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Deep within the labyrinthine depths of the underground chamber, Ian stumbled upon something utterly impossible. There was no runaway mother, no gambling father, no prodigious younger brother, and no ambitious sister carving her path in the wizarding world. Instead, there was a man— a man who should have been dead.
“Professor Ronnie Ehrlich…”
The figure sprawled upon the cold stone floor looked impossibly real. Ian had seen his corpse with his own eyes, and yet here he was, a breathing man with intact flesh and bone. His mind reeled, his scalp prickling with unease. This was even more disorienting than the realization that he had been ensnared in a time loop woven by Salazar Slytherin’s lingering enchantments.
But how? How could a professor who had perished only recently be revived within this loop, with no discernible purpose?
Was there some ancient magic hidden within the castle— some relic of Hogwarts that could anchor the souls of those who perished here? If not, then surely Professor Ronnie Ehrlich’s spirit should have passed beyond the veil, beyond the Twilight Realm, long before this strange cycle had begun.
Ariana’s absence from these events made one thing clear: Slytherin’s enchantments did not extend into the Twilight Realm. They held dominion over Hogwarts, but not over death itself.
And yet, if Slytherin had indeed left behind some means of resurrection within the castle, why waste it on reviving an Acolyte who had barely spent a day at Hogwarts this term?
A torrent of questions surged through Ian’s mind, each one more unsettling than the last.
“It doesn’t make sense! None of this makes any sense!” He muttered under his breath. It was absurd to think that Salazar Slytherin could have foreseen events at Hogwarts a thousand years into the future, let alone have devised contingencies for them.
Unless—
Unless Salazar Slytherin was still alive, watching, waiting, his influence woven into the very foundations of the castle. But if that was not the case, then the only explanation Ian could conceive was that Slytherin’s legacy had the power to preserve the souls of the recently deceased, returning them to the underground chamber upon the activation of his enchantments.
If that were true, then this resurrection was no accident.
It had meaning— something crucial to Slytherin’s design, a test or revelation for those who stumbled upon the secrets of this place.
“I have no idea what you’re on about, lad…” Professor Ronnie Ehrlich groaned, wincing as he stirred. “Whatever enchantment has muddled my memory, I think I’d still know if I were dead.”
The professor’s ribs were likely cracked from his earlier collision with the dragon bones. He coughed violently as he pushed himself upright, clutching at his chest, his face contorted with pain.
“No, Professor, I don’t think you understand what’s happening right now.” Ian’s voice was steady, though his hands trembled slightly. The thoughts swirling in his mind were beginning to crystallize.
He was sure of it now.
Just as he had suspected from the start, the key to breaking the curse upon his hand lay within this chamber. And the answer was standing before him— resurrected, oblivious, and utterly inexplicable.
“Actually, I believe it’s not so difficult to grasp.” Professor Ehrlich hesitated before retrieving his wand. He could sense the young wizard’s unease and chose instead to sigh, eyeing the wand where it lay on the stone floor, just out of reach.
“As you can see, my memory is hazy, and I have no notion of how much time has passed. But all signs point to a rather unsettling possibility: I was placed under the Imperius Curse, a pawn in You-Know-Who’s scheme.”
He exhaled sharply, pressing a hand to his temple as if trying to ward off the fog in his mind.
“You-Know-Who controlled me— he cast that curse— so he must have met some misfortune. Either that or he has already wrung me dry for whatever purpose he has intended. And now, with his hold over me severed, I am left to pick up the pieces of a life I do not remember losing.”
It had to be said that Professor Ronnie Ehrlich’s reasoning was, on the surface, quite sound. His current state did bear a striking resemblance to someone who had been freed from the Imperius Curse.
However.
That was certainly not the truth.
Ian had seen the professor’s body reassembled with his own eyes, and those remains had been verified beyond all doubt by several professors— even Headmaster Dumbledore himself— as belonging to Ronnie Ehrlich.
“I’ve told you more than once, Professor— you should be dead.” Ian made no attempt to soften the truth. Nor was he particularly concerned about the effect this revelation might have on Ehrlich’s mind. His earlier ruthlessness with the Disarming Charm made it abundantly clear that he harbored no sentimental attachment to a professor who had lasted all of a day or two before meeting his untimely end.
“Hah. The dead don’t get struck by your spells, lad.” Professor Ehrlich showed no sign of being rattled— mostly because he didn’t believe a word Ian was saying.
“What year are you in now?”
His last memory of Ian had him a fair bit shorter than he was now.
“First year. It’s nearly Christmas.” Ian answered promptly, then threw in his own question. “What else do you remember?”
“Still first year… tsk tsk.”
Ehrlich didn’t answer at once. His gaze drifted to his empty hand, then to his wand lying far beyond his reach.
For a wizard so young to have cast such a forceful Disarming Charm… The second-generation Acolyte’s eyes flickered with something between intrigue and a concealed, burning fascination.
“I saw the Transfiguration work you left in the Owlery,” He mused at last. “It was an impressive bit of magic. At the time, I thought you were simply a particularly promising dark wizard.”
“Who would have thought that, in just a matter of weeks, you’d already mastered the Killing Curse?” A glimmer of something unreadable passed through Ehrlich’s expression as he recalled the eerie green light that had flickered at Ian’s wand tip earlier.
He was certain of what he had seen— it had been a silent incantation, prepared with deadly intent. And Ian’s proficiency with it far outstripped that of his Disarming Charm.
“Professor, would you kindly answer my question?” Ian pressed, his patience thinning. “I want to know where your last clear memory stops.”
As he suspected, Ehrlich had no intention of making things easy.
Even in his pitiful state, with him being wandless and barely upright, his weight propped against a pile of dragon bones, the professor dodged the question, a smirk tugging at his bloodied lips.
“To be frank, Hogwarts isn’t fit to hold a talent like you. The headmaster here despises those who practice the Dark Arts. If he knew your true potential, he’d never let you be.”
His chest was badly caved in, and he was forced to spit out blood between sentences, yet his choice of words made it clear that he was trying to unnerve Ian with the threat of school rules.
“I get along quite well with Dumbledore, so I doubt that.” Ian rolled his eyes. Communicating with someone who seemed permanently stuck in the past was proving to be exasperating.
“He’s fond of disappointing those who think they understand him.” Ehrlich’s smirk widened despite the pain, his voice tinged with something close to pity. “You don’t know our headmaster like I do.”
Of course, as an Acolyte, his disdain for Dumbledore made perfect sense. What was less reasonable, however, was just how brazenly he was displaying it. His every word was practically an open admission of his betrayal of Hogwarts.
“I know our headmaster far too well. It’s you who doesn’t understand the position you’re in. I’d advise you not to dodge my questions by changing the subject.”
Ian frowned.
His gaze swept the underground chamber once more, but he found nothing else of note. This only strengthened his conviction that Professor Ronnie Ehrlich was at the heart of this mystery.
“Sorry, that’s a secret I can’t share with you.”
Professor Ehrlich shook his aching head before finally giving Ian a direct answer. Then, with a voice laced with temptation, he added,
“Hogwarts isn’t the place for you. I know somewhere better, somewhere your talents won’t be wasted.”
His attempt at recruitment couldn’t have been more obvious.
Perhaps this was the divide between wizards from different eras.
“Professor, you should save your breath. Nurmengard isn’t exactly an ideal place for higher learning these days.” Ian sighed, rubbing his forehead in exasperation.
Professor Ehrlich’s pupils constricted sharply.
“Impossible! Damn it! What do you know?” His voice was taut with tension. Even when he had suspected being under the Imperius Curse, he hadn’t shown this level of agitation.
“You’re one of Gellert Grindelwald’s men, aren’t you? That much isn’t exactly a secret.” Ian hadn’t expected such an intense reaction.
Professor Ehrlich first clutched his head, his expression momentarily vacant. Then, as if a dam had broken, his cloudy eyes cleared with sudden realization.
“Officially, I was placed here to keep an eye on Dumbledore… but in truth, that was never my real mission…” His pretense fell away, but as he spoke, his expression shifted again.
“I see now! So that’s it! The one who cast the Imperius Curse on me, it must have been Dumbledore… Of course! Only someone of his caliber could have placed me under the curse without my knowledge.”
His breathing grew unsteady, his bloodied lips twisting into something between a grimace and a smirk.
“No wonder I’m still alive. Dumbledore, the ever-sanctimonious, self-righteous Dumbledore, would never dirty his hands with a clean kill. He’d rather parade around his moral superiority.”
Professor Ehrlich’s murky gaze darted around the chamber, taking in his surroundings as his thoughts spun faster.
“It all makes sense now. This is a prison, isn’t it? Hogwarts’s very own oubliette. He couldn’t find the answers he wanted from my memory, so now he’s using a child, using you to extract them instead.”
A dry, humorless chuckle escaped him as he continued to speak. “How pathetic. If he thinks there’s some hidden truth buried in my mind, he’ll be sorely disappointed. I thought my purpose here was to find you.”
His expression darkened further.
“But it seems you’ve already chosen Dumbledore. And what’s worse, he’s dragged you into this interrogation. Tsk, tsk… Perhaps, in your eyes, that’s proof that he values you.”
He exhaled sharply, his voice dropping into a sinister murmur.
“But let me tell you this: you’ll meet the same fate as all who have ever placed their trust in him. You’re only eleven, and he’s already teaching you the Killing Curse. Are you so sure you’re not just another weapon he’s molding to his liking?”
His gaze sharpened, assessing Ian, searching for cracks.
“Let me think… You have a Voldemort here, don’t you? He was once Dumbledore’s treasured pupil too.”
Though battered and bruised, Professor Ehrlich still carried himself with an unsettling charm. But now, his words dripped with venom, each one carefully crafted to plant a seed of doubt in Ian’s mind.
The young wizard remained unfazed.
This sort of manipulation might have worked on Harry Potter, but to Ian, it was laughable. Dumbledore’s house was practically a second home to him— how could he not know whether Voldemort had ever been the headmaster’s cherished student?
“You vastly overestimate yourself, Professor. And you just as greatly underestimate our headmaster… Do you truly believe that if he wanted to see your memories, your feeble Occlumency would be enough to keep him out?”
Ian was beginning to think that having a rational conversation with Professor Ronnie Ehrlich was utterly impossible.
“I don’t have any hidden memories!”
Professor Ronnie Ehrlich’s voice rose slightly. That might very well be true. Even if he had been assigned some secret mission, Gellert Grindelwald certainly wouldn’t have divulged the details to him from the outset.
After all—
While this professor might not have grasped the full extent of Dumbledore’s abilities, Grindelwald most certainly had. The only way to keep information safe from Dumbledore’s probing mind was to deliver instructions at the very last moment.
“To be honest, I’d rather not resort to force, especially given that I’m a student and you’re a professor. All I want is to understand what happened to you.”
Ian’s patience was wearing thin. He spoke with sincerity and restraint, though his words carried a firm edge.
“Hah! What are you going to do? Try the Killing Curse on me again? If you’re looking for alternatives, I suggest the Cruciatus Curse. Haven’t you learned it yet? I could give you a few pointers.”
Professor Ronnie Ehrlich’s defiance remained unshaken.
“The Cruciatus Curse won’t get me the answers I need… but this might. Imperio.”
A soft glow flickered from Ian’s wand as his gaze locked onto the professor’s. An eerie shift in his expression hinted at the silent spell’s effect.
In the next moment—
Professor Ronnie Ehrlich’s eyes grew distant. He wavered, his expression contorting as though fighting an unseen force. His mind resisted, demonstrating formidable willpower. If Ian’s command over the Imperius Curse had been weaker, the spell might have failed entirely.
However—
Imperio was akin to Legilimency in some ways. As Ian pressed into the professor’s thoughts, he encountered an unexpected obstacle— Ronnie Ehrlich’s mind was a chaotic mess, riddled with fragmented memories.
“How can it be this disjointed?”
Ian struggled to comprehend how someone with such a fractured recollection of events could still function coherently. Perhaps this was why the professor clung so desperately to his belief that all of this was Dumbledore’s doing. His scattered memories might have fueled his paranoia.
“I refuse to believe it!”
The young wizard attempted to manually reconstruct Professor Ehrlich’s recollections. What he discovered was utterly bizarre; memories of the same event existed in hundreds of different variations. Take, for example, the breakfast scene from the day before the term began. In one version, the professor ate porridge; in another, he had a sandwich; in yet another, he didn’t eat at all. It was as if he, too, had been caught in some kind of temporal loop.
Each memory fragment felt vivid and real.
Yet all of them seemed oddly indistinct.
“Merlin help me. I hope I don’t end up like this…”
A shiver ran down Ian’s spine. He glanced at the professor’s hands. Thankfully, there was no Ouroboros curse mark.
Lost in the web of jumbled recollections, Ian found himself unable to piece together a coherent sequence of events. Perhaps even Professor Ehrlich himself could no longer discern which of his memories were real and which were fabrications.
“No wonder he was confused about how much time had passed.”
Ian could scarcely fathom the kind of mental resilience required to remain lucid under such conditions. If his own memories were this fragmented, he wasn’t sure he’d still be capable of rational thought. More likely, he’d be reduced to a raving madman, incapable of meaningful conversation.
Time crawled by.
Minute after minute.
Half an hour passed.
“I can’t tell! Damn it, I really can’t tell!”
Frustration etched across Ian’s face as he withdrew from the professor’s mind, exhaling sharply.
“I told you, I don’t have any hidden memories.”
Now freed from the spell’s influence, Professor Ehrlich slumped against the cold stone floor.
Despite his exhaustion, there was a glint of something in his gaze, a shadow of amusement, almost as if he found Ian’s struggle entertaining in some unfathomable way.
“If you could calm down for a moment, I think we might actually be able to go and speak with the person you’re loyal to.” Ian was beginning to feel at a loss with this overly imaginative professor. Perhaps Ronnie Ehrlich’s mental state was truly compromised. Otherwise, how could any reasonable wizard concoct so many absurd theories?
“You think I’d believe you?”
Professor Ehrlich’s sharp gaze bore into him as if he could see straight through any deception. He remained unmoved, utterly convinced that Ian intended to lead him to Dumbledore— whom, in Ehrlich’s delusions, had supposedly become Grindelwald.
“I understand that your mind isn’t exactly clear right now, but I’d rather not have you interfering with my Christmas plans.” Seeing that persuasion was futile, Ian turned on his heel, ready to leave.
“Where are you going?!”
Professor Ehrlich hurried after him.
“To find someone who can actually give me answers.” Ian glanced back, surprised to find that Ehrlich had only followed him as far as the passage leading out of the underground chamber.
“That little girl, Aurora, she can’t command me.”
The former Defense Against the Dark Arts professor stood rigidly at the threshold, lingering at the edge of the candlelight’s reach, his feet refusing to move forward. Something unseen had halted him.
“What’s happening to me?”
Professor Ehrlich hesitated, attempting to take a step forward. But before he could move, his hands shot up to clutch his head as a bloodcurdling scream tore from his throat.
“Aaaaah!”
His face contorted in sheer agony, his entire body convulsing.
“You can’t leave, can you?”
Ian eyed the deep red candle thoughtfully.
“There’s a voice! A voice in my head! It’s warning me, telling me to go back! Get out! GET OUT!”
Professor Ehrlich crumpled to the ground, doubled over, screaming with raw, unfiltered terror. His entire body trembled violently, wracked with invisible torment.
It was a sight that made Ian’s scalp prickle. The sheer agony on Ehrlich’s face rivaled that of someone under the Cruciatus Curse. It was as if his very soul were being ripped apart.
“This so-called resurrection… might have been better off not happening at all.” A pang of pity stirred within Ian as he flicked his wand, levitating Ehrlich and casting him forcefully back into the underground chamber.
Sure enough, the moment he re-entered the chamber, the screaming stopped. Professor Ehrlich collapsed onto the floor, panting heavily. His wide, terror-stricken eyes turned to Ian, his voice hoarse with fear.
“What… what in Merlin’s name have you done to me?”
Ian folded his arms. “I should be asking what Salazar Slytherin has done to you.”
Not lingering any longer, Ian turned and ascended the staircase leading out of the underground chamber. Professor Ehrlich, still sprawled on the floor, could do nothing but stare after him, stunned.
“That professor’s fate is truly wretched. Alive, yet worse off than the dead.”
Ian knew that extracting useful information from Ehrlich would require the right person. Only Gellert Grindelwald could make the professor speak without hesitation.
Of course, given the sheer disarray of Ehrlich’s memories, the credibility of his words would be questionable at best. Whether Grindelwald and Dumbledore could piece together the truth that Ian himself could not remained to be seen.
“It’s a shame I don’t know where Slytherin is buried. Otherwise, I’d track down his remains and find a way to corner him in the Twilight Zone for some answers.”
Ian bolted up the stone staircase, his thoughts racing.
What should have been a forty-minute climb took him just over ten.
His stamina was nothing short of remarkable.
“Dumbledore should be in Hogsmeade, and Grindelwald will be in his office.” Ian planned to gather them both and explain what had transpired.
But, as always, the best-laid plans rarely survive reality.
“How should I put this? You won’t find me in my office because I’m no longer there.”
Grindelwald’s voice rang in Ian’s ears the moment he emerged from the passage hidden behind the sink in the second-floor bathroom. The first-generation Dark Lord, clad in his usual black robes, was standing right there in the abandoned lavatory.
“Huh?”
Ian hadn’t expected to run into Grindelwald so soon.
“So, it’s here,” Grindelwald murmured, watching as the sink restored itself after Ian’s emergence. He stood before an identical basin, its faucet adorned with a familiar snake-shaped relief.
Judging by his posture, Grindelwald had been investigating something before Ian appeared. His fingers traced the serpent engraving, eyes alight with thought.
“Professor Grindel— Lockhart.” Ian hesitated, his surprise evident. He narrowed his eyes as realization struck.
“Were you looking for me?”
Ian doubted Grindelwald had chosen this particular bathroom for a casual visit. No one came here unless they had an unfortunate accident— or were the kind of wizard desperate enough to attempt flirting with Moaning Myrtle.
“I noticed your name vanished from the map while you were here.”
Grindelwald held up a familiar piece of parchment. Ian immediately recognized it as the Marauder’s Map, a replica he had discreetly sold to someone.
“Ah… But according to the map, I should be sleeping peacefully in my dormitory…”
Ian glanced at the map before looking back at Grindelwald’s knowing smile. Clearly, whatever enchantment he had used to mask his absence had already been dismantled by the professor.
“You should indeed be in your dormitory, not sneaking around on a late-night escapade,” Grindelwald said, his tone edged with amusement but layered with something deeper. “You do realize, don’t you, that the dangers lurking in this castle go beyond meeting a certain Dark Lord?”
There was something deliberate in the way he spoke, but before Ian could question him, Grindelwald turned his attention back to the sink.
“This is the entrance to Slytherin’s Chamber, isn’t it?”
His words made it clear he had done extensive research into Hogwarts’ hidden chambers.
“Not just the Chamber of Secrets,” Ian corrected. “It leads to an underground palace— one that even Hogwarts’ founders may not have fully explored. And right now, our supposedly deceased Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, Ronnie Ehrlich, is inside.”
Grindelwald’s expression shifted almost imperceptibly. He studied Ian carefully, his deep-set eyes narrowing.
“I don’t find that particularly amusing,” He said at last. “I personally arranged for his remains to be sent back to his homeland.”
Even for a wizard of Grindelwald’s caliber, the notion of a resurrection was difficult to comprehend.
“It’s not a joke, Professor. Ronnie Ehrlich is alive again,” Ian said firmly. He quickly recounted his encounter in the underground palace, explaining the strange inconsistencies in Ehrlich’s behavior and memories.
As Ian spoke, Grindelwald’s frown deepened.
“Perhaps you should have someone check whether the remains you buried are still where they ought to be,” Ian suggested.
It was a theory worth verifying.
But Grindelwald shook his head.
“This is an intriguing tale,” He admitted, though his tone was unreadable. “But such a thing is impossible. If you want to convince me, you’ll need to provide something more than just a good story.”
“Then let’s go to the underground palace now,” Ian said without hesitation. He turned back to the sink and hissed in Parseltongue, and the passage began to open once more.
But just as he moved to step inside, Grindelwald’s hand shot out, gripping his shoulder.
“Wait,” He murmured.
He didn’t seem inclined to rush.
“Aren’t you the one who wanted proof? Ronnie Ehrlich is alive in the underground palace— you’ll see for yourself.”
Ian frowned, puzzled by Grindelwald’s hesitation.
“We need to wait for Dumbledore here.”
After a brief pause, Grindelwald added, “After all, this is his school.”
Ian blinked. Since when was Grindelwald such a stickler for rules?
History books certainly hadn’t mentioned that.
“When did you even notify Dumbledore?”
Ian was astonished. He hadn’t seen Grindelwald cast a spell, send a Patronus, or make any other visible move.
“Just now,” Grindelwald replied simply, smiling. “We are old friends, after all. There are… special means of communication between us. Perhaps one day, I’ll teach you.”
Ian didn’t quite know how to respond to that. He had planned to involve Dumbledore anyway, so he could only wait.
And so, in the quiet, abandoned girls’ bathroom—
Two wizards, one tall, one short, stood before the sink.
The air was heavy with silence.
Then, suddenly—
“Perhaps you could start by telling me about some of the other… peculiar things you’ve encountered.”
Grindelwald’s calm, piercing gaze settled on the young wizard beside him.
“…”
Ian hesitated. That question had come out of nowhere.
What was it with old wizards and their ability to sense things?
“I have run into… unusual situations, and not just with Professor Ronnie Ehrlich’s so-called resurrection,” Ian admitted after a pause.
He had originally planned to explain his time-loop dilemma only in Dumbledore’s presence. Of the two, he trusted the older wizard more than Grindelwald.
However—
Since Grindelwald had asked so directly, refusing to answer felt like it would only make him more suspicious. Ian still couldn’t figure out how the man had picked up on his predicament so quickly.
“I wasn’t asking about that.” Grindelwald’s eyes flickered with interest. “But… intriguing. Salazar Slytherin’s legacy, is it?”
His gaze dropped to Ian’s raised hand, his tone not one of doubt but genuine curiosity.
“You know something about this?”
Ian tensed. The Defense Against the Dark Arts professor was far too composed for someone who had just learned about a potential curse tied to Slytherin.
“I’ve neither seen nor heard of this exact phenomenon before,” Grindelwald admitted. “Which makes it all the more fascinating, doesn’t it?”
Before Ian could react, Grindelwald grasped his wrist. A faint pulse of magic shimmered in the professor’s eyes as he examined the mark.
“Hah.”
Grindelwald’s smirk widened. “As I suspected. I can’t see the pattern on your hand at all— not as it appears to you— nor do I sense any active magic emanating from it.”
With that, he pulled a small vial from his robes, uncorked it, and poured the liquid over Ian’s hand.
A reaction.
The flickering Ouroboros curse mark sharpened into clarity, glowing ominously. But that wasn’t all—
A fiery red sigil, the one Ariana Dumbledore had left him, flared to life. And beneath them both, another unfamiliar marking began to take shape.
“Just as I thought.”
Grindelwald’s eyes lingered on the red sigil rather than the Ouroboros mark.
“It seems some of the castle’s old rumors aren’t entirely unfounded.” His voice was quieter now, more serious than before.
Ian, still staring at his own hand, finally shook himself from his shock.
“What kind of potion is this?” He recognized the scent of certain familiar ingredients.
“Bloodline potion,” Grindelwald said, tucking the empty vial away. “It reveals traces of ancestral magic or latent inheritances.”
Ian stiffened. He stared at the markings with wide, uncertain eyes.
“I— does that mean I’ve been tainted by Slytherin’s bloodline?”
His first thought wasn’t about what it meant for his magic, his identity, or his future—
No, Ian was preoccupied with something else entirely.
“Then I’ve completely wasted my time learning Parseltongue!”
His voice rang with sheer exasperation.
“Perhaps you already carry Slytherin’s bloodline within you. Intermarriage among wizarding families isn’t exactly rare,” Grindelwald remarked, studying Ian’s hand with a knowing look.
Ian frowned. The way he said it made Ian feel as if he were being branded a half-blood, an idea he had never considered before.
“I’m certain I didn’t inherit any of Slytherin’s blood,” Ian said firmly. He recalled the struggle he’d gone through to learn Parseltongue, an effort that hardly aligned with being a natural-born descendant.
“That may not be such a bad thing,” Grindelwald chuckled, as if attempting to lighten the mood.
Ian, however, wasn’t amused. “I don’t care about that. I just want to get rid of this mark. I’m convinced it’s the reason I was sent back to this time.”
He spoke with determination. As a student of the legendary witch Morgan, he considered Slytherin a mere trickster— one unworthy of leaving his mark on him.
“That can be dealt with,” Grindelwald assured him, his tone unnervingly casual.
Ian let out a slow breath, somewhat reassured, before shifting his focus back to the potion Grindelwald had just used.
“Professor, would you be willing to share the recipe for that potion?” Ian asked, eyeing the empty vial in Grindelwald’s hand. He was certain he had never come across anything like it in the Hogwarts library.
“Ask your Potions professor,” Grindelwald said dismissively.
“Bit stingy, aren’t you?” Ian muttered, a hint of disappointment creeping in.
Grindelwald merely smirked. “I don’t have the recipe. You’d be better off asking your Potions professor— he’s brewed more than a few of these. I simply took a bottle on a whim.”
“Wait, what?”
Ian was caught off guard.
So it wasn’t just the students and Quirrell sneaking supplies from the “good uncle”— even Grindelwald was in on it!
“I wouldn’t have expected that from you,” Ian admitted, unable to hide his surprise.
Grindelwald chuckled. “Your dear ‘uncle’ has insulted me publicly more than once, and yet he still walks around with all his limbs intact. That’s not just because I’ve grown more patient over the years.”
Ian had a feeling it was best to change the subject before this conversation led somewhere uncomfortable.
“When Dumbledore arrives, you both need to examine Professor Ronnie Ehrlich’s condition,” he said, bringing up the real reason they were there. The professor’s fragmented memories… his unnatural state… There was more at play than just a simple time loop.
Grindelwald, however, seemed more focused on Ian himself.
“I thought you’d be more interested in the significance of the other two patterns on your hand,” he mused, eyeing Ian curiously. “But it seems you already have an idea of what they mean.”
Ian suppressed a sigh. The old man’s perceptiveness was truly something else.
“Uh…”
How was he supposed to respond to that?
The first pattern he had seen was undoubtedly tied to the Prince family’s bloodline— after all, every generation of that lineage produced a potions master for a reason. As for the fiery red sigil, the one Ariana had left him…
That was something he couldn’t explain without revealing the Twilight Zone.
As he deliberated over how to shift the conversation, Grindelwald unexpectedly gave him the perfect excuse.
“I always thought I knew Dumbledore’s house better than he does,” Grindelwald murmured, almost to himself. Then he tutted, shaking his head. “But now it seems… tsk tsk.”
His attention suddenly snapped toward the entrance of the bathroom.
And then—
Albus Dumbledore entered.
Dressed in deep purple robes, his usually composed face was marred by bruises. In one hand, he held a small vial from which he was sipping a potion. Perched on his other arm, a fiery-red phoenix ruffled its feathers, looking equally weary.
Upon seeing him, Ian instinctively opened his mouth to speak.
But before he could—
“Young one, forgive my slight betrayal,” Grindelwald murmured, leaning in conspiratorially. “Retrieving our dear headmaster from his relatives was no simple matter.”
Ian barely had time to process that cryptic remark before Grindelwald strode toward Dumbledore.
“Albus, I assure you— I’m not joking this time,” Grindelwald said, standing before the headmaster.
Then, with a dramatic gesture, he pointed back at Ian.
“That little brat over there— I saw him in my crystal ball, running through the eighth-floor corridor with Ariana’s soul!”
He turned back to Dumbledore, eyes alight with excitement.
“He must be hiding some grand secret I haven’t uncovered yet!”
It was almost impossible to reconcile this animated figure with the Dark Lord the world feared.
In this moment, Gellert Grindelwald wasn’t the ominous sorcerer history remembered—
He was genuinely thrilled.
Like a wizard eagerly sharing the latest gossip, he practically relished reporting the young wizard’s predicament to Dumbledore.
(End of Chapter)
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