CHAPTER 33
1:33PM
"So…this is your idea of a party?"
Miranda could only roll her eyes at Harry's responding snort, not bothering to counter.
After a most filthy descent into the Chamber (she could still feel the grime and cobwebs in spite of her numerous Tergeos), the quartet had sloughed their way through alarmingly large piles of skeletons and a disturbingly large shed snake skin, before traversing through a rather long and winding tunnel that brought them into a larger cave.
The floors and walls of which were covered in a plethora of softly glowing runes, three sets of triplicates.
"Well…the good news is that these are not explosive runes. We needn't worry about being blown to high hell should we accidentally step on them." Amy stared at the symbols with a critical eye as her alder wand traced a series of detection spells she'd learned from Lockhart in Team Backdoor.
"And what is the bad news?" Amy winced at Luna's deadpan tone.
"Well…this particular series is water-based." She gestured to the glowing symbols: "Mirrored circular patterns of Laguz on the floor, Úr inverted 180 degrees widdershins on the ceilings, and…Thurisaz as the primary conductor rune connected to both…all rotated 90 degrees clockwise." Harry didn't like the grimace that she wore.
"What exactly does that mean Amy?"
"It means Harry, that if any one of these rune sequences were to be triggered, every bit of rock in here would be transformed into mud that would drown us alive while filling our lungs with watery dirt." Harry just blinked. "If that weren't bad enough, the incorporation of Thurisaz in that particular position - meant to invoke its chaotic aspect - would create downward whirlpools that will not only suck us right in, but will collapse the entire infrastructure of these tunnels…including whatever rooms are situated above it."
"Well, we can't have that now can we?" Luna's sarcastic statement was met with three matching snorts. "So, what's the plan?"
"Dunno. Maybe Harry can hiss at the runes and make them disappear?" Potter rolled his eyes at her cheekiness. It'd been inevitable to reveal his Parseltongue abilities to her due to the nature of their situation. However, he was still Slytherin enough to ensure she swore the necessary secrecy oaths to keep knowledge of his ability to herself. Though he would never admit it out loud, Harry had been rather chuffed to see her amusement at him letting Jim bear the brunt of public discontent at their shared talent.
"No Amy," responded Harry amusedly. "Unfortunately Parseltongue doesn't work that way. Don't even want to try any spells with any of this because I'm quite positive that I would trigger its reaction. We definitely do not need that." Everyone pondered for a few more moments until Amy snapped her fingers in eureka.
"Of course! Ugh Amy you idiot you should've thought of this before!" And with that outburst, she demonstrated to the others how to cast Featherlight Charms on their shoes, exactly like Fred Weasley had done to her and Neville's footwear that fateful day in Greenhouse 3. "It'll allow us to leap over the symbols without triggering them, it should be a breeze getting past all this!"
Naturally, the gods of irony did not take well to that verbal provocation.
Because at the exact moment Miranda finished murmuring "GRAVITAS PENNA" at her loafers, a small mischief of rats seemingly appeared out of nowhere and scampered their way directly onto the floor runes.
Chaos ensued.
BOOM! CRASH! WHOOSH!
THUMP.
Harry only managed a heartbeat of dilated perception to react. Grabbing Amy's hand (as she was the closest to him) he cried "EBUBLIO DUO!", causing a full-body translucent rubber shield to spring protectively around their bodies as a torrential downpour of mud fell upon them and erupted from the ground below. If that wasn't bad enough, the whirlpool vortexes Amy had predicted started to form, dragging them downwards as though it were thick liquid quicksand. As one both recast the full-body rubber shield, pouring quite a bit of their magic into its maintenance as they struggled to kick against the drowning force.
"LUNA! MIRANDA! YOU BOTH ALRIGHT?!" No response. With mounting panic Harry screamed both their names again, sighing in relief when he heard them reply back that they were fine. Luna had been quick to cast a Protego Maxima whilst Miranda had cast a shared Bubblehead Charm over their heads, allowing both witches to breathe as charmed mud rained down upon them. They too struggled to kick against the torrential downward force, hoping to Merlin, Morgana, and Circe that they wouldn't die choking on mud.
"What the hell are we going to do now?! This downpour isn't going to stop anytime soon! And that's if we're lucky enough to not be sucked downwards into mud soup before the entire castle collapses on top of us!"
"Yes Amy, we're very well aware of the situation!" The witchling glared at the side of Harry's head.
"I don't really have any ideas on my end!" Miranda's non-wand hand held on tightly to Luna's own, lest the downward force of the mud vortex dragged them all to hell. She was pleased to feel the younger witch's smaller hand squeeze hers in appreciation.
A series of more disturbing cracks resounded in the ceiling and the floor below as more murky liquid dirt flowed downward with increasing speed. Harry was suddenly reminded of his near-drowning he'd suffered the previous summer, recalling in too sharp detail the horrible sensation of aspirating filthy water into his lungs and choking from lack of oxygen. 'Well,' he thought sardonically, 'at least there's no bloody Grindylows involved this time around.' By his side he heard Amy start to pant in panic, eyes growing wide as the sunk slower and slower to their impending deaths.
Suddenly, the young Potter was struck by an idea. Thinking quickly he pressed his wand to his throat and cast an Amplification Charm so he could be properly heard.
"Alright, so here's the plan: On the count of three, we'll all cast the Propulsion Charm on ourselves out of this mud bath and away from the incident points. Make sure to angle your wands above and slightly behind your bodies so you'll be launched as far away as possible and in the straightest line as possible. Once we're on our feet we'll all cast Duro Maxima simultaneously and turn all this mud into stone. It'll probably be the only thing that prevents this part of the castle from falling into a muddy sinkhole."
"Probably?!" cried Miranda incredulously.
"Yes, probably! Any other ideas?" The older witch hesitated for a moment but shook her mud-drenched head now.
"Right then, are we all ready?!"
Three responding cries of "Ready!" met his statement.
"On my mark, 3…2…1 NOW!"
"ASCENDIO!"
Just as Harry predicted, all four found their bodies shooting straight out of the mud put, almost parallel to the ground as they were flung to the farthest side on the opposite ends of the room. Without any hesitation all four cried out "DURO MAXIMA!", pouring quite a bit of power into their combined spell. relieved to see They repeated the spell thrice more, spreading the magic over the ceilings and the floor. Slowly but surely, they were relieved to see the mud solidifying to stone, blocking off almost all of the cave. Neither side would be able to get to the other any time soon.
"Well?" Miranda's magically amplified voice rang out. "What do we do now? We can't get to each other at this point."
"You and Luna should get out of here, come back the way we came! If the aurors aren't here yet go get Tamsin and have her Floo call as many Board of Directors members as she can. The more of them that we have, the more aurors we'll get. It'll take a while and quite a bit of power to get this wall down, and I'm not too willing to try it now lest we accidentally end up causing an explosion."
"Alright! Are…are you and Amy going to be alright?" Harry gave a small smile at the genuine concern in her voice.
"Yes Miranda, we'll be fine." He heard Amy snort by his side, causing him to roll his eyes. "Go ahead, don't wait for us!"
"Please be careful you two! Promise me you won't die!" Luna's worried voice rang out, rather reedy in her distress. Harry promised that they wouldn't die, lightly nudging Amy when she snorted again.
Soon, the divided group continued their separate paths.
Chamber of Secrets - 2:29PM
A few winding tunnels later, Harry and Amy arrived at their destination.
As tense as she'd ever been the Gryffindor firstie clutched her wand in a death grip, briefly wondering why the hell she hadn't taken Harry's initial offer of returning to the Lions Den to wait for trained aurors who were infinitely more qualified to deal with this sort of madness. 'I guess Gryffindors really do charge on.' Almost as if he'd sensed her tension Harry positioned himself closer and slightly in front of the witchling, holly wand at the ready.
It was with good reason to.
On the inside of the Chamber proper was a long pathway flanked by massive brass snake heads, each of which had water pouring out of its mouth and into a narrow channel on each side of the walkway. Beyond them on either side were massive columns supporting a roof which was so high as to be shrouded in darkness. At the far end of the pathway was a massive and nobly-rendered sculpture of a bearded man that was easily forty feet tall with a huge flowing beard. His features were startingly lifelike; a sharply patrician jaw leading upward to elegantly chiseled cheekbones, topped off with sharp Avada-green eyes (so much like the Potter Twins and their mother). He stood tall and proud, with the same sense of quiet yet all-commanding confidence that Harry often saw in Tom Riddle. To Harry's lingering disappointment, he realized that even the Founder's image had not escaped slander by the Ministry – the man's face showed nothing of the "monkey-like" description that was in all the official depictions of him, written and portrait-alike.
However, that wasn't the most disturbing sight in the Chamber.
Right underneath the statue of the man were three figures, all three of whom were unconscious.
The first was Ronald Weasley, who looked to be suspended in animation floating a few feet above the floor. He was deathly pale, eyes tightly shut in seeming distress. His limbs hung loosely at his side while his head lolled to the right, in odd resemblance to an inert ventriloquist dummy. The second was Jim Potter, who was suspended upside down and wrapped in an odd cocoon-like substance. There was a horrible bruise on his cheek, as though a fist had been slammed directly into his face. Unbidden, a feeling of anger sprung within Harry at the sight.
The final figure was a tall and very well-built blonde man, bearing a strong and toned physique not unlike that of a muggle rugby player. He was very well styled, dressed in traditional wizarding robes of impeccable cut and obviously luxurious materials. He was elegantly seated in a small chair, long legs crossed at the ankles while he seemingly dozed off. As odd as all that was, nothing was odder than the man's overall appearance; he resembled a blurred photograph, like a still from one of his mother's old time movies that flickered in and out of focus. Squinting to activate the zoom feature of his glasses, Harry noticed something rather disturbing: a thin gossamer line stretching out of Ron Weasley's forehead connecting to the strange man (whom Harry was definitely convinced was some iteration of the Dark Lord), seemingly the source of his ghost-like appearance.
"Bloody hell is going on here?!" whispered Amy urgently.
"I honestly don't know," whispered Harry in response. "From what I can see the man sitting in the chair is a projection, seemingly coming out of Ron's head." Amy's eyes goggled in alarm. Harry could only grimace in response, the only emotion he allowed himself to show behind the sanctuary of his Occlumency shields. He would need every shred of calm confidence he could muster to get them all out alive.
"Not sure at all, but I imagine we're going to be getting some answers soon enough. Stay beside me." The Gryffindor nodded in agreement, further tightening the grip on her wand.
The two steadily approached, hackles further rising when the blonde blurred man didn't bother to register them drawing nearer. About three-quarters of the way the eyes of the strange man suddenly flashed open to regard them. Study them. Absorb them. His eyes - Harry noted - were a light watery blue, though they looked to be burning with an intense rat-like intensity that made the young wizard immediately nervous. After a few moments he smiled rather genially, revealing a row of what looked to be very white teeth that veered just north of sharp for it to be uncomfortable. Suddenly he clapped his hands loudly, his entire expression lighting up with seemingly boyish delight.
"Welcome you two! So pleased you were finally able to make it!" He smiled once more, and Harry was struck by how…easy-going and charming he looked and seemed. If he didn't resemble an out-of-focus faded photograph, Harry imagined he would've been at ease in the man's presence.
"Please, come come come!"
Neither was stupid enough to entertain the offer.
"Oh for Merlin's sake, I'm not going to bite you." The man rolled his eyes in irritation, exasperatedly amused.
"Would've thought otherwise with those creepily sharp teeth of yours." He blinked at Amy's snide statement, before throwing his head back in disturbingly high-pitched laughter. Harry and Amy exchanged a concerned glance.
"Oh you are clever Ms. Wilkes, truly your father's daughter." The witchling stiffened as her eyes narrowed dangerously. Before she could rudely respond Harry interjected:
"You seem to know our names, but we don't know yours."
"Oh pardon me! I'm never one to be rude. Rex Norvergicus, at your humble service." He bowed deeply from seated position as Harry grimaced at having his suspicions confirmed.
"...The Rat King? You've got to be bloody joking." Amy sneered, causing Harry to subtly nudge her. The girl's persistently Gryffindor snipes would be bound to get them killed sooner than they would need to.
"Yes my dear, the Rat King. Or…if you prefer to be more informal, I also go by the 'Dark Lord', 'He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named', 'You-Know-Who' blah blah blah." Rex rolled his eyes for effect. "Quite frankly I've always thought all of those hyphens seem too tedious an effort for the tongue. Rex Norvergicus on the other hand…as succinct as it is accurate. Wouldn't you two agree?" Two deadpan expressions were his answer. For his part Harry aimed at keeping the Dark Lord's attention on him, subtly attempting to edge Amy away from the madman's line of sight and into one of the room's corners.
"Sure…to a degree. But I must ask; you look vastly different from the last time we crossed paths. Less hideously balding rat-man hybrid." Rex Norvergicus glared furiously at that statement, his expression becoming so tightly wound Harry feared his teeth would snap. In an instant his expression smoothed out perfectly, as though his pique of anger had never even existed.
"Indeed I do Potter Minor." He was amicable. Too amicable. "This fine form you see before you is actually the true visage of my being; strong…powerful…capable…whole. Alas I can say my previous appearance was a consequence of events far beyond my control. Mainly," he snarled, "caused by you and your WRETCHED BROTHER!" Harry rolled his eyes with deliberate affect, still projecting the calm confidence he didn't feel.
"Wretched-smetched." He sneered rudely. "I don't really care much for whatever 'form' you wear, I could honestly care less about how a murderous dark lord who kidnaps children for sport - twice! - chooses to present himself. What I do find curious is how you even have a remaining form to begin with. Last I recall my brother and I burned you to a very well done crisp, and unless you're telling me you found the means to reanimate corpse dust, I have a very hard time believing that you even are the Dark Lord. Especially since you look like a poorly developed wizarding photograph. I've seen ghosts who look better than you." He sneered once more, baring quite a bit of his teeth in aggression to really drive his affected disdain home.
Harry's gambit was working; You-Know-Who looked so incensed Amy was surprised ghostly steam wasn't coming out of his ears. His intense emotion made the ephemeral link between himself and Ron Weasley become even more visible, surprising the young witch. 'Looks like he's coming out of Weasley's head! Blimey!' Even worse, Ron's unconscious face tightened in a grimace, as though the man's wrath were causing him pain. 'More than likely is, probably leeching off the poor bloke.' In that moment she wished she were a Legilimens so she could communicate her thoughts to Harry without the madman before them overhearing. Said psychopath was still fuming, his expression suddenly shifting from man to…something else. Something heinously non-human. Something… rat-like.
"As I said before, Potter, my previous form wasn't my normal one. You and your brother may have killed Professor Quirrell, but you certainly didn't kill me."
"Yeah, it seems that way. Just like Jim didn't kill you the last time you two crossed paths. Blew you to smithereens of course, hence you being vanquished and all that." Norvegicus growled. "But no, I guess that doesn't count as killing does it? So how are you here, right now? Haunting Ron? Got one of your lackeys to implant a recording in his head so you can spookily not scare us yourself?" The older wizard snarled maliciously, before his expression smoothed to one of stone.
Gesturing with his left hand, Harry and Amy witnessed Ron's wand arm lift in response, like a ventriloquist commanding his puppet. Both tensed at the action, ready to retaliate if need be. With a sweeping gesture Ron's wand levitated a quill out of his pocket, allowing it to float to hover smack dab in the middle of both groups.
"A quill." Harry's tone was deadpan. "Is this some sort of madman's metaphor? 'The pen is mightier than the sword' or some similar sort of rubbish?"
"Yes…and no." You-Know-Who's tone was light, playful even. A clear mismatch to the cruelly malicious expression he wore. "You see, this, this is one of the many keys to my persistence."
"Your persistence? What - did you shove your blackened soul into that thing or something?" To Amy's shock the man looked scandalized.
"Absolutely not! What do you think I am, an amateur?!" He shook his head in disgust. "Morgana's sake I would not dabble in the muck that is the necromantic arts just so I could make something as vulnerable and inherently unstable as a horcrux." Harry filed that term away for later. "Please, it would be a complete waste of a perfectly good murder." Now it was Amy's turn to look scandalized. "There are other, much much better ways to lengthen the terms of one's life."
"I am not certain what that has to do with a quill."
"Patience Potter Minor, I am getting to that." He turned his watery blue eyes to the still-levitating feather. "You see, this creation is an amalgamation of my ancestor's brilliance and that of Erasmus Wilkes."
"Excuse me?! What does my dead dad have to do with anything?!"
"Erasmus was one of the foremost scholarly minds I've ever come across, a true generation-defining brilliance. Made even more exceptional by his impeccable grasp of Dark Magic coupled with his mastery of Parselmagic. While I found some of his exploits to be a touch…juvenile at times, his intellectual prowess more than made up for his infantile proclivities. In spite of all that, Erasmus thirsted for knowledge that he did not possess. Knowledge…of Wild Magic." Harry felt the hairs on his neck rise. "I shared with him the knowledge of my ancestors, and in turn, he granted me a few tokens of his deep appreciation. Conduits I could utilize, should my true form - the body you see before you - was to fall victim to any severe magical damage."
"And how does that differ from shoving your soul into an object again?" Rex Norvergicus just rolled his eyes at Amy's snide question.
"It differs, brat, because it allows me to…mentally connect with anyone who utilizes them. The very second I established a mind-link with Weasley here and communicated with him…our fates were entwined and our differing paths converged until they became one. Until they became mine. Every whispered mental command, every action I prompted him to commit strengthened our bond, forged it in the strength of my power. Oh he fought me back on occasion, that great lion's strength struck back quite a few times. Alas, it was to no great avail as I gorged myself on his weaknesses and insecurities. What better way than to control him…groom him…consume him…" His eyes swam with malevolence. "Such delightful sustenance this little Weasley whelp has been, quite filling!" It took every bit of mental strength for Harry to choke down his bile.
"So you're telling us you…what? Had Ron go around holding the quill while you puppeteered him around like a helpless ragdoll?"
"Potter Minor, please don't insult me. This is a blood quill. An undetectable compulsion charm was just enough to ensure that the object would be used appropriately. And Ron Weasley here wrote many a tale!" He gestured to the boy's rolled up sleeves as a fiendish Chi-chi-chi-chi of rat-like laughter flowed out of his mouth. The two students could only stare in varying states of appalment.
Harry squinted once more, running his eyes over Ron's exposed arms. There were several flesh-toned markings that stood out sharply against his skin, like miniature brandings. They looked like runes, but none that he could recognize. None were Futhark, neither Elder or Younger. There was a keen familiarity to those symbols, and Harry raked through his memories to recall exactly when and where he'd seen them before.
It came to him in a flash: Pandora Lovegood's ritual, specifically the 13 pages of hand-written notes bearing the exceedingly strange runic text that he hadn't been able to make out. Like before, utilizing his unique legilimens ability to focus on the symbols made his eyes swim and the strange sensation of something seemingly imperceptible crawl up his neck. Something rather…blasphemous. "What is that language?" he asked urgently.
"Oh nothing much. Just a bit of…Verbis Diablo to spice things up."
"...The Devil's Tongue? Are you being facetious or do you think us to be idiots?"
"Indeed Potter Minor, Verbis Diablo. It is a…non-conventional language that you would very rarely, if ever, come across in your standard studies. Certainly not in Hogwarts and certainly less so in a Second Year's curriculum. Dumbledore's always been rather testy about those sorts of things, philistine." He rolled his eyes in seeming annoyance. "Anywho… it is, in its own way, a rather sacred language, often associated with Wild Magic. Specifically…the Dark Wild." Dread wormed up Harry's spine, recalling the last time he and Team Mysterioso had crossed paths with the horrors of that Merlin-forsaken realm.
"And the Parseltongue? Did you use the quill to get him to speak snake language as well?"
"Oh no Ms. Wilkes, that was purely your father's doing. Erasmus didn't mind a bit of blood magic so long as he could have a bit of fun with the result. He inscribed a unique transference spell of his own creation into the quill's vane, before coating it with exactly one drop of his blood. Repeated use of the quill allowed the blood - activated by the aforementioned spell - to mingle with that of the user. The transference spell allowed for temporary morphic resonance, making it possible for the quill's user to become a Speaker. I imagine Erasmus believed it to be personally amusing, for whatever deranged reason." It took considerable effort for the young Wilkes to not gawk at the Dark Lord calling anyone (even her admittedly demented father) deranged.
Harry needed the specter to keep speaking. "Well that's just odd isn't it? How is it possible for someone literally named 'Rat King' to mentally command an individual using Parseltongue? Snakes eat rats, consume them, remember?"
"Meh." The Dark Lord casually shrugged. "That bit was rather easy to overcome. I had Ron inscribe a barrier spell into his flesh that served as a unique psychic buffer, inhibiting my natural response to being in such close proximity to a Speaker. Made it rather easy when commanding the Speaker to command a rather large and deadly snake to wreak absolute havoc on the idiots, riff-raff, and sheer imbeciles loitering about in this failed institution."
At this point, Harry had successfully inched his and Amy's body as close to Jim's as possible without being entirely obvious. If he timed it just right, he could cut his brother down and hit him with a Rennervate. Harry surmised his brother's wand was more than likely in Ron's pocket if the handle poking out of his left pocket was any indication. With a properly timed Dilation, he could Accio Jim's ash wand to him and together, all three of them could potentially overcome Ron and make a break for it before he awoke again. That he had a basilisk under his possessed control made the situation all the more urgent. 'The aurors can deal with the rest of this nonsense.'
Unfortunately, it seemed that the Dark Lord did in fact notice, because the Dark Lord's projection blinked away as Ron's eyes suddenly flashed opened as his wand blurred.
"DEPULSsSO!" With a sharp slash of his wand Amy was buffeted away from Harry, magically propelled to crash into the left-side wall. A rapid-fire Incarcerous, Stupefy, and Expelliarmus rendered the witch confined, unconscious, and wandless.
'Drat.' With that thought, Harry Dilated his perception and attempted to respond.
THUMP.
Waddiwassi, Expelliarmus, and Flipendo poured out of Harry's wand, and he watched with somewhat morbid fascination as his spells slowly raced towards an unblinking Ron.
THUMP.
He successfully blocked all three, and with a speed that seemingly outpaced his the younger Potter's Dilation, a flurry of Parsel-enhanced Laceros rained down relentlessly upon the Slytherin. He blocked and averted a fair few, but it wasn't enough. Four got through, slicing through his upper wand arm, his thigh, one against his right cheek, and another directly across his chest. The pain was maddening and Harry stumbled, dropping to his knee as he attempted to respond.
It wouldn't be enough.
Like with Amy, Harry soon found himself silenced, bound, and wandless as he floated to hover face-to-face with a possessed Ron Weasley. Seeing him up close and under the Dark Lord's control was absolutely unnerving; his expression was frightfully malignant as his cold burning eyes - now mostly all black like a rat's - stared unblinkingly into Harry's own. Or at least tried to. Harry made sure to keep his gaze leveled at Weasley's nose so he wouldn't be entrapped in the ginger boy's gaze.
"Well well. Someone's been practicing." Ron's high pitched voice sounded amused as he leaned closer to a struggling Harry. "Hm…you're occluding quite heavily, impressive in spite of the pain that you're in." Dark-Ron tilted his head curiously, expression unreadable. "Your brother is an absolute imbecile, a bumbling blight upon my existence that literally…disappointingly…infuriatingly…posed a threat upon my life. I will be killing him, if that wasn't clear to you already. You, however…you fascinate me." Harry swallowed down his apprehension at that ominous statement. "We seem to have quite a bit in common, and I'm not just speaking about the great nuisance that is the Boy-Who-Lived's continued existence." Harry snorted in spite of himself, causing Ron to titter out a diabolical chi-chi-chi-chi.
"Well, I could spend the rest of my very limited time telling you about the ways we're similar. But…I do believe that would be rather…futile. In fact…why not simply just…show you?" Harry's eyes lightly widened in alarm as he struggled against his bonds and fought to keep staring at Ron's nose and not his eyes. "Ah, not looking at me eh? I can rectify that quite easily enough. CRUCcCIO!"
Sheer agony.
It was the only sensation that bloomed across all of Harry's senses as his mouth opened in a silent scream. He trashed in his bindings to no avail, fighting a failing fight against the horrific strength of the Parsel-enhanced curse. It felt as though acid ran through his bloodstream and danced across his skin, leaving a trail of raw flesh in its wake. His eyes felt as though they were on fire, burning from the inside out. He couldn't breathe, couldn't allow himself to consider the action of breathing because the pain was entirely too great for him to risk it. His nose dripped blood as the curse forced its delicate capillaries to burst.
After what felt like a lifetime the curse finally lifted and Harry's entire body slumped in a semblance of mild relief, though phantoms of pain still caused his body to spasm. Unbidden, his head jerked up to look directly into Dark-Ron's own, who smiled poisonously.
"That, Potter Minor, was a mere demonstration. Six seconds, impressive that a puny Second Year survived that, much less is still lucid enough to pay attention." Harry swallowed back the first three insults that sprouted on his tongue. He wanted to live long enough to be able to use it. "As I'm sure you've surmised, that was purely demonstration." A jerk of his wand forced Harry's head to remain stationary, and - to the boy's mounting horror - forced his eyes to look directly into the redhead's own. "This, however, is the true show - LEGILIMENS!"
AN 1: More on Verbis Diablo will be expanded upon soon enough. And yes, it is influenced by Penny Dreadful.
AN 2: The runic sequence described in this scene is entirely of my own making due to the little research I cobbled together regarding Elder & Younger Futhark. I am not really certain how rune-working is meant to work, so apologies in advance if my interpretation reads like complete gibberish.
AN 3: My interpretation of Peter Pettigrew/Rex Norvergicus doesn't really lend to Rafe Spall as the actor I envision for the role. In his stead, I am picturing Dan Stevens (specifically in The Guest) as my Peter Pettigrew.