"Oh, thank the goddess," Fleur sighed as they arrived in the magical enclave in the center of Tripoli. "It might not be summer, but I'd take this place over Britain in December any day."
"I hear you," Lavender smiled. "It's gotta be twenty degrees warmer."
They heard the other portkey come in, and Fleur rushed to catch her stumbling girlfriend.
"Thanks, luv," Tonks murmured as she regained her balance.
Harry, alas, wasn't so lucky and ended up rolling onto his arse.
"Hopefully one of the powers of this bloody flute is managing to travel around with more grace than a newborn deer," he grumbled.
"You know I can sympathize," Tonks chuckled as he stood up.
"Least you have a bloody excuse," Harry muttered, shaking his head.
"Is flying the only type of magical travel you're good with?" Ginny asked.
"Yes," Harry replied, "and even then I don't know if it extends past brooms. I'll have to try a carpet sometime just to check."
"Keep in mind they are illegal in Britain," Susan pointed out, "and given how fond many figures in the ministry are of the bribes they get from the broom manufacturers, that's unlikely to change any time soon."
"Ah, Magical Britain," Sirius sighed, his voice dripping with disdain. "I'd say never change, but I know there's no need."
"Is bribery just openly accepted?" Hermione asked.
"No, but they find ways to do it anyway," Sirius replied. "Usually it comes in the form of campaign donations, since nobody looks too closely at where campaign money goes after the fact, but the big thing is speaking fees. I've heard Fudge speak before, and I can't imagine anyone giving that man a hundred thousand galleons to give a thirty-minute talk like Nimbus did about six months ago."
"Ah," Hermione muttered.
"Do you feel anything?" Daphne asked.
"I don't know," Harry replied, looking around. "I've felt a sense of restlessness since I last blew into the flute, and while I think that's intensified, it could easily be in my head."
"I just wish we had some idea where Orion Black found the damn thing," Sirius grumbled. "It might not give us all of our answers, but I doubt it would hurt to check out."
"His diary really didn't contain any hints?" Padma asked.
"It was definitely somewhere in Peloponnese, but the cave was something he stumbled across by chance, and his description of it and its environment was frustratingly vague," Hermione recalled. "I read through his entire journal and even checked to see if he hid information behind some kind of enchantment."
"Now you're thinking like one of us," Sirius chuckled.
"We're just going to have to rely on whatever magical weirdness you ended up with," Lavender shrugged. "I assume there really is something to it, given how easy it was to get us all here."
"Yeah, there's no way Daddy would have been that okay with Pad and I coming along," Parvati agreed. "I expected to have to get Mum's help and employ my full-on puppydog eyes, but he agreed immediately."
"Parv, my mother agreed to let me go to a foreign country with a boy," Ginny said flatly. "None of my brothers even questioned it either. I was half-tempted to tell them all we'd be flying here and I'd be spending the entire flight riding Harry just to see if anything could make them crack."
"I'm glad you didn't," Harry chuckled. "I'd like to be able to look at least a few of your brothers in the eye going forward."
"It was just bizarre," Ginny sighed. "I'm so used to them being annoyingly overprotective that it was really jarring to see them so suddenly uncaring."
"We've been lured here for a reason," Luna declared, her voice airy and light. "That reason is unlikely to be found in a city, though I don't know if Tripoli had yet been founded in His day."
"Well, let's check into the hotel that I arranged first, and then we can go exploring," Sirius said, looking down at a map. "It's this way."
The marauder led his many charges along the narrow streets of Tripoli towards their destination. He'd had a pretty good sense of direction for years and knew well how to read a map, so they quickly found the hotel and checked in. With Hermione's help, the purebloods among them managed to fit into the muggle world better than they usually did, and though Daphne chaffed at the idea of wearing clothing more revealing than she was used to, Susan's appreciation for how she looked quickly soothed her distaste. It wasn't even that bad, consisting of a floor-length skirt and tight-fitting sweater, the cut of which showed off just enough of her large, creamy breasts to be enticing.
Lavender was dressed quite similarly and was much more comfortable with it, to the visual delight of more than a few men they passed along the way.
"Are you from around here?" the girl at the checkout desk asked in Greek, smiling up at Sirius.
"No, no, we're from England," Sirius replied. "Decided to escape the cold for a little while."
"Your Greek is quite good," the girl complimented.
"It should be for what the bloody Department of International Cooperation charged me for the lessons," Sirius thought to himself, not letting his frustrations show on his face.
The Department had the means to implant languages into people, allowing them to learn them in a fraction of the time it would normally. If you worked for the department, the lessons were quite cheap, but if you didn't, they charged far more than the average wizard could ever pay. He was more than happy to waste his family's money, but still thought that the lot of them were dickheads, something not helped by his distaste for the department's head, Bartemius Crouch.
"I've always thought it sounded like a beautiful language and decided to learn it a while back," Sirius smiled. Reading her nametag, he asked, "Hey...Elena, is it? My godson and his friends are really into nature hikes, and I was wondering if there were any spots that you thought were particularly nice."
"You've certainly come to the right place," Elena replied. "Depending on how far you're willing to go, there are plenty of gorgeous places in Arcadia. West of the city is largely woodland and forest, with mountains. I don't know about hiking, but the forest west of the city is one of my favorite places to drive through. It's just so very beautiful."
"West of here?" Sirius asked. "That sounds great. Thank you."
"It's nothing," Elena smiled. Handing him the keys, she added, "Enjoy your stay."
"I'm surprised you didn't hit on her," Harry commented as they walked to the elevator.
"What makes you think I didn't?" Sirius asked. Harry had specifically not gotten Greek lessons because they wanted to see if he started speaking the language as they drew closer to wherever they figured the flute was going to lure them.
"I didn't get a word of that, but even with the language barrier, I still know what you sound like when you're trying to seduce a woman," Harry replied.
"Well, I still might," Sirius grinned. "Birds love a foreign accent, after all. I did ask her about spots suited to hiking, though, and she said that there's a pretty big forest west of here."
"It's as good a place to start as any, I guess," Harry shrugged. "I was thinking that we could start by flying around the more rural parts around here and see if anything draws my attention."
"From what I've read, this place seems to be more rural than not," Hermione piped up. "The entire peninsula's about six times the size of Cornwall and has less than twice the population."
"That is pretty sparse," Harry murmured.
"Arcadia's always been sparsely populated," Luna said serenely. "I think that's what Pan liked most about it back in the day."
"'E wasn't exactly a god of urban sprawl," Fleur added.
"Well, so long as we're careful about disillusionment charms, we should be able to fly about freely," Sirius said quietly as they entered one of the hotel rooms. "This one's mine, and the next few down this hallway are yours. Officially, Harry's bunking with me, since I didn't want some busybody sticking their nose into our business, but I'll leave the actual sleeping arrangements up to you lot."
"Thanks, Sirius," Harry smiled as the girls all looked at each other conspiratorially.
They took about an hour to get settled and get their things put away. Each of them carried enchanted luggage charmed to keep anyone other than them from wanting to open it. It wouldn't work on wizards or witches unless they were exceptionally weak-minded, because it wasn't terribly powerful, but it would keep muggles from snooping through their things. Once they were finished, they gathered together in Sirius' room, where he, Tonks, and Fleur worked adding notice-me-not charms to their brooms.
"I wish we could get permits to do magic on trips like this," Ginny grumbled.
"It'll just be a few more years," Tonks said soothingly as she finished charming another one.
"I guess we couldn't exactly just make ourselves invisible," Lavender laughed. "Birds would fly right into us."
"Brooms are actually charmed to give off something that keeps birds away from us when we're in the air," Sirius replied, "but we'd not be able to see each other."
"Is that a relatively new enchantment?" Ginny asked. "I know before snitches were invented, Golden Snidgets were used in their place."
"I honestly don't know," Sirius replied.
"I have no idea either," Hermione added, "but it would make sense. I still can't believe seekers used to hunt little birds."
"Snidget hunting actually predated quidditch," Luna said sadly. "Their population really suffered for that."
"Sad as that is, we should probably be going," Daphne drawled. "I doubt we want to be up in the air past dusk."
"You're right," Harry agreed quickly, hoping to avoid an argument sparked by Daphne's coldness. "The forest west of here that the woman downstairs mentioned sounds like as good a place to start as any."
"Your broom is done," Fleur smiled, handing him his firebolt.
"Thanks, Fleur," Harry said as he took it. "Just follow my lead and let's hope that I actually get a feel for where I'm going."
"The name of Arcadia broke you out of the trance that the flute put you in, and that has to mean something," Luna murmured, raking her nails through his hair. "Rather than focusing on trying to feel something, focus on relaxing your mind. If we're in the right spot, and we're right about the flute's influence on you, it will occur to you."
"Right," Harry grinned wryly. "I just need to focus on relaxing."
"Use your occlumency fundamentals," Sirius suggested.
"That's not a bad idea," Hermione added.
Harry closed his eyes and took a deep breath, drawing on his experience with the mind arts to calm himself and put aside his concerns about the journey he'd taken with his lovers. His nervousness was banished easily enough, but he found that doing so didn't rid him of his sense of restlessness. There was something deep inside him that longed to rush into what he was about to do, and it reminded him in a way of the feeling he got before a big quidditch game, though he wondered if he was only thinking about that because of the broom in his hands.
"Let's go," he said, mounting the broom.
The others followed suit, and they all flew out of the enlarged window before them, with Sirius turning and returning it to normal as he left last. Once he was in the air, with the wind blowing through his hair, that sense of restlessness eased up. Flying was always a source of comfort and calm to him. It was something that Hermione would never understand, he knew, as she didn't care much for flying in general and spent all her time watching him play quidditch worried about him, but flying had always something that set his mind at ease.
As he sped through the air at great speed, watching the world pass by, he was able to let go of anything that he was worried about at the time and focus purely on what he was doing. As he escaped the city limits of Tripoli and found himself above a vast forest, he breathed in the delightfully fresh air and felt a shiver go down his spine.
The land was beautiful, green, and lush, with low mountains and shallow valleys as far as the eye could see. He couldn't say that it felt familiar, but he did like it, and as he flew around the region, circling the vast stretch of barely settled land, he sighed in contentment.
"It's gorgeous!" Parvati called out.
"If nothing else, we'll have gone somewhere lovely," Padma agreed.
"I still say I'd prefer to see the beach, but it is really pretty," Lavender chimed in.
Harry smiled at them and slowed down, coming to a stop miles above a small village.
"Did something draw your interest?" Luna asked.
"No, it's just...are those olive trees?" Harry asked.
"Couldn't say from here, but they do look pretty short and squat," Hermione replied.
"I'm going to land there for a second," Harry announced before rushing to the ground.
"Hominem Revelio," Tonks muttered as she joined him, letting a breath go when she realized that there wasn't anyone nearby.
"Is something wrong?" Fleur asked, furrowing her brow at the sight of Harry staring at a tree.
"This...I've seen this tree," Harry replied, "these trees."
"Huh?" Ginny asked.
"When I fell into a trance that time in the common room, when I was playing the transfigured guitar," Harry explained. "I think this is the olive grove that I saw in my vision."
"What exactly happened there?" Tonks asked. "You mentioned it before, but I didn't ask for details."
"The Gryffs threw a party for Parvati's birthday, and Hermione transfigured a cushion into a guitar after our enchanted music box went on the fritz," Ginny replied before the others could. "As Harry started playing, he closed his eyes and fell into a trance, though we didn't really realize it at the time because we couldn't stop dancing."
"You were making them dance?" Fleur asked.
"Not intentionally," Harry replied, wincing at the memory.
"I swear it's the most you've ever tired me out with clothes on," Lavender laughed, though she then blushed as she remembered that Sirius was there.
"Are these trees really thousands of years old, though?" the man asked.
"No," Hermione replied. "There are examples of olive trees that have lived for millennia, but not a whole grove."
"The trees look exactly like they did in my vision anyway," Harry added, shaking his head. "I don't think that was a memory of Pan's; I think it was a clue about modern-day Arcadia. Back when I was in the trance, I felt like I knew what the land was called but couldn't recall the name."
Turning around, he found himself looking at the same undeveloped land that he saw back then and knew that it had to have come from the flute. He had been to Greece once before, but not to Peloponnese, and there was no good reason for him to know this place. That memory did bring to mind a question he hadn't thought to ask before.
"When we took our trip to Greece back in the summer after my second year, was that because of the panflute?" he asked, looking at Sirius.
"No," Sirius replied. "After you slew the basilisk, I worked to get it harvested and the parts sold off. One of the people I worked with on that was a lovely Greek woman who worked for the auction house where I put the skeleton up for sale. We hooked up, and she invited me over to celebrate when the skeleton sold. Merlin, what was her name again?"
"It's a wonder none of your conquests have ever neutered you," Tonks snarked.
"Hey, I'm always upfront with the women I sleep with about my intentions," Sirius protested. "I might be a lech, but I'm an honest one."
Harry snorted and walked off, trying to see if he sensed anything. The landscape looked familiar, but that was about it. As he continued down the hill, he came across a thicket of trees and walked on, followed by the others. He took slow, deep breaths, fighting down his frustration. He got the sense that he was close to what he was looking for, but he still hadn't gotten that innate sense of being pulled towards anything that he was hoping for.
"Uh, Harry, you might want to slow down," Sirius cautioned.
"What's wrong?" Lavender asked. "I don't hear anything."
"Yes, that's the problem," Sirius muttered, drawing his wand. "I don't hear anything at all."
"No animals around," Tonks said, flicking her own wand into her hand. "Be on your...look out!"
Harry saw a massive shape diving towards him from the air and rolling out of the way, only to laugh at the last moment as he thought that he recognized what came for him.
"Don't attack him!" he called out.
"Hi…" Sirius went to ask before his eyes went wide. "No bloody way."
"Are you both mad? That's a bloody griffin!" Tonks exclaimed, moving in front of the other girls. "I know Harry's good with animals, but…"
"That's an understatement," Susan sighed. "You should hear the praise Hagrid gives him regularly."
"And that isn't just any griffin, is he?" Sirius asked as Harry bowed to the creature, who bowed in turn.
"Hello, Godric," Harry smiled, reaching out to scratch at the griffin's neck. "What are you doing here, you big lug?"
"You know this griffin?" Fleur asked.
"Godric, really?" Daphne asked flatly.
"I was young; shut up," Harry replied, earning a round of laughter. "Yes, I met this little guy the last time we came to Greece. He has these darker feathers on his chest in the shape of a v. I know it's him."
"Nearly shit myself when he landed in front of Harry," Sirius muttered. "Out of all the oddities the flute gave you, your affinity for animals is the one that I've enjoyed the least, just because I never got used to it."
"I always thought you were exaggerating," Tonks said.
"Nope," Parvati grinned. "Every time Hagrid introduces us to a new creature in class, it immediately takes a liking to Harry."
"In case you've ever wondered why we've never gone to Africa, that's why," Sirius said dryly. "Last bloody thing I need is a nundu following you home."
Hermione snorted at that thought.
"Could you introduce us?" Luna asked, walking closer to Godric and Harry while still keeping a respectable distance away.
"Of course," Harry replied, nudging Godric over. "Godric, this is Luna."
"Hello," Luna smiled, bowing low enough to give Harry a good view of her tits through her sweater.
Godric bowed back, and she moved to pet him, only for him to snarl at her as she did.
"Hey!" Harry chastised the beast. "She's a friend. Sorry, Luna, that was odd. Usually, like with hippogriffs, if you get them to bow back, you're good to go."
"I don't think he was bowing to me," Luna gasped, stepping back as she noticed the half-lion-half-eagle still holding himself low. "I think he wants you to get on his back."
"Huh?" Harry asked, looking over at Godric in confusion.
"But griffins aren't as willing to be ridden as hippogriffs," Padma pointed out.
"But they do guard treasure," Hermione countered. "What if Godric here is the sign we've been waiting for."
"Wait, you mean…" Harry went to ask.
"A griffin to guard...whatever we think we're going to find here," Daphne mused. "Hermione, did the journal mention Orion Black fighting anything when he stumbled into the cave and found the flute?"
"No," Hermione replied. "Still, if Godric wants to give you a ride, we might as well see if he has anything in particular in mind."
"He could just want to fly with you," Ginny said. "We'll follow from a distance."
"That's probably for the best," Sirius agreed.
Harry shrugged and stuffed his broom into his mokeskin pouch. He smoothed the feathers on Godric's neck and carefully climbed onto his back, marveling as the Griffin stayed still. Though they were generally very ornery beasts, it was possible for wizards and witches with an affinity for magical animals to befriend them. He knew that Newt Scamander kept one in his menagerie for years, for instance. Actually riding them was very uncommon.
Hippogriffs were part horse and had a horse's nature augmented by the attitude and pride of an eagle. Nothing in a griffin's makeup had a history of being ridden by humans, and they were generally far more difficult to mount, with many magiozoologists claiming that it was outright impossible. Despite that, as Harry settled himself on Godric's back, he felt the mighty creature's wings beat against the air and soon took flight. He held on tightly and grinned as his mount began to fly in a very deliberate, straight path.
"This isn't for fun, is it?" he wondered to himself, feeling for the first time all day like he might actually find what he was hoping to.
Atop his broom, he'd flown around in circles, trying to spot anything that caught his eye and drew him in until the olive grove did just that. Riding Godric, his flight was far more directed, and the giant flying beast took him far to the northeast. They crossed a small town, and he winced as he realized that there was no charm on the griffin to keep muggles from noticing him, but he didn't hear any screaming, and soon enough they were past the town limits and flying towards another thick stretch of woodland.
This area was craggy, though still incredibly green, and as Godric began to descend, Harry looked out and saw that they were landing next to a stream. He dismounted the moment they touched the ground and looked around in confusion as Godric drank from the river. In front of him was a short mountain that the stream arced around. In every other direction there was nothing but trees, and nothing about the area looked at all familiar.
"Was he just thirsty?" Sirius asked as he landed.
"No idea," Harry replied, looking over at Godric, who was still drinking as the others landed.
With nothing else to do, he leaned back against the mountain and quickly fell inside.
"Harry!" Hermione cried, rushing over only to stop in her tracks as a cave entrance appeared that hadn't been there before.
"Holy shit," Harry laughed as he stood up. "Godric really did lead us to something."
"Fascinating," Fleur mumbled. "The entrance only appeared after you'd already fallen into it. Come back out and let's see if it disappears again."
Harry walked out, and, sure enough, it appeared again like solid stone and vegetation.
"Hmm, so sorta like the entrance to platform 9 ," Ginny mumbled, pressing her hand against it, only to freeze when it was stopped by the solid stone. "What the hell?"
"Wait, that doesn't…" Harry went to say as he pressed against it.
Ginny, who had been leaning against it, fell forward as it disappeared again and Harry barely managed to catch her.
"So, is it me?" Harry asked.
"Well, once you touch it, we can pass through," Ginny replied.
"Wait, if this is the cave where Orion found the flute, then that might be the answer," Sirius suggested.
"Oh, yeah, that would make sense," Hermione said. "Both of you come back out, and Harry, you give me the flute."
"Is this really necessary?" Lavender asked.
"It's neat magic," Hermione replied. "I'd like to at least try to figure out how it works."
"Here," Harry said, handing her the flute. Before he turned back towards the cave, he saw Godric had finished drinking and looked like he was about to leave, so he went to him. "Thank for the help, mate."
Godric shrieked and flew up into the air, disappearing above the trees.
"Completely solid," Daphne muttered as she pressed against the cave entrance. "If the flute is the key, then Hermione's right. This is really interesting magic."
"Even Gringotts doesn't have security like this," Fleur added. "I imagine the goblins would be very interested in enchantments that 'id the very doors to the vaults unless the keys were pressed against them."
"It could be useful for prisons too," Susan piped up.
"Yeah, no, it was the flute, not me," Harry concluded as he pressed against the rock. "No one has been inside this cave since Orion Black."
"Well, hopefully that means that we don't have to worry about being attacked by anything in there, but I'd still draw your wands and keep on your guard," Sirius muttered as he drew his own.
"Just fyi, I'm not much of a fighter," Lavender winced.
"Just remember which end of your wand goes where and use the most offensive thing you know," Daphne replied, earning a glare from the other blonde.
"Stay in the middle," Fleur advised. "That goes for anyone who 'asn't fought before, though, as Sirius said, we have no reason to think that we will be attacked."
"Here," Hermione said as she handed Harry back the flute.
Putting it in the mokeskin pouch at his hip, he pressed against the mountain, and the cave entrance appeared again.
"Lumos," Sirius cast, lighting their way as they ventured inside.
"Oh wow," Fleur breathed.
"Fleur?" Tonks asked.
"I don't think we need to worry about all of you using magic 'ere," Fleur said. "This cave is utterly awash with it. Nothing cast in here would be detected by the local ministry."
"That's good to know," Harry murmured, adding his own lumos spell to brighten things up.
"Hopefully the cave being sealed off for hundreds of years means there's no spiders in here," Lavender muttered.
"Don't worry, Lavender, there are only two known types of spiders in Greece that are venomous," Luna smiled, "and the jumping spiders are only found in Crete."
"There are jumping spiders!?" Lavender exclaimed.
"Shh!" Daphne hissed. "If you don't mind, I'd rather not have us snuck up on because we couldn't hear anything over our own chatter. Hit yourself with a calming charm if need be."
"Sorry," Lavender muttered.
"It's okay, Lav," Parvati said soothingly, taking the blonde's hand.
They continued on from there into the cave, coming across nothing living at all. It was wide and winding and descended so gradually that Harry didn't notice at first that they'd traveled below the surface. It was only when he turned and looked behind them that he saw how much higher the last trace of outside light was situated.
"This is quite the cave," Hermione murmured. "I imagine it was carved intentionally."
"Likely," Fleur replied. "Its width is too uniform to be natural. Whatever made it lacked the precision of the goblins, though. There's a certain crudeness to the walls here."
"I...wait, is that a dead end?" Harry asked, waving his wand in front of him.
He rushed forward and came across what, as he suspected, was the end of the cave. It had been curved as they went along, but there hadn't been a single part of it that split off, and while he figured that it was possible he was going to have to press against every part of both walls to find the true path, as he looked at the stone pedestal he found at the end of the cave, he doubted it.
"This must be where Orion found it," Sirius breathed, hovering his wand just above the pedestal.
"Yes, look here," Harry grinned as he illuminated a cave wall with distinct writing on it.
"Here lies...the vessel of the...something...Pan…" Sirius struggled to read and translate. "The charms that those overcharging arseholes use give you the ability to speak the language almost immediately, but they take time to let you read or write it."
"That's okay, you read enough to know we are where we thought," Harry grinned. "This is where he found the flute."
"Cool," Daphne said dryly. "Now what?"
"Um, I'm not sure," Harry replied. "I can place the flute back and see if anything happens."
"One way or another that might be for the best," Sirius muttered.
"I wouldn't suggest just leaving it here," Hermione protested. "The cave is opened by its presence, and someone else could come find it. If this trip ends up being for naught, we should turn it in and let the I.C.W. lock it up with the others."
"Or we could just keep it safe," Daphne argued. "It's not like it shoots lighting or causes tsunamis."
As they argued, Harry placed the panflute back on the pedestal where Orion Black had presumably found it centuries prior and felt a chill go down his spine as he let it go. Staring down at the weathered instrument, he got the distinct sense that he was being given a choice. He could leave it where it was and go, giving up the powers it had given him and ensuring that it would cause those around him no further problems, or pick it back up and accept it fully. He couldn't say where this sense came from, and it wasn't as though he heard it in words or anything, but he was absolutely certain nonetheless.
"I'll agree the ministry can be a bunch of knobheads, but these rules were put in place for a reason," Tonks added when she heard the sound of a flute playing and she whipped around to stare at Harry.
"Harry!" Sirius exclaimed, rushing over as he noticed his godson playing the flute.
It glowed slightly, but not as much as it had before, and as Sirius closed the distance, he found no barrier in the way.
"It's alright," Harry said reassuringly. "In here, as I am, I can play it freely, and I think it's the key."
He went back to it, playing nothing in particular, and a sense of calm overtook all of them at the sound.
"Do you feel anything odd?" Hermione asked, still partially concerned.
Harry just shook his head and continued warming up.
"Well, I guess we just wait and see what happens," Lavender shrugged.
"Does anyone else feel a little tingly?" Luna asked. "The panflute sounds lovely."
"It is nice," Susan smiled.
"Play Freebird!" Sirius called out.
"Do you even know what that means?" Hermione asked, furrowing her brow.
"No, but I heard someone shout it at a concert in America, and the Yanks found it hilarious for some reason," Sirius replied.
Harry snorted at that and decided on what tune he was going to play. His godfather might not have known what that meant, but he did.
"Oh wow," Hermione breathed as he launched into the solo from the Lynyrd Skynyrd classic. "I somehow doubt anyone's tried that on a panflute before."
"Is that supposed to be music?" Daphne muttered under her breath, scrunching up her nose in distaste.
"Oh, look!" Padma exclaimed, pointing at the pedestal, which had begun to glow the same shade of green as the flute.
"Uh, Harry..." Sirius went to warn him.
Harry paid him no mind, continuing on with his eyes closed as he felt the music flow from him. He heard the sound of people moving about and knew without looking that his girls were dancing to the rhythm. In the distance, he heard Sirius call out something, but he couldn't make out what and didn't care. It was only when he started to hear stone scraping against stone that he opened his eyes again and saw the pedestal sinking into the ground.
"Finally!" Sirius exclaimed. "I could barely move for a moment there."
"We couldn't stop," Ginny panted.
"Mon dieu," Fleur gasped, still watching the pedestal sink.
The raised dais it had been sitting on had already slipped beneath the ground, and it continued sinking further, twisting around again and again to reveal a spiral staircase that led far lower than she expected.
"Whatever answers there are here to find and whatever power I'll be able to master, it will all be found down there," Harry declared, pocketing the flute.
"Well, you can play the panflute without ending up in a coma again," Parvati said brightly, "so that's progress."
"I finally feel that sense of direction I was hoping I'd get as I drew closer to where I needed to go," Harry smiled. "I know what I seek is down here."
"Just stay on your guard," Sirius sighed. "Orion Black might have made it this far, but I doubt anyone's been down there since Pan's day."
"Bubblehead charms might be a good idea," Hermione pointed. "The air in long-sealed passageways can be highly dangerous."
"Good idea," Fleur complimented.
They cast their charms and continued onward down the spiral staircase, though as Sirius went to join them, they hit a bit of a snag.
"What the hell?" he asked as he tried to step down onto the first step only to hover above it.
"Um, I'm as confused as you are," Tonks said, perplexed as she managed to step down just fine.
Sirius walked around the spiral staircase, finding himself unable to pass through the invisible barrier around the whole thing.
"It's likely the flute," Hermione guessed. "Harry's connection to it is giving him access to this vault, while our connection to him is letting us come too."
"I don't like the idea of you going down there without me," Sirius hissed.
"Sirius, it'll be fine," Harry assured him. "I'm not half-bad with a wand; Susan and Daphne are both well-trained, and Tonks and Fleur are both downright dangerous. We'll be careful and come back if things seem hairy, but I need to see what's down here."
"And none of us are letting him go without us," Ginny said firmly.
"Try your mirror," Sirius all but ordered.
"Sirius Black," Harry murmured after a moment of fiddling for the mirror in his mokeskin pouch. His godfather's face appeared in it a moment later and relaxed a touch the second that it did. "We'll be able to keep in contact."
"I'm calling in an hour and seeking help if you don't answer," Sirius said flatly.
"Alright," Harry agreed. "We will be careful."
Sirius sighed and conjured a chair for himself as he watched the last of them disappear down the staircase. Looking over at the wall with the distinct Greek writing on it, he tried to focus on the words, figuring that he didn't have anything better to do than attempt to give it a proper translation.
"This looks remarkably well maintained for a place that hasn't been touched in millennia," Hermione murmured a while later as they traveled down through the much lower.
"That's true," Harry agreed. "The chamber was a dirty ruin by comparison."
"There are powerful spells woven into every stone 'ere," Fleur explained. "For them to still be active all these centuries later is remarkable."
"That means there are runes being used, right?" Lavender asked. "I know regular spells wear off without reinforcement."
"Given how old all of this is, I can't really say," Hermione replied. "Part of what makes runes so powerful is the fact that countless wizards and witches through the centuries have imbued them with great meaning. Back in Pan's day, they wouldn't have been as strong."
"'Owever they did it, the enchantments 'ere are incredibly powerful," Fleur murmured. "It feels...wild too. Similar to how Harry's magic feels."
"That makes sense," Padma piped up, "given everything."
"There's a wider chamber ahead," Daphne announced. "Let's stop there for a second and look around. I want to see if there's anything written on the walls."
"They've been completely bare so far," Ginny pointed out.
"We've seen nothing but this long, narrow hallway so far," Daphne replied. "Whoever enchanted this place, as they did put a great deal of effort into it. There must have been a reason for it, and I'd expect them to leave hints."
"If those hints are in Greek, we're fucked," Harry grimaced. "I should have gotten the same lessons as Sirius."
"Your reason for avoiding them was sound," Luna said. "The rest of us could have, though."
"Or at least one of us," Hermione added.
As they entered the chamber and looked around, all of their eyes went wide at what they found. It appeared to be a dead end, for one thing, but that wasn't what surprised them.
"At least we don't have to worry about it all being Greek to us," Lavender quipped as she looked around in amusement, earning a few groans.
The walls were covered in carved images of Pan and various nymphs. Most of them were just scenes of frolicking through various nature scenes, but three in particular were far more explicit. In one, Pan had a nymph on her hands and knees and was vigorously rutting her like a beast. Her eyes were closed and her tongue hanging out of her face as pleasure robbed her of her senses. The one next to it was a threesome scene, with one nymph riding his comically large cock while another sat on his face. The third and final one showed Pan holding a nymph in the air aloft, more using her as a masturbatory aid than anything else.
"These carvings are really well made," Fleur murmured, tracing a finger over the figure of Pan in the first sex scene. "Capturing genuine emotion like this in stone is quite hard."
"None of these walls are illusions," Harry commented as he pressed on the last one.
"Maybe we missed a side passage in the hallway," Parvati suggested.
"Or you might need to play the panflute again," Susan added.
"I think we need to have sex," Luna said, drawing more than a few odd looks. "Think about it. Most of these scenes are completely innocuous, but the three that aren't are directly opposite the hallway we just came from. Given Pan's connection to sexuality, I expected sexual tests to be part of getting through here. Luckily for Sirius, he couldn't come."
"Hmm, so you think we need to recreate the sex scenes," Fleur surmised, tapping her chin. "It's possible."
"This place is really clean, at least," Daphne sighed.
"I'll do this one," Luna smiled, pointing at the third image. "As the smallest one, I'll be the easiest to hold like this and use like a fleshlight."
"Okay, which one of you told Luna what a fleshlight is?" Hermione asked, rolling her eyes when Tonks' hair turned red for a moment.
"Dora and I could be the pair for the threesome," Fleur offered, grinning lasciviously at Harry.
"Given how heavily enchanted this place is, casting spells on it wouldn't be advisable, and the stone floor would be murder on our knees, so this first one will be unpleasant," Daphne winced.
"We can just conjure pillows, and even without them, I'm no pampered princess," Ginny smirked. "Since doggystyle's up first, I can be the test of whether or not this works like Luna thinks."
"If it does work, there might be more scenes later," Lavender grinned. "I'll happily volunteer for those."
"Such a giver," Parvati giggled as Ginny stripped down.
Harry looked up and down along her slender form and grinned. Her breasts weren't large, but they were very perky, and her pale pink nipples stood already hard. Undressing with a wave of his wand, he set it aside and pulled the ginger in for a kiss, which she returned hungrily. His hands slid down along her back and cupped easily her greatest asset. While she'd never be as buxom as some of his other lovers, her arse was easily one of the greatest he'd ever seen, and he kneaded her plump cheeks firmly, grinning at the thought of how he'd get to see them ripple and jiggle for him soon enough.
"Already dripping down your thighs," Harry rumbled as he broke the kiss, having felt her slick on his leg as she ground her sex against him.
"I swear just your touch does it these days," Ginny whimpered, reaching down and wrapping her hand around his massive cock. "The sound of your voice and the thought of this horse-like monstrosity don't hurt either."
"My perfect little pet," Harry grinned, making her shudder. "Perfect wet and wanton for me."
He pushed a finger inside her tight cunt and his grin grew positively feral as she cried out in pleasure.
"H...Harry," Ginny whimpered.
"On your hands and knees," Harry ordered. "Whether or not it helps us continue on further, I'm going to fuck you until you pass out."
"Oh, Merlin," Ginny gasped, turning around and getting into position as quickly as she could.
True to her word, she didn't bother with pillows or anything else, seemingly unbothered by the hardness of the floor, but even if she was, it would have been the last thing on her mind as Harry buried himself to the hilt inside her sweltering pussy in one thrust.
"Fuck yes!" Ginny screamed.
"Fuck me, you're amazing," Harry groaned.
Since the beginning, he'd had little trouble getting his girls wet, but he had noticed that it was getting even easier. As Ginny said, his touch alone was often enough now, and failing that, a heated look often sufficed. She took him as easily as always, and after perhaps a dozen thrusts, he already felt her beginning to flutter around his length.
"HARRY!" Ginny shrieked as she came, her whole body going taut as a bowstring as the pressure inside her became too much.
Harry held her tightly as she writhed and convulsed around him, pounding her even harder. Her gorgeous arse jiggled hypnotically as his hips slapped it again and again, and if not for the even more alluring sight he caught out of the corner of his eye, he wouldn't have looked away for a moment. Fleur and Tonks had stripped down and were kissing passionately, though, and that was a sight he couldn't help but take in, even as Ginny continued to squeal in unending ecstasy.
"Harry, look!" Hermione exclaimed.
"Oh, wow, that actually worked," Susan laughed.
Harry turned to where they were pointing and saw that the first carving had begun to glow a familiar shade of green. As he continued fucking Ginny, it got brighter and brighter, and even he could feel the magic in the air around them.
"Don't stop!" Ginny cried, sounding half delirious. "Don't stop, don't…"
She trailed off as consciousness left her, and Harry reached forward to catch her as she slumped over, making sure that her face didn't hit the hard ground. Once she was settled on the floor, panting for breath and completely out of it, he slowly pulled his rock-hard length out of her, keeping an eye on the wall to see if the glow in the first sex scene faded at all. When it didn't, he relaxed and moved to lie on his back next to Ginny.
"Did you two decide who's going where?" he asked, looking over at Fleur and Tonks.
"I'm sitting on your face, 'Arry," Fleur replied, grinning.
"It's not like it matters," Tonks shrugged. "Either way you're going to drive us bloody mad."
Harry grinned at them, and that smile only grew wider as Fleur walked over. As she placed a foot on either side of his head, he looked up at her slick cunt and licked his lips. She was visibly soaked, and as she waited for Tonks to lower herself down onto him, a droplet formed on her folds. Harry watched, mesmerized as it slowly grew and opened his mouth as it fell, catching her fluids on his eager tongue.
"I still can't believe you're bigger than I ever tried being," Tonks chuckled as she ground her pussy on his cock.
"'E is still soaked with Ginny's juices, mon amour," Fleur grinned as she stepped forward and squatted down towards his face. "You do not need to get 'im wetter."
"I know, but I still like teasing a little," Tonks chuckled as she reached down and picked up his cock.
Harry swiped his tongue along Fleur's dripping wet pussy just as Tonks impaled herself fully and grinned as both women cried out in pleasure. If anyone had told him back during third year that he'd someday actually get to fuck his first crush, he'd have thought they were barmy, and if anyone had told him last year that he'd get to fuck her and Fleur at the same time, he'd have rushed them to the hospital wing just to be safe. The fact that the two of them were not only regular lovers of his now, but that they were far from the only ones still boggled his mind at times.
"Holy shit, I love this fucking cock!" Tonks cried.
"'E's better at eating pussy than any man I've...oh fuck...ever 'eard of, and it's still even better," Fleur moaned.
"Thanks for...ahh...letting me have it then," Tonks cried, cupping her girlfriend's cheek and pulling her in for a kiss as she started riding Harry harder. Breaking the kiss a moment later, she cried out, soaring towards her peak, which hit a moment later like a freight train. "FUCK!"
Harry groaned as he felt the metamorph's unnaturally hot, tight pussy start to spasm around his length and pressed his tongue against Fleur's clit. As he started speaking parseltongue, her screams joined her girlfriend's and he tightened his grip on her hips to hold her steady.
"Keep it up, Harry," Hermione said. "The picture's nearly glowing as brightly as the first one."
He had no intention of stopping until the two of them were fully sated and started pounding up into Tonks as she faltered, prolonging her pleasure further. They were in a small room, and their screams echoed well. Ginny had been loud, but the two of them together were deafening, and he wondered if any of the others had conjured earplugs for themselves. After minutes of continued orgasmic ecstasy, Tonks slumped forward, and Fleur wrapped her arms around her, shaking like a leaf herself.
"'Arry...zat's enough," the beautiful blonde begged, and he backed off immediately. As she rolled off of him, she gasped, "Zat tongue is...incroyable."
Harry grinned at her and licked his lips, pulling his cock out of Tonks and rolling her unconscious form over to join her girlfriend.
"My turn!" Luna exclaimed, skipping in place with visible excitement.
Harry looked at the wall for a moment, noticing that the two images were both glowing equally brightly and stood up.
"This position will be a first for me," he murmured to himself as he studied the image on the wall.
He had held women in his arms as he fucked them before, but it was always with him holding them to him and them holding onto him. The idea of just holding a lover by her hips and rutting into her as she dangled freely in the air seemed like a recipe for unnecessary injuries, and he'd have been reluctant to try it at all with anyone other than Luna.
"It's okay," Luna said reassuringly. "I'm really small, and you're cock isn't the only thing really big about you. I trust these yummy muscles are up to the task."
"Climb onto me first, and once you're impaled, I'll let you go and start fucking you," Harry instructed, and Luna practically shivered in anticipation.
"I never understood what some of the older girls meant when they talked about climbing particularly hot boys like trees," Luna said as she grabbed his broad shoulders and pulled herself up as he palmed her arse and helped her up. "I figured it was a wood reference, but seeing you now, I get it."
Without another word, she lined herself up with his cock and sank down in one swift movement, crying out in pleasure as she did so. Harry grunted as he felt her tight, wet heat envelope his cock and dug his fingers into her hips to hold her steady. She held onto his shoulders as he started slowly easing his cock in and out of her.
He still wasn't sure about the position, but he was pretty certain that he needed to recreate all of the images to proceed, and so once he was reasonably confident that he had her secure, he said, "Let go of me, Luna."
"Okay, just don't stop!" Luna cried, letting go of his shoulders and allowing herself to fall back.
He held onto her tightly and picked up his pace, pounding into her dripping cunt. The loud squelching sound coming from her sodden sex was drowned out by her screams as her pleasure grew more and more intense. He saw the carving on the wall begin to glow just as Luna drew close to her peak.
"I'll be your nymph, Harry!" Luna cried. "I've never wanted anything more! Just never stop fucking ME!"
She came hard, flailing in his arms as pleasure thundered through every inch of her body. Harry groaned, the feeling of her fluttering and quivering around his length, feeling his own orgasm approaching. The wall began to glow the same shade of green as the other, but he barely noticed, chasing his own pleasure as Luna drowned in hers.
"Fuck!" he grunted as he came, filling the petite blonde to the brim with his hot, thick cum.
The feeling of his seed painting her inner walls white made Luna cum even harder, and she squirted around him as her eyes rolled back into her head. Just as Harry felt himself faltering, Hermione conjured a chair behind him, and he fell back into it, pulling Luna forward so he could wrap his arms around her.
When the third carving started to glow as brightly as the other two, all three grew brighter, becoming blindingly so to the point that they all needed to close their eyes. All at once then, the lights disappeared, and when they opened their eyes, they saw, rather than the carvings on the wall, a vast empty space where the sex scenes had been.
"Ahh, and they were so nice," Lavender pouted.
"The way's clear," Hermione smiled, nudging Ginny. "Once we're good to go, it seems like we're heading further downstairs.
"Wasa?" Ginny asked blearily, blinking the sleep from her eyes. "Oh, cool, it worked."
Harry carefully lifted Luna up and let her rest in the chair as he got dressed. A few minutes later, when she, Tonks, and Fleur were awake enough to hobble forward with some assistance, they all continued further into the cave network, unaware that as they passed through the barrier they'd just unlocked, the mirror in Harry's pouch glowed for a second and went black.
"Thirty-two bottles of beer on the wall, thirty-two bottles of beer," Sirius sang to himself in boredom.
It wasn't his first time reaching thirty-two, and he doubted it would be his last. Glancing over at the wall with the Greek writing on it as he had periodically for the last forty minutes, his eyes went wide as he realized that it actually made sense to him finally.
"At bloody last," he grumbled, bringing his glowing wand closer to the wall. "Here lies the vessel of the great god Pan. Let he...wait a tick."
Reaching into his mokeskin pouch, he grabbed Orion's journal and flipped to the page on which he wrote his translation of the message on the wall.
"Here lies the vessel of the great god Pan's power. Let he who is worthy restore the horned one's power. He will return in songs floating on the winds." Sirius read silently. "That's not what this says, though."
Feeling his heart rate spike, he looked over the message again, making sure that he was correct.
"Here lies the vessel of the great god Pan," he read aloud. "Let he who is worthy restore the horned one to power. His rebirth will come in song and on the winds. What the hell does that…"
He trailed off, recalling how they had come here. Godric the griffin had reached out to Harry twice, and flown him right to this cave where the flute had been found. Orion's translation had been wrong and likely tinged by his own desires for power and how the other Olympian artifacts had worked. In what he had translated, it sounded like Pan's power could be claimed by someone worthy of it. In the true translation, though…
"Harry!" Sirius gasped, grabbing his mirror. "Harry Potter! Harry Potter! Damn it!"
He paced back and forth, trying to think as he started to fear that his godson was in more danger than he'd ever imagined. Out of other options, he cast, "Expecto Patronum."
His silver grimm appeared and spoke a message into it, saying, "Albus, Harry is in danger. Please come to Greece. The flute doesn't contain Pan's power, I think it contains his soul!"
He watched the silvery, glowing dog disappear in the direction of Scotland and hoped that the headmaster would have an idea of how to fix this mess before it was too late.