If there was any time to panic, it would have been now, as he sat on the common room couch playing back the vision he got in the dead of night. He could see the great beast speak to him, yet instead of fear he felt something closer to excitement. Maybe because he was finally finding some answers. The reason things had changed and this ancient creature had been awoken was because of his coming to 1976. Time travel, it seemed, was not as benign as Minerva McGonagall had implied. But it was no use crying over spilt milk, death by Voldemort, death by something else.
He kept thinking about that dragonfly caught by the swallow. Tom Riddle had been a hateful waste of a man, whatever had killed him was nothing alike. There had been a connection, through the vision, the creature with the great silver eyes was no different from the swallow hunting the dragonfly, or the squid hunting the birds. To it, the whole of the world was its prey, and its weapons were magic and the sharpness of its teeth.
The danger of it did not escape him, to see the so called 'Dark Lord' reduced to a whimpering child was something out of the impossible. He turned over his hands. They did not shake, his breathing was measured. He went to the dorms and back to sleep deciding to break the news after their final exam.
He suspected he got perfect marks. So did the three others. He took them aside afterwards and as soon as they were out of earshot, he told them. "It happened. Voldemort is dead."
"Let's go somewhere private," Severus said, and they made their way to the Unity Dorms.
They waited for him to speak, and it was in this moment he wished he had a pensieve to show them. "Have you ever seen a dragon?" he asked.
"A friend took me to visit a Green Welsh one time, amazing creatures," Lily answered.
"What – whoever killed Riddle was bigger, it looks like a dragon, but… not a dragon. It spoke to me."
"What did it say?" Remus asked.
"I'm the reason it awoke, same as Keldran. If I hadn't been here… Well you get the idea, I think we should go see him, he was probably waiting for this."
"Are you sure he's dead?" Remus asked. "You told us he had Horcruxes, that he couldn't be killed unless they were destroyed."
"Just because we don't know how doesn't mean it can't be done. I saw Voldemort get destroyed completely, his horcruxes are useless now. It's strong, I mean aside from its giant claws and teeth. It knows magic nobody else does."
It seemed he wasn't the only one capable of keeping his cool, they all took in the information without flinching.
"Let's just go see Keldran," Remus said. And if there was any doubt whether he was in control of his emotions, he certainly fooled Harry.
They walked to the 7th floor, stopped before the blank wall, and the door with the golden handle appeared. Harry wondered if he was the only one thinking this might be the final time they stood here, regardless of how things turned out. He turned the handle and walked in. The room seemed larger than before, unnaturally so. The ceiling was so high he wondered whether clouds might form, and the carpet beneath their feet almost stretched the length and width a quidditch pitch.
Ever since his vision he'd had a hunch, and every second it seemed to be proven right. A moment after their entrance, Keldran turned to them, his customary grin absent from his face.
"I see," he said calmly. "No more deceptions now."
He put aside his staff and his hat, and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, literal fire was burning within them, and a moment, later smoke rose from the stitching in his robes, obscuring the view. Harry was ready, for anything, but he sensed no danger. From within the white smoke gleamed fiery gold light, roaring with a hiss and crack.
The smoke settled around them, hiding the carpet, and as it sunk, it revealed a glimmer of the purest gold. Beneath the gold came large amber eyes, of a burning, living colour. Beyond it extended flaps of gilded sheet-metal into wings the size of a jumbo jet. Its teeth were sharp and white with a golden sheen. Below its head, its body was marked by a dark, foul looking scar. Giant claws adorned its front and hind legs.
The creature, once the wizard Keldran, closed its eyes and breathed out slowly. A deep breath released sulphuric air into the room. He didn't notice at first, but it had a long, winding tail. Gold like the rest of it, coiled behind it. Its eyes blinked with a deafening wet sound.
Its mouth did not open to speak, but its voice had the quality of boulders moving through molten earth. "They called me Keldran, 'the Golden One', and I need your help in defeating my sister."
It was difficult not to be enraptured by the magnificent golden being before him. But the pervading thought at seeing the truth behind it all, was that the stakes were much higher than any of them had ever imagined. He moved slowly in his draconic form, each breath taking the span of minutes. Harry spared a look to the others, their faces were eager. After all, the hours they put in had been for this singular purpose.
Keldran's rumbling voice spoke up again, his gargantuan claw motioned to a desk on the West side of the room. "I have left a map for you, the location of the tools you will need."
"Your sister, who – what is she?" Harry asked.
"I have lost the ability to read your thoughts since your change," Keldran said. "What happened when you saw her?"
"She showed me how she obliterated Bellatrix, how she killed Voldemort and made him cry in terror. She spoke to me," he said calmly.
A plume of fire erupted from his nostrils in irritation. "She sees you as her favoured prey, admiring, almost. You saw her in what I can only assume was a temple. She had followers, she was revered more than once in human history. Men would bring sacrifice of their own kin to her, to curry her favour. But all met an untimely end. You are connected, I can not deny that. You might find it difficult to fight her."
"I don't find it difficult at all," Harry promptly said. "Who is she?"
Keldran's jaw grimaced and his eyes narrowed in anger. "Abraxas," he spat out in a roar of fire, "you must stop her, or there will be no future for any of us."
Lily shot him a questioning look, and he smiled back. "So how do we kill her?"
"On the following blue moon, the trove on the map will open. You are the only ones who can enter, not even I could. It is many centuries old, but it contains the weapons to defeat her. They have been attuned to you, in the way you have been growing to fledgling size. Go there on the blue moon, and you will find the means to defeat my dreaded sister, as well as the location of her lair. Will you face her?"
Without saying a word, Remus went over to the table and picked up the aged piece of parchment, taking it back to the others. Harry nodded, and they made their way to the door. Before turning back he got an idea. "Do you mind if I take your hat?" Harry said. Keldran l lifted a golden claw and levitated it into his hands, sparing him what might have been the monstrous version of a grin. He turned to the door and with his hand on the handle, he leaned his head in Keldran's direction. "Farewell, Keldran."
"Good luck, my dragons," he heard as the door closed behind him.
They had tea, in the Unity Dorms, and Selwin was nowhere to be seen. Remus sat next to him, a rarer occurrence not quite disturbing their dynamic. "Who are we fighting?" he asked.
Harry turned the cup in his hands, warmth spreading to his palms. "We've seen glimpses of what Keldran can do, who he is. She's the flip side. I don't even think I can say she's evil, any more than I can say Keldran is good. But I do believe we need to stop her. Abraxas." He tried the name rolling off his tongue. A name that somehow had been carried to the present day and had found moderate popularity among wizards. A rush of dopamine coursed through him as he remembered the beast's silver eyes. He longed to stand face to face with it, wand in hand, to end it. "Let's see the map."
Remus unfurled the parchment, and on it appeared a map of what was clearly the Mediterranean, 'here be dragons' and all. Marked in old script, was an island in the Aegean Sea.
"What island is this?" Severus asked.
"I don't recognize it," Lily said.
"It's not on any map," Harry said, "I used to have a globe, I know it almost by heart. How can we get there?"
"I can make a portkey, get us close," Severus said.
"Meanwhile," Harry started.
"We wait," Lily finished.
Harry got restless the last few days of the term. He sat in the dungeons looking at Keldran's old ragged hat, his legs dangling over the rest of the armchair.
"Is that the bloody sorting hat?" Reg asked after walking in.
"Maybe," Harry replied calmly.
"Do you want to get expelled?" Reg sighed, settling into the couch.
"Reg," Harry said, still looking at where once the hat's mouth had animated and started everything. "I don't think I'll be going to Hogwarts next year."
"Oh, sod off!"
He sat up and put the hat in his lap. "I'm serious."
Reg's face turned from annoyance to hurt. "No way," he said, shaking his head.
"Sorry. I just don't think after everything… I don't think I'd have it in me to come back, it wouldn't make much sense."
"You're the one not making any sense."
"Maybe one day I'll tell you everything over a drink."
Silence settled over them for a moment, Reg seemingly deep in thought. "That scar, was it really –"
"Yeah."
"Seriously? A chimaera?"
"Serious as dragonpox." Harry stood up and spun the hat in his hands. "Do you want this?"
"No, I don't want the bloody sorting hat!"
They both laughed. "Don't think this old thing is going to do any more sorting. Still..."
He made to leave when Reg called after him. "Where are you going?"
"To give Dumbledore his hat back, of course," he said with a smug grin.
He didn't bother hiding the hat on his way to the tower. In a few days he'd be on his way to Lily's home on the Hogwarts Express and whatever whispers would make their way through the castle was somewhat inconsequential. The gargoyle moved aside before him and he walked upstairs to the office, the doors already wide open, Dumbledore sitting at his desk.
"I had hoped you might pay me a visit soon," he said with a smile. "And… is that my sorting hat?"
Harry tossed it over to the desk and Dumbledore deftly caught it with a sly grin, slowly turning to a frown. "It seems different."
"The 'sorting' part of the hat might have escaped."
"Escaped? Harry did –" Dumbledore's eyes widened and he stood up, leaving the hat on his desk. "Have you succeeded?"
"That's a complicated question," Harry said, scratching his head. "Tom Riddle is dead, if that's what you mean."
"And are congratulations not in order?"
"Not yet."
"Not yet," Dumbledore repeated, and took off his glasses.
"I'll send you word if I've succeeded, but I won't be coming back."
"A shame," Dumbledore mused. "And might I conclude that Miss Evans won't be coming back for her last year either?"
"I haven't asked her, but… No, she won't."
"How did he die, if I might ask."
"Very painfully, I'd guess."
"I see, it feels –"
"Anticlimactic?"
"You might say so, yes."
"Goodbye, professor," Harry said, and turned to leave.
"Harry," Dumbledore called from his desk, hat in his hands. "How would you replace the sorting? If you were in my place."
"Let them choose," Harry said after a moment. "I did."
NEWT and OWL students would get their results during summer, but for the 6thyears the official results came in a few days before the end of term. His Exceed Expectations in History of Magic stuck out like a sore thumb. Lily, of course, nagged him about it to no end ("After all the work I put in tutoring you!") Needless to say she got perfect marks, as did Severus and Remus. Some of the students would give the four dark looks at the mention of 'only' getting an EE, but the three would not pass up a chance to annoy their fellow students one last time.
They hadn't bothered to isolate themselves to discuss things any more. Worst thing would be crazy stories floating around next year, and they wouldn't be around to witness that.
"We're staying with my parents," Lily said to Severus and Remus over dinner. "I'd say join us, but my poor mum might have a heart attack."
"No," Remus said over his bowl of soup, "I want to go home anyway. Not to be morbid, but it might be the last time."
"I will too," Severus said, "I might hate my father but it feels wrong not going back home."
"You should come over to my place after," Remus said, "we've always had an extra bedroom. Mum always wanted a sister for me, but..."
"Right, thanks."
"We should come together a few days before the blue moon," Harry said.
"Where?" Lily asked.
"Sirius?" Remus said. "He said his parents allowed him to invite people over now. And, well, it's the safest place I know of. I know you don't like them," he finished, looking at Severus.
"Fine, if it's just for a few days."
"Lovely," Remus said with a smile.
"I guess it's all settled then," Lily said.
"Almost," Harry said, thinking of the other purpose of his stay at the Evans home.