Iris had been under the Cruciatus. She had explored Pensieves, her own Mindscape, and had summoned an eldritch horror into the body of her cat. Until now, Iris had had no idea what the expression sensory overload actually meant.
Every single part of her mind, one after the other, had punched out for the weekend and left. Her body was moving, swaying, aimlessly drifting through the crowd. She really didn't know what to do, how to act, or feel like doing anything. It was so bloody loud that she was sure she wouldn't be able to understand a single word even with the use of Legilimency. At some point she had caught herself starting to bob along with the crowd, hypnotized by the dizzying surreal shapes which made up this place. She wasn't really feeling it, but the steady beat of the music, and the herd mentality of the wild crowd made it hard not to follow along. Even if only to stand out less.
She had tried several times to get a mental map of this place, understand where she was and where she had to go, but it seemingly kept changing with each and every song. Anytime the music shifted, so would the stage, the dancefloor, and the infinite void of colors around them, reconfiguring into an entirely new shape that would fit the new song. On the one hand, this was completely awesome. On the other, this made it a nightmare to try and get anywhere. Twice she had tried to make her way through the crowd over to the bar to at least try and ask directions, but before she had made it half-way there, the song had ended, and she had found herself on the other side of the room.
It didn't help that Iris—while now somewhat tall for her age—was still easily a head shorter than most of the crowd of older Germans—even most of the girls. The dancers pressed around her, constantly jostling and bumping into her. Hands brushed her, not all of them accidental. And somehow, especially around her arse. She tried to twist and catch a glimpse of whoever it was, but it was useless—they were swallowed by the throng of writhing bodies before she could make sense of anything. She really had to get out of here. At some point throughout all this, Iris realized that somehow, when she had entered this place, her backpack had disappeared, and she hadn't even noticed.
Getting desperate, Iris focused as hard as she could—which was an achievement in of itself in her current state—and slowly began to wrap her body in the blue glow of the Force aspect. She didn't point it in any particular direction, really, she just used it to dampen any outside Force whatsoever. Basically, to increase her own inertia.
And boy, did that work. As if she weighed as much as her food intake would suggest, Iris began to shove through the crowd, and this time, it wasn't her drifting, it was everyone else. Closer and closer, people were sent stumbling, falling—at some point almost like dominos—as she pushed on the mass of bodies, and it gave way.
Finally, Iris bumped another large boy out of the way, and reached the safety of the bar at the side of the dancefloor. There was a girl behind the counter. And she was wearing... uhm...
Blushing, Iris leaned over the counter and tried to get her attention. Maybe they had a map for this place or something? It couldn't hurt to ask. The older girl met her eyes, smiled and leaned in, and all of a sudden, all the noise around her seemed to deafen into a dull drone.
"Was darf's sein?" the girl asked with a smile.
Iris swallowed and tried to gather herself. "Ich bin neu hier. Gibt es hier... eine Karte?"
The blonde grinned and pointed at the large glowing sign suspended above the bar displaying various items and prices.
What? That wasn't what she'd asked for. Iris shook her head. "Nein, ich meine, eine Karte, wo es hier was gibt? Ausgang, Toilette, und Dinge wie das?"
In return she got a grin and a wink. "Nein. Einfach immer der Nase nach!"
Just follow her nose? Iris stared back incredulously.
"Hier findest du nicht dein Ziel, es findet dich!"
And with that, the deafening bass suddenly returned, and the girl moved on to serve the next customer.
So her destination was somehow supposed to find her? However that would work. She'd chalk that up to magic, she guessed.
Iris made to get up but suddenly a finger nudged her shoulder from the side, and Iris looked up and found a familiar face.
"Schwester! Hast du rein geschafft! Krasse Bude, oder?"
It was the young Kebap vendor, meeting her with a friendly grin, shouting something at her. She barely understood his words at all; wouldn't have understood anything if not for her Mindlight.
"Es ist Wahnsinn!" Iris yelled back.
"Waaas?" came the expected reply. Why did they even bother? It was so bloody loud they wouldn't be able to understand each other with hand signs in here.
"Hier!" he yelled with a grin.
Iris blinked looking down. He was holding out a long glass filled with colorful liquid that seemed to have several layers of color all the way down, a metallic straw, lemon slices and some other sort of greenery floating on top, and stuck to the rim of the glass. Also, the metallic straw seemed to be coated in something crystalline, and pink.
"Is fur dich!" came another yell, as he kept dangling the beverage in front of her.
Why? Why was he... did he buy that for her? Iris threw a wary glance over at the girl at the bar, who grinned and threw her a thumbs-up.
What... eyes darting between the two of them, and the glass in front of her, Iris' mind failed to compute. She was completely out of her comfort zone. And the sensory overload wasn't helping. Wasn't she supposed to... God... what was even happening. She looked back down and realized that somewhere in her musings, she had taken the glass from his grip, and was now holding it with both hands.
She didn't want to be needlessly rude, but she had other things to do. And it wasn't like she really cared about this boy at all, he was more like... well, he had been really friendly to her, for no reason, other than to maybe sell his Kebap...
No. Using her last two remaining on-duty braincells, she took the glass in one hand, and made to hand it back to him. Something clinked against it.
The older boy had an identical drink in his hand, and had just clinked his glass against hers with a blinding smile.
"Wochenende!"
And with that, he raised his glass, and began to drink.
Iris stared back down at the swirl of fruits and colors. It did have a very nice smell to it. Just a sip couldn't hurt, right? And then she'd leave.
~V~
"And you think he'd learn his lesson, but nooo. The year after, he rallies up like fifteen people, and they lock me in the dueling ring! And of course he starts grandstanding. Like actually, like some cheesy Mafia film."
Iris flicked her fingers to summon her glass from the small table, and took another sip. The mental image of Malfoy dressed up in a black suit and fedora caused her to giggle and almost choke from the delicious fruity sweetness.
A long sigh of pure contentment left her lips as the taste washed over her, and she looked back down to meet the eyes of the girl she had been talking to. Iris had no idea what her name was, it hadn't seemed all that important. But she was pretty, and she had asked her... well, something, probably, and they had somehow started talking. To be fair, Iris had probably done most of the talking.
"Like actually... Why don't we see what that reputation of yours is really worth... Have you ever heard anyone talk like that? I mean—"
Iris broke off into giggles again.
"Yeah. Not that that Oscar-worthy performance helped him any," she grinned, and leaned closer towards the black-haired girl, staring into her brown eyes. "Wanna know what happened next?"
The girl didn't reply, but Iris was sure she was eager to know the answer.
"I took them out," Iris said with a grin, then leaned closer. "All fifteen of them. Slapped into the ground with style! One. After. The. Other."
The girl seemed to jump with each of her words, obviously excited to hear the story.
"Crazy, right?" Iris giggled. "But they had it coming. I just hope they learn their lesson at some point... I mean I've already burnt down the whole corridor, banished him to the shadow realm, and torn apart his little rag-tag assault force, I'm kinda running out of ideas... You got any ideas that don't involve just outright murder?" Iris chuckled at her own joke. "Sorry. Must be Theo rubbing off on me."
The black-haired girl stared back, seemingly just as clueless as her. Iris' hand flashed green again as she sent her glass back to the small table, causing the girl to jump and gasp—apparently still in awe every time she did it. Idly, Iris twirled her finger to play with the sound dampening charm she had placed around them, which was distorting the music so they'd be able to talk. If she just increased the lowest frequencies in small pulses, that kinda sent shivers through her body. Oh, and the girl could feel it too, she was squirming... Merlin that was cute. Iris tugged a little harder, causing her to jump a little.
"You like that? Feels funny, doesn't it?"
That earned her a muttered. "N-no?"
"Yeah, funny is not quite the right term, is it?" Iris mused, scratching her neck.
She tugged a bit more, then she had an idea. Iris called some blue light into her hand, then spread the Force aspect throughout her body. But this time, instead of dampening Force, she amplified it.
"Ooohhh..." Iris cooed. "It's like a massage... A bassage, hehe..."
Iris swirled her finger, shivering from the resulting sensations.
"Mmmhh... I could do this all day... Wanna try it too?"
Iris scooted even closer towards the girl who had at some point moved all the way into the corner of the bench, until Iris was almost sitting in her lap. She reached out a hand and set it down on her leg, slowly spreading the blue light all over her body, causing the girl to squeak.
"Don't worry, it's just light, it doesn't hurt at all! Well unless I want it to, of course," she added as an afterthought. "But you get a pass. You're cute."
Iris shaped the magic to amplify Force again, then raised a finger of her other hand and tugged at the sound dampening charm.
"Eeep!" the girl gasped, and scrambled to the side, squeezed past her and tumbled over the small table, almost knocking over Iris' drink.
"Hey, watch out! Wait, where ya going? I haven't even told you about last summer yet!"
Iris stared after the pretty girl who made a beeline for the dancefloor and disappeared into the crowd. Oh well. It probably wasn't a good idea to talk about that part, anyway.
She spent a few more minutes idly playing with the sound dampening charm, until she realized that her drink had run dry again. Also, she was hungry. Well, more than usual. Okay, just as usual. Still.
To sum it up, she had to get to the bar. But that was right now on the opposite side of the dancefloor. And there were a shitton of people in the way.
Well, she'd just have to bulldoze her way through again. Iris pulled the blue light back into her own body and spread it out, dampening any external Force once more, but then she got an idea. Iris bent her knees and jumped.
"Whooaaaaaaaa—"
Iris left the ground and soared, in a wide arc, shouting excitedly, which quickly turned to confusion and then flailing. She sailed over their heads, tumbling upside down, until the music suddenly dropped and the stage vanished. The rectangles were back. And they were back with a vengeance. An infinite maelstrom of colors, shapes and sounds exploded around her in every direction, and she wasn't sure if she was even still falling anymore. She just felt like she was floating... somewhere in this unreal space of music and light, the dancefloor or any other physical objects nowhere in sight. Iris called her orb of light just to bring some order to the chaos. Or rather, some more familiar chaos to this completely unfamiliar insanity.
Her iridescent orb materialized, and it began sizzling and humming. Whoa, that was cool. It felt like something trying to pour in, and something piercing right back out, what was it? It looked so damn pretty! Iris pulsed it a bit brighter, and the air began to shiver around it, distorting the shapes behind it, and an electric buzz accompanied a breathtaking shiver, a palpable feeling of power. With a gleam in her eyes, Iris pushed again, eager to feel it once more. It felt like some part of the room was flowing into it, more and more the space directly around the orb began to distort, causing Iris to gasp in awe. Could she make it even bigger? It felt a bit like the magic was colliding with itself, inwards versus outwards. But perhaps if she gave it a slight spin in just the right way, the magic could just flow past itself in both directions, maybe for a much cooler effect?
Iris reached out towards her orb and twisted, then flared it once more.
All the rectangles shuddered and froze in place, as a shivering shockwave burst out of her orb of color, drenching the entire infinite void, and seemingly distorting space itself. The music broke, tearing itself apart, as the blinding glow of iridescent colors asserted total dominance over the space she found herself in, and overrode the laws of what had previously existed. The edges of some of the geometric shapes seemed to be caught in her ball of light, and much like when she was casting polarized magic, began to be sucked inwards. Iris tried to let go of her orb, but found that she couldn't. More and more shapes, colors, light and space were drawn towards her wildly spinning orb, which seemed to almost have caught fire with blinding colors and magic. An infinite maelstrom of magic tearing this reality apart, the music now nothing but low distorted electronic screeching, as the miniature star hungrily devoured unending amounts of color, shapes, and magic.
The air was shaking, vibrating with an angry hum of power, Iris clinging onto the blazing orb for dear life, her hair whipping across her face in the storm, as the resonance cascade seemingly tore apart existence itself. With desperation, she clawed at it, trying to will it away, somewhere, anywhere, pull it back within her, but it wouldn't, it couldn't...
Iris desperately reached for her Mindlight, flaring it as brightly as it would go, and in that moment, it felt like a storm blowing across her mind, tearing through the haze, and leaving only crystalline thoughts.
This space only existed as an illusion; a spell. And her orb was capable of interfering with magic, of distorting and dispelling area spells especially. Somehow, the orb seemed to try and destroy the illusionary space, causing it to collapse inwards, and in turn the unleashed magic fed back into the orb. She had to interrupt this cycle somehow, but—
That was it!
Iris reached into her magic, into her orb, and forced it to turn Violet.
Her orb detonated in a blinding flash of Violet; a circular shockwave erupting and rippling through the void. There was a heavy sonic boom, as all the trapped magic was flung back and released into the space, flooding it with all the captured aspect of Illusion. Space itself seemed to bend back outwards, shiver and flicker, then turn black. For several seconds, there was nothing but silence, and utter darkness. Suddenly, the entire void flashed Red, then Green, then Blue, and then White, before turning black again. A single white rectangle hung in the nothingness below her, the only object in this space other than herself, and her still sizzling orb. Iris focused, and finally managed to dismiss the orb once and for all.
Then, she noticed that the rectangle was coming closer. No, in fact, the rectangle wasn't moving, she was. She was still falling.
Like an old tape recorder, the music slowly began to play again, very deep and distorted, but gradually gaining speed, and pitch. The square came closer and closer and closer. Just as it was about to take up her entire vision, it flashed brightly, suddenly in all colors at once, as the music snapped back into full swing, and the rectangle below her revealed itself as the dancefloor. And she was about two seconds from crashing into it. Fuck!
Out of options, and with her wand firmly stuck in her pocket, she desperately called blue light and flooded her whole body with it. Then she gave it direction—upwards.
Iris impacted the dancefloor on one knee, with one hand on the ground. Upon further inspection, she hadn't landed exactly on the dancefloor, rather, on the raised podium in the center. Whoops.
As she got to her feet, she was met with wild cheers from the crowd. Getting up this quickly caused her to stumble a bit, the haze returning with a vengeance. Right, she had cut out her Mindlight...
What was she doing again? Oh yeah, the bar. But—
The music dropped once more, and the lights flared and focused onto the floating half-sphere, as the floor reconfigured itself once more. The platform she was on sank into the ground, and she suddenly found herself right in the center of the wild crowd.
~V~
Holy shit, this was fun!
Iris had no idea how to dance, how to move, what to do in any sort of way, other than to jump along with the beat. But that alone was somehow... so incredibly satisfying. Exciting. Just to let go, move, turn off her brain and forget about the...
Iris stumbled, and collapsed. People were still moving around her, but she barely noticed it. How had she forgotten? She was out here, dancing... drinking... while Harry was... Harry was...
Somehow, for the first time since he had died, she found herself giving in to tears.
"Harry!" Iris wailed. "I... I'm sorry!"
Her words lost in the deafening sound around her, yet it was all her mind could think about. "It's m-my f-fault!" choking out the words, Iris clawed at her eyes, her tears flowing freely for the first time.
Her vision was slowly turning dark. And the moving and bumping had stopped. But Iris just sat there, crying onto the colorfully illuminated floor.
No, it wasn't turning dark. But the shadows had returned. And people were noticing. This... this probably wasn't good.
Iris slowly stumbled back to her feet, shadows still wrapping all around her, and began to shuffle over towards the edge of the dancefloor. She didn't have to use Force, or even nudge anyone. People were already giving her a wide berth before she even approached them, as if they could sense the darkness without even looking.
What was she even doing? Wasn't she... crap... that's right...
Iris fired up her Mindlight and began to slowly and gradually clear the haze from her mind once more, allowing her to pull back the shadows for good.
Fuck.
What the hell had she been doing? She had known. She had known what alcohol would do, but as always, she had assumed the rules wouldn't apply to her. And she had gotten what she deserved.
Iris' mind reeled from the rollercoaster of all the things she had done over the past hour. She slowly began to roll back her memories, and had to beat back a blush.
She should probably apologize to that poor girl. But then again, she'd likely freak out if Iris came hunting her down again after all she had done. Better to just leave her alone entirely.
Alright, eyes on the task, Iris. There was a job to do, a reason why she was here. And thinking back with a clear mind once more, there was one idea of how she could get there. This place really seemed to be only partially real, and if what the girl at the bar had said was true, then she could probably get to the hidden black market just by wandering the place and focusing on her destination. After all, her destination would find her, not the other way around. She supposed it was a pretty neat way to hide something like that, if it actually worked, that was.
Iris began wandering along the edge of the dancefloor, turning into the void filled with shapes, passing places, more bars, smaller floors, bathrooms, and random doors, until she suddenly found herself in another black room. The music was extremely muffled, seemingly even more than it had been outside the building.
Looking around for a moment, checking for anything magical, suspicious, or generally... pretty, she finally swallowed and approached the single round wooden door in the center of the room. Reaching out a hand, she tried the handle, only to find it locked. Well, well, well.
With a shrug, Iris withdrew her wand, drew a blinding amount of yellow light, jabbed and twisted fourty-five degrees clockwise. The piece of wood seemed remarkably unimpressed by her efforts. But it hadn't been her spell, she had seen it catch. It just hadn't found anything to unlock. Which was odd.
Maybe the door was somehow barricaded? Or it was just as unreal as the rest of this place?
For the lack of any other ideas, Iris reached out a hand, took a breath, and knocked. From inside of it, she could hear a muffled voice.
"Nein, danke! Wir brauchen keine weiteren Besucher, Gratulanten oder entfernte Verwandte!"
What the... That sounded like someone lived here! Someone very grumpy, who really didn't want any visitors. Or... distant relatives? Why would someone— No, hang on.
She knew this. She knew this! Except only in English! But Harry had made her watch the movie one too many times not to know it by heart. But that couldn't be it, could it? Was it a joke? Or was it some sort of... passcode? No matter. There was only one possible reply here.
"Und was ist mit sehr alten Freunden?"
Iris held her breath, staring at the wooden door, as no reply came forth. Was it the correct translation? What about very old friends? Or was it a different line in the German version? Seconds ticked away. Iris let her gaze sweep around the room in worry. Suddenly, the door seemingly swung open, only for the entire room to turn white.
~V~
Iris didn't know what she had expected. A shoddy bar like the Leaky Cauldron, a dusty shop with sleazy employees like the one in Knockturn alley, or at least just an assortment of stalls, sellers, cloaked figures lurking all around the place, maybe even a shady library filled with mad researchers.
Somehow, this was even more unsettling.
It was white. And empty. Nothingness in all directions, no shape, no color, even the music had gone quiet.
But somehow, this infinite emptiness was scary all on its own. There was a certain suspense about it. A feeling as if there might be someone around her, as if she were not alone, but she couldn't see anyone else. And somehow, her backpack had reappeared on her shoulders. Iris really didn't like this. She was painfully aware of the buzz still permeating her mind, only held back by the constant glow of her Mindlight. If she'd lose focus here, especially if there were other people around... Iris gathered herself and forged onwards into the void.
Only after walking for a few seconds, shapes had appeared before her. Two door-shaped rectangles; and upon further inspection, they were labeled by small black letters floating in mid-air.
To the left it read VIP Bereich. And to her right was another rectangle labeled Selbstbedienung.
Wait... Huh? Did she translate that correctly? A self-service... black market? Or was she even in the right place?
Only now did Iris realize that maybe she should have done something about her appearance before coming here, on the off chance someone recognized her. Oh, well. She was in a foreign country anyway. Still, it couldn't hurt to try the self-service door first.
Iris stepped forward, through the rectangle, and ended up in the white void again. Except this time, there were rows and rows of things here. Small floating black squares at around her chest height, containing various things, with a small floating black text above them.
Amulets, tools, cauldrons, skulls, other things, and most importantly, books. Yes!
This was it! How would this work? If anything, she'd have expected a black market to work based on trust, where you'd talk to the vendor, get to know each other a bit, make sure there was at least some level of mutual understanding, haggle the price and vanish again, where you wouldn't even get to deal with them without some sort of recommendation or collateral. But this place seemed to go entirely in the other direction. Full anonymity. She had no idea who was selling the stuff here, and probably whoever it was had no idea who was buying it either.
If anything, she'd have expected a black market to be more... black?
The question was just how it would work. Iris was pretty sure she couldn't just snatch up whatever she liked and make a run for it. Either there were spells on the things itself, or more likely, this illusionary place wouldn't even let her go unless she paid what she owed. That, of course, opened the question of whether she could attempt to steal stuff from here through the shadow realm.
Well...
Maybe, if there were any. But probably not even Voldemort would be able to summon shadows within a perfectly white void. So that idea was out. First, she'd have to see if there was anything here she wanted in the first place.
Getting curious, Iris approached the first book to her right, which was labeled Kraft der Gestirne, and picked it up. Or rather, tried to. Instead, her hand was stopped by an invisible force just about a few inches shy of touching it. Well, she supposed there wouldn't be much point to buying the book if you could just read it here without even buying it.
Then, she realized that the moment she had tried to touch the book, a second row of text had appeared beneath the large one.
Richard Stern, 1864
50 G
Holy shit, this was written by Mr. Stern! What was it doing here, then? Wait... it said 1864, not 1964. There was no way he was that old, right?
Well... at least they rounded up the price this time. Also, looking at the price made Iris realize that perhaps she should have brought a bit more than just two hundred Galleons.
Moving on to the next book, past some strange amulets and an entirely black mask, Iris approached the tome and read the title.
Sünden der Väter - Generationenflüche
Curses for entire family generations? What the...
Iris froze as a noise pierced the silence. A faint mumble, humming, something. She whirled around, letting her gaze sweep the area, trying to find the source. It seemed to be coming from nowhere at all. Meaningless words without any coherence, barely audible, but coming from everywhere all at once. But as she kept looking, all she saw was the white void, and the items on display.
"Hello?" Iris whispered carefully.
No reply came. Instead, Iris tried Revelio. This only caused the entire white void to glow purple for a moment, before settling back down again.
The mumbling just continued, the source seemingly just as unable to see her as she it. Iris really didn't like this, but she had no choice but to continue. The alternatives were either leaving or doing something reckless, both were not an option if she wanted to get what she came here for.
She glanced along the rectangles, and noticed what looked like a golden necklace, with a sign displaying the words Amulett des Todeshauchs.
Well, she had been looking for things related to Death, so... Iris reached out and touched the barrier.
Verwesungsfluch - Unaufspürbar
2,500 G
Her eyes almost popped out of their sockets at the price tag. The heavy bag of almost two hundred Galleons suddenly felt light as a feather in her pocket. But also, if she had translated this correctly, this was probably... a cursed object? Enchanted with some sort of... withering curse? Also, it was supposedly undetectable. She wasn't quite sure which parts of these claims justified the insane price tag, but also, this really wasn't why she was here, so she didn't particularly care.
Turning around, Iris froze.
Der Todeshändler
Wait. Was this book about... She didn't know the exact word, but if she split it apart, the first half meant Death. She guessed it could translate either to something like weapons merchant, or... it could be a book about bargaining with Death.
Iris bolted across towards the small floating black rectangle, and inspected the old black leather book resting upon it. A touch revealed the additional words.
Friedrich Grimm, 1825
140 G
Holy crap, this would eat almost her entire budget! But then again, this was exactly what she had come here to find, wasn't it? Well, if it actually was the latter. But... if it was just about a weapons merchant, would it be that expensive?
Decision made; Iris stared at the book. But what to do next? How did she actually... buy it? Well, it was magic, so...
With her hand still resting as close as it could get to the book, she declared, "Ich möchte das hier kaufen."
The book flashed yellow, and suddenly, instead of the book, there was a large set of shiny golden scales, tilted towards the left, whereupon the book rested. The right tray was left empty. It seemed pretty obvious what she had to do. Also, it looked like there would be no haggling the price here.
Since she had spent most of the money in her pocket on fizzy drinks, Iris reached for her backpack and pulled out the bag of Galleons she had brought. She began piling them up one by one, the clinking of each coin piercing the void, and overshadowing the muffled mumbling noise. Slowly, the scales began to tilt towards the center. Only once she had piled exactly 140 galleons into the tray, the needle met the center line and flashed yellow.
Cool. And now what? Hesitantly, Iris reached out, and tried to touch the book again. And this time, there was no resistance. She gripped the leather and slowly lifted it from the scales. This caused the scales to tilt all the way to the right until the tray filled with her Galleons sunk into the black square and disappeared. After a second, so did the entire square. Iris stood, staring down at the book she had just purchased. Had it been worth it? Flipping it open revealed the text to expectantly be entirely written in German. She supposed learning the language would pay off after all.
This place was still giving her the creeps, and also the voices slowly seemed to grow louder, so she quickly shoved the book into her bag and shouldered it once more. Should she cut it there and make off with what she had? Or try and find another book to spend her remaining fifty-something galleons on?
It couldn't hurt to look, right?
Yes. Yes, it definitely couldn't.
Raising the Dead for Dimwits
Emmanuel van Rhodeus, 1325 — neu übersetzt 1944
30 G
Wait, what? Was that what she thought it was? If her theory from first-year held, this was actually written by Emeric the Evil. And it was even in English. But why was it that cheap?
Well, she'd never find out unless she tried it, she supposed. Piling almost the entirety of her remaining Galleons into the scales again, Iris quickly snatched up the book and flipped through the first pages.
Well, at least it started off promising, with what looked like a detailed explanation on how to create Inferi. Pocketing that book as well, she turned to idly scan the remaining squares, in the knowledge that she probably couldn't afford anything else anyway. She moved past an assortment of books on Gegensatzmagie. Whatever that would— Oh, that had to be polarized magic! Damn it. And all of those cost at least fifty Galleons. Maybe she'd come back here some other time again, if she still hadn't managed to bring back Harry by then.
Glancing towards a set of blood-red chalices, she moved past a small golden amulet, only to be forced to do a double-take.
Zeitumkehrer
Below the bold black floating letters rested a small golden round device. It looked a bit like a pocket watch, except it held what looked like an hourglass embedded within the surface, rather than a watch face. Shivering, Iris reached out to touch the thing.
Voll funktionsfähig, Zeitsperre manipuliert, max. 1 Mond
10,000 G
Her hand rebuffed by the invisible force, Iris stared at the price tag. Then back up at the title.
A time-reverser? As in time travel? That was...
That was an option?!
"Holy shit!" Iris whispered.
She had never even considered something like this. It had never occurred to her, because it should be categorically impossible. All her physics books said so.
And yet, she was staring right at it. With her hand this close to the golden hourglass, she knew this was the real deal. Iris had never felt anything like this.
Fucking time travel was real. And wizards could do it.
The past wasn't set in stone after all. She could go back in time. Go back and change it. Go back and save Harry.
If only she had brought ten thousand fucking Galleons. But... if she read the description right, it would go a maximum of One Moon, which was around one month. If that indicated the possible time span, that meant she still had over two weeks. She could leave and come back with the money in a few days.
Iris shifted on her feet in front of the golden thing, staring at it with the intensity of a drowning man in front of a rescue ring. The voices had grown almost deafening now, distinctly female, and instead of random words, seemed to have a certain mantra to them, a repeating phrase, over and over.
But could she afford to let this chance slip her fingers? What if someone else bought it before she came back? Also, did they even have that much money in their vault to begin with? She just remembered seeing that pile of gold that had seemingly filled the whole room, she had no idea how much that actually was in numbers. For all she knew it could be way more than enough, but it might just as well amount to barely a fraction of this ridiculous price tag.
No. It was right there! The one thing that could save Harry, before he even died in the first place. There had to be a way to get it.
Iris knew this was a bad idea. And that she probably still wasn't thinking quite clearly from all the alcohol, but she didn't care. After weeks, this was the first thing that looked like it might actually succeed! Everyone and everything told her that bringing back the dead was impossible—including her own experience on the subject—but she wouldn't have to perform any resurrections, if Harry never died in the first place.
Alright, time to do the impossible again.
Iris cracked her fingers, stepped forward, held her hands above the black square, and closed her eyes. Was it just Force? A physical shield? Iris called blue light, and tried to reach out to nudge the small hourglass, but found herself firmly rebuffed. Opening her eyes to inspect the colors, she saw mostly a firm glow of Yellow, flaring up whenever she tried anything. So it wasn't a spell preventing her from moving it, casting magic or doing specific things. It was Control. It fundamentally prevented theft. That would be an issue. Also, there would be no use confounding it, since it didn't have a mind of its own.
Maybe she could override it then, using a pure Control aspect?
But what spell to use? There was nothing to unlock here. Silencio wouldn't help much. Some spell... that would symbolize her taking possession of this thing. Imperio wouldn't work, both because it didn't have a mind, and because she couldn't summon shadows here. For the same reason, she also couldn't use a dark polarized Accio. Should she try a freeform spell? Like she had done when she had made the defibrillator work...
The mumbling was no longer mumbling, it was words, and distinctly sounding more and more urgent. For a lack of any better ideas, Iris withdrew her wand, pointed it straight at the device, and began to call yellow light.
"Do... don't... Not... Don't... go... do not... away..."
Was this some sort of anti-theft charm, warding her off? Also, why was the voice sounding so familiar?
Well, no matter. Iris took a breath, pinned the hourglass underneath her gaze, and with determination declared, "Mine."
Her wand flashed yellow, and so did the hourglass. A deep rumbling echoed, shook through the room, and the hourglass began to glow and vibrate. A flaring, echoing sound quickly rose, until all of a sudden, the entire white void flashed yellow, and Iris felt an oppressive feeling bear down on her, tear apart her spell, her Control, causing her magic to shatter.
In a blink of an eye, it was over, the room returning to white. The voices quieted down, but they were still there.
Damn it. So it wouldn't be that easy.
But then in the end, the problem wasn't whatever spell was on the device, it was this space itself. And that meant...
Iris held out a hand, and called her orb of iridescent light into it.
A palpable sound of sizzling plasma, of arcing electricity, accompanied with a deep hum drenched the white void, as space itself began to distort around her orb. The room started flickering. All the other squares and objects began distorting into their respective colors in a dizzying real-life display of chromatic aberration.
Iris held her breath. The time-reverser was still sitting there, resting innocently on the black square which was distorting wildly under her chaotic light. Holding the orb right there, she carefully reached out a shaking hand, moving closer and closer until she met the point of resistance. And she pushed right through, as if it weren't even there.
Iris felt her fingers enclose around the cold metal, and a rush of joy flooded her body, only to be immediately drenched by an onslaught of tension and anticipation. What would happen once she let go of her light? Would she have to keep it up all the way out of here?
With shaking hands, she held up the tiny golden hourglass to her face and inspected it. It seemed to be on a sort of swiveling apparatus, allowing her to turn the entire thing within its casing, using the knobs at the side. Should she... try and use it now? Maybe to escape and confuse the magic of this place?
"Do not... Don't DON'T DO IT... go away... don't!"
The voices certainly seemed to disagree. But she had come this far. This was her best shot at saving him.
Moving almost as if on instinct, she drew the chain of the device around her neck, letting her orb float directly in front of her. In this moment, she knew what to do. It was an hourglass, so one turn would be one hour. That meant she'd have to turn it at least three hundred times to be safe. That would be quite a ride. What was the worst that could happen?
"Don't... do not... Stop... NO... DON'T DO IT... Don't—"
Iris finger touched the knob, and she twisted.
If she had thought that this space was surreal before, it was nothing compared to what she saw now. As she kept turning, the hourglass started spinning and flipping in several directions inside the enclosure, and the room began to expand... into a fourth direction. Iris saw herself, countless versions of herself, scattered across time—past and future—each holding an hourglass within the distorted, shimmering void, all staring at it, flipping it endlessly. Everywhere she looked, she saw herself, yet all were standing in exactly the same space.
The tiny hourglass seemed to grow to an incomprehensible size within her hands, filling the void until Iris stood amidst a vast landscape of gears and clockwork, all rotating in a distinct counter-clockwise motion.
The Iris next to her looked up, gasped, and took off running.
So did the one to her other side. One after the other, all the Irises kept dwindling away, until it was just her, standing inside this space of gears and clocks surrounded by a white void. Except the void was no longer white. It had slowly started to dim, and distort. The gears began to creak, and started to slow. Iris looked between her surroundings and the tiny hourglass still in her hands. She desperately kept turning and turning, but the gears ground ever slower, until they came to a screeching halt, and with them, the void had turned entirely black. She could only make out faint shapes of stilled gears in the soft glimmer of her orb, now looking somehow old, worn and rusty.
The sizzling noise of her orb slowly grew in pitch, growing erratic, starting to fling sparks, until in an instant, it was snuffed out, and she was left in absolute darkness.
Someone was here. She didn't know how, or who... No, worse. She did know who, but not how she knew.
In the depths of her mind, the red moon began to flare to life, tearing up the ground, and causing the buildings rested atop it to start to crumble. The green moon responded in kind, both the moons burning in a blinding light, screaming their message into the void, even though Iris refused to hear it.
A pair of blazing red eyes opened before her.
The sole light in the darkness.
She could barely make out an outline, but even that told her that no matter how good the light, she would never be able to comprehend it. Perfect hair, silky smooth skin, and a completely unreal and ethereal body shape upon which no flaws would be tolerated by definition. And yet she could not even make out its gender.
But she knew exactly what it was. Who it was.
"Time... such a curious thing..."
The figure moved, its presence shifting around her in impossible directions. Iris was frozen to the spot, unable to breathe, as the Name began echoing through her mind unrestrained.
"It has been... quite some time..." spoke a voice that defied explanation, originating from somewhere behind her.
Iris felt a gust of breath in her face.
The figure now stood directly before her, reaching out a hand. It stopped inches from her cheek, disappearing into thin air just before contact.
"And I would love to have a chat... But, ironically, it seems we don't have... the time."
Iris felt her grip loosen against her will, her fingers betraying her mind's commands.
She blinked, and in that instant, the time-reverser was gone from her hand. The figure held it, inspecting it curiously before letting it dangle from the chain.
"I shall be... keeping an eye on this... until we meet again."
The hourglass flashed yellow, and with a deep rumble, the gears began moving clockwise. The figure almost smiled. "I'm sure you'll understand."
Faster and faster, the room began to blur around her, all the Iris-copies re-emerging and converging back into her until with a snap, it was over. Iris collapsed onto the ground in the white void, an empty black square looming before her. The voices were gone. So was the figure.
And with it, her best chance of saving Harry.