Harry Potter and the Fortress of Woe

a/n: Thanks for reviewing and for pointing out the little mistake in the last chapter. I have fixed it by now. Enjoy!


“What’s that supposed to mean?” asked the headmistress, whirling around to face Binns. “What is the Fortress of Woe, who summoned it and why?”
Ginny was sure that her former Transfiguration teacher was going to completely exploded if Binns did not give her a proper answer within the next minute. Her mouth, which always shrunk to a thin line whenever she was angry, had almost completely disappeared and her eyes were flashing with a blend of irritation and full blown anger. Apparently the headmistress did not like to be withheld information. However, Professor Binns did not appear to be affected at all by her anger and Ginny doubted that he had even noticed it. The ghost teacher only cleared his throat like he often did in class and almost immediately launched an explanation in his drowsy, boring voice and Ginny had to forcefully remind herself that she had to pay attention, because Binns was for once not talking about Giant Wars or Goblin Rebellions.

“The Fortress of War is an ancient rumour which apparently contains a bit of truth.” said Binns, pursing his lips at the word “rumour”, obviously believing that it was way below his dignity to talk about something that vague. “According to some rather dubious sources, the Fortress was erected by the famous necromancer Necraal, who was defeated by Merlin a few years after creating the building. Necraal was an expert in raising the dead and in creating spells affecting another person’s mind. His research about the influence of magic on the human will were the foundations for the Imperious Curse, the most powerful controlling spell ever created. Most people believed that the Fortress of Woe was nothing more then Necraal’s sanctuary, but there are some indications pointing against the assumption. For one, Necraal did not vanish together with his Fortress, even though Merlin was hot on his heels. If the Fortress had only been a safe haven, the necromancer would have never endangered his well being to prevent Merlin from destroying it.”

“Alright, let’s assume for a moment that this pillar of light is indeed created by the Fortress of Woe.” interrupted McGonagall. “What is the point in summoning it now of all times? Whatever was in the building is more than a thousand years old. Surely all knowledge this Necraal managed to collect is more than a bit out of date by now. Why would You-Know-Who waste valuable resources to restore an ancient building with no apparent value?”
“I am coming to this.” replied Binns, sounding a bit irritated at getting interrupted, no doubt because it almost never happened in his class. “As I said before, Necraal was an expert at mind manipulating magic. According to the dubious sources I mentioned before, he created the Fortress to take over the country by enslaving all of the population’s minds. Of course a spell that big would require enormous amounts of energy, but the necromancer is said to have found a solution for this problem shortly before his demise. He is believed to have constructed a device able to extract and to store a human being’s energy and to transform the stolen vitality into raw magical power. When provided with enough victims there would be enough energy to power the mind enslaving spell, which is allegedly already prepared in the Fortress. Necraal is believed to have banished the Fortress to a save place and to have left a scroll filled with information how to return it, what obviously happened today. However there is no reason to panic. As I said, it is unknown if this device does exist and even if it does it has most likely been damaged over the years.”


“But still Voldemort considered it worth the effort.” said Hermione pensively. “What do we do now?”
McGonagall wheeled around and only now seemed to realize that she was not alone with the ghost teacher. She did not look pleased at all at Ron’s, Hermione’s and Ginny’s presence. “The three of you go back to the Gryffindor Tower and there is no need in sharing the information you just witnessed. The Order will take care of this issue.”
“I doubted that because no one had been able to actually find the Fortress of Woe unless brought there by Necraal himself.” said Binns, as though this was merely a mildly interesting legend. “Good evening.”

With these words he floated back into the castle and neither Ron, nor Hermione nor Ginny could remember seeing their former Transfiguration teacher’s mouth so thin.

- - - - -

Pain was clouding Harry’s mind as he slowly staggered to his feet. His whole left arm was on fire and he thought his chest was hurting as well, even though it was hard to say, thanks to the agony which pretended to be an arm. Blinking quickly for a few seconds, to clear his vision, Harry concentrated on ignoring the pain, so he could examine his injuries. He was more than a bit surprised as the pain lessened from almost unbearable to a tolerable level. His Occlumency training seemed to be having more benefits than he had thought. Pushing the thought away, Harry started to examine his body.

He was surprised to find out that the pain in his left arm was caused by almost two inches long metal splinter, which had obviously been part of the locket before it exploded, which had buried itself deeply into his left palm. Even though the sliver had completely penetrated his hand, the wound was not bleeding nearly as much as Harry had anticipated, but his instinct told him that this would change as soon as he removed the invading object. Not really sure what to do with this injury, Harry continued his search, deciding to look at the whole picture before making up his mind.

He found a lot of splinters sticking in the dragon armour protecting his chest and he knew that he would surely be dead, had all those drawn blood. Otherwise he was alright, except for a few minor cuts and bruises from the explosion. Harry looked around and found his wand lying on the floor three feet away and gingerly picked it up. The movement sent waves of fire travelling through his beaten body and Harry gritted his teeth while fighting down the pain. Normally it would have been time to visit the hospital wing and to let Madame Pomfrey heal his wounds, but he had no intention to get interrogated about where he got the injuries. Of course he could ask Ginny or Hermione to patch him back together, but he did not want to risk splinching himself when trying to Apparate in his condition. So, he would have to heal himself.

Harry knew only a single healing spell. It had been described in Fifty Wicked Combat Spells, because it required almost no time and only very few energy to be cast. Therefore it enabled the user to heal little injuries while fighting and sometimes even that small an advantage could turn the tables. Unfortunately, it only worked on non-magical wounds and Harry had no idea if his wounds would be considered non-magical, they had been created by a magical object after all. Oh, well, he would simply give it a try.

Scooping up his concentration, Harry muttered the incantation under his breath, making sure to pour a bit of extra power into the spell. The effect was immediate. A wave of energy passed over his body and for a moment the pain flared more intensive than before. Harry watched the splinter in his hand getting forced out of his flesh and watched in amazement as flesh, sinews, muscles and nerves knitted themselves back together, leaving only a small patch of irritated skin behind. The pain vanished and Harry felt as good as knew, only a bit tired.

He took another glance around the library and was glad to find the Horcrux blasted into a billion pieces. His instinct, as well as the knowledge imparted into his mind by Dumbledore’s Thought Bottle, told him that this piece of Voldemort’s black soul was gone from this world forever. Glancing at his watch he realized that he had been gone for almost an hour. Damn! Ginny, Ron and Hermione were probably already forming a rescue mission, his chance of sneaking out without the whole castle knowing were shrinking rapidly. Cursing, Harry wheeled around to run out of the library, but jerked to a halt as he spotted a piece of parchment lying beneath the chest which had contained the Horcrux. He placed the box on the floor and glanced at the parchment, which appeared to be at least several years old. Harry was disappointed to discover that instead of ordinary text the parchment was covered in runes completely alien to him. He did not know whether the parchment was connected to the Horcrux, but vowed to take it with him anyway. He did not have any idea where to find the next one and the possibility of getting to know its whereabouts was definitely worth taking the possibly useless piece of parchment with him. Harry knew he should show it to Hermione, she should be able to decode it, being a natural in Ancient Runes. Remembering that he had wanted to head back to Hogwarts, Harry turned around and hurried out of the room.

- - - - -

Harry climbed into the common room barely ten minutes later still slightly dazed from his experience at Grimmauld Place. He had been way too close to dieing or to be seriously injured and Harry would have been a fool if this had not been bothering him. Especially the fact that the Horcrux had been unprotected otherwise, was nagging him. If he had nearly died trying to dispel an unprotected one, then would he be able to destroy a protected one? Harry had his doubts and felt more than a bit disheartened. However, giving up was not an option, not after everything Riddle had done to him. Voldemort would pay for his crimes and Harry would be the one to punish him, even if he died in the process. He would have to fight either way; Voldemort would never stop hunting him, until he was either dead or locked away in one of his torture chambers. Fleeing would only delay the inevitable and Harry firmly preferred meeting his nemesis on his own terms. He would train harder than ever before and study the memories Dumbledore had left him thoroughly. Harry hoped that it would be enough.

Sinking in one of the armchairs next to the fire, he realized that the common room was completely devoid of his housemates. Maybe they were still at the feast or watching the bizarre lightshow outside. Harry did not know what on earth it was, but his gut instinct told him that it was not good at all. He made a mental note to ask Ron, Hermione and Ginny about it as soon as he encountered them. For the moment, he was glad to be able to rest for a while, suddenly feeling very tired. The whispers of power he had heard while holding the Horcrux flashed briefly through his mind, but Harry managed to chase the insidious thoughts away. He knew now that he had been foolish to react that panicky as he heard the voices for the first time. Voldemort had probably only cast a spell on the Horcrux to prevent whoever found it from destroying it. It could not mean that Harry was subconsciously whishing to be immortal, could it?

A firm hand on his right should interrupted his thoughts. He wheeled around in his chair, wand in hand and ready to curse any attacker into oblivion only to come face to face with Ron, Hermione and Ginny, all of them looking at him in various degrees of anger.
“You better have an explanation where you have been the last hour and why you did not tell us about your whereabouts, Potter.” growled the latter, her eyes blazing. Harry realized that he was in big trouble; Ginny had probably worried herself sick about him and was now angry about finding him unharmed in the common room. It did not really make sense, after all she did not want him to get injured, yet Harry could understand her and he knew that his explanation would only make things worse. Ginny would flip as soon as she learned that he had not told her about his trip to Grimmauld Place because he wanted to protect her and he doubted that Ron and Hermione would react much differently. Still he was not going to lie, partly because he did not want to and partly because Ginny had always been able to tell when he was trying to. But he definitely was not going to discuss this in the middle of the common room, which was getting more and more populated each second.
“Funnily enough I have one.” replied Harry, meeting Ginny’s fiery gaze without flinching. “But this is not the place to discuss it.”
“Room of Requirements then?” asked Ron, his gaze darting from his best mate to his sister. Having been at the receiving end of his sisters glare of death numerous times during his life, Ron could not help to feel a bit of admiration for Harry, who did not seem intimidated at all.
“Definitely.” replied Harry, before standing up and leading the way out of the room.

The four of them walked to the Room of Requirements in silence, each of them way too wrapped up in his own thoughts to continue their discussion. They could feel the argument brewing between them and each of them knew that it would not take long for it to finally erupt. They found the room to be small and bare except for a blazing fireplace and four armchairs, rendering it strikingly similar to the Gryffindor common room. Harry sat down in one of the chairs with a sigh and waited for the others to join him before starting to speak.

“Alright, I had this brainwave when walking back from training.” he said. Harry was not at all comfortable with talking about the Horcruxes in front of Ginny, but he realized that she would never ever accept getting sent away now. “Suddenly I remember Sirius brother Regulus, who deserted the Death Eaters and was killed by them. Conveniently his middle name is Arcturus, which means that his initials are R.A.B...”
“Oh my god!” exclaimed Hermione. “Does that mean Regulus has stolen the Horcrux?”
“Yes.” replied Harry. “He must have somehow discovered it and obviously realized how dangerous and valuable this information was. After he had decided to leave the Death Eaters, he must have stolen the Horcrux as a last act of defiance. Maybe he had also hoped to negotiate with Voldemort about his life and considered his chances higher if he had the Horxcrux, but we probably will never know. Anyway, I remember Sirius telling me that his brother returned to Grimmauld Place in the middle of the night one day before he disappeared. I guessed that he had hidden the Horcrux in Grimmauld Place, so I went there and found it after a while. I used the knowledge Dumbledore gave me to destroy it. Today one part of Voldemort’s black soul was destroyed forever.”

“Well, that’s great mate!” said Ron, the anger on his face replaced with excitement. “Any ideas where the next one is?”
“Maybe, I found this piece of parchment next to the Horcrux.” answered Harry. “I can’t read the runes on it, but it is possible that there are some hints in there. Hermione, do you have any ideas what this could mean?”
Harry pulled the parchment out of his robe pocket and by doing so exposed his formerly injured hand which was still covered in his blood and which he had kept hidden in his pockets before. He heard Ginny’s and Hermione’s sharp intake of breath and was not surprised as the former grabbed his hand and bent over to examine it closely.
“Oh my god Harry, what happened to your hand?” she asked, her eyes wide.
“There were a few … complications as I dispelled the Horcrux.” replied Harry, knowing that he was now in very big trouble. “I healed the wounds, but forgot to wipe the blood away. Sorry for scaring you.”
“And when did you plan to tell us about these complications?” replied Ginny, her eyes narrowed in anger. “The same time you were going to tell us about you going away?”
“Well, I had not really planned to do so at all.” answered Harry truthfully, his own temper flaring due to Ginny’s accusing tone. “I am healed after all, so what would have been the point? You would only make a scene, like you are doing now!”
“Oh excuse me for caring!” snarled Ginny, her anger mounting. “Excuse for worrying about you when you have vanished into thin air! If you don’t want me to care about you then simply say so, I will be gone as soon as the words leave your mouth!”
“Don’t be stupid, of course I want you to care!” snapped Harry, interrupting her rant. “I did not tell you about my plan to visit Grimmauld Place because it was going to be dangerous and I knew that you would have wanted to accompany me! Excuse me for wanting to get you through this war alive!”

That did it, Ginny swelled like a bullfrog and Harry mentally kicked himself for choosing these words. He knew that Ginny hated getting babied more than anything
“You wanted to protect us?” she screeched spitting the word as though it were a vile curse. “Well then listen to this! I am tired of getting protected by you, you stupid noble git. I am a grown woman and I can take care of myself and you are not going to continue doing things behind my back simply because it suits you!”
Silence followed her words. Harry had originally wanted to retort with equal ferocity, but could not deny that her words held some truth. He had chosen not to tell his friends, because he did not want to lose them on a dangerous mission, knowing that he would never forgive himself if something happened to them. He knew that each of them could defend himself in a duel and Ron’ strategic genius, Hermione’s knowledge and Ginny’s fierce fighting could really be helpful when destroying a Horcrux. Yet, he had chosen to go to Grimmauld Place alone; did this make him a particular good or a particular bad friend?

Shaking his head and deciding to think about this some other time, Harry admitted defeat.
“You’re right, I am sorry for being an overprotective git.” he said, not sure if he was lying or telling the truth. “I should know that each of you could be a real help and I should at least tell you what I am going to do, so that you can watch my back.”
“True, but at least you are my overprotective git.” replied Ginny, the anger on her face gone. “Thanks for at least trying to change, I know that it is hard for you to accept that you are not responsible for everyone’s protection.”

Ginny gave him a quick peck on the lips, which caused Ron to avert his eyes, Hermione to sigh and Harry to relax. The tension in the room was gone and everyone could not help but to feel both relieved and also a bit surprised that the argument had been over so quickly.
“Alright.” said Harry, breaking away from his beautiful girlfriend. “Now tell me about this strange lightshow going on outside.”

- - - - -

One evening, six weeks later, Harry was sitting in the Gryffindor common room, lost in thoughts. Originally, he had wanted to do his Potions essay, but his mind kept wondering to the war. So far Hermione had not succeeded in translating the runes and that meant that they still had no idea where to find the next Horcrux. And there was the thing with the Fortress of Woe. If all the rumours about the place were true, then Voldemort had acquired a mighty weapon indeed. The thought of getting mind controlled was troubling Harry greatly, but what galled him most was that he was powerless to prevent it. Neither he, nor the Order or the Ministry had any idea where the Fortress had been summoned and so far none of them had managed to acquire even a scrap of information about it. They had no idea what Voldemort was planning and when he was going to activate the Fortress’ power, provided that the ancient building still held powers, of course. Harry liked to think that Voldemort had wasted lots of his resources to summon a powerless building, but he knew that he was only hoping beyond hope. As soon as there would be any information retrieved regarding how to find and to enter the Fortress, Harry would jump into action, but until then he had vowed to train as hard as possible, having no desire to be just one more of Voldemort’s victims.

Over the weeks he had made enormous progress in duelling. His reflexes were faster when ever before, rendering him able to win a fight against three training dummies at the same time. He had finally enough control over the Starfire Charm not to blow himself up when using it, though he still tended to burn himself. Harry’s control over his power had increased as well, allowing him to supercharge spells should it be necessary. Supercharged spells retained the original effect in a more powerful variant and were harder to block than ordinary ones. A supercharged Reductor Curse, for example, was able to blast straight through a wall and would still affect anyone hiding behind it. Despite his progress, however, Harry was not content. For the last four weeks, practicing the Focus Arkanum had been very frustrating. No matter how hard he tried, he never was able to gather more than a certain amount of energy. He could feel much more power inside of him, wanting to be used, but the excess energy simply slipped from his grasp whenever he tried to access it. It was driving him mad.

Harry had already searched for a solution in the volume describing the meditation technique, but what he had found was far from satisfying. He had discovered that a highly complicated potion could help him to overcome the power block, as it was called in the book. However the potion, which was called night whisper, was highly dangerous, because it forced the drinker’s body to expose all of its energies. If the drinker was not able to control the energy or to dispose it, then he or she would be incinerated with seconds. Also the potion caused the mind to relax, allowing the subconscious to take control and therefore could cause dreamlike hallucinations. When brewed incorrectly or overdosed, it could also lead to madness, coma and death. Not desperate enough to try the potion yet, Harry had decided to simply keep on practicing, maybe the block would disappear by itself.

Looking up from his essay, after admitting to himself that he was unable to concentrate on it anyway. Harry spotted Ron and Hermione sitting at the other end of the common room, desperately trying not to look each other into the eyes, even though they were sitting in front of each other at the same table. Harry furrowed his brows; they had been like that for almost two weeks! At first he had thought their strange behaviour as another part of the bizarre mating ritual they dared calling a relationship, but when they had not bickered in a week he was beginning to get nervous. He had tried to talk with both Ron and Hermione about it, but the two of them had pretended that nothing was wrong and Harry had given up after a time. Now his patience was wearing thin. Time was much too precious to waste it and Ron and Hermione had once again found a reason not to spend what could be the last days of their lives together and once again returned into their state of painful isolation. Well, Harry would be damned if he was going to let that happen!

Just as Harry wanted to start thinking about how to approach his best friends, Ginny came down from the girl dormitory and slid into the armchair next to him.
“What is bothering you?” she asked, as soon as she had seen his face. Ginny had always been able to tell if he was angry or upset about something, but Harry could not help to admire the way she was able to penetrate his carefully erected façade.
“The two over there.” he said quietly, tilting his head at Ron and Hermione. “Something is the matter with them, but they don’t want to talk about it. I wish, I could find out what is going on.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean.” replied Ginny, gnawing at her bottom lip, obviously thinking hard. “I asked Hermione myself a few times about it, but she did not say anything. I have given up by now, I don’t see any way… oh! That’s it!”
“What?” asked Harry, wondering what on earth she was talking about.
“I know how to get Hermione to talk to me.” exclaimed Ginny, a smug look on her face. “Tomorrow I will have the answer!”

Harry watched her standing up and crossing the room. She whispered something into Hermione’s ear and the two of them walked up the stairs leading to the girl dormitories. Well, if someone could find out what was bothering Hermione, then it was Ginny. Satisfied, Harry refocused his attention on the essay lying on the table in front of him.

- - - - -

While Harry was finally making some progress at his thrice accursed essay, a portly, old wizard was holding a wine bottle in his hand, examining its label and clicked his tongue in approval. An excellent vintage! The elder was sitting in a lavishly furnished dining room, the table in front of him craning under the load of exquisite dishes prepared for his pleasure. A fire burned merrily in a fireplace to his right, chasing the December chill away, which often penetrated the old buildings thick walls. The old man looked at the red wine, which looked almost black in the greenish bottle, picked up a corkscrew and opened it. It was the last thing he ever did.

Instead of delicious and refreshing wine, pure blackness poured out of the bottle. Two clawed hands manifested within a split second and broke the victim’s neck within a heartbeat. As he fell to the floor, the rest of the darkness contracted and formed Sandro the shade assassin.
“You had an excellent taste of wine.” he told the corpse, summoning his black book and crossing out a name. “A pity that it did not save you.”

It had almost been too easy. The mansion was heavily guarded, way too heavily to perform a clean and quick assassination. Therefore, Sandro had hidden himself in one of the wine bottles which were supposed to be delivered to his victim. All food getting brought into the house was checked for poison, but Sandro was not the least bit toxic, even though he was deadly. Of course he had drunken the wine before slipping into the bottle and he had liked it so much that he had written down the wine’s name. A rather refreshing way to kill someone, all in all.

Looking up his next appointment in his black book, Sandro realized that the time has come to pay Harry Potter at Hogwarts a visit. Well, tomorrow he would, because more than three jobs a day was supposed to bring an assassin bad luck. Also working more than three hours a day was almost obscene! Looking forward to the new job, the assassin smashed one of the room’s windows and flew away into the night, ignoring the alarms sounding as he forced his way outside.

- - - - -

As Harry crept downstairs to the common room on the next day, it was a Saturday, he was surprised to find a thoroughly exhausted looking Ginny sitting on one of the tables. She had dark rings under her eyes, which were unfocused and glassy and her hair was still tousled from sleep. Confused, Harry set down next to her.
“Hey, are you alright?” he asked her, causing her to groan and to clamp her ears shut.
“I will be, if you stop screaming.” she replied testily.
Harry’s brows furrowed in confusion as he realized that his girlfriend was suffering from a massive hangover. He could not remember any reason to get wasted yesterday, especially getting wasted without him, after all a drunken Ginny could be real fun.
“Err, Ginny, why did you got drunk yesterday?” he asked, omitting the “without me” for the moment.
“You wanted me to find out what was wrong with Ron and Hermione, did not you?” she answered, glaring at him. “It was necessary to get drunk in the process.”
“Really?” he asked, his interest piqued. “What did you do and what did you find out?”
“Well, I played ‘Have You Ever’ for most of the evening with Hermione and when she got drunk enough, she told me.” replied Ginny. “And after she told me I had to drink because it was so disgusting.”

“How on earth did you get Hermione to play ‘Have You Ever’?” asked Harry, amazed that his best female friend would agree to this kind of game. He knew it very well, having played it with Ginny several times during the summer holidays. One player asks another one a yes or no question and he or she has to answer truthfully. If the answer is yes then you have to drink one sip, if it’s no two sips. If you hesitate you have to drink three. It is a nice game to get to know your fellow players, but people normally get drunk very fast. Ginny and he had always played the strip version of the game, which works the same, except that you have to strip instead of drinking.
“Well, I told here that we would be using Butterbeer, but I used the spiked versions of the drink Fred and George sell in their shop.” answered Ginny, grinning despite her pounding headache. “And what she told me really made my day; it looks like her and my brother are having sex.”
Harry nodded, even though he shuddered at the mental image. This was no big surprise.

“And, it looks like not everything is going smoothly.” continued Ginny, her voice dropping to a whisper. “Apparently Ron is too focused on his own pleasure and Hermione feels a bit left out. She told him and he totally flipped, bruised male ego, I think. Well, and that’s why they have been so distant in the last few weeks. What are you going to do about it?”
“Me?” asked Harry alarmed. He did not like the sparkling in her eyes one bit. “What am I supposed to do about it?”
“Well, teaching my brother how to do it right would be a possibility.” she replied, grinning.
“Excuse me? You want me to show Ron how to pleasure a girl?”
“Yeah, I can hardly do it myself, for I lack both the knowledge and the physical necessities.” she answered dryly, amused at his shocked expression. “Go on, you are Harry Potter, it can’t be harder than the other stuff you have done. Good luck love, I am getting myself an anti-hangover potion.”

Harry watched her leaving with his jaw hanging open. He was so dead!

- - - - -

Three hours later, Harry had finally scooped up the courage to confront his best mate. He asked him to accompany him to the Room of Requirements, because he had something important to discuss with him. Ron looked slightly confused, but agreed immediately, apparently not aware that his best friend knew about the nature of his and Hermione’s problems. Just as the two of them walked out of the portray hole, Harry caught a glimpse at Ginny, who was smiling at him encouragingly.

The moment Harry set foot onto the ground in front of the Fat Lady, everything went black. His arms and legs were grasped by the darkness shrouding him and his mouth was suddenly filled with rubbery black stuff, smothering every chance of screaming for help or of uttering an incantation. Harry heard Ron screaming, but the sound was distant and he knew that his best mate would never be able to help him. Then the blackness started moving, carrying Harry with it out of the castle.