in a moment."

Fleur's image vanished from the mirror.

As Harry waited for her to arrive, his stomach knotted, and his mouth went dry. Anxiety gnawed at him. Is she angry with me? Did I do something wrong? An awful chill swept down his spine, leaving him breathless. Does she want to leave?

He paced into the study, grappling with a tight ball of panic, and grabbed the portkey drawing. With a swift incantation, he activated it, and a downpour of rain began to drench him. Harry quickly transfigured a fallen stick into a large umbrella that could accommodate both of them, and then he stood there, waiting.

Fleur apparated in, her face taut, and her lips pressed into a thin line. The rain drenched her, but it quickly evaporated into a veil of steam around her.

Concerned, Harry asked, "What's wrong, Fleur?"

Fleur whispered, "I did something stupid."

Harry's heart sank, and the umbrella trembled, releasing small streams of water onto the ground. He suppressed the rush of despair, telling himself, No, she hasn't said what she did. Don't jump to conclusions.

"What did you do?" he asked, keeping his voice low.

Fleur stepped under the umbrella and gently cupped Harry's face in her hands. "No, not like that," she clarified. "You are mine. And that means that I'm yours."

Relief flooded Harry's stomach. She didn't betray me, and she's not leaving.

"What happened?" he asked. "Is Gabby okay? Your parents?"

Fleur reassured him, "They're fine. I did something stupid, is all. One of the girls here, a Hogwarts student, has family in England, a cousin, and she was talking endlessly about what the Daily Prophet has been saying." Fleur's hands moved from Harry's face to his shoulders, drawing him closer to her. "I was so angry with her. I still am. I used Cassandra's Curse, but I didn't hold back. The mediwitch thinks that the effects might last for almost a month."

Harry, relieved that it was nothing serious, reassured her, "That's nothing. The girl will be fine."

Top of Form

"So?" Harry gently tilted Fleur's chin up with his fingertip and locked eyes with her. "You told me you didn't care what I did so long as I was yours, Fleur. I feel the same."

Fleur confided, "I am in a lot of trouble. The school has suspended me. I can take my exams, but if I fail, I can't return and do them at the same time as everyone else. They wrote to my parents, too."

Harry held her close, reassuring her, "You won't fail. You never fail."

Fleur, her face buried in his neck, confessed, "But my parents, they will be angry with you for being the reason I did it. I'm sorry. I made things even harder for you."

Harry responded with affection, "I quite like that you wanted to defend me." He kissed her on the top of the head. "And someone once told me that the more it hurts to get something, the more satisfying getting it is."

Fleur teased, "Well, at least you're listening to someone smarter than yourself." She sighed and wrapped her arms around him. "I was going to ask you to come here for Christmas. I was really looking forward to you being around all the time, but now…"

Harry assured her, "If you want me here, and I'm allowed to stay, then I'll come. I can ignore anything I have to."

Fleur's fingers tightened in his robes as she whispered, "Merci, mon Cœur."

Harry gave her a reassuring squeeze and held her close, taking in the sweet scent of marzipan that drifted from her and the warmth of her presence.

Fleur then leaned her head back, questioning, "Why did you want to speak with me?"

He smiled. "I just have a question. What do you know about the Bureau d'Énigmes?"

Fleur's brow furrowed as she answered, "A little. It's a secret what they actually do, but most people know about the general fields, the mysteries are famous."

Intrigued, Harry prodded further, "Oh? Care to share?"

Fleur provided more details, "The bureau was created by an English wizard who came to France after marrying a French witch. He designed the Bureau d'Énigmes based on your Department of Mysteries, though the bureau is a half a century younger. Why do you want to know?"

Harry's curiosity was piqued as he asked, "Are there prophecies in the Bureau d'Énigmes?"

Fleur confirmed, "Yes. The witnesses of the prediction are obligated to leave a memory in the bureau. There's some spell that notifies them if a prophecy is made. I've no idea how that works. Some kind of trace on those capable, perhaps. There're only prophecies about French wizards and witches there, though. The Bureau d'Énigmes has no authority to keep any others."

Harry pondered for a moment and then concluded, "But if there are prophecies in the Bureau d'Énigmes, then there are likely ones in the Department of Mysteries as well."

Fleur's eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Why are you interested?"

Harry confessed, "When I escaped from Voldemort, I surprised him with how much stronger I'd grown since our last encounter. He mentioned a prophecy and implied that it was about, or at least mentioned, me."

Fleur suggested, "You want to hear it. Why not ask? You're legally entitled to listen to a prophecy that is relevant to you in France. I'm sure it's the same in Britain."

Harry's tone turned somber as he explained, "The Ministry would never allow me to view a prophecy that's connected with Voldemort, not when they're doing everything they can to cover his return up."

He admitted to himself, I'll have to take it myself.

Fleur's eyes darkened slightly. "Tell me you're not planning to steal it."

Harry whispered, "I don't want to lie to you. I need to know what it says. Voldemort knows."

Fleur's concern deepened. "How would you even get in? How would you get out?!"

Harry confessed, "I don't know. I only learned about the Department of Mysteries today. I might be able to get my godfather to help. He and the rest of Albus Dumbledore's followers are secretly guarding the department, though whether it's the prophecy or something else, I don't know."

Fleur urgently cautioned, "Don't rush in and do something reckless. I will not have you die or get sent to Azkaban because you wanted to hear some prophecy that might not even help you."

A lump formed in Harry's throat, and he vowed, "I'll be careful, I promise. There's no point winning anything if it loses me you. That's – that's just not winning anymore."

Fleur insisted, "And you'll tell me what it says. I can't help you if you keep me in the dark."

Harry grinned playfully and gave her an appraising look. "The dark's the last place you should be."

Blushing, Fleur teased, "Are you sure, mon Cœur?" She took his fingers and guided them down to her waist, then up until his knuckles brushed against her breasts. "There are all sorts of things we could do in the dark."

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