Unraveling Plans

Three days later, the dragon was now two days old, Madam Bones, a group of four dragon handlers from a Romanian Dragon preserve, including Charlie Weasley who was translating, Rita Skeeter and her photographer Bozo, and four aurors including Sirius Black arrived at the gates of Hogwarts to get the problem with the dragon out of the way. The students of Hogwarts had been informed by Professor Dumbledore that Hagrid had prevented the illegal use of a rare dragon and that the DMLE would come to take the dragon to a preserve. Hagrid had told Dumbledore about the incident at the Hogs Head and how he got the egg over a game of cards and just wanted to get it away from the man. And how he couldn't just let the poor little dragon in the egg die. Dumbledore, knowing Hagrid, accepted the explanation and was glad that this wouldn't blow up into his face like the troll and the Cerberus had.

He had had to explain to Madam Bones what security measures he had taken to prevent Voldemort from returning and what information he got from the splint the healers pulled out of Harry's scar. The DMLE head had to agree that it had to be prevented at all cost that Voldemort ever got his hands on the Philosopher's Stone. Additionally Dumbledore had warded off the complete third corridor against students and given a warning. The danger of a student accidentally stumbling in there was not there. She didn't like it, but she had tested the precautions to guard the stone and had to admit, they were impressive. But Dumbledore got a strict warning against putting the students at risk. Following that the corridor had also got wards that prevented Fluffy from escaping.

Now Hagrid was presenting the two days old Ridgeback that didn't seem to like the attention. Hagrid had prepared a bucket of a mix of chicken blood, brandy and a sleeping draught Professor Snape had prepared. He put the bucket in front of the dragon, he had named him Norbert, and despite the tenseness in the dragon he drank it. Fifteen minutes later the Ridgeback was sleeping peacefully. The dragon handlers took the baby dragon and put him into a transport crate.

"Can I visit him sometime?" Hagrid asked tearfully.

"Sure. We're glad you got the egg before somebody could do something really bad with it. You're welcome to visit the preserve anytime you want, Hagrid." Charlie assured him.

That did seem to cheer Hagrid up.

"Bye, Norbert." Hagrid said, blowing his nose in his giant handkerchief.

Meanwhile Rita was interviewing Madam Bones, Dumbledore, Harry and in the end Hagrid. Bozo was taking photos from the dragon, the eggshells Hagrid had kept, Hagrid and the dragon, the dragon handlers, the students that were watching and Madam Bones and the aurors. In the end the dragon handlers took a portkey back to the preserve to bring Norbert to his new home. Soon the assembled people left, Madam Bones again thanked Hagrid for his actions and Sirius said goodbye to his godson.

.....

Quirrell's True Colours

Things at Hogwarts went into the hot phase before the exams. In all houses students were working hard to prepare for the exams. Harry, Terry, Lisa and Tony had built a study group for the preparation, another was Su, Sylveena, Kevin and Michael and the third one consisted of Padma, Morag and Mandy. Sometimes the groups were joined by other classmates from the other houses and more than once they interchanged depending on the subjects. Susan and Hannah joined the group around Harry for Potions and Defence Against the Dark Arts, which the two houses had together. Neville sometimes joined them for Transfiguration. His Charms work was good enough on his own that he, Hermione and Miranda only occasionally asked Harry for a hint.

While the students were busy repeating the things they had learned over the year, Quirinius Quirrell was trying to find a way to get to the stone. The first attempt on Halloween had been a failure. While he had managed to get the answer of how to get past the damned Cerberus from the drunken Hagrid, he wanted to kick himself for not believing the rumours about Potter singing the beast to sleep. Music was the answer. The more problematic part was that now there were more wards on the corridor. He would have to sneak in there undetected first and Dumbledore, after the DMLE was now involved, kept a much closer eye on everything. He was running out of time. He had to resort to drinking unicorn blood to keep alive, but Dumbledore had been told already that something was killing the unicorns in the forest. So far he had killed two and would need to get a third soon to keep alive with his master using up his body. They needed the stone to get two powerful bodies.

He had extracted the information about the obstacles from Sprout and McGonagall by using Legilimency. None of them had noticed anything, but then again, his master was a master legilimens and they had only needed a few seconds to get the information. There was a mix of two plants in the first room. Devil's Snare and Dragon's Breath weed. One loving the dark and weak against fire, the other loving fire and producing a poisonous spore if in close contact with fire. Tricky, but doable. McGonagall had animated a giant chess-board. With the chessmen being charmed to not let anybody pass. Manageable. The tricky parts were Snape, Flitwick and Dumbledore. Flitwick was part goblin and the damnable critters were immune against Legilimency, Snape was a master occlumens and Dumbledore the same.

He didn't know if Snape was truly loyal to Dumbledore or was just biding his time, but it was too risky to test. And he got to feel the fury of his master again and again. He couldn't even harm the Potter boy during the Quidditch match as the whole school including Dumbledore had turned up. He didn't know if he suspected anything, but his presence had effectively disrupted his plans during the Ravenclaw vs. Slytherin match. Which the damned Ravens had won. The Gryffindors had also beaten the Hufflepuffs, but only by a margin of one hundred ninety points. The game had been over soon as the Hufflepuff seeker had seen the snitch first and only a lucky turn of the snitch in the direction of the Gryffindor seeker had got them the victory. The game had ended 240:50 for Gryffindor. Which meant without an extremely long match, something happening to the Ravenclaw key players and the Gryffindors having an extremely good day, the cup was secure to go to Ravenclaw and the Potter brat. He didn't like that at all.

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