Chapter 67: De-petrified, Unknown Stabber, and Marauder's Map.
If you want to read ahead, you can check out my Patreón @
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The link is also in the synopsis.
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It was weird to wake up from petrification, thought Ivy Potter as she looked at the hospital wing ward from her bed. One moment she was looking around the corner through mirrors just to make sure there wasn't a gigantic snake waiting for her, but then she saw acid-yellow eyes in the mirror, and everything went black.
The advice saved her life even though she didn't like the source of the said advice.
She was miffed that she was taken out twice in a single day. Once by Quinn West and then by the Basilisk later that day. It was a weird thought to have after being petrified and coming as close to death as she had been, but for Ivy, those events were the last memories she had before the petrification.
There was no fear or dread when she was petrified as the petrification from Basilisk was instant. It didn't give Ivy a chance to feel anything at all. Sure she woke up with a slight scream of terror because she could remember the Basilisk, but what she saw was her mother standing by her bed, hugging her tightly.
Ah, she was petrified, were her thoughts. It felt almost anticlimactic, being petrified by the deadliest snake in the world. The only thing she didn't like was the stiffness in her body from no activity for weeks, but Madam Pomfrey cured it in a jiffy.
Ivy's first worry came when she remembered Hermione was with her and asked what happened to her best friend. She was told that the students were being released from their petrified state one every half hour so that Madam Pomfrey could have ample time to check if something was wrong before moving on to the next student.
Ivy was the second last to be cured, and Hermione was after her, making Hermione the last student to be given the mandrake juice.
The bushy-haired witch's first reaction was funny. She woke with a yell of "Bullocks!" That was something Ivy wasn't expecting from a person who always chided Ron for his language.
Then Ivy was told that the Heir of Slytherin took her into the Chamber of Secrets. Harry and Ron had gone in there to save her. It made her feel grateful to her brother and childhood friend.
The two dummies had ventured into the Chamber of Secrets just for her. There was no way that her heart didn't feel warm for the two. She forgave them for being so annoying all the time.
Then came the tough part where the now reinstated Headmaster told the students before them that the Slytherin's monster had petrified them for months. It wasn't a nice thing to see when Colin Creevey found he had lost a big chunk of his first year at Hogwarts or when Susanna Heselden found she missed out on crucial time in school during her O.W.L year.
Justin Finch-Fletchley yelled that they should kick her brother Harry out of Hogwarts. But the Headmaster explained to him that Harry wasn't the Heir of Slytherin and the whole incident was because of a dark magic artifact that opened the Chamber of Secrets but didn't go into detail.
Ivy thought that she and Hermione were lucky because they were only out for a few weeks and didn't lose time on the level as the others did.
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- (Scene Break) -
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Ivy, Hermione, Harry, and Ron sat huddled in Harry's bed in the Gryffindor boys' dormitory. The curtains around the poster bed were drawn, providing privacy to the golden squad. It was the first time since Ivy and Hermione were waken up from petrification that the four had sat down together to talk about what happened.
"Let's start," Ivy spoke to her friends. She was leaning against the headboard of the bed. "Tell us what happened down in the chamber."
Harry and Ron looked at each other before Harry started telling the events that transpired.
"We found the parchment in Hermione's clutches and immediately found the information about the Basilisk in it. Then there was the note on it which said that Moaning Myrtle knew about the location of the Chamber of Secrets."
"Then it clicked in my head," Harry explained, "That if the Basilisk could kill with its gaze, then the what if the girl who died the last time the Chamber of Secrets was opened never left the place which she died. What if she was there the whole time?"
Ivy and Hermione's eyes widened as they understood. Harry, who saw the expression, nodded.
"Moaning Myrtle was the girl killed by the Basilisk last time the Chamber of Secrets was opened," Harry recalled the conversation he had with the ghost. Ron, who was on the side, nodded. "Myrtle said that she was crying in a stall when she heard a boy making strange sounds while Myrtle was in the lavatory and when Myrtle stepped out, all Myrtle saw were big yellow eyes before she died."
Hermione had a strange thought that she decided to put out.
"Do you think glasses provide protection against Basilisk's glare?" Hermione asked, wondering about the information Quinn had given her and Ivy. "I mean, look at all of us who got petrified; we all saw the Basilisk's eyes indirectly. Shouldn't meeting the Basilisk's eyes through the glass count as looking at it indirectly?"
Ivy shook her head in disapproval, "I don't think so. In every case this time, the Basilisk's eyes were seen through reflections. Water, mirrors, and viewfinder, all of which showed reflections of the eyes. And, Creevey saw the Basilisk through a ghost; I don't think we can take ghost bodies and glasses as the same thing."
She looked at Harry and thought of something.
"And, even if glasses do provide protection against death by glare, then I don't think Myrtle was wearing glasses at that time."
Hermione frowned and questioned, "Why do you think that? Myrtle's ghost always has glasses on, which means she had glasses when she was alive."
"Harry said that she was crying when she was in the lavatory," Ivy jutted her chin towards Harry and said, "I have seen him cry. He always removes his glasses when he cries. I mean, doesn't everyone who wears glasses remove their glasses when they cry. So, it is reasonable to think that Myrtle wasn't wearing her glasses at that time."
Harry, who was telling them the ordeal he went through, was flabbergasted when the two girls started to talk about him crying. How did they go from Basilisk and Chamber of Secrets to him crying?
"Alright, stop talking about me crying. I don't cry," Harry said so that they could move on from the current topic and spoke the last words with some weight as if insisting on them. "Let's move on."
Ivy and Hermione giggled while Ron chuckled as he looked at his best mate. Harry felt heat rush to his cheeks and hurriedly spoke.
"So, when we asked about what she saw that day. Myrtle pointed at the sink right in front of the toilet she haunts. And, when we searched the sink, Ron found a tap with a snake on it."
Harry gave Ron a thumbs up before turning back to the girls and revealed.
"There is something that you don't know about this year is that I have been hearing voices." Harry winced when he saw Hermione and Ivy glared at him.
Ivy massaged her temple and spoke in a voice that clarified that she was holding back her anger. "I have said this a lot through the year, and I can stress this enough, but you are really an idiot! Do you know what you just-..! If you had just told us-..!"
Ivy and Hermione had gone into Quinn West's office and got caught by him and were blackmailed into being under his debt. Ivy was sure that either she or Hermione would have figured out the monster's identity with that piece of information.
And while Ivy didn't know if she would have broken into Quinn West's space. Ivy was sure she wouldn't have asked West for the monster's identity, and that would have saved her from doing a job for him.
Harry remained quiet for a while and observed his two female friends. He waited for them to calm down before continuing.
"Well, then I spoke to the tap in Parseltongue, and the whole sink came disappeared and left behind a huge hole which was the entrance to a tunnel that I think went down below Hogwarts."
He remembered the entire tunnel ride into the Chamber of Secrets. With him trying to stifle his screams and Ron loudly screaming as he slid behind him.
"When I reached the Chamber of Secrets, I saw an unconscious student there." Harry stopped to recall his name. "His name is Terence Higgins, a Slytherin."
Ivy and Hermione noticed Harry didn't show his usual reaction when he talked about Slytherin. Harry would show signs like a shallow frown or a wrinkled of his nose. But right now, he didn't show any of those. Even Ron didn't snort in derision or snarl things like bloody snakes.
Ivy even saw light sympathy in her twin's eyes. That was new, she thought.
"So, Terence Higgins was the Heir of Slytherin," Hermione asked the question.
Harry shook his head and revealed. "No, Higgins wasn't the Heir of Slytherin," he looked at the two girls and spoke, "Voldemort was the Heir of Slytherin."
Ivy and Hermione's eyes widen at the revelation.
"What do you mean Voldemort was the Heir of Slytherin?!" Hermione's voice fully expressed her shock.
"Terence Higgins was being controlled by Voldemort. Voldemort possessed him and opened the Chamber of Secrets and released the Basilisk."
Hermione was still frowning as she asked, "But, how did he possess Higgins?"
A haunted look flashed on Harry's face as he explained, "He used Tom Riddle's diary to possess Terence Higgins."
"What do you mean?"
Harry got up from his bed and walked to his desk. He picked up a piece of parchment and quill from his table and wrote something on it.
After staring at the parchment for a while, he returned to the bed. The parchment went to the middle of the bed.
Ivy, Hermione, and Ron leaned forward to look at the parchment.
*
[
[ TOM MARVALO RIDDLE ]
[ I AM LORD VOLDEMORT ]
]
*
Every letter of the first line was connected to the letters of the second line with arrowed lines.
Ivy, Hermione, and Ron were shocked to see the words transform into Voldemorts' name.
"An anagram," gasped Hermione.
"Yes, Tom Riddle was Voldemort," Harry's face was pale as he stared at the parchment. "There was a memory of Tom Riddle in that diary which could manipulate people who wrote on it."
The other three understood what that meant. Harry had that diary for some time, and in that time, he had become withdrawn and something of a recluse. Harry was under the control of Tom Riddle's diary, and they could see how that knowledge was affecting Harry. A slight change in events, and Harry could have been lying in the Chamber instead of Terence Higgins.
"Tom Riddle was the one who opened the Chamber the last time," Harry told them about the memories that Riddle had shown him. "He didn't want Hogwarts to close because of Myrtle's death, so he blamed Hagrid for it, and everyone believed it because of Aragog."
Harry then proceeded to tell them about his struggle with the Basilisk and how Fawkes, the phoenix, helped him by blinding the Basilisk and how the Sorting hat gave him the sword of Gryffindor.
"... Fawkes cried on my wound and healed them and then burst into flames. I was so scared that he died, but it turned it was just a burning day. It is normal for phoenixes, and Fawkes had exerted himself enough to trigger a rebirth from ashes."
The other three listened with silent attention. Taking in every word coming out of Harry's mouth. It wasn't every day when they heard a tale from a person who fought the Basilisk and lived to tell the fable.
"What happened after that?" asked Ron, engrossed in the story.
"Oh, then I passed out."
"You passed out?!" The same sentence came from the mouth of the three listeners.
Harry scratched the back of his head and ruffled, "Well, I had just been bitten by a Basilisk after I drove a sword through its head. I think it is normal for anyone to pass out after that."
"But what happened to the young Voldemort? Did he escape?" asked Ivy.
Harry shook his head and revealed something that surprised all.
"That is the thing. When I woke up to baby Fawkes's loud chirps, I saw that Riddle's diary had a Basilisk fang stabbed into the diary." Harry said the sentence like he couldn't figure it out. "Riddle said that he was going to use Higgin to come back to life, but when I woke up, he was still alive, and Riddle wasn't anywhere to be seen."
"But, that doesn't mean that Voldemort is gone. What if he escaped?! What is he is out there right now?!" exclaimed Ivy. Voldemort being out there scared her a lot.
Harry shook his head and refuted Ivy's worries, "Professor Dumbledore told me that when the diary was stabbed with the Basilisk fang, the memory of Tom Riddle inside was destroyed. He assured me that Tom Riddle didn't return to life. He was destroyed with the diary."
Ivy, Hermione, and Ron breathed a sigh of relief at that. Dumbledore's assurance was all they needed to believe that Voldemort wasn't returning as Tom Riddle.
"What I don't understand is that who stabbed the diary. There wasn't anyone in the Chamber other than Riddle and I." Harry glanced at Ron and said. "Neither did Ron see anyone entering the Chamber."
Ivy and Hermoine shot quick and discreet glances at each other.
Someone entered the Chamber, he says? Which meant that someone knew the Chamber's location. And, both of them knew someone who fit that description.
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- (Scene Break) -
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"Hey, Ivy?" muttered Hermione as the two climbed down the stairs from the boys' dormitory to the common room. "Do you think..."
"It might be him," answered Ivy. "But we can't be sure. It could be entirely someone else."
Both girls knew who they were talking about. The person who had given them the information about the Basilisk knew the Chamber's location.
"I am sure that even if we asked him. He would deny everything," added Ivy.
Hermione nodded at that.
"What about the payment? What do we about it?"
The two girls exited the staircase as Ivy answered. "We need to get West what he wanted. I don't know what he will do if we don't get him the Marauder's Map."
She jutted her chin across the common room and spoke, "And we are going to do it now."
Hermione looked in the direction Ivy pointed at and saw the Weasley twins huddled together in one corner.
The two walked over to the twins, and Ivy spoke,
"Fred, George, we need to talk."
Weasley twins looked up from whatever they were doing and spoke in their usual twin-speak.
"Ivy," "Hermione," "What can we" "do for you today?"
Ivy wasted no time and got to the point.
"I want you to give me the Marauder's Map."
The identical twins made identical expressions of surprise. They looked at each other before staring at Ivy and asked.
"Why do you" "want the map?" "No, let us ask," "How did you know" "about the map?"
Ivy sighed as she answered, "My father is part of Marauders. He told me about the map. Now, give it to me."
The Weasley twins' jaw dropped as I stunned them at the sudden revelation.
"James Potter," "Senior Auror," "Is a Marauder?" "You must be joking!"
"No, he is Prongs. Do you know about that name?" she said, giving them proof her father was a part of the Marauders.
The twins nodded in unison and perfect coordination.
"Good, so now give me the map. I really need it."
Fred, or maybe it was George, took out a folded parchment from his pocket and handed it to Ivy.
The daughter of Prongs took the parchment and awkwardly stared at it as she didn't know what it was. She licked her lips before asking the twins."Dad didn't tell me what it was or how it works," she spoke. "Tell me about it."
'Ah, I should have given this more thought,' she thought simultaneously.
Fred took the map from Ivy's hands and laid it on the floor. He gestured his twins and the girls to stand facing towards the wall to create a barrier.
"This, Ivy, is the secret of our success," said Fred, patting the parchment, fondly.
"It's a wrench, giving it to you," said George, "but your father did make it, so we guess it can't be helped."
"Anyway, we know it by heart," said Fred. "We bequeath it to you. We don't really need it anymore."
Ivy and Hermione noticed that the twin-speak had gone down. Even though they spoke in turns, they weren't completing each other's sentences.
'The map must be genuinely important to them,' she thought.
"Ah, we got emotional," said George, wiping an imaginary tear with his finger. "Explain, Fred."
"Well... when we were in our first year, Ivy - young, carefree, and innocent -"
Ivy snorted. She doubted whether Fred and George had ever been innocent.
"-well, more innocent than we are now - we got into a spot of bother with Filch."
"We let off a Dungbomb in the corridor, and it upset him for some reason-" "-So, he hauled us off to his office and started threatening us with the usual -." "-Detentions, disembowelment. It was then -," "- we couldn't help noticing a drawer in one of his filing cabinets marked Confiscated and Highly Dangerous."
"Don't tell me -" gasped Hermione. Ivy gave her friend a side look, the rule-abiding witch had stolen from Snape; why was she acting so shocked now.
'Not that I am the one to talk,' thought Ivy, having stolen from Filch.
"George caused a diversion by dropping another Dungbomb. I whipped the drawer open and grabbed - this." pointing at the folded parchment.
"It's not as bad as it sounds, you know," said George. "We don't reckon Filch ever found out how to work it. He probably suspected what it was, though, or he wouldn't have confiscated it."
"And you know how to work it?" asked Ivy, getting curious about the parchment's functionality.
"Oh yes," said Fred, smirking. "This little beauty's taught us more than all the teachers in this school."
"Get to the point," sighed Ivy.
George smiled as he took out his wand, touched the parchment lightly, and said,
"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."
And at once, thin ink lines began to spread like a spider's web from the point that George's wand had touched. They joined each other, they crisscrossed, they fanned into every corner of the parchment; then words began to blossom across the top, great, curly words, that proclaimed:
[
「Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs Purveyors of Aids to Magical Mischief-Makers are proud to present -」
「THE MARAUDER'S MAP.」
]
It was a map showing every detail of the Hogwarts castle and grounds. But the truly remarkable thing was the tiny ink dots moving around it, each labeled with a name in minuscule writing.
Astounded, Ivy and Hermione bent over it.
A labeled dot in the top left corner showed that Professor Dumbledore was pacing his study; the caretaker's cat, Mrs. Norris, was prowling the second floor; and Peeves, the Poltergeist, was currently bouncing around the trophy room. And as Ivy's eyes traveled up and down the familiar corridors, she noticed something else.
This map showed a set of passages she had never entered.
"Hidden passages are littered around Hogwarts," said Fred and George continued for him, "Passages that go out to Hogsmeade, or passages that connect different parts of the castle."
"Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs," sighed George, patting the heading of the map. "We owe them so much."
"Noblemen, working tirelessly to help a new generation of lawbreakers," said Fred solemnly.
"Right," said George briskly. "Don't forget to wipe it after you've used it -" "- or anyone can read it," Fred said warningly.
"Just tap it again and say," "Mischief managed!" "And it'll go blank."
Ivy traced her finger on the map as if trying to find someone, and finally, her finger stopped on the fifth floor, in the West corner, at a certain classroom.
「Quinn West」
George saw Ivy's finger stopping on Quinn's name. "Ah, little lord West -" "- the information broker, the all-knowing Ravenclaw." completed Fred.
"Now that I remember, he knows about the map, doesn't he, my less handsome twin?"
"Yes, he does. It was a big surprise, wasn't it?"
Ivy looked at them with shock and said, "You two know that he knows about the map?"
"Oh, yes. We don't know how West knows about it -" "- but he does. It was a surprise back then, but now?-" "- now it just seems normal given that he seems to know everything."
Fred and George had plenty of interaction with the Quinn West. They regularly employed Quinn West for testing out their trick potions. It was a boon for them because they didn't need to check the trick/prank potions on themselves.
The twins didn't know how he did it, but Quinn West would modify the potion recipes and return recipes that would be better than before and perfectly safe to consume with no lasting effects. Perfect for prank potions.
"We occasionally have tried to follow him -" "- but he would always slip away from us." "He probably knows the castle-" "-as well as we do."
The twins saluted and said in unison, "We can respect that."
"So, young ladies," said Fred, in an uncanny impersonation of Percy, "mind you behave yourself."
"See you girls later," said George, winking.
The twins bounced away, leaving behind Ivy and Hermione with the map with them.
It was time to go back to the place they were held captive and talk to the devil.
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Harry Potter - Boy-who-lived - After being bitten by the Basilisk, that is.
Ron Weasley - Didn't do much - But, props for bravery.
Ivy Potter - Nani Intensifies! - Obtained [Marauder's Map] x1
Hermione Granger - Un-petrified - Bullocks!
Fred and George - Weasley Twins - ... Goodbye, map - Man, they are superb guys, aren't they?!
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Chapter 68: Payment, Simple, and Returning Home
If you want to read ahead, you can check out my Patreón @
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The link is also in the synopsis.
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Even though she had only been to this part of the fifth floor twice, it was one of her least favorite places in Hogwarts. The first time she had been here, Ivy had gotten help, and the host had been pleasant enough, and she had gotten what she wanted with something little extra for a great price. It was just that the parting had been a mixture of shock and surprise.
The second time, she had come to do something not so ethical, and the results were not the ones she was expecting. She would still groan and sigh for several minutes after remembering the events that had transpired.
And she sincerely considered that it wasn't wholly her fault. Quinn West had shown so many signs of suspicious activity. Yeah, he had brought that on himself.
Now, here she was for the third time, standing at the door of the same classroom-turned-office, her hand on the doorknob of the entrance. She genuinely didn't want to enter the room.
Ivy could feel the stare of her best friend from her side and muttered, "Alright, alright, just give me a second."
"You already had two minutes' worth of seconds," replied Hermione in a slightly exasperated tone. "If you don't want to, I can take the lead. He did ask us both to get the map."
Shaking her head, Ivy replied, "No, I asked for the information, and the map belongs to my dad. I need to deal with this."
"You are overthinking it, you know? Think back to the time when we came here for the notes. The exchange at that time was simple." Hermione sighed at her friend's actions. "We gave him money and got the notes and the information on the Philosopher's stone. There was no stunning and being bound to chairs."
"But, what if tells us to do something," Ivy looked worried. Quinn had said that he might make her do something that she was uncomfortable with. "And, we can't really refuse him after all that happened."
"Again, we can do nothing about it. If West wanted us to do something, he would have found us to collect his favors." Hermione shrugged and even though she didn't like someone having her under their control. She had given this situation some thought. "It is inevitable; he will ask for something one day, might as well worry about it when the problem comes. No reason to waste time by worrying about it right now."
Hermione gave Ivy a push and asked Ivy to open the door and enter the door.
The redhead pursed her lips before opening the door with determination.
Inside the office, the two girls saw Quinn West sitting behind his table. His eyes were closed, and there was no expression on his face. He was sitting so still that they thought he was a statue.
But, the door chime on the top of the door alerted Quinn of their presence as he opened his eyes and saw the visitors.
He showed no change in expression and just stared at them. No, he was observing them.
"Yes?" he asked with a flat tone.
Ivy, who was walking towards the table, frowned when she saw Quinn. She could see the telltale signs that he was using that.
"What are you doing?" she asked. The question was vague, and Hermione, who was just behind her, frowned.
'Is she again going to start something?' Hermione's experience while Ivy and Quinn West interacted was full of situations like this. Ivy would act recklessly and ask questions that stumped Hermione.
She wanted nothing out of the ordinary to happen this time around and just wanted to quickly complete the transaction and get out of here.
"You know what I am doing, exactly." Quinn's reply came in the same flat tone and no expression.
Ivy's eyes narrowed, and she asked back, "I know what you are doing. What I meant was, why now? Drop it - it is unsettling."
"I am practicing," said Quinn. "Not my fault you find it unsettling. Deal with it."
Hermione was part confused, part confused, and part irritated. It was always like this. Whenever these two meet, she was sidelined.
"What are you two talking about?"
"He is using occlumency," came the reply.
Hermione didn't know what occlumency was, so it still didn't clear Hermione's confusion. "What is occlumency?"
"I will tell you later." She quickly replied before turning back to Quinn and asked, "You are more expressionless than Daph - I mean Greengrass."
"You know that Daphne's expression is not because she is using occlumency," Quinn replied back. "That is just her resting face."
"Let's move on. Why are you two here?" Quinn wasn't having a good time, and right now, he didn't want to deal with anything. Especially with these two. "The card isn't showing that I am in for consults, so why did you two come here?"
Ivy frowned before talking out the folded parchment and said, "We bought you the Marauder's Map."
She was expecting a crack in Quinn's face, but he stayed expressionless.
"Ah... I see. So you bought it. Good job, I guess." replied Quinn. He stood up from his barstool and raised his hand for the map.
Ivy didn't immediately hand the map over and asked. "What are you going to do with the map? I hope you are not going to keep it. It is my dad's, and I am not going to let you keep it."
"I have no wish or desire to keep the map," Quinn replied. He didn't need it. "I just want it for a couple of minutes, and you will get it back after that."
"But, what are you going to do with it?" Ivy pressed on. She didn't care that this could get her in trouble. She wanted to know.
"You are smart. You will figure it out after I am done." He once again raised his hand to ask for the map. "Rest assured, I won't damage it."
Ivy's eyes wandered between Quinn's hand and face before she handed the map over. "Take care of it." she softly said.
"Sure," came Quinn's reply as he stared at the parchment.
Ivy sighed because Quinn's flat voice made it impossible to detect any vocal tone clues. It was like she was talking to a robot.
"Feel free to sit while I return in a while," Quinn offered without looking at them and entered his workshop leaving the two girls behind.
"So, what is occlumency?" Hermione immediately asked.
"Sit down," Ivy sighed as she took a seat. "This will take some time to explain."
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- (Scene Break) -
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On the other side of the glass wall, Quinn stood with both his hands on the table, his head hanging down and eyes closed.
The reason he had asked for ten minutes and not a minute to work on the map because he was busy groaning in his head. Trying to maintain his occlumency because of the stupidity he had done while he was under the influence was threatening to break his already thin spread emotional occlumency bounds.
'Why did I have to ask her to get the map?!' While Quinn's face was calm as a cucumber, inside it was a raging turmoil of emotions and regrets. 'Why me?!'
His entire interaction with Ivy Potter after he had come out of the second vault had been a series of blunders that had now become a huge mistake.
The first and biggest mistake was to confront Ivy Potter while she was Polyjuiced into Daphne. This whole mess started at that point. If he was not under the influence at that time, Quinn would have ignored the thing and just turned a blind eye to the entire situation.
Getting a Potter under his debt was outstanding in almost every situation. But this situation wasn't one of those.
'Hell, no! It is the worst situation!' cried Quinn. 'Blackmail! Really, Blackmail! What was I thinking?!'
After that came the break-in, which Quinn was fine with. He would have done the same thing even without the influence from the second vault.
He would have stunned them and then probably got them to owe him just like he did, but he would have done it much more calmly and did damage control by the time they were done.
And, then was the bigger deal.
'Why did I have to tell them about the Basilisk?!' screamed Quinn internally. It was the mistake that could have and might still backfire. 'How am I going to answer if somebody asks me why didn't I tell professors? How am I going to answer this?!'
Similarly, he was slumped because he had given them the Chamber's location. Just these two things could ruin his peaceful life at Hogwarts.
Quinn was snapped out of his self-loathing when he felt something. He looked down and saw that his hands were sinking into the wooden table because the entire tabletop had turned into sand.
He clamped down on his occlumency to cut down his leaking emotions.
Quinn raised his hands as the surrounding sand trickled down, and almost in a robotic and inorganic manner, bits and pieces of sand turned back into the wooden table as Quinn used his incomplete magic.
After taking in a lot of deep breaths, Quinn calmed down his emotions and decided to end this, and after that, never to talk to anyone in the golden squad.
He touched the parchment and softly spoke,
"I solemnly swear I am up to no good."
The map came to life, and Quinn immediately found his position on the map by browsing through the spread parchment. He put his finger on his position, and within the next few seconds, the footsteps and name tag representing Quinn West on the map lightened until it was no longer visible.
"Done," said Quinn. "Now, I am free from any tracking."
This was the only good thing that came from this. If Quinn was under the radar of Ivy Potter, Hermione Granger, and with them the golden squad, then erasing himself from Marauder's Map allowed him to roam unseen.
He had Recon, and they had nothing to track him. He could outrun them all day long, and they could never find him.
"Mischief Managed."
After he was done, Quinn moved back to his office.
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- (Scene Break) -
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"Here you go. I am done." were Quinn's first words while he returned the map to Ivy Potter. "Your payment has been recorded and completed. The deal is finished. Thank you for doing business with me."
Quinn skipped the part where he says to the clients to return if they had problems. He didn't want them to ever return.
Ivy took the map from Quinn and gave it a close observation. Trying to figure out what Quinn did.
"You can look at it after you get out of here," said Quinn. "Please, leave."
Ivy and Hermione raised their heads and stared at Quinn, who stared back. The two parties stared at each other before Ivy nodded and stood up from her seat to leave. Hermione looked at Ivy and then Quinn before fidgeting a little and decided to go for it.
"Are you selling the notes for this year?"
Quinn, who wanted them to leave, clenched his hand under the table and nodded. He stood up, went to his workshop, and brought out two sets of notes.
Quinn placed one set in front of Hermione and then eyed Ivy, "Do you want one?"
Ivy nodded but didn't say a single word. Neither Quinn nor Ivy wanted to speak to each other at this point in time.
"Same as last year," Quinn quoted the price. He didn't say anything about a discount because right now, it wouldn't even be funny.
Hermione put down money for both sets and replied to Ivy, who looked at her with a quirked brow.
"... I was always planning to buy these and well thought it won't harm in carrying money for yours as well." Hermione blushed under the gaze of the other two people in the room as she picked up the notes.
"Let's leave," muttered Ivy as she turned to the door and exited without saying a word.
Hermione followed after her friend but not before throwing a quick glance at Quinn.
After the door was closed, Quinn suddenly felt very tired. He wanted the school year to end.
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- (Scene Break) -
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"I found it," Ivy yelled. She had the Marauder's Map opened on her bed as she touched a spot on the map.
"What did you find?" asked Hermione. Looking up from the notes she had gotten today.
"I found what he did to the map," Ivy was frowning.
Hermione stood up from her table and walked to Ivy's bed, and asked, "What did he do?"
"He erased himself from the map," spoke Ivy. "I can't find him anywhere on the map. Yeah, that must be it."
Hermione sat down on Ivy's bed and looked at the Marauder's Map. She studied the map, which was one of the more fascinating works of magic she had seen.
But right now, she had something else on her mind.
"So, you didn't ask him if he was down in the Chamber of Secrets," asked Hermione.
Ivy stilled at the sudden question before answering the question, but she didn't look at Hermione.
"It doesn't matter, and I don't care."
But Ivy knew why she didn't ask that particular question.
The reason was simple...
She didn't want it to be true. She didn't want to hear from Quinn's mouth that he was down in the Chamber of Secrets.
Ivy Potter didn't want to hear that Quinn West saved her and her twin's life.
He had threatened and blackmailed her twice. In both cases, he had implied that he would make her family's life hard. Her image of Quinn was anything but positive.
She didn't know how she would feel if she was told from that same person's mouth that he was indeed the one to save her and Harry's life.
Things were simple this way.
As long as Quinn West was the bad guy in her mind, things would remain simple.
And, Ivy Potter preferred simple after the events of this year.
.
- (Scene Break) -
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The last few weeks had been tough. Quinn had found that if someone went from happy to the point of extreme giddiness to showing no expression, people would notice something was wrong.
To combat that problem, Quinn had to force himself to show fake expressions. Which proved to be mighty difficult when he was so detached from his emotions. He even had to put fake emotions in his voice, which was difficult in its way.
Quinn's magic was just too glitchy to keep illusions on his face the entire day. Which made it necessary to fake his expression.
To lesson this hardship, Quinn had chosen to spend the entirety of his in hiding. He would spend all his time in the Room of Requirement.
Room of Requirements was the reason he had chosen to stay in Hogwarts rather than going home. He didn't know what was happening to him, and while his grandfather contacted Mr. Alan, it could be dangerous for Quinn to stay at home and risk losing control of his magic.
His family could get injured by him. And Quinn didn't trust anyone other than Alan with his mind.
Every day inside the Room of Requirements, Quinn would undo the bindings on his emotions, letting them and his rampant magic flow out.
While letting his magic was painful, it was also stress-relieving. Quinn binding his emotions all day wasn't good for his health.
For the few minutes that Quinn let go of his emotions, he felt whole again. While it was painful, and Quinn struggled to force his magic to stay inside the entire time he let loose, it was the only time he felt whole.
His exams weren't a problem because even with his current condition. Quinn could still perform magic above the asked level. He made sure that his results would be the same as last year because he didn't want anyone to know that he was suffering from an ailment.
All his free time went in researching what had happened to him. But in the few weeks before the term end, he made little progress about his condition.
So, when he deboarded the Hogwarts Express and saw his grandfather standing there. It was like a beacon of hope in the darkest of nights.
"Is he at home?" Quinn skipped the greetings and directly asked.
"Yes, he is waiting," answered George.
George had sent a MagiFax to Quinn, telling him he had agreed to see Quinn and meet him the day Quinn returned home.
"Good, let's go home," Quinn said in the flat tone he had for weeks.
George had prepared a winged-horse-pulled carriage because Quinn didn't trust himself with magical transportations like Floo, Apparation, or Portkey.
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- (Scene Break) -
.
"Where is he?" Quinn asked Elliot just as he entered the manor. His patience had run thin the second he saw the West manor from the carriage.
And usually, this would be considered rude Elliot knew what was happening to Quinn and answered,
"He is sitting in the reinforced training hall."
Quinn nodded and bee-lined his way to the hall, which was reinforced just in case Quinn went ballistics. It was reinforced to withstand strong magic.
He opened the door to the hall and saw the old man from which he had learned the magic that kept his magic at bay.
The old man turned his face towards the door and then shifted his body when he saw Quinn.
"Oh, Quinn. It has been a while, hasn't it?"
Alan D. Baddeley had arrived.
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-*-*-*-*-*-
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Alan D. Baddeley - My favorite character - Guess, who is back?
Quinn West - MC - Hey, why am I in the second place?! I am always in the first place!
Ivy Potter - Complicated emotions - Possessor of modified Marauder's Map.
Hermione Granger - Bookworm - Worried about exams.
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-*-*-*-*-*-
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