HP: The Duelist of Hogwarts - 431

Chapter 431: The Giants’ Settlement

This was Sean’s fifth Magic Awakening.

The first had been his natural awakening as a wizard.
The second came after his battle with Quirrell, triggered by the fragment of Voldemort’s soul lodged in Quirrell.
The third arose from the diary.
The fourth from Ravenclaw’s diadem.
And now, Marvolo Gaunt’s ring had brought on the fifth.

Once he hooked this unprecedentedly thick and long strand of magic, Sean’s power exploded.

A violent, magical storm whipped through the Room of Requirement. All the junk stored there crumbled into sand-grain fragments, swirling around him like a cloud of gnats. The storm tightened, gathering layer by layer until it formed a solid pyramid around him, entombing him at its centre.

No one knew how long it lasted before the pyramid suddenly collapsed, dissolving into a rain of sand that scattered across the room.

Sean rose from the drift at the centre and rolled his shoulders, feeling the difference at once.

During that flood of power, magic had surged wildly through his body. A portion of it, tugged by his open Spirit Vision, had poured straight into his eyes, fortifying them. His Spirit Vision had jumped from LV1 to LV3 in one stroke. It still did not match Gavin’s mastery, but it had reached the same general level. An unexpected bonus.

Leaving the Room of Requirement, Sean felt, quite simply, unstoppable.

He halted before a window in the corridor and drew a deep breath, forcing his heated thoughts to cool. He needed to avoid storming off to kill Umbridge, kill Fudge, kill Barty, and then go and challenge Voldemort, only to be killed himself.

Once his head had fully cleared, Sean turned and headed for his room to continue his work on Life Alchemy and the potion to cure werewolf infection.

He had barely stepped back into the Slytherin common room when Blaise came straight to him with a message from Dumbledore.

“The Headmaster wants to see me? He’s back?” Sean asked.

“No idea. I got it from Potter and I’m just passing it on.”

“All right, got it. But…” Sean narrowed his eyes at Blaise, half-smiling. “Since when have you and Harry been in such close contact? You two getting along that well now?”

Blaise reacted like a cat whose tail had been stepped on. “What are you talking about? I just ran into him, that’s all. Don’t start making things up!”

Watching him bristle, Sean shook his head, amused. “Fine, you just happened to meet. No need to act like someone trod on your tail. I’m going up to the Headmaster’s office. We’ll talk later.”

Leaving the common room, Sean headed straight for the gargoyle.

If there was nothing urgent, Dumbledore did not disturb him.

Which meant if Dumbledore asked for him, something important needed doing.

“Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans.”

The password was correct. The door swung open.

Sean stepped through, and as he did, a Slytherin student loitering down the corridor shot a furtive glance toward the office, then hurried away.

Inside the Headmaster’s office, Sean was surprised to find no sign of Dumbledore.

He raised an eyebrow and scanned the room. Once he was sure Dumbledore truly was not present, he turned his gaze up to the portraits of past Headmasters. “Professors, do you know what Professor Dumbledore wished me to do?”

At that, several portraits who had been pretending to nap or stare into space glanced at one another. Then, as if by unspoken agreement, they all looked at Phineas Nigellus Black.

Sean followed their gaze and smiled up at Phineas. “Professor Black, what did Professor Dumbledore ask you to tell me?”

Phineas peered down at him. “How did you know it was me?”

Because literally everyone just looked at you, Sean thought. Even an idiot could follow that.

Of course, he could not say that. Instead, he replied, “As the scion of one of the oldest pure-blood families and the only Headmaster from Slytherin House, if Professor Dumbledore wanted someone to pass on important instructions to a Slytherin, naturally, he would choose you. Wouldn’t that be only logical?”

The compliment brought an irrepressible smile to Phineas’s face. If not for the other portraits watching, he might have burst into open laughter.

Under their collective look of disdain, he held himself in check and said, “Dumbledore asked me to tell you this: Hagrid and Maxime have gone to negotiate with the giants. On his orders, they are trying to bring the giants to our side.

“The plan was going reasonably well at first, but lately they have suddenly lost contact. Dumbledore has also received reliable information that Death Eaters are secretly approaching the giants as well. He wants you to go to the area near the giants’ settlement and investigate. At the very least, you must find Hagrid and Maxime and confirm their safety.”

“Where exactly is the giants’ settlement?” Sean asked.

“The location is…”

Once he had the coordinates, Sean did not waste time. With a Time-Turner in his pocket, he could always rewind later and attend whatever classes he missed. For now, he used the authority Dumbledore had granted him to step into the Headmaster’s fireplace, leave Hogwarts via the Floo Network, and head for the giants’ territory in search of Hagrid and Madame Maxime.

He tugged lightly at his robes. The fabric rippled and flowed, becoming a voluminous hooded cloak that shrouded him completely. Sean now stood a solid one metre eighty-three, eighty-four—tall and broad-shouldered enough that with the cloak up, no one would guess he was underage.

From the portraits’ vantage point, this simple bit of Transfiguration drew soft exclamations. It was a small trick, yes—but wandless, wordless Transfiguration of that precision was anything but. Without superb Transfiguration skill, it could not have been done.

Sean paid no attention to their reactions. He only took a pinch of Floo powder from the pot above the grate and tossed it into the flames.

“Diagon Alley!”

The fire flared emerald green. Sean nodded a brief farewell to the watching portraits and strode into the flames, vanishing from the Headmaster’s office.