Chapter 9

Minerva woke with a soft gasp. Her eyes fluttered open and she found herself laying in bed, without any memory of how she had precisely gotten there. Her brow furrowed and her lips pursed as she shifted in the bed ... and felt something sleek and warm and eminently human beside her. She froze, her eyes widening. She lifted her head, craning it around to see that she did, in fact, lay in a strange bed, in a strange room, with a strange someone slumbering beside her. Her cheeks burned and a confused ripple of excitement, shame, horror and confusion exploded through her.

What had happened?

How had she gotten here?

She gulped, slowly, then slid from the bed, moving to not waken the figure. She tiptoed from the room and came to an adjoining bathroom. There, sitting beside the filigreed sink, was a small silver bowl. Glowing, shimmering white liquid flowed within it, swirling without any sign of what stirred it. Beside it sat a note, lit by the backwash from the bowl. Minerva, finding a bathrobe, yanked it about herself and picked up the note. Angling it, she was able to read the words.

Alotrexis notes
September 26th
September 31st
October 1st
-ask for details later
MG

Minerva blinked. She mouthed words. Alotrexis. Something about it - flowing and foreign even to the magical words she had been learning in Hexgramatica, made her think ... fey. Feyish charm. She read the note again and felt her stomach do a slow flop.

It was her own handwriting.

“Bloody hell,” Minerva whispered. She thought back and knew the last date she could remember clearly was September 24. It had been Monday. Her first classes. She frowned. She had lost two weeks of classes to Alotrexis. Alotrexis ... and then something clicked into place. It was the smell wafting from the bowl - crushed flowers and ozone. She had scented it and the snatch of memory floated through her mind.

Alotrexis is a method to weave memories from a mind and store it externally. It is used by...

Then the sentence flittered away.

Minerva put her palms to her face and groaned. It didn’t take a genius to realize what had happened. Minerva had, by her own hand writing, damned herself. She had prepared to perform this Alotrexis on herself, for reasons that were now lost in that bowl of glowing memory. Three days plucked out of her head, including the reasons.

Well!

She had gone a mite farther than she had planned, hadn’t she. She ducked back out of the bathroom and then started to creep towards the figure laying in bed. There was a nightstand, and there was her wand, set beside another contained in a leather holster that concealed it. The figure was tall and long limbed, and their face was turned, mashing into the bed. In the darkness, their hair could have been brown or blond, but decidedly not black. The excited thought of...

Of Harry. Yes. That was who she hoped for. Hell, that’s why she’d made the phitler.

She had made one, right?

Minerva took her wand and scuttled back into the bathroom. She closed the door silently, then realized something. She felt something trickling between her thighs. She reached down and, in the dimness, felt what flowed from between her thighs. Her cheeks burned and her stomach knotted with ... excitement, yes. This was how a girl should feel when she had gotten to lay with Harry Arthur-Perry. She wiped her fingers off on a towel, her cheeks flushing even more deeply. Then, excitement turned to true dread.

“What have-” She stopped herself. She put her hand over her face.

She hadn’t used protection. Buying a rubber would be difficult, but not impossible, she was sure. But then again, if she had asked, would he have used one? She had heard men hated them. But ... Harry was a gentleman, right?

He’d have done so, if she had asked?

So, had she not asked?

If it had been true love, maybe she hadn’t.

“Minerva, you’re an idiot,” she whispered softly. Because if the philter had made her feel true love, it sure didn’t feel like it was now. Would she need to drink one every day of her life if ... if...

Minerva frowned, putting it out of her mind. She’d worry later. She touched her wand to the side of the bowl, making a soft ringing noise. “The only problem is I don’t know how Alotrexis even works,” she said, quietly. The liquid within the bowl trembled, writhed, bubbled like someone had set a fire beneath it and let it simmer for hours.

Growing from the bubbles, like a sculpture formed from light and liquid, came the shape of Professor Ravenwood. Her head was lifted up and she spoke - and her voice came out tinny and echoy, like she was being transmitted off an old wireless set that hadn’t seen an electrician in ages. “Alotrexis takes memories from the mind and focuses them - Alotrexis memories are never lost, never age, never decay. They are stored past the death of their originator, and have been the reason why wizarding society has never faced a ‘dark age’ like those of our mundane ... brothers.” She snorted, softly. “You will now get to witness some of our Alotrexis, and ask of them questions of the past...”

She flowed back into the puddle.

“Ah,” Minerva said. “How did I learn to do Alotrexis?”

The bubbling came again. This time, Minerva herself emerged. She was holding a book and reading from it intently.

“Of course I did,” Minerva said, sighing quietly as the memory showed her continuing to read silently. She rubbed her temple, then craned her head over, murmuring. “Show me how I can get the memories back in...” She said. To her surprise, the Minerva holding the book began to move like a rapid exposure film, jerkily and unnervingly sweeping through what looked like hours of study before finally, she turned a page and came to a juddering halt. Minerva craned her head closer and, despite the uniform color, was able to pick out words marked more as indentations in the liquid surface of the phantasmal book. She read them one by one, carefully.

Touch a memory with a wand, then place it upon one’s tongue?

She snorted. “Of course,” she said. “It’s a feyish charm, no wonder it would be both childishly simple and...” She coughed. “Have implications.” She glanced back at the door to make sure it was still shut, aware of Harry sleeping in the next room. She tried to make herself feel warm and happy about having laid with him. Instead, she just wanted to be even more quiet as she took hold of her wand, then said: “Show me ... September 26th.”

The memory started to bubble.

Minerva touched her wand to the bubbling liquid. Glowing gold flowed up her wand, then dangled from it, wobbling like a thick bead of honey. She squared her shoulders, lifted her head, thrust out her tongue, and half closed her eyes.

The droplet splashed on her tongue. Warm and oh so bittersweet.

To Minerva’s shock, she did not remember the memory as a memory. She appeared within it, ghostly, transparent, and ... it did not easily split days into moments. She did not begin with her waking up, with her eating breakfast. She began, she saw, at a moment that seemed to be chosen to leave her feeling the most shaken.

Minerva saw herself, pressed against a corridor door. Katarina Wolfe grinned at her. They were in close, their lips almost touching. Minerva’s hand was raised above her head, her chin lifted, her eyes wide as Katarina murmured softly. “You are being quite adorable when you squeak so...” She crooned.

Minerva squeaked - both as she watched and in memory.

The memory, though, quickly shook off Katarina, stammering. “Y-You are an absurd creature,” she said.

“Am I? Then why is it you are asking for a lock of my hair?” Katarina asked as she followed after Minerva, who was starting down the corridor. Minerva followed both - trying to think of the best way of thinking of ... well, herself. The memory seemed so vivid and real, more real than her own actual memories. It was as if she was reliving it, rather than remembering it. Save for the remove of being a spectral blue ghost walking through the props and players of the past like an unnoticed stage hand. That left it feeling more surreal than most things Minerva had run into at Hexgramatica - which was saying something.

“I am looking into making a potion, and a shapeshifter’s hair is required for the beginning base,” the pats Minerva said, her voice edged as Katarina followed her. She took a left turn, then shook her head, then went and took a right instead. Katarina followed with a big grin, spinning on her heel to keep up with Minerva’s erratic course correction. “That’s all.”

“Any shapeshifter?” Kat asked, curiously.

“Any, yes, but you’re the only shapeshifter I happen to know,” Minerva said, her past voice prim and proper.

Minerva, watching, snorted. “Did I even check the apothecary classes?” She asked herself. Then she frowned. She actually knew precisely which potion it was that she had been interested in - she knew it as clearly as if she had spent hours studying it. A philter of love. She crossed her spectral arms over her chest and arched an eyebrow at herself. Her past self looked as casual as she could manage - but ... damn, Minerva had not realized how obviously she lied.

“They’re out. Besides, Professor Ravenwood only wants to give out reagents for potions that are a part of-”

Kat caught onto her hand, tugging her back around. Her grin was ... well...

Wolfish.

“What. Potion?”

“It’s none of your business,” Minerva said, her voice soft.

“No, you idiot!” Minerva groaned, putting her hands over her face as she saw what her past self was doing. “She’s a wolf! She chases! Haven’t you learned that by now?”

Her past self sniffed, lifting her nose. “And so, you will do well to let me go and ... just say yes or no. Give me some hair or don’t.” She tugged her hand back - but Katarina tugged back, pulling her just a bit closer. Minerva bit her lip as she watched through her fingers. The sensation of Kat’s hand on her wrist was repeated, echoing into her spectral form despite viewing things from the outside. That glowing heat, the scent of her, burned in her brain like fire. Pieces of the memory were at a remove - but pieces were so intimately close that they rasped against her skin like a fine razor blade.

“Say please,” Kat whispered.

“You’re impossible,” Minerva said.

“I know.” Kat stepped closer and Minerva drew away again. Chasing. Chasing. They were both moving deeper down a side corridor, the lights dim and dark. Only a few candles here. In that darkness, Kat’s croon was almost a growl. “Say. Please.”

“Kat...”

It was dark enough that Minerva couldn’t see herself. But she could feel the burning heat between her thighs. “Why is it,” she whispered, her voice echoing faintly. “That I am such a terrible lesbian? Can’t I atleast have the taste to be interested in ... in proper women! Women who aren’t such ... such...”

In the darkness, Kat made a noise between growl and purr and Minerva felt the rasp of teeth on her throat. She and her past self made the same soft moan - as Kat’s growl shaped into words. “Say it.”

“Oh-”

Then light bloomed. A seam grew in the wall, flaring wide, as Minerva’s past self leaned against stone that gave way. A hidden hinge squealed, and Minerva had a perfect view of her own shocked face as she found herself leaning into open air, the secret door she had mistaken for a secure wall yawning open wide. Kat, too shocked to even react, gaped ... then lunged forward. But Minerva’s past self was already falling free, her hand slipping from Kat’s hand as Kat let out a cry:

“Minerva!”

Minerva winced. She, thankfully, did not feel every bump and bruise as her past self tumbled, head over heels, down and down and down and down the stairs. They twisted, like so many stairs in the damned castle, so that Minerva just kept rolling, grunting and swearing in Yiddish the whole way down. Kat sprinted after, her shoes rasping on stone, but Minerva seemed to always roll just a bit ahead of her.

Finally, the two girls came down to the bottom, followed by Minerva’s ghostly future self. They had come into a narrow rectangular room with four torches flickering on each wall. The light cast across about half the room, leaving the other half completely dark. Minerva’s ears perked and she heard the low, steady breathing well before her past self or Kat. Her past self had an excuse, she had just tumbled down a flight of stairs. Minerva had no idea what Kat’s excuse was ... save that she was Kat drop to her knees, cradling Minerva’s head.

“My sweet, my light, oh, Minerva, please, say something!” Kat whispered, her voice dipping quiet and low. “Please, please be okay.”

Minerva felt her heart squeeze. Her past self looked so dazed that she clearly hadn’t heard a word of it. She did mumble. “Kat? Muh ... stop flirting with me...”

“Oh you-” Kat shook her head, then smacked her palm. She pulled out her wand. She held it out and whispered. “Hælan Haefod Wif!”

The tip of the wand glowed and she touched it to MInerva - who grunted as something CRACKED inside of her. Her eyes widened and she focused more on Kat. Minerva wondered ... how badly had she hit her head? The darkness made it hard to tell. ANd ... she didn’t feel any of this. How much did it take to forget cracking your head that hardly? Her stomach did a queasy flip flop, even as her past self shook herself and sprang to her feet, brushing her hands along her robes.

“I’m fine! I’m fine!” Minerva’s past self said.

“Good!” Kat said. “I was not being worried.”

“Good,” Minerva said.

“Good,” Kat said right back, the two of them looking at one another - in the light of the torches, Minerva could see how ... flustered Kat was. How worried had she gotten? How silly did she feel for her reaction? What gnawed at Minerva was this, though: What did her past self think about this? Had she heard? Did she know?

“How can a memory be so confounding?” Minerva muttered to herself.

Then Kat frowned. She slowly turned to look ... at Minerva, the spectral observer. Minerva felt a cold chill run through her body, but then Kat’s voice grew soft and firm. “Minerva, get behind me.”

“Why, what-” Minerva’s past self yelped as Kat stepped between her and the far side of the room. The low, steady breathing that Minerva had heard before had gotten louder. Closer. It came, now, with a pattering drip drip drip and a low growing sound. Minerva spun around and saw that Kat hadn’t been looking at her.

She had been looking past her, into the darkness of the memory. There, glowing from the darkness, were two bright red eyes. “What is it?” Minerva whispered, softly.

“I don’t know,” Kat said as the growling got closer, and with it came the heavy tread of a foot - weighty enough to make the ground creak. Then two more eyes gleamed to the left of the first pair. And another. Three pairs of eyes, all of them blazing brilliantly as Kat stepped back another foot, pushing MInerva with her. “Oh! Now I am knowing!” She exclaimed. “Run!”

She and Minerva turned and sprinted up the stairs as, from the darkness, came a massive hound. A hound the size of an elephant. A hound with three, snarling heads, with bright blazing eyes, and teeth so sharp and large that they looked ready to rip off limbs as easily as they could chew kibble. Claws scraped at the ground as the three heads let out baying woofs and the two students fled up the stairs as if they were being pushed by the nine winds. The three headed hound woofed several more times - but it did not chase them up the stairs. There wasn’t enough room.

The two girls came up the stairs, Minerva following after, panting as she jogged the whole way to keep up with them. The secret door was sealed shut. “Oh hell!” Kat exclaimed, putting her palm against the stone wall. SHe shoved once, twice, then grunted as the door pushed her inwards, swinging open to reveal Professor Stengrad, who glowered down at the two of them.

“What. Are. You. Doing here?” the professor of beasts growled, his scars only adding to his fierceness.

“We just-” Kat stammered.

“I leaned on the wall and it fell inwards and-” Minerva said at the same time

“There’s a beast down there!” Kat added.

“And we ran back up!” Minerva said, hurriedly.

The professor breathed out a slow, steady sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You are two very fortunate students,” he said, quietly. “This door is meant to be locked. I will ensure that it remains so. If you breathe a word about this ... to anyone ... then I will dock five hundred points from House Sildanus. Each! Do you understand?”

The past Minerva and Kat both nodded hurriedly.

“Good,” Professor Stenguard growled. Then, he started past them, moving down the stairs, taking them two at a time. He waved his wand and the door crashed shut.

“Good lord,” Minerva whispered. “Why the bloody hell are they keeping that thing down there?”

“It was a Watcher,” Kat said, quietly. “A polymorphic beast, modeled after a mythological protector. I am thinking that we have a Classics fanatic somewhere in the staff.” She snorted. “They protect things for Magisters.”

“Like ... what?” Minerva asked.

“Things they are not wanting to let out. Or things they are not wanting to let in,” Kat said, her voice grim.

“And they’re storing it at the school?” past Minerva asked, her eyes goggling.

“What is being a safer place than Hexgramatica? It being secured within its own dimension, within the center of the most powerful Empire in the world,” Kat said, chuckling. “A watcher is, what is the term? Going overboard.”

Minerva - both past and present - shivered.

Past Minerva started to walk away.

Present Minerva did wonder about something. She put her palm against the wall. She pushed. There was resistance, but her spectral form seemed to have something of a knack for ghostly behaviors. She pushed through the brick and stone like it was a thick gelatin. She stepped through, into the flickering torchlight of the spiral staircase. She heard soft footsteps and when she froze, she saw the image of Professor Stenguard. He was adjusting his robes, and wiping from his cheek a fleck of what seemed to be blood. He muttered, under his breath; “Damned bitch.”

The door opened with a flick of his wand and a barked order of Drit Flyht So! and then he was gone. Minerva felt no compulsion pushing her towards the present, or away from her memory. She started down the stairs, feeling a queer sense that she was doing something forbidden and illicit. But...

She was curious.

And what better chance for...

This?

She came to the room with the Watcher. It did not lift its head. Er. Her heads, if Professor Stenguard was to be believed. Minerva still tip toed past it, her heart in her throat. The Watcher didn’t rouse. She came to a heavy steel barred portcullis that barred the way. She pushed through it with ease, her body slipping around the bars with whispering tickling feelings. Two torches lit the corridor beyond, and she saw at the far end was ... another door.

It was covered in runes. Interlocking and complex, they were all beyond her current study ... save that they had a single unifying feature.

They were for warding.

Minerva walked forward and put her blue palm against the door. While the portcullis and the secret door had been something she could just walk through, these? These burned. She jerked her palm back with a hiss. But the door, as she stepped close, had a thin slit in it like the kind you’d see in a moving picture about a prisoner. To Minerva’s shock, the slit clacked open with a rasp. The room beyond was pitch black, but as Minerva peered in - careful to not press herself against the glowing runes - she swore she saw something inside.

Then, crooning, came a dark voice.

“Oh hello there.”

Minerva froze. This was a memory. There was no way. No way at all.

“Oh you’re adorable,” the voice was female. It dripped into Minerva’s ears like warm honey. “And in such deadly danger, my dear little witchling.” The name witchling made Minerva’s eyes widen. She gulped, then opened her mouth, then closed it. “It’s all right. Speak.”

“Y-You can hear me?” Minerva whispered.

“Of course...” The chuckle that followed made Minerva’s heart flutter and her spectral skin turn cold and clammy.

“But how?” Minerva asked.

“There’s more in Heaven and Earth than was dreamt in your philosophy,” the voice from the darkness said, amused. “Though, you will want to wake straight up after this little conversation. You’ve pushed your luck quite far enough - these wards can only go so far.”

“W-What do you mean?” Minerva asked.

“Ahhh, witchling is right, you are new.” A faint clink and clatter came from the room, shifting links on chains, rasping against stone. “You’re not in a memory. You’re in the astral plane, shaped into a memory by your Alotrexis spell. That means that they are waiting for you. The further you step from the memory, the further you move from that illusion of security, the further you step ... into the dark ... the closer they come.” The chains clinked and clattered and the laugh that came from the slit made Minerva’s blood run cold. “It is quite amusing, normally, the most dangerous thing you could find in Hexgramatica would be ... well ... me.”