Chapter 108: Detention
Boys' Hallway, Durmstrang, Feb. 14th
There was a sense of dread as Harry approached the simple brown door at the far end of the third floor corridor. During his three years at Durmstrang, he'd overheard all sorts of rumors and whispered conversations about Ivan Dutov. There were various stories about the man himself. Everything ranging from Ivan being the former commander of Grindelwald's legion – an over-zealous student support group at Durmstrang during the 40s that helped the Dark Lord maintain order at Durmstrang – to his supposed assassination attempt against the Portuguese Prime Minister in 1986.
For every ridiculous rumor though, there was always one constant. No matter who was telling the story, Ivan was never featured kindly. Doing his best to ignore the more outlandish rumors, Harry steadied himself before knocking twice on the caretaker's door.
As the seconds stretched on, Harry couldn't help but start to irrationally hope that Ivan had somehow forgotten about his detention. Such thoughts were quickly dashed when he heard the soft click of the door unlocking.
Upon entering Ivan's office, Harry's first instinct was to turn around and try a different room. Surely, with all the terrible rumors, Ivan's office should have resembled a dungeon. Instead, Harry had walked into any other professor's office. All around the room were various, non-threatening looking, magical trinkets and books. Letting out a slight breath he didn't know he was holding, Harry approached a girl sitting in a straight back chair directly in front of Ivan's desk.
"Excuse me, do you know where Mr. Dutov happens to be?"
If not for the most innocuous twitch at Ivan's name, Harry would have thought the girl in the chair hadn't heard him.
Stepping closer, he was slightly unnerved that the girl seemed to do her best to ignore him at all costs. In fact, were it not for the girl's steady breathing, Harry would have thought the girl had been petrified. He was about to reach out and touch her shoulder when the door behind the desk opened.
Stepping back from the girl, Harry said, "Mr. Dutov, I'm here for my detention, sir."
"Ms. Gabbles," Ivan said, ignoring Harry completely, "your hour is up. I trust you've learned your lesson?"
"Yes," Came the barely audible whispered response.
Ivan nodded, his eyes never straying from the student in front of him. "Excellent." Reaching into his pocket, he removed a small blue vial from his robes and placed it in front of her. "The antidote. I've heard it tastes like pineapples. Drink it and you're free to go."
Slowly, the girl lifted one hand to the vial. Each motion she made seemed to bring about a larger, more pronounced, wince. By the time her hand grasped the antidote, tears were running down her face, and her entire body seemed to be shaking. Using her thumb and forefinger, the girl popped the cork on the vial and slowly brought it up to her mouth.
Harry watched in disbelief as the simple act of uncorking the vial had caused the girl's fingers to quickly bruise, turn purple, and then begin to bleed.
As the vial inched closer to her mouth, the girl's shakes and soft whimpers became more and more pronounced. Eventually, her arm was shaking enough that Harry thought the vial would surely slip from her grip and be crushed on the stone floor. Amazingly enough, the girl managed to get the vial to her mouth and drink it in one gulp. Almost immediately, she sagged into the desk, a moan of pain reverberating from her throat.
"Have a good day Ms. Gabbles. Do see Lady Shluga before you go to sleep." Ivan commented casually.
For the first time, Harry started to understand why people spoke of Ivan in hushed tones. While hardly an imposing man – Ivan stood barely at five and a half feet – the more you watched Ivan, the more uncomfortable you grew. The man's movements seemed jerky and erratic, almost as if he wasn't comfortable in his own skin. He spoke pleasantly, but without any of the emotion the words typically conveyed, making him seem quite unnatural. Having never spent any time around the man, seeing him only at feasts where the entire staff was present, Harry only now recognized just how wrong Ivan really appeared.
Only after the girl had quickly gathered her belongings and quickly fled the room did Ivan turn his eyes to Harry.
"How are you this evening, Mr. Potter?"
"Well enough, sir," Harry said uncomfortably. "Can I ask what–"
"Ms. Gabbles rather foolishly attempted to cheat on her spell crafting quiz." Ivan said simply. "She believed Professor Cherny wouldn't notice if she substituted an auto-correct quill for a standard one. She might have actually gotten away with it if Professor Cherny wasn't called away to Kiev and requested Professor Kosarev to proctor the quiz."
Harry mentally filed the older girl as a particularly stupid individual.
"Now, what shall we do with you, Potter?" Ivan opened a drawer in his desk, quickly grabbing a piece of parchment and glancing at it. "Cursing students in the Main Hall, Mr. Potter?"
Growing more and more nervous, Harry decided simplicity was his best option. "Yes, sir."
"Quite an offense, but you've never been punished before, have you?" Ivan asked. "May I ask why you did it?"
"He insulted my mother."
Almost immediately, Harry felt Ivan prodding his mind with Legilimency. The attack came so sudden, Harry momentarily found himself seeing Calypso raise her wand to curse Müller. Immediately, Harry cleared his mind of emotion, stopping Ivan from seeing any more than he already had.
"Bravo, Mr. Potter. You're quite talented. Yes, I can see why the professors have taken such a shine to you." Ivan tilted his head to the side slightly as he continued to probe for weaknesses in Harry's Occlumency. "Karkaroff says you are to receive lashes. Nasty things, lashes. Easy to heal though. You'll be fine in the morning. Fifteen solid licks sounds fair, I suppose. Is that agreeable to you, Mr. Potter?"
"Do I have a choice, sir?" Harry asked, still attempting to maintain his Occlumency against Ivan.
"Of course you do, Mr. Potter. Choice is what separates us from the animals. Would you like to be immobilized or face the whip standing on your own power?" Ivan muttered a spell and a long black whip sprung from the tip of his wand. Standing up, Ivan cracked the whip, causing Harry to wince.
"Immobilized."
"Wise choice. Wand on the table, Mr. Potter"
It took every bit of control Harry had to remain calm and keep his mind Occluded while he stood up and placed his wand on the table. As soon as he stepped away, Harry found himself petrified from the neck down.
"Lashes," Ivan said from behind Harry. "I've never been fond of them, Potter. They're an all too Muggle way of punishment, but what can we do if that's what the Highmaster wants."
Without warning, Ivan snapped the whip across Harry's body, striking him clean across the back.
Harry bit the inside of his mouth to keep from screaming; however, before he even fully processed the physical pain in his back, Ivan lashed out with a vicious Legilimency attack.
As Harry struggled to clear his mind, Ivan hit him with another strike from the whip – this one tearing the flesh from Harry's lower back. Unable to stop himself, Harry screamed as the pain shattered his attempt at clearing his mind. Immediately, memories began to flash before him. Being cornered after Transfiguration during his first year, the agony caused from a bone breaking curse to the back...
"No! No! Stop!" Harry cried out as Ivan continued to mercilessly strike out with the whip. Hanging his head, Harry started to sob. The physical pain from Ivan's whip was excruciating, but it was the feeling of utter helplessness as Ivan riffled through his unprotected mind that was truly terrifying.
It didn't take long for Ivan to discover that Harry had lived a very comfortable life. The number of painful memories were few and far between, and Harry could actually feel the man's disappointment as he began putting more of effort in the lashes instead of Legilimency. As Harry remembered his former classmates from Ravenclaw taunt him behind his back, he lost track of the number of times Ivan had struck him with the whip. It wasn't until Harry felt a burst of twisted happiness in his mind that he was able to pull himself out of his darkest thoughts. Using the feeling of happiness as a base, Harry mounted one last attempt to clear his mind and push Ivan out.
A soothing chill ran down Harry's back as a number of the lashes on his back began to heal. "You've done better than most, Mr. Potter." Ivan said. "Only one more before you're free to go."
The thought of finally being free from Ivan caused Harry to cry. A whirlwind of emotions – elation, hope, rage, embarrassment – effectively destroying any chance he had at clearing his mind. Feeling Harry's attempt at Occlumency failed, Ivan lashed out with one final burst of Legilimency quickly followed by a strike with his whip.
As Harry felt the 15th strike slam against his back, the memory of himself, his body magically held upright in Ivan's office, flickered to the front of his mind. He saw his clothing in tattered, bloodstained pieces, his head hung in defeat as tears ran freely down his face. All the while a grinning Ivan walked calmly behind him, occasionally muttering Legilimency and bringing the whip down across his back.
The moment Harry felt the memory fade, so did the spell immobilizing him. His legs immediately gave out from underneath him, and it was only Ivan's quick wand work that stopped Harry from cracking his head open on the stone floor. Muttering various healing charms, Harry felt the pain from the last lash begin to fade across his back.
"All done." Ivan said before taking out a headache potion and placing it on the floor next to Harry. "Go. Curfew is in 10 minutes, and I doubt you want to be seeing me for detention tomorrow, do you?"
Harry didn't say a word. He just picked up the vial and scurried out of the office.
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