Chapter 37: C037 - Second attack, vastly different outcome
As we walked on the quiet footpaths of Hogsmeade's outskirts to talk a little more and occassionally enjoyed a few quiet stretches with the snow crunching under our feet, I found myself enjoying my time with Isobel quite a bit. Not romantically, but she was a great conversationalist in a pleasant setting like this.
"I have to admit, this was much nicer than I had thought possible," Isobel admitted when it was just the two of us near the woods as we were walking towards a bench that overlooked a picturesque, snow-covered clearing.
"I will admit that this was just as pleasant as I had hoped," I countered with a self-assured grin.
"Charmer," Isobel scoffed with a small smile and a shake of her head.
We sat down on the lone bench, and Isobel took out the rose I had given her at the start of the date and looked at it for a while. I kind of regretted not bringing a camera because that scene of Isobel gazing at that pink rose with the snow-white setting in the background was uniquely beautiful.
But that quiet calm was not meant to last as every instinct in me screamed at me to dodge once again. I acted as fast as possible and shoved Isobel into the snow next to the bench, using the counterforce to move away in the other direction.
As Isobel was still screaming midfall, three red spells had already flashed past us. Three spells that my date hadn't seen as she started cursing me, thankfully verbally and not magically.
With a spell taught to us by Flitwick to build igloos during survival club as shelter in snowy environments called 'Nix Scutus', I quickly put a dome of snow over my witch companion as a form of protection and deflected another 'Stupefy' sent my way as I dodged a curse I didn't know by throwing myself to the ground again.
But two could play at that game. My eagle vision made it easy to figure out where the three disillusioned assailants hid, especially since it granted me a uniquely wide field of vision, so I sent an overpowered no-look verbal 'Expelliarmus' in the direction of one of the wizards and grinned in satisfaction as it connected and almost ripped his arm out of his shoulder and made his wand fly in directions unknown.
I deflected another curse and dodged forward into the snow once more and used another one of Flitwick's spells to make a fist of hardened snow that grew from the ground at a dead angle of one of the remaining two assailants.
"'Nix Pugni'!" I shouted and immediately heard a satisfying crack as another attacker was out of this fight.
The icy snow fist hit him right in the nuts. One of the few wounds magic couldn't heal properly or swiftly, and I was out of mercy for these people attacking me constantly with a numbers advantage and at their convenience.
The third assailant noticed that I somehow saw them through their 'invisibility' without problem and started his plan to abandon his two co-conspirators, but they sadly chose when nobody was around to attack me and the circumstance they thought was in their favor actually was in mine.
"'Lumos Maxima'," I commanded and sent a white ball of light in his path that hopefully sufficiently blinded him in this white snow world. And, indeed, it did as I noticed with my eagle vision that he stopped running at full speed and instead made unsure, staggering steps in an effort to dodge potential follow-up spells.
But he didn't manage to dodge my full-body-bind 'Petrificus Totalus' followed by 'Expelliarmus' to disarm my attacker.
With two more 'Stupefy' for the other two screaming buffoons, I floated the three attackers into one place, got their wands and only found two since I sent the first one to outer space for all I knew and couldn't be bothered to search for it.
"Marcus Flint, and Adrian and Austin Pucey... nice. Unlike you miscreants, I'd sadly get into trouble for breaking your wands like you animals did with mine, so I guess I'll just do this," I murmured as I watched all three unmoving Slytherin students in front of me and tried the two wands they still had with them. I didn't know whose wand it was, but the one with an eery pale white color obeyed me as I didn't want to use the nightmare curse with my own in case for some reason inspecting wands was suddenly allowed when it was to defend a Slytherin student.
"'Somnia Dolor'!" I cast on each of them a bunch of times until I started to feel the wand fighting my magic.
I didn't know the extent to which they would suffer, if at all, after Pomfrey cleared the spell out of their system. But it was listed as a prolonged torture spell in one of Walden Macnair's books, and I wanted to try it out for quite some time already. The sickly yellow color of the spell already looked promising, and I was happy to note that the negative emotions I had to invoke to really power the dark spell came and went from my psyche easily thanks to my occlumency.
The grip dark magic had on your mind through continued use didn't bother me just yet, but I merely cast this nightmare spell a dozen times and not kill droves of people with the killing curse, so I couldn't be sure if that was an infallible boon provided by my status as a very learned Natural Occlumens with the teachings of a millenia old artifact created by the Hogwarts founders or not.
"Are you okay, Isobel? You can come out now," I shouted as I started searching the three guys' belongings and found two extended pouches.
I didn't bother breaking into them as that could be a trap, and I couldn't care less about gaining a paltry sum of galleons. I simply set them on fire a good distance away from us just like they did with my stuff for the first attack, waited until all the expelled contents were gone as well, and destroyed their shoes and socks for good measure so that they would have to walk in the freezing snow with no footwear.
I didn't peck them as learned wizards that knew spells for such an occasion.
Isobel walked over with a frightened expression as I cast a few overpowered 'Finite Incantatem' to cancel any charms and enchantments they might have had on their clothes. It wouldn't work if these were high quality clothes made with real effort, but I counted on the fact that at least some of their clothes didn't come with those guarded enchantments or whatever they were called. I also tried my hand at 'Surgito', the counter-charm for enchantments, but I was pretty sure it wouldn't work on clothes. But it was my first time using it, and the book had been incredibly vague about what kind of enchantments it affects.
"You okay?" I asked once again when Isobel said nothing and merely kept on watching me.
"I'm okay. But why are you so calm?"
"You have the benefit of being from a respected family with no social flaws other than associating with me now, so you're not the target of these clowns usually. This was the fourth attack on me since the one that put me in the hospital wing for a week."
"You... fight one versus many fights as a first year and come out on top?" Isobel asked me incredulously. "Why do they keep coming back to keep getting humiliated?"
"Because I do this," I answered with a shrug and pointed at the boys with the second wand, uncaring for the damage I could be doing to these three morons, and cast, "'Obliviate!'"
They were unconscious, so even if they somehow started to remember their total defeat at my hands after I wiped away their reason for being here and fighting me from their memory, I had reasonable doubt on my side and I cast the spell from a wand that wasn't mine.
"... that's illegal," Isobel meekly commented when I put the wand back into the hands of one of the three at random after wiping it down in case they somehow started taking finger prints.
"Like them attacking us unprompted out in the open?"
"We could have called the aurors?"
"Yeah, worked out great for me the first time around," I said with a scoff, and Isobel furrowed her brows.
She eventually sighed, and I walked over to gently take her arm to walk her away.
"'Oblitiate Pedia'," I cast calmly and repeatedly as I walked the two of us away, and Isobel watched back as our footsteps vanished and turned back into pristine, untouched snow.
"How do you know so many spells? Obscure ones to boot," Isobel asked once we got back to a public area and saw some people, which was when I stopped casting the spell to vanish our footsteps.
"Flitwick, plus I practice a lot. Like, a lot a lot," I answered with a shrug. "Sorry for putting you in their crosshairs. I should have known something like that might happen even if I am seen with you."
With that, I tried to disengage my arm to make us look more casual but Isobel grabbed back my arm and kept hers in mine for the remainder of our walk back to the carriage that would take us back to Hogwarts.
"It was honestly quite exciting. I hadn't seen anything like it before," Isobel admitted with a grin that was supposed to hide her uneasiness. "What will happen to them now, though?"
"Those three? Uh, I guess they will be missed during roll call after dinner, so someone will start looking for them, which won't be hard since there's magic for it. If they wake up before it, I'm hoping they are gonna freeze their nuts off and spare this world offspring from their bloodline by not finding their way back," I described with an uncaring shrug.
"Is that really okay?" Isobel asked with an uncertain frown.
"If you are uncomfortable to be put in this position, I won't hold it against you for reporting it to Filch at the gate or any other professor in the castle. I can't ask you to go against your conscience for me. But please just make sure to emphasize that they attacked first and unprompted, and I'll get through it."
"Your first instinct was to protect me... I would never report you for this," Isobel mumbled with a shy expression that caught me a little offguard.
"That's okay. If you sleep on it and feel different tomorrow, do what you think is right."
Isobel looked at my profile and grabbed my arm a little more tightly in response.
-----
"Dear students. May I have your attention for a moment," McGonagall loudly requested during breakfast the next morning. "Yesterday, three students were attacked and robbed in Hogsmeade near the Griffith Clearing. An official investigation has been started by the aurors, but I would still ask each and every one of you to come forward if you have witnessed the crime. Anything helps."
"Who are the three attacked students?" Someone shouted from the Gryffindor table.
"Slytherin's Marcus Flint, Adrien Pucey, and Austin Pucey," Professor McGonagall answered succinctly.
"Probably blasted their own nuts off in a daring game of hide the wand!" The same voice from the Gryffindor table shouted in a joking manner.
"Mister Weasley! These were serious attacks that could have cost them their lives. I will have you show this matter the necessary sobriety it warrants. Three points from Gryffindor!"
"I still say they did it to themselves! Or they tried to rob someone and got got," someone shouted leisurely from the Gryffindor table.
McGonagall gained a resigned expression and merely countered, "Another three points from Gryffindor, other Mister Weasley. The matter you describe is in the auror's consideration."
"It was Macnair!" Someone suddenly shouted from the Slytherin table.
"And how would you have come to know of that Mister Malfoy? As far as I am aware, you are not on the list of students who visited Hogsmeade this weekend. Trust me, I made myself familiar with the list after the incident was brought to my attention," McGonagall immediately asked in a no-nonsense tone.
"Yeah, Malfoy! How could you know? Did you send them to torture me again like the last time so you know they'd be looking for me?" I shouted back unhurriedly.
Several gasps rang through the Great Hall, and the negative attention Malfoy tried to heap on my head by exposing me in the Great Hall was shifted onto him.
"Stop pouting lies, Macnair! You have no proof that I was involved in that at all! This is slander," Malfoy countered with a red face.
"And you have proof I somehow overwhelmingly beat a fifth year, a fourth year, and a first year all alone after getting jumped in a premeditated three on one ambush? Or are you saying instead of enjoying my double date that I very openly went to, I stalked two people I beat in Quidditch so hard the week before that we broke four school records and then I robbed them for some reason? You know what, Malfoy? I consent to a search of all my belongings. Dormroom, and extended pouch included. I will place myself under Professor McGonagall's personal watch to show her I am not going to destroy evidence unlike those Slytherin upper years who were coveniently burning stuff near the lake when the aurors came to investigate the attack on me."
Gaining public approval when you were debating an idiot like Malfoy was ridiculously easy. Many people nodded at that and I saw the transfiguration professor give me a pleased nod because Malfoy wasn't actually the first to accuse me and would have asked me to follow her after breakfast regardless as I would find out later. I would also learn that the first to accuse me was Professor Snape, who hadn't shown anything other than sheer dislike towards me in my time at Hogwarts.
"See? No comeback. You're just trying to smear my name like the classless, jealous buffoon you've always been."
"Who would be jealous of you, blood traitor?" Malfoy screeched back angrily.
Like I said before. Debating an idiot. But kicking a dead horse would only get me animosity - so I didn't deign to answer him and save myself from earning the dissatisfaction of the upper year Slytherins. Well, more dissatisfaction.
Harry frowned in my direction after he had seen the looks Isobel had given me. Hermione frowned at her food because, at least I got the impression, she was jealous of Isobel for getting taken on a date by me. Tonks frowned at me from the Gryffindor table for reasons unknown to me. And Gemma frowned at me from the Slytherin table for reasons that were known to me.
I once more publically escalated my feud with Malfoy, and while Draco's stock in Slytherin was falling rapidly, Lucius Malfoy had a firm grip on his faction in the Wizengamot and continued to wield tremendous power. Power that reached all the way to Hogwarts.
Little did they know that if Isobel hadn't been there, the three Slytherin students might not have survived the encounter, or I could have done more harm to them like they did with me.
Sure, talk was big, but I had dreams about assassins reaping lives as easily as wheat. I met a living assassin and got a legendary assassin's hidden blade as a training device together with a promise to learn more proficient ways of killing and fighting. I got a book on how to best end a life and how to best prolong suffering. I even got a book on anatomy that showed how to inflict the most pain in the shortest time, all without magic.
Ending a life didn't come with such a high hurdle in my own moral compass anymore. I would likely rethink that when I actually took a life, but I was sure I didn't mind ending a sociopathic bully like Flint.
But also talk was big. So we would see when it came to that.
Half an hour later, I found myself in the presence of Auror Jenkins, the younger auror who was present when Aunt Amelia visited me at the infirmary last time, a second, unknown, young auror, and Head Auror Scrimgeour, who had investigated the assault on me.
"Talion, nice to meet you once more. But we have to stop meeting like this, I reckon," Auror Jenkins greeted when I walked into Professor McGonagall's office with her.
"That's going to be hard in your profession, I assume. I already consented to a full search, by the way. You can ask me whatever you want, too," I offered as I stood still near the professor's desk.
"That saves me the trouble of asking. There's been someone to come forward to accuse you, so you working with us will help us cross you off of the list of suspects more easily," Jenkins countered with a relieved smile.
"Oh? Word travels fast if you heard Draco Malfoy's accusation already? If he's accused me before the announcement, I would like to know why he knew I'd be close to those three," I answered calmly but with a small crease forming in my brows.
"It wasn't Heir Malfoy. One member of the faculty did, and according to him, he didn't make this accusation lightly," Jenkins said as he opened my extended pouch and started pouring out all of its content.
The auror with him, who didn't bother introducing himself, cast a 'Priori Incantatem' on my wand and kept the list of spells it provided him. Curiously enough, he didn't record my magical signature, not that it would have helped them. Griffith Clearing wasn't the place of the attack, after all. Patrick moved their bodies to the other side of Hogsmeade based on a discreet signal of mine before I arrived back at Hogwarts.
"Did the headmaster order you not to record magical signatures again?"
"Indeed he has," Jenkins answered and cast a spell on me I didn't recognise. "No worries, that was merely a detection charm to check you for hidden space magics to conceal any more items."
I noted down that little nugget of information but still protested outwardly, "I know I should feel safe in your hands since you're professionals and the professor is present... but please announce your next spell on me beforehand. I almost dodged and closed the distance for a punch..."
"I would have liked to see that," said the still unnamed second auror with an amused chuckle. "Those snow spells in your last spells, care to explain those?"
"Oh? Yeah, a lighthearted snowball fight with my date when we were on a walk all alone. Flitwick taught us those in survival class. One's a fist, the other a spell to construct an igloo."
"You cheat in a snowball fight with a girl? And a snow fist? Were you trying your hardest not to get a second date?"
I shrugged and answered, "I don't have much going for me as an orphan. Showing off I'm pretty decent at magic seemed right."
"And that's where the repeated stunners, disarmers, and full body binds came into play? Should we be worried for your date?"
McGonagall's small smile immediately vanished as her eyes bore into my soul. I knew I was losing her goodwill by the second, so I quickly defended myself, "Isobel entered Hogwarts entirely unharmed! I'm a complete gentleman and renounce your accusations! I demonstrated these spells to her after boasting that Professor Flitwick considered putting me in a dueling competition after he trained me all school year!"
"Calm down, kiddo. We already checked on Miss MacDougal's well-being on boss' orders."
I blanked for a moment because that didn't make sense, and I managed to articulate my confusion with a resounding, "Huh?"
"Oh, you didn't know? Lord MacDougal is one of Head Auror Scrimgeour's oldest friends. He doesn't kid around when it comes to family. So every time we're here, we are strictly ordered to look for a few students here since Lord MacDougal isn't the only overprotective parent, after all."
"Yeah, you better treat her right. Lord MacDougal can be... uh, unreasonable," Auror Jenkins chimed in with a sagely nod.
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