Demons and Botched Rituals Part 27 (Patreon)

Hermione pulled her attention away from the crystal ball that was showing Jade and Jessica sprawled out on the large bed by the fire, reading the books they'd borrowed from Merlin's library and focused on the runes that Harry was carving on the bottom of the crystal ball stand with a nail. "What are the chances of this going wrong?"

"Fifty, fifty? Forty, sixty?" Harry replied, not terribly concerned as he was expecting it to fail a couple of times before he got it right, assuming that his crazy idea worked at all.

Hermione glanced around at the books piled on the tables that she'd grabbed for a bit of light reading. "We should probably activate it in the swamp in case it explodes."

"Explodes?" Harry asked with amusement. "I'm not Seamus, the chances of it exploding are remote."

"Not in the library," Hermione replied firmly.

"Remote doesn't mean impossible," Harry agreed, knowing he wasn't going to win that argument, mostly because she had a point.

"How many times do you think you'll have to carve the runes to get it right?" Hermione asked, wishing Harry and River had managed to keep the books in some semblance of order so they could find something useful to their current project.

"At least a couple. It's like I have an instruction manual playing in the background while I'm using a pattern, without the pattern, I'm trying to remember something I only half remember, it helps that I've made half a dozen of all of the crystal balls I have patterns for but I'm still basically moving runes from one project to another without knowing what the other runes do. It sort of makes me wish I'd taken ancient runes," Harry admitted as he started on the last rune.

"I've taken three and a half years of ancient runes, it's not as helpful as you'd think," Hermione replied, wishing she had some of her rune books with her.

"That makes me feel slightly better about taking Divination," Harry lied, not sure why the hell he'd let Ron talk him into taking that stupid class.

"Useless class," Hermione muttered, thinking back to some of Trelawney's less than amusing predictions.

"I'll stick with enchanting," Harry replied as he finished carving the last rune. "Do you want to watch it explode?"

Hermione raised her eyebrows. "I thought you said it wasn't going to explode."

"It's sort of like saying break a leg, if you don't say it, you have to worry about it," Harry replied as he headed for the door with the crystal ball.

'Not sure it works that way,' Hermione thought as she followed Harry out of the room.

Jade looked up from her book and smiled at Harry. "Does it work?"

Harry rested the heavy crystal ball on the edge of the bed. "I haven't tried, Hermione didn't want me testing it in the library in case it exploded."

"That could be a nasty trap," Jessica mused as she put a bookmark in her book and closed it.

"Let's not leave a bunch of dangerous artifacts scattered around for innocent people to run into," Hermione argued, not particularly interested in having something explode in her face.

"Probably for the best," Harry agreed, tucking the idea away for later. "What are you reading about?"

Jessica rolled off the bed, landing on her feet. "Merlin's notes on water purification. It has directions for making an alchemically treated sponge that removes various chemicals and taint which I'm assuming means bacteria. None of the ingredients are particularly expensive and it lasts a couple of years before you need to replace it, assuming you're not filtering complete sludge."

"It's worth checking with Selena or her parents, it might be cheaper than dealing with the Enchanting Guild," Hermione suggested, knowing water quality was a major problem in medieval or even renaissance era cities.

"I’m reading a book about some of Zeus' more amusing adventures," Jade replied as she stuck a bookmark in the book and rolled out of bed. "Where are we going to test the crystal ball?"

Harry dropped the crystal ball in his enchanting box and hit the button, curious what he'd get. He smiled when he got a schematic for a crystal ball that would punch through most defenses on a fixed location. "There's a slight change to the last rune before the connecting rune."

"Draw it," Hermione suggested.

Harry used his finger to draw the rune in the air, leaving a rune formed from glowing blue light. "Does that help?"

"Where did you pick that up?" Hermione asked as she studied the glowing blue light and the rune.

"One of Merlin's books, it's a simple cantrip for writing in the air, he used it to impress and terrify people," Harry explained as he set the crystal ball on the bed.

"It might be the equivalent of a tense change, because you're talking about a location rather than a person," Hermione mused.

"Not sure," Harry admitted as he focused on the crystal ball and activated it, causing the crystal ball to swirl with purple mist before it cleared, revealing a hazy image of the Weasley twins in their room looking at a cauldron. "That worked better than I was expecting."

"Why is it hazy?" Jade asked.

"No clue," Harry admitted as he focused on Ginny, causing the image to jump and show a reasonably clear though still faded image of Ginny holding a bucket of soapy water and scrubbing at a wall with a brush. "She looks about ready to set someone on fire."

"Mrs Weasley probably gave her busy work to keep her from bothering them while they're having an order meeting," Hermione suggested, knowing that was Molly's response to anything stressful.

"Probably," Harry agreed as he let the image fade. He dropped the crystal ball in his enchanting box then selected the enchantment that would let him project an image and enchanted the crystal ball. He set the upgraded crystal ball on the bed and focused on the kitchen when they normally had order meetings.

Hermione watched as the crystal ball filled with mist before it slowly cleared, revealing a mist-covered scene of Dumbledore and some of the order members sitting around the table. "This would be easier if we got sound."

Harry focused and used the lesser shape changing ability to change his skin back to something closer to human. "We'll have to actually project into the room if we want to hear what they're saying and they'd probably notice."

"No point in waiting," Hermione said, knowing they'd probably get yelled at for using the ritual. "What are we going to tell them about the ritual?"

"Nothing," Harry replied, not seeing a reason to tell the order anything beyond that they were alive so they wouldn't worry or do anything tragically stupid. "Half of the trinkets in the house are cursed. We'll just tell them that we have no idea how we got to the other world and that it took us a couple of days to acquire a crystal ball that would let us send a message."

"Works for me," Hermione said as she used her lesser shape changing ability to change her skin to match Jessica's, not particularly happy with the order since telling Harry about the prophecy would have prevented the trap working and Sirius would still be alive.

"Give them hell," Jade suggested.

"Ready?" Harry asked as he reached out and touched the crystal ball.

"As I'm going to be," Hermione admitted as she reached out and touched the bottom of the crystal ball so that Jade and Jessica could still see it.

Harry focused on where he wanted to appear in the room and activated the projection ability, appearing next to Snape. "Boo."

Snape twitched, drew his wand and blasted the dark haired person in a low cut shimmering green dress that had just appeared next to him before his brain finished processing the person's face and realized it was Harry.

"Harry!" Mrs Weasley blurted, shocked to see the stunner had gone right through Harry like a ghost.

"Hello," Harry offered, rather amused to see Hermione standing behind Mrs Weasley wearing a black ball gown. 'Nice.'

"What are you wearing?" Snape demanded, trying to change the subject before Molly started ranting about him trying to stun Harry.

Harry glanced down at the shimmering green dress his projection was wearing. "A dress, get over it."

"Why are you wearing a dress?" Tonks teased, having noticed Harry's smile when he appeared.

"It's a very nice dress," Albus offered.

Harry turned to look at Tonks. "Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a crystal ball that can project across dimensions in a second hand shop?"

"Next to impossible?" Tonks asked thoughtfully, fairly sure the ministry would lock anything up that allowed you to look into other dimensions much less communicate with them.

"Close enough," Harry agreed as Tonks waved her hand through his arm. "Having fun?"

"I'm just checking to make sure you're not a ghost," Tonks replied with a grin, relieved that he didn't feel cold like a ghost would.

Harry laughed. "Not that I know of, I'm just using a crystal ball to project an image so I can hear you and communicate."

"Where are you?" Molly demanded, wanting to get him back somewhere safe. "Do you know where Hermione is?"

"Behind you and next to me," Harry replied, trying not to laugh as Mrs Weasley spun around to look at Hermione.

"Hello," Hermione offered.

"How do we know you're actually Potter?" Snape asked with a sneer.

"Do you remember the time my aunt cut my hair?" Harry asked, thinking about one of the memories Snape had looked at when he was digging through his head. "I called you a sadistic bastard when you taunted me with that memory."

"Did you leave the house?" Snape asked, willing to acknowledge that Harry wouldn't spread the story and no one else would have put any significance to the event.

"Not willingly. We were working on research. We must have drifted off or picked up something cursed while cleaning that knocked us out because we woke up in another world with no idea how we got there," Hermione explained, feeling slightly guilty about the way Mrs Weasley went a bit pale at the idea of causing everything by making them clean on their vacation, but it helped sell things and they should have been able to enjoy their vacation, not got stuck cleaning everything.

"Where are you currently?" Remus asked, before things could devolve into an argument.

"We're currently in the Swamp of Stench helping a friend with her alchemy shop while we try to figure out how to get home," Hermione replied as she walked around the table so that she was standing next to Harry.

"What do they sell?" Snape asked thoughtfully.

"Everything from healing potions and bug repellent to elixirs that will permanently increase your strength, agility, or vitality. We'll probably toss in Potions of Youth once we get a decent source for the ingredients, but we're just trying to get the shop back up and running since the old alchemist died after selling most of his supplies," Hermione explained.

"Lab accident or age?" Snape asked.

Hermione shook her head. "He was picking herbs in the swamp and something nasty got him."

"How dangerous is the swamp?" Arthur Weasley asked.

"Hagrid would love it," Harry offered with a smile.

"In other words, worse than the Forbidden Forest?" Remus asked.

Harry turned his head to look at Remus. "I haven't seen any car sized spiders or murderous centaurs in the swamp, but there are magical crocodiles and lizard folk, to say nothing of the bogs and other hazards, so yeah, the swamp is worse."

Mrs Weasley scowled as she thought about Harry and Hermione in danger. "Please tell me you're not planning on exploring."

"Not a chance, the swamp earned its name," Harry replied, not seeing a point in arguing about it since he wasn't going to explain the fact that they'd been turned into demons and would just come back if they were killed. "You need a bubble head charm or a salve to kill your sense of smell if you want to go anywhere near it."

"Do you have adequate ventilation?" Snape asked, wanting to make sure they didn't poison themselves.

"The pipes are enchanted to move and filter the air in the lab," Hermione assured everyone.

"Are you eating enough?" Mrs Weasley asked, worried about them.

"We're fine," Harry assured them. "I know how to cook."

Mrs Weasley turned to look at Albus. "How are you going to get them home?"

"Never underestimate the power of a good lemon drop," Albus offered, fairly sure he could bribe Fawkes into finding them, now that he knew where to look.

Mrs Weasley stared at Albus. "How is that going to help?"

"I'll do some research, Hogwarts has an excellent library," Albus assured her.

"We're safe enough," Harry assured them. "I just wanted to make sure no one was overly worried."

Snape glanced at Hermione, figuring it was her idea. "Have you had any trouble using magic without your wand?"

"I picked up a pair of gloves that work as a focus and Harry has a glove that works as a better focus and gives his arm regeneration," Hermione said, not seeing a point in mentioning the boost to dark magic.

"Do they have publically available books on how the gloves are created?" Snape asked, reasonably sure he could figure out how to use a left handed glove to cast shields if Harry could use one.

Hermione shook her head. "Not that I've seen, but I'll keep an eye out, most of the professions here are controlled by guilds and we don't have the right connections to join the Enchanting Guild."

Harry opened his inventory menu to check on the extra focuses he'd created when he was working on increasing his Enchanting. He pulled one of the gloves out of his inventory, on the off chance that his crazy idea actually worked.

Snape stared as a glove appeared out of thin air and promptly fell through Harry's fingers and hit the table with faint noise. "How?"

"Magic," Harry replied, hiding the fact that he was shocked his inventory skill actually worked through the crystal ball. "That's an extra focus glove, feel free to take it apart and try to reverse engineer it."

"Excellent," Albus offered with a smile, knowing that having a sample from the other dimension would make it easier for Fawkes to find them and happy about having a holiday project that wasn't related to politics or Voldemort.

"Speaking of teleporting things across dimensions, I have a potion that breaks curses that might help with your arm," Harry said as he brought his hand down to the table and pulled a vial of the grape juice from the Holy Grail knockoff out of his inventory, causing the vial to clink on the table.

"Did you make it?" Snape asked warily, not trusting anything Potter made.

Harry gave Snape a less than impressed look. "I'm not my mother. Besides, half a year of proper Potions instruction doesn't make up for five years of shit instruction."

Albus pulled out his wand and cast a spell to detect poison. 'Nothing, not even traces of anything that would upset one's stomach,' he mused as he put his wand away. He picked up the vial, popped the cork and drank half of it, fairly sure it wouldn't make things worse. He smiled as the flavor hit his tongue, reminding him of a summer in his younger years when he'd visited a vineyard in France that had particularly good grape juice.

Snape stared in disbelief as the blackened flesh on Albus' hand flaked away, revealing perfectly healthy and much younger skin. "How much did the potion cost?"

"Nothing," Harry replied with a smile. "Now if you'll excuse me, we should probably cut this short as I don't want my crystal ball exploding."

"Why would it explode?" Tonks asked.

"No idea, ask Hermione," Harry replied with a smile then dropped the connection, causing his projection to vanish.

Mrs Weasley focused on Hermione. "Why would it explode?"

"We're scrying on a heavily warded location across dimensions," Hermione explained, her lips curling up into a smile when she noticed that Professor Dumbledore was already looking younger. "Before I go, how long have we been gone?"

"You had dinner four days ago and weren't there for breakfast three days ago, why?" Remus asked.

"I just wanted to make sure time was running at the same rate," Hermione replied.

"It's generally rare for time to run differently outside of certain faerie realms though it has been known to happen," Albus mused, thinking about some of the stories he'd heard.

"We'll try to keep in touch," Hermione promised then ended the connection, not wanting to explain that Harry had basically dosed Albus with an elixir of eternal youth until they could run some tests and get used to the idea of him being younger. She glanced around when she found herself back in the room with Harry and the girls then focused on Harry. "You're going to need to come up with a story about where you got the elixir."

"I'll just tell them I got it from a version of Merlin, they're welcome to harass him if they can find him," Harry replied, not particularly worried about it as long as no one knew he had more.

"How did you know the inventory would work?" Hermione asked.

"I didn't," Harry admitted. "I opened it to check on something without even thinking about it. Once it was open, I figured I might as well try grabbing something cheap on the off chance that it worked."

"Does that mean we could make something to scry on Voldemort and leave a bomb under his bed?" Hermione asked thoughtfully.

Harry shook his head. "As much as I'd love to kill Voldemort without having to get near him, I've never been to Malfoy Manor, which means we'd have to use the other crystal ball and hit him when he's taking a bath."

"Not my idea of fun, but if it gets the job done, do you really care about having to get really drunk so you black out certain details?" Hermione asked.

"No but I'd rather not find out the hard way that he has a spell that can jump dimensions using our projections as a focus," Harry argued.

"He's not a voodoo priest," Hermione argued.

“He’s an undead fuckwit and I’m not giving him the chance at a new world with new magics to learn,” Harry said firmly.

Hermione frowned. “Point.”

0o0o0

'This is pointless, Harry should have told Kreacher to clean the fucking attic,' Ron complained as he climbed up the stairs into the attic, fairly sure his mother just wanted him out of the way while they had their order meeting or just didn't really understand that house elves liked cleaning. He stopped when he noticed that one of the boxes had been shifted from the last time he'd been up there.

He walked over to the row of dusty boxes and stared when he saw a large five pointed star in a circle painted on the floorboards with candles at the points of the stars. "What the hell?" he blurted, not sure why someone had drawn the weird diagram on the floor in the attic since it hadn't been there when they'd checked the place over the summer.

Ron glanced at the stack of books next to the diagram and recognized the journal on top as the journal that Hermione had been writing in all break when she'd gotten obsessed about a project she wouldn't talk about. "I should have asked what she was working on. I should have known they weren't up here snogging," he muttered to himself as he walked around the line of boxes and picked up the journal.

Ron picked up the journal and opened it, seeing Hermione's familiar handwriting. 'Research the ancient Celtic and Norse rituals, ignore the Aztec, they're tainted. Aztec?' he mused, not sure where he'd heard the name before. 'It was probably in History, useless class. Cross reference Roman demigods to see if they were wizards or under the effects of ancient rituals.'

Ron skimmed the next couple of pages of her notes, knowing she tended to be long winded and not sure what karma was or why she referenced it a couple of times in some of the rituals or how some of the runes fit into things beyond the fact that they were on the drawings of the five ritual circles in the book. "Fame, knowledge, luck, power and wealth?" he mused as he looked at the labels for each of the ritual circles she'd drawn.

Ron glanced at the ritual circle drawn on the ground and compared it to the circles in the journal. "If you ignore the candles, that looks like the ritual for power if you added the runes for knowledge. Seriously, what the fuck?" he complained as he skimmed over the rest of the notes about the ritual they were planning on using to get enough power to defeat Voldemort.

"What type of backstabbing bastard doesn't tell his best friend about the chance to get power?" he complained as he skimmed over the section that was talking about a heroic quest for power. "Heroic quest? Dream quest? That would explain why they're not back yet, bastards, I'll just have to catch up," he muttered the last part as he flipped to the actual ritual to figure out what he needed to do.

He briefly considered telling his folks about the ritual before realizing that they'd just erase the circle, take the journal and stop him from using it. 'Screw it, I have about thirty minutes before Mum checks on me, that should be enough time to finish the ritual and get enough power to make a name for myself.'