Preparation

Once we had come up with the plan, Fred pulled out the marauder's map and started looking for Charlie on it. After a thorough search, Fred found Charlie out at the quidditch field with the rest of the Gryffindor quidditch team practicing for their last match of the season.

Once we had arrived, not wanting to disturb the players, we observed silently from the stands. Once the practice was finished, George motioned for Charlie to join us.

Seeing the tall, stocky redheaded Weasley, headed our way, I noticed that he was one of the most muscled wizards that I have ever seen. As he lumbered over, a sincere smile appeared on his face, obviously happy to see his brothers.

Charlie spoke in a surprisingly soft voice, and good-naturedly teased, "Counting down the days till you can get on the team."

George grumbled, "It's not fair that they don't let first years on the team, Fred and I would be better beaters than what you have right now."

Fred promised, "No matter, next year, there will be no stopping us, we'll be the terrors of the sky."

Hearing Fred's promise, I started feeling sorry for the other teams, next year, Gryffindor would have some of the most talented and chaotic beaters ever to play for their team, no one would be safe from the bludgers.

Charlie smiled and asked, "So what are you little trouble makers up to, some new scheme to drive Filch mad this year."

An evil grin appeared on George's face, and he said, "Of course not, does driving Filch crazy in one year sound like something we would do."

An identical evil grin appeared on Fred's face as well, and he added, "Besides what fun would that be, it's far more fun to spread it out, we plan to have a lot of fun with him over the next seven years."

Charlie nodded towards me and asked, "Who's this?"

Holding out my hand, I said, "I'm Alex."

As he shook my hand, George stated, "Alex needs some help with a project of his, and we're hoping that you can help him with it."

Charlie looked at all of us suspiciously, no doubt thing we were up to something. It didn't help that George and Fred were both trying to look innocent, which had the opposite effect.

Deciding to step in, I said, "I'm trying to learn how to dismantle a ward."

Charlie looked at me in disbelief and said, "That's nuts, that advanced magic."

Shaking my head, I explained, "I'm not trying to cast a ward, I'm trying to learn how to dismantle one. I've read that it's easier to take one apart than casting.

Eyeing me thoughtfully, Charlie mused, "Well, I suppose that is true. Why do you need to learn how to do it, most wards are there for a reason, it sounds like you're trying to break into something."

Sensing that Charlie was becoming too suspicious, George revealed the ace hiding up his sleeves, and said, "June 6th, 1985."

I didn't know what that meant, but looking at Charlie's horrified face, I'm guessing something happened. Charlie looked around anxiously and whispered, "You promised never to speak of that incident again."

Fred grinned and said, "And we won't, but remember you owe us, and we're calling in your marker."

Charlie grumbled and said, "Fine, where do you want to do this."'

I smiled, and said, follow me, I have the perfect place. I lead them to the seventh floor to the room of requirement. When we got nearer, the room appeared, Fred and George looked at each other in confusion; this room wasn't on their map.

I motioned to them that I would explain later, and when I opened the door, a small unused classroom was revealed. Charlie looked around in confusion and said, "Huh, I could have sworn that I've been here before, but it looked different."

While I planned on telling Fred and George, I didn't want everyone in the castle knowing about the room. So I awkwardly said, "Well, a lot of these rooms look similar; you probably just went into a similar room."

Looking around the room, Charlie asked, "So, what type of ward do you need me to set up."

I pulled out the book that I translated containing wards and handed it to Charlie and said, "On page 29 there is a ward against physical objects, that's the one I was hoping for you to cast."

Opening the book, Charlie started reading, finding the spell, he looked up in confusion and said, "I don't recognize this spell."

Worried, I asked, "Will that be a problem."

Shaking his head, Charlie explained, "No, but I need to study this for a few minutes. I have reviewed similar spells to this, so it shouldn't take me to long."

While Charlie was studying the spellbook, I casually asked, "So, Fred and George were telling me that you are interested in becoming a magizoologist."

Charlie answered without looking up from the book, "Yes, I've always found that working with creatures is preferable to working with people."

Hearing Charlie's response, I knew I had something that would pique his interest, so I suggested, "Maybe sometime, I can introduce you to Althena; she is a lamassu."

Charlie looked up in surprise and clarified, "Did you say you have a Lamassu? How on earth did you get one? Their mothers usually never let their eggs out of their sight, and even then, Lamassus' are incredibly picky about choosing who to bond with. They have been known to refuse to hatch if they disapprove of the person who has their egg."

Shrugging, I grinned and said, "My uncle got the egg for me, and I guess I'm just lucky Athena liked me."

Now that I had his attention, I casually said, "Speaking of magical creatures. Have you ever heard anything about a Grendel."

Charlie grinned at me and asked, "Do you have an interest in magical creatures? There aren't very many people who even know what a Grendel is because of how long ago they were wiped out."

I shook my head and said, "No, it was just an old story my uncle told me about them, and I was trying to get more information on them."

Charlie sighed and complained, "I wish I could help you more, but information about them is sparse. There weren't very many of them, besides, back then, a lot of wizards guarded their knowledge fiercely, unwilling to share it outside of their families and apprentices. This led to a lot of information being lost. It wasn't until the Hogwarts was founded that wizards in Britain started pooling their information, and by then, Grendels had been extinct for centuries."

I tried not to let the frustration show on my face, gloomily I said, "So you don't know anything."

Charlie shrugged and said, "Well, legend has it that they were long-lived, incredibly strong, had healing that was so powerful, they could regrow limbs in minutes. Outside of those rumors, we don't know what they were capable of."

I winced at hearing how fast the Grendels could supposedly heal. An accelerated healing factor likely indicated that spells wouldn't last very long against them. Not wanting to raise Charlie's suspicion, I let the conversation drift into silence.

Grumbling to myself, Fine, If I can't find a specific weakness to attack the Grendel. I will simply have to prepare for any possible scenario that way, no matter what the Grendel does. I will be ready for it.

Thirty minutes later, and I was looking for a ward that prevented physical objects from crossing the boundaries. As I looked at the glowing circle on the ground, I grinned and said, "Thanks Charlie, I owe you one."

Waving off my gratitude, he said, "Don't worry about it, I owed the twins, and this cleans the slate." He glared at the twins and added, "Right."

Innocent grins on their faces, the twins responded in unison, "Right."

As soon as Charlie left, Fred turned and asked, "What is this place?"

"Ya, It's not on the map, everything is on the map," George added.

Smiling fondly at the room, I said, "This is known as the room of requirement, and you won't find it on that map of yours. Almost anything you need can found if you ask for it correctly. There are limits, but it's probably the most powerful enchantment I've ever seen or heard about."

"So, say I wanted a broom," George said.

As he finished, several brooms appeared in the corner of the room. Fred and George looked at each other, grinned in unison, and said, "Wicked."

While they were testing out the enchantment of the room, I turned my attention to the ward in the center of the room. Charlie had set this one up opposite of the one holding Octavius. It only prevented physical objects from crossing, where the other prevented physical objects from leaving.

I had wanted him to set it up the same as the one containing Octavius, but he had insisted on doing it this way as a safety precaution. Now that I had something to practice against, it was only a matter of time before I mastered dismantling wards.

Over the next month, my free time was spent in the room of requirement, working on taking down the enchantment. Additionally, in preparation for confronting the Grendel, I began spending time preparing for any scenario that might come up.

One great thing about the room of requirement was that it was able to provide access to Hogwarts potion ingredients. Although I'm sure this would end up driving Professor Snape mad as he tried to figure out why his potion ingredients were disappearing.

The great thing about potions is that if you were willing to put in the time and effort. There were potion recipes for almost anything. The only downside to potions was that they were temporary and took a great deal of time to prepare.

I ended up crafting dozens of different types of potions, all of which were designed to help any unforeseen circumstances that might happen.

Knowing that potions alone wouldn't be enough, I started working on more aggressive spells and curses, such as the Cutting charm, Blasting curse, and the Full Body-Bind curse and many others.

Guessing that being able to hit the Grendel with a spell might be difficult if they were able to move fast. I got the room of requirement to provide some bludgers, which made for great moving target practice.

Not alone in my pursuit to prepare, my friends often joined in the practice. One day, just as I was getting comfortable keeping track and being able to hit one bludger with spells. I heard Anna snicker at me, and yell, "Watch out."

As I turned, I blanched as I saw an additional bludger headed my way. "Are you crazy," I shouted while dodging an angry bludger. that was doing its best job to damage my skull.

Anna grinned and innocently said, "What. You said you wanted to prepare for the unexpected, and I'll bet you weren't expecting that. Besides, you were getting too good dealing with only one bludger; this way, you will be more effective."

Glaring at her, I said, "You do realize that you're just as much a target as me in here.

She grinned and pointed at the bludgers who seemed to dislike me, as they were ignoring everyone else. "Are you sure," she asked, "They seem to be ignoring me.

Seeing the unbearably smug look on her face, I decided she required a lesson. Luckily the room read my intent, and several more boxes containing bludgers appeared near me.

When she saw the boxes, she panicked and said, "You wouldn't dare."

Busting out my own Cheshire cat grin, I opened the chest containing more bludgers, and said, "I would."

Soon, there were a total of six bludgers flying around the room, bouncing off the walls in their attempt to bludgeon us. We spent the next half hour dodging and ducking while we tried to deal with them. But, at least I wasn't the only one who had to deal with dodging the bludgers.