Chapter 52: Halloween Of Illusions and Symbols (1/2)
If you want to read ahead, you can check out my Patreón @
[ ]
The link is also in the synopsis.
-*-*-*-*-*-
The dinner feast at Halloween was always special at Hogwarts.
The decor of the Great Hall was all Halloweeny and spooky. Floating pumpkin heads from the ceiling and spooky bats flew around the dark, enchanted sky.
The lighting on the Great Hall was also dimmed by a level, giving it a different feel than usual. It was oddly stimulating to see a place that you saw every day changed slightly.
The goblets had engravings of pumpkin, and the food came in cauldrons instead of the usual utensils.
Like every year, Quinn had put on his pointed hat for the occasion and had a pumpkin and bat lapel pin on his robes. It was his way of being festive.
Plus, he had dipped into his chocolate reserves and distributed chocolate to every Ravenclaw he came across in the Ravenclaw common room.
Unknown to him, they gave him the nickname Chocolate West because of the chocolate he had been giving out. It didn't help when he would randomly produce chocolate and give them to people even before Halloween.
Quinn cleaned his hands and corners of his mouth before turning to Eddie and smiling, ”What Halloween candy is never on time for the party?”
Eddie gave the question a thought before shrugging, ”I don't know. Which one is it?”
”Choco-LATE,” laughed Quinn.
Eddie gave him a flat look and spoke, ”That wasn't funny.”
Quinn pursed his lips and nodded, ”I know, here you go.” Placing something on Eddie's hand.
Eddie looked at his hand, expecting to see the usual chocolate, but it turned out not to be chocolate.
”A candy cane?” asked Eddie, his brows quirking up.
Quinn showed a shallow lopsided grin and chortled, ”The chocolate is late.”
Eddie's jaw fell as he gawked at Quinn. He closed his mouth before asking, ”Did you plan that?”
”No, it just came to me!” smiled Quinn, shaking his hands around his head. ”Genius, right?!”
”... No, it wasn't,” spoke Eddie, his face showing his complete disagreement.
Both friends got up from their bench spots and started to walk towards the exit
Quinn threw his arm around Eddie's shoulder and poked his cheek, ”Come on, admit I got you.”
”Nope, it didn't.”
”It did.” ”Didn't.”
”It did.” ”Didn't.”
”It did.” ”Didn't.”
.
.
.
”It did.”
”Didn't!”
Quinn and Eddie walked together among the crowd of students who were going to the common room. He would walk with them till the fifth floor, then he was going to part with them to go to the Room of Requirements.
But then the crowd of students slowed down till every stopped and stilled. A murmur spread across the students, and then all of them heard something that bought chills to Quinn.
”Enemies of the Heir, beware! You'll be next, Mudbloods!”
Quinn froze when he heard Draco Malfoy's familiar voice. He had familiarised with it from all the times he had quarreled with Harry Potter in the Great Hall.
Eddie felt Quinn's arm slip away from his shoulder and watched as his friend step away from him and walk towards the front of the crowd.
”Hey, where are you going?” Eddie called out to Quinn but didn't get a reply from his roommate. ”Quinn!”
Quinn didn't hear Eddie as he moved through the crowd towards the front of the traffic. His fingers twitched occasionally, and numerous students felt tugs on their clothes, shifting them slightly to the side as Quinn used magic to make a path from himself.
Quinn finally reached the front of the crowd and saw the scene he had read about and seen in the cinematic representation of the books.
Foot-high words had been daubed on the wall between two windows, shimmering in the light cast by the flaming torches. And, not any words, but words, written in blood red, and the dripping marks certainly upped the graveness of the wording.
THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED. ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE.
His eyes shifted away from the bloody words and saw Mrs. Norris, the caretaker's cat, was hanging by her tail from the torch bracket. She was stiff as a board, her eyes wide and staring.
'Is she dead?' thought Quinn and immediately looked at the floor to see a puddle of water.
'Okay, there is a chance that it might be alive.' The events exactly matched the canon, so there was a chance that Mrs. Norris was alive and was just petrified.
Quinn finally took note of his surroundings. The chatter, the bustle, the noise died suddenly as the people in front spotted the hanging cat. Harry, Ron, Ivy, and Hermione stood alone in the middle of the corridor as silence fell among the mass of students pressing forward to see the bloody sight.
Attracted no doubt by Malfoy's shout, Argus Filch came shouldering his way through the crowd. Then he saw Mrs. Norris and fell back, clutching his face in horror.
”My cat! My cat! What's happened to Mrs. Norris?” He shrieked at Harry, his eyes popping red as he looked feral.
You!” he screeched. ”You! You've murdered my cat! You've killed her!
I'll kill you! I'll —”
”Argus!”
Quinn looked as Dumbledore made his entry on the scene, followed by the professors. In seconds, he had swept past the golden quartet and detached Mrs. Norris from the torch basket.
He handled the situation swiftly and immediately asked Filch and the golden quartet to follow him to his office, and Lockhart offered his office because it was the closest.
The silent crowd parted to let them pass. Lockhart, looking excited and significant, hurried after Dumbledore; so did Professors McGonagall, Lily Potter, and Snape.
Quinn felt relieved as he saw the events happening just as canon progression. It made him feel in control and brought calmness that the diary-Horcrux was in the castle and not out of Hogwarts, which meant there was a solid chance the Basilisk might die at the hands of Harry Potter this year.
But...
Quinn didn't know that his relief would turn against him as without his knowledge, someone had seen his relief, someone that didn't have a good impression of him.
Ivy Potter, the Potter Princess, part of the golden quartet, caught sight of Quinn's figure in the crowd's front. And, something caught her attention, and when she observed, she saw a look of recognition in Quinn's eyes as he stared at the bloody scene.
Her eyes widened as she saw relief and something else in Quinn's expression as he watched the wording on the wall and the hanging cat.
A seed of apprehension gripped her heart as she saw him not showing the stunned and dismayed expression matching the others surrounding them.
Ivy continued to glance at him with the corner of her wide green eyes as her mother pulled them away from the crowd.
Without Quinn's knowledge, his hated wench had struck again.
Fate had placed an impending crisis on Quinn's head, and he did not know what was about to come.
.
- (Scene Break) -
.
The knowledge that the Basilisk was active in Hogwarts was a positive and negative thing at the same time.
The positive from the situation was that the course of events remained close to the canon progression. Quinn didn't need to worry about canon blowing itself out of the pool and the Basilisk wrecking havoc later on.
The negative of the diary-Horcrux being at Hogwarts was in the short term. It wasn't sunshine and daisies when you lived in the same building as the deadliest snake in the world, one that could kill you with a single look.
To feel a moment of safety, Quinn had come to the Room of Requirement to think about... something. He couldn't think much about how to handle the Basilisk.
Quinn's first priority was to stay away from the serpent and make sure he and the snake never met. He had no delusions of taking on the Basilisk.
'If it was blinded, then I would take my chances,' thought Quinn, tapping away at the armrest of the chair he had asked from the Room of Requirement.
There were two places in Hogwarts where he was safe from the Basilisk, he was sitting in the first, and the second was the Icy vault. Snakes didn't like cold, and Basilisk wasn't an exception; if Quinn became a squatter in the Icy vault, he would be safe from the Basilisk as it would avoid the cold climate of the vault.