Incoming Avalance

Incoming Avalance

Minerva slotted the last set of her bound notes onto the shelf, sighing in satisfaction as she did so: Alchemy was less of a subject and more of an Art, her understanding was barely enough to make her feel comfortable in letting others see her thoughts on the topic.

She took an instinctive half step back when a hand reached from above her head and plucked exactly those notes from where she had put them, and she immediately scowled in faux annoyance: "Rubeus! You should at least pretend that you weren't waiting here to ambush the results of my hard work!"

"I don't have that kind of time to waste." he replied good-naturedly as he immediately started to skim her notes, reaching his desk with only two of his long steps, where he sat and pulled out a quill and a mostly unblemished piece of parchment: "And I think that Alchemy might be the missing piece for the Cure."

A derisive snort sounded from another table, where Riddle was reading a thick, ancient-looking tome that sported some truly sickening illustrations: "Everything is the missing piece for your Cure, until you try it and discard it."

Minerva's green eyes returned towards Hagrid, and the rolls of parchment that he had set on one side of his desk when he had entered the Rùnda maybe an hour prior. She suspected that those were the notes she had been waiting for on the kind of spells used against the Chimaera, but as she was kind of pressed for time, with her duties as Head Girl, Quidditch player, and potential apprentice of Flamel himself, she simply shook her head and returned to her desk: eyeing critically the tomes relative to the extensive charms needed to turn even an easily dismissed handbag into something far more valuable.

Now that I think about it... "Did you manage to render the Hydra properly, Rubeus?"

"He did." Tom answered idly when it appeared clear that the humungous Slytherin wasn't going to answer, "I'm waiting for the right opportunity to enquire with Professor Slughorn about a hypothetical selling of the skin and the blood, while Rubeus already wrote to Ollivander, and is waiting for a reply."

"Truly?" she was impressed despite herself, arranging for the rendering of a restricted creature that underaged wizards had no business handling sounded much harder than what it actually was, "Good for us... I'll hop to Gringotts during the first Hogsmeade weekend: shall I open a single vault for the proceedings? Then we can split three ways at our leisure."

Hagrid raised his dark eyes from the notes he had speed-read through at that offer, only to nod and quietly return to his frantic note-taking, while Tom hummed thoughtfully: "I don't know if the rendering is complete, but Hagrid has the tools to accomplish it now, I'm surprised that his notes on the topic haven't made their way on the shelves already."

"Too vague." the tallest Slytherin replied distractedly, "Their realization is merely an application of the ritualism implicit with every potion, not a discipline onto itself..."

Minerva finished checking over her other work, and as she was satisfied, bounded the parchments with charms she was by now well versed into, only to directly levitate them towards Riddle, who arched an eyebrow at her, silently questioning her smug expression. "Rubeus mentioned how impossible you were once he revealed he didn't know how to make an enlarged trunk for you."

The younger prefect snorted dismissively, but nodded towards her nevertheless: "I was merely surprised that he couldn't accomplish something that he took an active part in when we were in Greece."

"Read the notes and figure it out: the brews we added are used in the exempli gratia written at the end." the witch saw through Riddle's attempt at having her directly explain the proceedings, an explanation during which he'd undoubtedly find a way to cajole her into producing the trunk he had asked of Hagrid before Hogwarts resumed.

"Must you truly study such a distasteful subject?" she grimaced openly when, walking closer to the Slytherin prefect, she truly understood what he was reading. There was no doubt that it was seriously dark magic: the tome itself seemed to be swallowing the light surrounding it, the ink on its pages gleaming just too wetly for it to be natural. "And don't bother trying to talk circles around me: Inferi can't be that interesting, and what kind of application can you take from this knowledge that cannot be achieved with a cleaner animation on a mannequin?"

Riddle raised his eyes from the book: "Knowledge is neither good, nor evil. I thought that we were over this?"

"Planning on your private team of undead, Tom?" Hagrid asked jokingly, but his gaze was serious, and his shoulders slightly tense, "I'd never thought you'd be willing to read true Dark Arts in the middle of the Rùnda..."

"Both Minerva and I are waiting for your general notes on Ritualism." the Slytherin Prefect answered at an angle, "Given it involved the sacrifice of Hydra's heads, freshly cut, the voluntary deadly poisoning... I too would have never thought that you'd be so open with practicing Dark Magic, and yet here we are."

"I saved your life." Hagrid snorted, "I'd take a 'thank you' over you picking apart my methods, only to use them as an excuse to..."

"Flamel immediately recognized this as a Ritualistic Scar." Minerva interrupted the two before they could truly start with their bickering. Then she raised her left hand, showing the pale circle of skin that stood a bit raised against otherwise unblemished pink, "He also mentioned how interesting my bloodwork is... I don't think he'd have agreed to teach me without it."

The two other wizards stopped and eyed her curiously, waiting to see if she'd be more forthcoming, only to be disappointed when she shook her head and decided to change topic: "Returning to the Inferius, is it truly that interesting?"

"With the correct reading key?" Riddle lost the wide, predatory smile that so often mirrored Hagrid's and assumed the more common self-satisfied tilt of the lips coupled with his lightly upraised chin, "Yes, it is."

"Reading key?"

"I had originally dismissed it too," Riddle eyed Minerva with dark amusement shining in his eyes, "after all it was merely a quote that came to mind during one of the Slug Parties, something that merely happened to echo what the Professor himself told us, do you remember?"

"The mind exerts Will, the body has Strength, magic holds Power, and the soul is a reflection of them all." despite being quite tipsy that night, Minerva gave proof of how keen her mind was by recalling exactly those words, making Riddle nod approvingly.

"I didn't deem them of any importance beyond some author's poetic attempt... until the ritual: mind, body, and magic." Tom smiled widely at Rubeus, who was frowning distastefully at the smaller wizard, as if he hadn't wished for him to truly grasp the complexity of what had happened. "And the soul is a reflection of them all... can you guess what I am certain an Inferius lacks?"

"A soul." Rubeus tilted his head, a familiar curious gleam shining in his dark eyes as he leaned back in the massive armchair that he had to transfigure so that it'd be able to hold his bulk: "Can you make an Inferius with something different than a person?"

"Now who's thinking about a private army of undead?" Riddle taunted Hagrid while he closed his book, raising his left leg so that it rested over his right knee and clasping his hands over the dark tome: "In theory, the sky is the limit... magical creatures naturally oppose manipulation of this kind, on the other hand, being dead, even a common spider can be spelled in a manner that would kill a living specimen. Surprisingly, a few parts are oddly similar to a technique to summon selected memories to the forefront of one's mind."

"That's not surprising at all... how soon can you prepare your notes on the topic, with our favorite reading key as the founding principle?" Rubeus carefully rose from his seat and returned Minerva's notes to their original place, exchanging a penetrating glance with the witch while Tom thought about the question he had just been asked.

"You can't possibly have read them all, Rubeus, never mind understanding..."

"I read enough to understand that it'd take me a month of focused study to grasp that amount of information, and up to a year to make my first tries in the field." turning fully towards the much shorter Minerva, he asked seriously, almost pleadingly: "Could you produce an ingot of quicksilver so that it'd have the malleability and properties of iron, without losing any of its intrinsic meaning?"

"That kind of transmutation is quite complex... I'd need to ask for Flamel's help, but he hasn't accepted me just yet, I need to realize a personal project to show off that I'm 'creative enough to waste his time on'." she spoke with uncertainty, her eyes lowering as if ashamed.

"Do you want a hand?" the offer came immediately, and for a moment, the Gryffindor witch was sorely tempted: if not in the practical aspects, Rubeus had given ample proof of the truly unbound nature of his imagination. Surely with his insight, she'd be able to get started much sooner... But then she observed him carefully, and despite the healthy appearance of the wizard, there were deep bags under his eyes, and his smile appeared strained.

He's doing too much, look at how tired he appears to be. Seer willpower was what kept their tallest friend going, she knew that much, it'd be better for him to reduce the bulk of subjects and topics he tirelessly researched not to increase them. Still, Minerva smiled, pleasantly surprised as Rubeus wasn't one to offer his aid so freely, but she shook her head: "It has to be my project, but thank you."

"Could Professor Dumbledore realize it?" Riddle asked with a blank face while he opened again his chosen tome, his shoulders tensing minutely as they always did when the Transfiguration professor was named, "He is an accomplished alchemist too."

"He surely knows the theory," Minerva replied while rolling her shoulders to work out the few knots she had accumulated with hours spent over her notes, only for her green eyes to dart from Tom to their tallest friend: "but realizing it... I wouldn't know."

"I'd have to explain what it's for in any case," Rubeus shrugged while he returned the neat notes on Alchemy to the shelf dedicated to Minerva's works, "so I can't ask him."

The witch crossed her arms expectantly and rose a challenging eyebrow towards the much taller wizard: "Well, you'll explain it to me in any case."

"You want to try again with those runes?" Riddle's question came out of nowhere, and Minerva briefly felt left out, not for the first time: when the mood struck them, Rubeus and Tom were worse than her younger brothers, communicating between them with allusions and silent glances, as if there was a secret language only they were made a part of.

"Let's sit, shall we?" Hagrid gestured towards the lit fireplace and the comfortable armchairs present there, his eyes finding Minerva's while he smiled knowingly, as if he had been able to immediately zero in on the cause of the witch's brief flare of irritation. "I'm waiting to have an actual cure before writing down the whole process, but if you want to know, I'll tell you... if you're up for another trip to Greece before the winter holidays."

Minerva's eyes narrowed dangerously as she immediately guessed what he was aiming at: "You want to go hunting, again? Our first failure didn't..."

"I'd hardly call it a failure." Rubeus immediately interrupted her, a faint expression of annoyance appearing on his face.

"Tom almost died!"

"And you griffindorishly put yourself at risk of doing the same." over the witch's head, Hagrid's dark eyes met Riddle's, who had flinched minutely at the vehement reminder of his brush with death, only to add: "And now that everything is said and done, I think that he doesn't regret it."

The Gryffindor witch briefly glanced at her fellow prefect, who studiously avoided looking at her while a complex expression appeared on his face: his instinctive reaction was to deny Rubeus' words, only to feel put on the spot as he, now safe and away from the danger, evaluated the positive sides against the negative ones. He had risked his life, yes, but Minerva and Hagrid had both proved that they'd easily put their own on the line to save his, he had witnessed and took part in a more unique than rare piece of magic, and he was now about to be able to learn more about the instinctive curses his tallest companion seemed capable of producing, while Minerva had perfected the enlarging charms coupled with potions capable of turning common wood into so much more, and he'd soon dissect her thoughts on the topic.

Yes, as things were now, he couldn't bring himself to brazenly lie, not when he was under the knowing gaze of Rubeus. Besides, he was still extremely curious to see what the younger wizard would be able to achieve with the 'storing-ink' combined with chimaera's blood, and at the prospected gains of the rendering of yet another magical creature, the orphan that had known hunger couldn't truly deny the stirrings of greed that brought with them the promise of a dependable amount of money available to him even before finding a job outside of school.

"Didn't you gain Flamel's interest thanks to the ritual?" Riddle's sardonic question forced the witch to bring her focus once more on Rubeus, who sat heavily on the armchair next to the lit fireplace. It was telling that she didn't even stop to consider how serious it'd be to effectively run away from School for the time needed to hunt for a chimaera in Greece, and despite herself, she felt a faint stirring of eagerness at the thought of hunting once more...

"My explanation, Rubeus?" crossing her arms, the witch found herself tapping a foot impatiently against the stone floor of the Rùnda, and while the gesture almost made the tallest Slytherin guffaw, he managed to swallow the brief tang of hilarity he had felt, and nodded seriously. Neither of the two Slytherin wizards let the witch see their satisfaction in knowing that she was definitely on board with whatever could prove itself useful to improve her understanding o her favourite aspects of magic, reasonable rule-breaking and personal risks aside. Even if that understanding trickled down as a side effect or Rubeus and Tom' researches and experiments.

"So, here's what I figured out until now..."

Rubeus and Minerva sat near the flames and Riddle found himself smiling: he didn't want to miss the chewing out that the witch was going to deliver once Hagrid told her how close he came to being killed when he had carried on himself runes meant to direct Marie. And if Hagrid glossed over those entertaining details, he'd have the choice between lording the truth over his head or busting his carefully spun tale.

Riddle hummed thoughtfully. Decisions, decisions.

In hindsight, I should have known that presenting Minerva and Tom with my decision of bringing another into the Rùnda wouldn't go well.

After a lengthy discussion about my even lengthier research about Lycanthropy, the opportune jokes and the unavoidable chewing up from Minerva, I had decided that it was the best possible moment to introduce the topic of Filius. And by introducing the topic, of course I meant informing the other two of the fact that I had already gotten the first year Ravenclaw on the path towards the Rùnda.

At the news that I had given to a first-year some of my notes as a test to see if he'd make a valuable addition to our little group, the Grrifindor witch had began pacing in front of the spectacular doors she had transfigured previously, while Riddle had lost the truthful uncaring air he had when he didn't bother with his mask, donning instead the pleasant expression that made him yet another face attending the Slug Parties.

"I can't believe you'd do something like this without warning us." Minerva's voice was scathing while she paced nervously, incredibly territorial out of nowhere now that she had been presented with the option of adding another to the Rùnda.

"I can believe it." Riddle sighed while he sat behind his desk, his dark eyes studying my form from across the room, his voice was cool and controlled: "It doesn't mean that it's even remotely acceptable."

Of course he'd be against adding Filius to our group: Minerva and I had proved ourselves, and he had given a chance to Minerva only because I had managed to use his curiosity against him back in my first year. So I leaned back in the massive armchair that stood next to our lit fireplace, and merely asked: "Why?"

"Why?! What do you mean why?" despite my question being clearly directed at Tom, Minerva wasn't going to be ignored: "You gave a child an impossibly challenging task, dangling in front of him knowledge as if he's some kind of dog to train to follow your whims."

"And you were going to bring him here without warning us once he succeeded, which is, in regards to me and Minerva's peace of mind, much more severe." Riddle easily cast aside the decidedly odd worry that the witch had expressed, knowing that it was merely the first thing to jump to her mindwhile she worked through the turmoil my news had revealed: "The Rùnda was meant to be ours. A safe, tranquil spot from the mediocrity of Hogwarts..."

"And if Filius proves successful, he'd demonstrate the kind of raw talent and intellect that could only benefit from our company, and of which company we could only benefit." I raised a challenging eyebrow, consciously stopping myself from fidgeting: "You're in your last year, aren't you, Minerva? And Riddle won't stay here much longer, and while I don't want to open this place to the unworthy, I don't want it to go to waste: how would we benefit from the Rùnda not being used once we leave Hogwarts?"

"So you only wanted to use our charisma to get the child used to you, and then exploit him!" the Griffindor witch huffed angrily while she crossed her arms, her pace slowing minutely while she kept elaborating why she felt so opposed at the idea of adding a stranger to the Rùnda

"How would we benefit from it being used?" Once again, Riddle was the one to keep us on track, and his smooth voice gave me the opening I needed.

"If it were up to you, you would have never even attempted to study with Minerva, and look where we are now!" I made an ample gesture with my arms encompassing everything in our secret room: "We don't need a newcomer to be brazenly better than all of us put together, besides the sheer impossibility of such an event, he's a first year and hardly had the time to accomplish much on his own. Doing as I did, we'd simply encourage his talents, offer an understanding, quiet companionship, and we'd have access to any interesting discovery yet to be made, to either reinterpret in our own projects, or for another to build something new from. Eventually, something useful is bound to come up."

"You're so disgustingly mercenary Rubeus... I'm appalled." Minerva didn't mind being on the other end of my utilitarianism, not after I had openly proven that I'd risk my life to keep Tom, and by extension her if their roles were reversed, alive. Still, it didn't mean that she felt comfortable in letting another being drawn into my web.

"We became friends because of the time, effort, and peril shared among us." my eyes met the green ones of the witch across the room: "But everything began when I dragged Riddle to you in the Library, after you had dismissed me because I was just another first-year student, or do I remember it wrong?"

"You remember correctly... but it doesn't mean that you can simply decide to bring other people here." her lips thinned into a single line, expressing her disapproval while she fought to hold back her Scottish burr.

"And I didn't."

"But you intended to." Riddle rose from his seat, unable to fully hold back the nervous energy that I had injected into him by merely proposing to let another enter what he undoubtedly felt was his private territory.

I didn't truly care as long as his sociopathy afflicted people I didn't care about, but I wasn't going to let his megalomaniac personality prevent me from enjoying the benefits born of adding Filius to the exclusive group composed by us three: "Once he proved himself a worthy investment of time... yes." my reply came in a calm, measured tone while I forced myself to remain seated: "Not unlike Minerva did when you asked me to learn enough Transfiguration theory to keep up with her, back when I was eleven, no?"

"Discarding that... Tom has the right of it: you weren't going to give us any saying in the process." the witch in question stepped towards me wth an angry expression on her face: "That is the unacceptable part, I think: we gave ust as much as you for this place, Rubeus."

I had hoped that she'd be open to adding some new talent to our group, but I was hardly unprepared. For now, I had managed to open the witch to the option of adding other people, while her outrage was merely turned towards the way in which I had gone behind their backs to accomplish it. I held no illusions about Tom: unless the advantage was clear to see and immediate, he'd never accept another into the Rùnda. It was fortunate then, that to maintain his polite fiction of reasonable human being, he'd have to accept a majority of two if I managed to swing Minerva's opinion around: "What would you do then?"

Knowing that I was getting as something, the witch in question frowned: "What do you mean?"

I rolled my eyes, barely refraining from shrugging: "I won't apologize: in my opinion, Filius has what it takes, and my little test, or challenge, will both prove it, push him until he's able to prove it, and entice him with the promise of more possibilities. He's a Ravenclaw, shunned for his appearance: with loneliness and endless toil on one side, and companionship and challenging help on the other, I think he'll choose the Rùnda, which will remain something unique we added to Hogwarts after we're gone, growing from generation to generation once we figure out some tweaks to the enchantments."

"You want us to provide challenges of our own." Tom's distaste for the idea appeared and was gone faster than I could blink, and when his eyes darted towards the suddenly thoughtful Griffindor witch, I saw that he immediately understood that I had been aiming to convince her from the beginning.

Still, I wasn't going to let him take control of the conversation, not this time: "If it is what it takes to make him worthy in your eyes... yes: this room was meant to be for us in the beginning, true, but now that our time in Hogwarts begins to run short, it can become much more, and it can be used to put in contact those we'll find interesting with our future selves. But it begins with accepting other people, and while Filius hardly had the time to present himself as a genius just yet, my challenge will take care of that."

"You gave him your notes on something that hovers between Charms and Mind Arts." Minerva cut in, her keen mind burning through the path I had prepared for her thoughts to follow: "You think I should provide him with something to prove an unnatural skill in Transfiguration?"

"No." I shook my head, "It's not about the skill in the subjects taught at Hogwarts, it's about finding out if he has the potential that the Rùnda can make bloom into something more." then my eyes turned towards the older Slytherin wizard that I knew was going to take advantage of the smallest overlooked detail in our informal agreement: "An actual challenge, not an excuse for you to say no, Riddle."

Seeing that he was losing the cut-and-dry 'No' position that would have seen anyone forever banned from the Rùnda once we three were gone, Riddle shifted the direction in which he could express his disapproval and refusal of the proposal: "The kind of challenges we were to propose, if we go ahead with this surprise Rubeus sprang on us, would depend on what we'd seek in people we'd share our hard-won prizes with."

Then his eyes met mine before he smirked, letting me know that he had both perfectly understood what had happened, and that he was about to strike back: "In the spirit of fairness, given that you already gave your test looking for an academic quality, it'll be up to Minerva and myself to independently test him on something else."

With the impossibly smooth grace only he was apparently capable of, Riddle walked by Minerva's side and hooked his arm with hers, beginning to walk towards the exit of the Rùnda while the witch guessed where the fellow Prefect was getting at: "We'll talk about our respective challenges and let you know if your candidate passes them."

I gritted my teeth while I nodded in understanding. I had been so happy of being able to get Minerva on board, even if she hadn't truly realized it, only for my trepidation to turn to worry now that Riddle had decided that admitting Filius in the group was a challenge for him to sabotage.

It was par of the course when dealing with him, but that didn't stop me from wanting to punch him in his too-perfect face.

AN

It's been a longer wait than usual, hasn't it? Well, it took a while to properly tie together the series of events that I planned for the fic, while Real Life kind of cut me off from this hobby with no hope for me to fight back.

I wanted to hop directly to Greece and to hunt down the Chimaera with this one, but I preferred going a bit slower and to truly set up the next few events, in the hopes that the plot doesn't feel disjointed. McGonagall and Riddle's reactions to Filius' 'induction' are too pivotal to dismiss or to pass as a secondary aspect in a more action-focused chapter, you'll see why, even if the title of the chapter gives it away somewhat.

So, as always, opinions, hopes? Let me know!