Chapter 136: Year Six - Chapter Seven
There was something incredibly cathartic in the way I found myself in the eye of the hurricane. The peace and the silence around me were blissful. They were so blissful, that I utterly ignored the chaos that rose in a spiral around my presence. I looked at Wayne, an anchor of calm in an oasis of peace, surrounded by the sandstorm of a desert called absolute chaos.
Wayne looked back at me, and took a sip out of his chocolate cup. Quite literally, since he had apparently charmed a chocolate bar into a chocolate cup, and filled it with hot chocolate. It was a nice and nifty piece of charmwork, which wouldn't spill chocolate nor melt it, but when you finished drinking, you could take a bite too.
"Take this!" a hex sailed in the air, billowing with strength and ripping apart a tree trunk.
"No, you take this!" another hex flew, barely missing the intended target by a few inches. I glanced in the direction where the Hexes were flying, and then turned my attention to the watchers' gallery.
"You're a self-entitled, spoiled princess-brat!" the snappish tone was a new thing, but apparently annoyance, once it reached a certain point, made teenagers snap. Who'd have guessed.
Ron and Harry both winced, and tried their best to cover their eyes.
On the other side, Amanda was cheering for the other team.
I, meanwhile, quietly took a sip out of a small pocket flask. Nobody had to know I had a way into Aberforth's stash of Firewhisky, less they end up asking for a share of it.
I heard a peculiar curse being uttered just in its inception, and lifted my wand to intercept it with an Expelliarmus of my own. "Keep it to Jinxes and Hexes," I said amiably. "It's a friendly duel to practice non-verbal spells, yes?"
"Sure," Megan gritted out, huffing.
"Of course," Hermione acquiesced.
Then, they began throwing spells at one another once more. I shook my head, and took another quiet sip of my firewhisky. Wayne extended his chocolate cup in my direction, the unspoken words of 'share a bit' clearly coming through his mannerisms. I rolled my eyes, and did just that. Wayne took a sip of his corrected chocolate cup, and then gagged ever so slightly.
"Shade," he whispered, "This is..."
"Aye," I said. "Cannae a man 'aft his drink?" I did my best to use a Scottish accent, and since even I barely understood what I said, I reckoned I had taken to it perfectly.
"How to ruin perfectly good chocolate," Wayne muttered. "I thought it was coffee."
He then tapped his wand against his chocolate cup, and the entire thing vanished in thin air.
"Oi, you can't think like that if you want to put up a chocolate industry," I quipped. "You should consider alcoholic variants to-"
"Excorio!" Megan sharply snarled the spell, which punctured through Hermione's Protego, since it was weaker due to a lack of pronunciation from the girl in question, and as I barely had the time to widen my eyes, the Gryffindor's head was shaved clean. Hermione stared, mouth wide, at Megan's victorious smile.
"Capillus Incrementum," I said with the budding start of a headache, my own Charm gently swishing around Hermione's head to return the girl's fizzy hair back to its natural status. "Megan, it's Non-Verbal spells only. Point to Hermione. Hermione, you need to improve your Protego in its non-verbal form. It's still weak if it can get punctured by a verbal hex. A curse is more than likely to break through, though, so keep that in mind."
"Fine, whatever," Megan grumbled, and returned to the plaid picnic sheet with an affronted look on her face. It was as if she had eaten a sour candy. She sat down, huffing and biting with far more viciousness than needed on a scone, while Amanda merely hopped off her tree stump, and waved at Ron to get ready.
Ron didn't like the blood lust on Amanda's face, but I simply let him be. He'd live.
They actually went for a while too, if without the actual heat that had characterized Hermione and Megan's duel. I didn't peg Megan for being so competitive. I had hoped that in making such pairings, no duel would grow too heated, or too beyond my ability to fix.
I watched as Ron's legs gave way to a Jelly-Legs jinx, and called the match once more. "Keep an eye out on whether or not you actually have a Protego," I said. "A flawless cast is indistinguishable from a failed attempt, since the result is invisible to the naked eye."
As Harry got up, I looked at Wayne. Wayne, in turn, looked at me. "I'm becoming a magical chocolate maker. I refuse violence on the grounds of making pastries."
"You still have exams to take," I pointed out.
"I can flunk them," Wayne answered, amiably enough.
I raised my hands in defeat, and stood up. I gathered my balance in a matter of seconds, the Firewhisky actually packing quite a punch, but giving you courage by the score. I'd need a hefty backlog of it for what I had planned to do later that night.
It was an unfortunate realization, which had sunk into my brain as I dimly realized that events were happening in a slightly shifted order. If Hagrid had gone at the start of the year term to look for the Giants, if that was the reason for his disappearance, then it meant that he might not make it back for Aragog's death in time. A month had nearly passed; the timetable was all wrong. He was supposed to have returned by then, since I vaguely recalled something about him being sad for the Care for Magical Creatures thing, and the first Hogsmeade weekend yet to happen.
No, there was something utterly wrong with the timetable.
"Ready mate?" Harry asked, and I gave him a gentle nod.
I swished my wand forward and a wordless Expelliarmus impacted against a flawless Protego. Go, main protagonist, let me train you through the secret training technique known as practicing for the end of the year exams, or for whatever the hell we're going to do at the end of the sixth year, since NEWTS are on the seventh.
Yet that paled in comparison to the very actual risk of having the Acromantulas in the forest run wild. Aragog ran a tight ship, but his heir or whatever the hell Acromantulas called their leader might not.
So I had to run preemptive pest control. If a Battle for Hogwarts ever happened, I needed to ensure there wouldn't be extra ammunition for the Dark Side. If this meant finally doing something good and true and keeping my word on the matter, then so be it.
Also, I'd oversee the operations from the safety of a command hill, leaving the rest to the Draghuls which, I hoped, would prove to be enough-
"Shade, stop!" Megan's voice caught my attention, bringing my thoughts back to the matter at hand. I blinked as I dimly realized the tip of my wand had emitted a powerful gust of fire, which was seconds away from burning through Harry's Protego, the poor boy trying his best to hold on as the heat seemed to grow, the flames themselves slowly starting to circle around him, lashing out eagerly for a chance at burning his clothes, or puncturing through his shield.
I swished my wand back, the spell coming less in an instant. Harry gasped in relief and then immediately began to cough, gasping for air. I pinched the bridge of my nose and shook my head. "Sorry!" I said. "Got distracted-too much in my thoughts," I shook my head, "You all right there, Harry?"
"You nearly burned him to a crisp!" Ron snapped, angrily stomping in my direction while Hermione instead ran to check on Harry's health. "That ain't gonna pass with just a sorry, mate!"
"Really sorry," I muttered, "Really my fault, got distracted, and my wand went her way, as she always does when I'm not checking. Are you all right, Harry?" I asked once more, honestly worried.
"Just a bit of ash in my throat," Harry coughed out, "Nothing bad."
"No, it's not nothing bad," I answered, grimly. "I really do need to keep a check on this sort of things. Dumbledore's already worried more than enough, and I can't add more to his platter." I shook my head, and pressed the palm of my free hand against my forehead. "Right, right. Did I miss most of the duel? I've got a blank after throwing the Expelliarmus."
"You've got a blank? Seriously?" Ron muttered in disbelief. "You want to hear how great you were or something? You pretty much wiped the floor with Harry!"
"Ah?" I mumbled, "I did?" I rubbed the ridge of my nose, thinking about the past few minutes as the recollection did indeed return to me. Yeah. It had been pretty normal stuff. Expelliarmus, he had sent one, I had parried it with my fingers, then I had swished my wand for the ground to explode in motes of dust, then I had ignited the dust, then I had slammed a veritable flamethrower against Harry's hastily conjured Protego.
Pretty normal stuff.
I could have killed the Boy-Who-Lived by mistake, but it was pretty normal Wizarding stuff.
"Shade, you're a bit out of it," Megan said, warily raising a hand to my forehead. She then removed her hand after a grimace settled on her face. "You're a bit chilly."
I sighed. It had to be the after-effects of the Firewhisky. Heat had to come, and go, from somewhere.
"If you're feeling sick, then it's the Infirmary for you," Amanda's voice brokered no further discussion, and I didn't actually feel inclined in rebelling against it. I was dragged away, not really opposing any form of resistance, and by the time Madame Pomfrey visited me and deemed me ready for the undertaker due to the coldness of my flesh, I couldn't help but ponder what this was all about.
Why was I even feeling this sick? Was the Firewhisky bad? I couldn't actually remember.
No.
Wait a minute.
Why is the room spinning?
I woke up after what felt like a few minutes, but were in truth a couple of hours. My eyes realized, in the dim lighting, that the figure standing by my bedside was none other than the Headmaster, a candle softly glowing by the side of his face as he read something on a small, tattered book.
He didn't look in my direction. He didn't need to in order to realize I was awake.
"Now, Mister Umbrus, you will be pleased to know that it was not a poison which you ingested, but merely one of Aberforth's extremely infamous Firewhisky experiments. I confirmed that my brother is missing a barrel of the liquid, but how you ended up with a flask of it, or felt the need to drink from it, is what eludes me," as Dumbledore said that, I couldn't help but wince.
"I think it was somewhere under the teenage rebellion phase in the dictionary of life," I grumbled, massaging my forehead as the beating in my skull refused to die down. "I didn't think it would pack quite that punch."
"As your guardian I would like to invite you to reconsider your drinking choices until a future time, perhaps starting with something quite softer," Dumbledore said. "I find myself partial to Hot Cocoa with a hint of lemon liqueur."
I rubbed my temples, thoughts snaking their way into my head. "I did it," I said. "It is incredibly vexing how I actually managed to get you to speak to me by doing something so incredibly stupid," I grumbled. "Teenagers really do stupid stuff to get their parents to notice their existence, and I'm quite peeved it actually worked."
"Well, Mister Umbrus," Dumbledore said with a dreadful sigh. "I was notified by Madame Pomfrey as your guardian, and could not help but come in person, I admit that perhaps...perhaps I did not deal properly with the events that followed this summer's little escapade, and this felt as good of a way as another to settle the slate clean." He took a small breath, "This old barmy codger would like to apologize, but it seems that with age, the ability to do so withers together with one's self-control."
"Eh," I muttered, shrugging. "It's all right. I'm a handful of a teenager and you're a single, elderly dad. We'll make due, just as long as you promise to shield me from uncle Aberforth's wrath."
Dumbledore's words died in his throat, and in the glimmer of the candles, something like a wavering shadow of tears seemed to appear for the briefest of moments. It was soon gone, a small smile settling instead on the old man's lips. "I fear that uncle Aberforth is, rather than angry, quite pleased at seeing some good, old, law-breaking behavior from what he felt was a copy of my younger self," he chuckled then, "And I am utterly afraid to say that he might have expectations for your future nights of drinking, expectations which I will be sorely disappointing you both with, at least until you are of a proper age."
I smiled, and bowed my head in defeat. "Oh no, what will I ever do?"
"Enjoy some good, old Mektert, for example," Dumbledore said, and I blinked at that.
"Using something other than English to keep your sweet-themed passwords is against the rules!" I groaned. "I don't know that many languages-"
"Then, you clearly should learn them, son," and his eyes twinkled as he said that.
Mine twinkled in reply.
"You're still in detention," he added next, taking the wind off my sails.
"B-But daaad!"
It was utterly unfair.
It wasn't like I expected to be named heir of ancient and most noble houses, or given the sword of Excalibur to cleave in half the big bad evil Voldemort while enjoying my time with sexy fairies, but at the very least, one could forgive a Firewhisky escapade or two, no!?
The fact I had to serve detention with Professor McGonagall made, somehow, things better.
It merely setback my inevitable purging of the Forbidden Forest by a few days at most.
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