Chapter 156

Two days later.

Late in the evening, when the clock was already eleven, a figure in a black robe was moving along the gloomy, dark corridors of the School of Witchcraft and Wizardry illuminated only by small, steel candelabra, towards the stairs to the fifth floor.

"Sir, the headmaster began to move and headed towards the exit from the office."

  Hearing these words in his head, the young man did not stop, but continued on his way and turning the corner, he stepped onto the first step.

"I understand, watch him and tell me if he suddenly goes in my direction," Severus ordered, having climbed the stairs and was already moving along the corridor of the fifth floor, towards the very place where Rowena Ravenclaw could presumably hide her library.

"Yes, sir".

Today, Severus was very lucky, because the full moon would be at eleven, at a time when all the students, as well as the teachers, had already gone to bed and no one would disturb him, and the caretaker, who usually patrolled the castle at night, was taking care of his cat that day, to whom Severus had prescribed vitamins, under the guise of medicine, and therefore he was unlikely to leave his closet. 

Although usually the teachers joined the patrol, but Minerva, whose duty fell on this day, had a test today, so at the moment the woman was checking them, leaving everything to Filch.

"But still, I wonder what this old man needs at such a time?" although he had a hunch that he knew about this place, but ...

"The headmaster came out of his office and headed towards the stairs."

Hearing Pettigrew's words, Severus frowned slightly.

 "What is it?" Nagini asked, puzzled, noticing the change in his expression. "Dumbledore, left the office and..."

"Sir, he went down to the seventh floor and continues to go down."

A few seconds later, he stopped in front of a large window, with a beautiful view of the night sky and the moon, the light from which fell perfectly on the wall in the castle, where the four lines intersected. 

"... already on the sixth floor …" opening a pocket watch with the symbols of the four faculties, he looked at the time, "Two more minutes …"

"Maybe he knows about this place?"

"Maybe …" but before he could finish, he heard the voice of the "rat-locator" again.

"Sir, he's going down to the fifth floor and... he's left the stairs and is heading your way."

"…knows, he's coming straight towards us…" looking in the direction from where the quiet but gradually increasing sound of footsteps was heard, the young man hissed discontentedly and looked towards the window again, "Just one more minute…"

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A few dozen seconds later, to the very place where the Prince had been before, and now there was no one, the figure of an old man appeared, illuminated by the weak light from the candelabra, he was looking around the space by the window with a thoughtful look. 

"Hmm ... most likely it just seemed that way," the old man said tiredly, sighing, because the last weeks were very difficult for him and he did not even have time to have a normal rest, because due to the fact that Hagrid was bitten by the Acromantula, the school was simply flooded with people from the Ministry and the Board of Trustees, who were simply pressing on him all this time and for this reason, he had to use his connections in St. Mungo's and detain the forester there for a while, since he had too soft a character and could simply not withstand the pressure from their side and let it slip about the spiders, how he let him out in the forest and they multiplied in the forest and then Azkaban would definitely be guaranteed for him and this is in the best case, and in the worst case, it could even come to the "dementor's kiss" *, because the cultivation of these dangerous magical creatures, which were classified by the level of danger on par with Basilisks and Dragons, was strictly prohibited, and only with the permission of the Ministry of Magic and under certain conditions was it allowed to do so. 

But only after full approval by the Department of "Regulation and Control of Magical Populations".

And even after that, problems began in the Wizengamot, in which Albus had been increasing his influence for a very long time, and this is not to mention Voldemort, whom he had to closely monitor, so the elderly man simply had a terribly tired look, as if he had aged ten years. 

Smiling wearily, the wizard ran his hand along the brick wall. 

"Perhaps we should give up on this…" he muttered, watching the moonlight become brighter with each passing second, until in an instant, from top to bottom on the empty brick wall, various symbols began to appear, until it was filled with them.

"What did you want to tell us, Foundress...?" The previous headmaster had told him about this place, who accidentally found a message in one of the Ravenclaw rooms, and in the end, having spent almost two months, he was able to reach this place, but here his research stopped. 

Although Armando Dippet was able to translate sixty percent of the runes, having spent almost ten years on it, there were also those that he could not find a mention of in any book, and because of this, it was simply impossible to understand what Rowena Ravenclaw wanted to tell. 

Of course, Dumbledore also tried to do this and even asked for help from his good French friend, Nicolas Flamel, and only together they were able to master another ten percent, because he just happened to have one ancient book in his extensive collection with a translation of some symbols, but this was the limit, and those remaining thirty percent were scattered throughout the "text" and it was simply impossible to understand its exact meaning.

And he himself did not understand why she left such a complex message, the translation of which was simply impossible to do, he even had a thought that she just wanted to mock them in this way.

 And again a tired sigh escaped from his lips, and shaking his head from side to side, the headmaster, with some kind of melancholy in his eyes, watched as the runes slowly began to disappear.

He came to this place every month during the full moon, hoping that something might change, but, as usual, he left with the same unsolved riddle... And when, finally, he disappeared around the corner, Snape's head poked out from behind the window on the right side, and then he jumped back in and thoughtfully began to examine the symbols. 

"I underestimated her, she turned out to be too smart a woman…" Severus muttered with a crooked smile, because in front of him were not simple runes, but runes and writing from his world, albeit a little crooked, "It's not surprising that I couldn't feel anything... it was not paint that was used here, but some kind of mineral,eating into bricks, without magic and reacting only to bright moonlight."

"Well, what is it?" The snake hissed with a bit of impatience in her voice, because it was rare to see such an expression on Severus' face, and this meant that there was something very interesting there. 

"A rare type of runes... very "rare"," smiling, he glanced at Nagini, who looked at him with a bit of displeasure, as if knowing that he was not telling everything.

"Okay, let's go to another place," stroking her on the top of her head, Severus headed towards the stairs.

"~ Meow!"

"You can come with us too," the half-breed said with a smile, looking out of the corner of his eye at the kitten, who had been hiding in the shadows until then, and then turned his gaze to the maledictus and added: "And don't be offended, I promised that I would tell you everything, but not now, let me keep everything a secret for now, okay?"

" Hm !" snorting discontentedly, she turned away, but at the same time, allowing herself to be stroked and although Nagini was still a person inside, it still brought her a lot of pleasure ...

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     They didn't go very far from that place, just two floors below, on the opposite side of the Defense Department classroom, where classes were usually not held at all, although Severus still didn't understand one thing: "What kind of quirk does everyone have to put entrances to such important places near the women's restrooms or in them?" with a trembling eye, the Prince muttered, looking at the toilet a metre away from him.

" Okay," shaking his head and throwing these thoughts out of his head, he walked up to the wall and calmly began to count the bricks from the toilet until he stopped at the fifth one and clicked on it , he almost imperceptibly moved a millimeter back, and then he pressed another one two spots higher than the previous one, and then from the same centre down, left and right,  "And now the answer to the riddle, in runes from my world..." On that on the very wall, on the fifth floor, there was a message addressed to the "young Ravenclaw", with praise for having come so far, but with an order not to relax, as well as with an "inconspicuous" hint to remember the first stage at the end, paying a little more attention to it than to the others.

But Severus didn't even need to do this, because his gaze immediately concentrated on the familiar symbols, which he knew as his own name and in which the next point was hidden, to which he had to get and in what sequence to press certain bricks, and also a riddle, surprisingly very simple, even childish, the answer to which was "book", but this word had to be written in a language from his world, which of course was not a big problem for him.

And finally, having written the last symbol, he created a barrier around the wall and the next moment it began to tremble, and then, with a grinding sound, it began to move apart, showering them with almost century-old dust, and a passage opened in front of them, behind which there was a staircase leading down. 

"And here our library has been found... I hope…" after the last two weeks, he no longer really believed that what he was looking for would really be there, but he still had no choice and, having created several barriers around himself, because it is unknown what could be expected there, he began to go down, and the passage, like in those films that they watched on TV, when the main characters fell into a trap, was slowly closing, which worried Nagini a little, and Lucky was completely calm and curiously looked around as they went down the spiral staircase. 

A few minutes later, when the staircase finally ended and Severus stepped onto the last step, a plain wooden door materialised from the void right in front of them, on which an eagle was engraved on a blue background, but without a handle.

"The mind's chamber is more valuable than gold," a simple book appeared in Snape's hand and the next moment, a recess opened in the stone wall, into which he placed it. 

As soon as it closed, there was a clicking sound and the door slowly began to open...

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