FicWad

The Harry Potter universe is the creation of J.K. Rowling. This is fanfiction. The standard disclaimers apply.


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Chapter 47: One Day — Albus Dumbledore, Part I


Wednesday, January 16. The Headmaster's Suite. 5:30 AM.


Albus Dumbledore awoke almost three hours before sunrise to the sound of Fawkes fighting with a rooster. Despite the unexpectedness of the noise coming from downstairs in his office, it didn't take long to identify it. There wasn't much else it could be. He had, in a move that had seemed like a good idea at the time, allowed the roosters free passage past the gargoyle, and he was intimately familiar with Fawkes' various vocalizations.

"Brawk! Brk brk brk k-brawk!"

"Hssssss! Trtrtrtrrtroort! Dreeeet!"

"Krawk!"

This was accompanied by the sound of flapping wings and the rattling of precariously placed objects. Albus sat up in bed, snatched the Elder Wand from under his pillow, and amplified his voice to say "Cease!"

This worked for students, usually. It had no effect in this case.

"Droooereeet! Ptrt! Kkhkht!"

"Kruk-krawk Kr-oooo!"

"Fffffffft!" Crash.


The last crash was worrisome, actually, but he had no way of knowing what it might have been. The rooster was incredibly loud, too, given that the door to his bedroom was closed. Now Fawkes, being a magical bird, could certainly screech at the top of his lungs and get Dumbledore's attention without leaving his perch. But the rooster had this marvelous resonant quality that seemed to penetrate everything—there was no way anyone could sleep through that, and if any basilisks or cockatrices were around, they were surely dead, or, at least, temporarily deaf, by now. The last time he remembered being woken up by a rooster was when he last stayed at Aberforth's place in Hogsmeade at one point during the war; that bird had been loud, but not ear-splitting. He supposed he was feeling his age, and was spoiled by living high in a castle tower where his sleep had only the types of interruptions he permitted.

He sighed, stood up, threw on his bright pink bathrobe, and opened his door to head downstairs.

"BRAWK!"

"FEEEEEP!"

Flapflapflap, crash. This was followed by the 'Whoosh!' of Fawkes teleporting, apparently across the room, in a ball of flame.

Albus could have run down the stairs to his office, if he wanted to—he was incredibly agile for a man his age—but he honestly didn't want to find out what had just fallen on the floor, or what had caused the fight in the first place.

"BRK-BRK-BRKAWK!"

As soon as he poked his head around the corner, it became immediately obvious what the problem was. Someone had cast an engorgement charm on the rooster, which was now four feet tall and standing on his desk. It was staring up at Fawkes, who was on a high shelf on the far side of the room. The remnants of Dumbledore's latest, now-wrecked, monitoring device were scattered on the floor, along with torn papers and a spilled inkwell.

Albus paused to admire the chicken—at many times its size, it was impossible not to notice the brilliant colors and iridescence of its feathers. This was a mistake, as it heard him, spun around, and flew at him.

"KROOK!"

"Reducio!"

Flapflapflap. Returning it to its orginal size didn't interrupt its path towards his face—he rapidly followed up with a non-verbal stunner.

"Well, Fawkes, that was exciting!"

"Trrrr."

"Yes, yes, thank you for not hurting it. Hmmm. I suppose either someone thought it was a good prank, or they were actually trying to be helpful—perhaps both! I will have to ask the portraits about it later. It was certainly louder this way, wasn't it."

"Frooo?"

"I'm sure you were very brave, but no, I wasn't worried about you for a moment. You can always teleport away. Scourgify!" He looked dismayed; the ink was going to take some experimentation to get out, and it wouldn't be the fun kind of experimenting. He silently hovered all the clutter off of the floor, dropping it in a pile on his desk to be dealt with later, and headed back upstairs to his quarters.

After showering, he walked into his closet. The lamp turned on automatically. He stood there for a full five minutes, wearing only his underwear, staring at a rail full of robes that would have looked identical to the untrained eyes of nearly everyone else. At last selecting one, he gestured at it with his wand—a half circle counterclockwise brought the background to the right shade of magenta, and three taps made the polka-dots a blindingly bright lime green. That would do!

He liked bright colors. He really did. But he knew he could only get away with it because everyone already thought he was crazy. On the other hand, his wardrobe choices had the side-benefit of helping to convince everyone he was crazy. That was important for a leader such as himself—you needed to make yourself seem unpredictable, and to that end lime-green polka-dots were far preferable to the random cruelty of Voldemort.

The second drawer down in his sock dresser, when extended, came five feet into the room, allowing him access to two-hundred and eighty three pairs of wool socks. It took him another three minutes to root through it until he found what he wanted. Almost no one had ever seen Dumbledore's enormous sock collection, but then almost no one had ever asked to see it, either. Usually when he started talking about socks, people tried to escape from the conversation by any means available.

On his way back through his office, he picked up the stunned rooster and carried it down to the hallway under his arm. He noted that the paintings of his predecessors were all asleep in their frames—he had, of course, sent his staff around the castle to query the portraits after the incident, but was unsurprised when the effort was fruitless. Portraits endured a lot of tedium and tended to spend a lot of time asleep. A good silencing spell, combined with even a half-assed concealment charm, was usually enough to allow someone to slink past them.

He patted the gargoyle affectionately as he walked past it. It, at least, was a little more alert in responding to threats. He would have to ask the portraits about it eventually—Dippett, especially, had spent long hours fiddling with things like that.

Once the gargoyle had slid closed, he reset the permissions to keep the roosters out.

"You know, I'm beginning to see the wisdom of the 'no live poultry' rule. Hm. Well, you should get back to work, chicken. Rennervate!" The rooster, un-stunned, flew at his face again. It found itself bouncing off a shield spell; the old wizard was fast.

Albus declined to re-stun the rooster, and kept the shield spell up on his way down to the Great Hall. If he had been more familiar with roosters it would not have been at all surprising to him that the bird followed relentlessly after, clucking, crowing, and slamming into his shield. He entered the Great Hall through the faculty anteroom, arriving at the same time as Eeles, who was hanging up his heavy, snow-covered cloak on the wall.

"I see you found a friend."

"He woke me up, actually! Got into my office and picked a fight with Fawkes. Or at least, I assume that's what happened. Fawkes might have started it, I suppose. Anyway it's my own fault for telling the gargoyle to let them in."

They were arriving just as the Hall opened, and just as the food was appearing—only the two of them, Hagrid, and Madam Pince were usually up this early. Dumbledore let the rooster follow him into the hall. It continued pecking at his shield and ignored everything else.

"Look at that—it certainly seems fixated on you."

"It does, doesn't it—perhaps it's angry that I took the engorgement charm off it?"

Eeles just raised his eyebrows.

"Oh yes, that was how I found it. Four feet tall and standing on my desk. Made a mess of my office, too."

Eeles whistled. "How bad was it?"

"Well, it knocked everything off my desk, but I think Fawkes must have kept him contained there."

"Nice familiar," Eeles said, sitting down. "D'you suppose you can distract that thing by feeding it? Here—let me try." Eeles took a handful of granola from a bowl and tossed it onto the floor between them, calling out "heeerre, chicky-chicky!"

The rooster ignored the granola and flew at Eeles, who, with a single, graceful motion, hover-charmed it far out into the Great Hall and dropped it. It fell onto the Ravenclaw table.

Unfortunately, large birds fell from the sky onto the tables hundreds of times a meal, and the Ravenclaws didn't really look at the rooster until it was right in front of them, running down the middle of the table, stepping in the food. At other tables this would have resulted in swearing or shrieking. The Ravenclaws mostly ignored it and cleaned up after its passing in the same way that they did with owls.

Now, there were owls in the Great Hall at the time, swooping around, delivering letters and packages. A Great Grey, having just risen into the air, saw the rooster coming down the table towards where it had just been. It was normally lazy, and didn't have too much of a hunting instinct, but, well, if the world was going make things this easy for it . . .

It flew around in a tight circle, flapping, gathering speed, and dived onto the rooster with enormous force. The rooster was killed instantly with a bite to the neck as the owl slid down the table with its prize, getting scrambled eggs, milk, pumpkin juice, and hot oatmeal all over itself and everyone within ten feet of it. It looked distinctly pleased with itself as it got to its feet and started tearing into the rooster there on the table. Well, it was time for breakfast, after all.

The professors, up at the faculty table, were not in agreement as to what to do.

"Huh," said Eeles. "I bet that's the first thing that owl has ever caught for itself."

"Nice catch, too!" offered Hagrid, applauding.

"It's like bacon, but you catch it yourself! You know," Eeles said, turning to the Headmaster, "as I understand it . . ." he looked thoughtful as he searched for words, drumming his fingers on the table. "You know, letting that thing follow you in here was exactly the sort of judgment call that gets Kettleburn in trouble all the time."

Dumbledore wasn't entirely happy with that comparison. No one had been endangered by the rooster. He supposed, though, that he really shouldn't let the owl just eat it there, in front of the increasingly horrified students. He hovered the owl and its freshly-caught breakfast up and through the mail-window, out into the snowy outdoors. Presumably it could finish its meal on the castle roof somewhere. It was a big owl; nobody would try to steal from it. He sighed.

"While that was certainly dramatic, and I think we are all awake now, unfortunately we have a limited number of roosters at the moment."

"Can't you just go buy more?" asked Eeles.

"Yes, but someone has to go out and get them. Hagrid, how did you find the ones we have now?"

"Oh, I had yer brother get 'em fer us. Evryone already thinks 'e's a mite odd, so 'e could buy up roosters an' nobody'd raise an eyebrow."

Eeles looked back and forth between the two of them. "You have a brother? And pretending to be crazy is a family trait?"

"I assure you, Erasmus, the majority of it is not an act. And Aberforth is, I think, considered merely eccentric."

"So is that the same Aberforth who runs the Hog's Head?"

Albus nodded. "Indeed. So," he said, changing the subject, "how was last night's hunting expedition?"

"Uneventful. Pointless, too, if you ask me. There's no sense having the four of us tromping around the school at night—all we catch are students out of bounds. It's overkill, for that. Can't you get your Ministry to send somebody out to do it?"

"Supposedly they will be doing just that at some point today. It was a rare event, where your friend Mr. Malfoy and I agreed on something and Cornelius Fudge did not—the Minister insisted he would send somebody over to help search. Of course, I think it's futile, and Lucius wants to leave the basilisk alone because it's a national treasure, but essentially we agree. I expect any day now we shall see an editorial in the Prophet from him insisting that Salazar Slytherin must have known what he was doing, and how it's all my fault for allowing muggleborn students to attend Hogwarts."

"So he believes it's Slytherin's basilisk?"

Albus shrugged, and, in a quieter voice, said "the actual beliefs of Lucius Malfoy are a mystery to me."


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


When Albus returned to his office, there was a man with a bloodhound waiting for him. The dog was sitting patiently on a leash, and, when it saw him, started swishing its tail back and forth on the floor. The man looked like he didn't want to be there at all.

"Well, at least someone is happy to see me!" He peered over his glasses at the man. "Penvro Smout, if I am not mistaken?"

"Wow! It's been fifteen years, professor! I'm impressed. How . . . ?"

"At my age, you are all a bunch of youngsters, and you look about the same to me as the last time I saw you in my office. Am I correct in believing Cornelius sent you?"

"Well, my boss didn't tell me that, exactly, but I'd believe it. I'm with Dragon Research and Restraint now—they were hoping Snotra here"—indicating the dog, who was now licking Dumbledore's hand as he held it out for her to smell—"could sniff something out."

"I admit it's worth a try. Do you need any assistance? Still know your way around?"

"Hard to forget it, sir. We'll be fine on our own. Anywhere you think I should start?"

"Hm. I'd start down by the Hufflepuff common room, cover the rest of the dungeons, and work up from there. I can't say I have much hope you will find anything, though. No offense to your nose, of course, Snotra! Hm. I need to go in that direction myself—I'll walk you part of the way down."

"Alright then."

"So, Cornelius thinks a bloodhound can do it, does he?"

"Oh, Snotra isn't a bloodhound! She's a Cardiff Dragonhound. Bred 'em to hunt the Welsh Greens, back in the 20s. Ah, don't feel bad—she won't take offense. Everybody else thinks she's a bloodhound, too. The differences are subtle, you see."

Albus didn't see, but didn't really feel like getting a lecture on the breed standard for Cardiff Dragonhounds, either, so he simply nodded, and changed the topic to Penvro's life since Hogwarts. This kept them occupied until they parted ways.

Dumbledore's actual destination was the kitchens. It was not a place he went very often—a few times a year, at most. This was partly because he didn't want the house elves to think he was telling them how to do their jobs. The kitchens were their domain, and he respected that. He could trivially have called one of them to his office for the conversation he needed to have today, but coming down here in this case was also a gesture of courtesy. He was asking for their help, not ordering them.

The entrance to the kitchens, or at least the one used by humans, was hidden by an enormous painting of a pear. Getting past it involved tickling the pear; the story behind this had unfortunately been lost to history, but everyone agreed that the painting was very old and that there was no sense messing unnecessarily with familiar castle fixtures.

The picture of the pear didn't actually squirm or react when it was tickled. The door just swung open to let you pass.

Most visitors didn't get very far past that point before being swarmed with house elves eager to be helpful; today was no exception. Albus gave them all a grandfatherly smile and dismissed them with a wave of his hand. He was here to see a particular elf.

The kitchens were, of course, enormous—substantially larger than the Great Hall itself, at least in terms of floor area. Copies of the house and faculty tables lay directly beneath their counterparts, with the actual kitchen proper sprawling out on the far side of the faculty-table copy.

Visually, the Hogwarts kitchen was dominated by a central fireplace jutting out from the wall. This was a massive brick edifice, rounded at the base like an enormous squash, and tapering into a chimney towards the top. An arched opening twenty feet across gave access to a magical inferno which Albus had never seen unlit. Visible within the flames was a complicated system of wrought-iron rails, spits, hooks, and chains. There was enough room to roast several whole oxen at one time, but at the moment it held only huge brass kettles, kept polished by the elves, gleaming in the firelight. Around the sides were a dozen oven doors, at least one of which would be open at any given time, day or night, as the elves busily filled or emptied it.

Iron, stone, brick, and brass—this was the decor of the kitchen. Lighting was an irregular combination of firelight, torches, and gas lamps, broken up and reflected by countless pots of copper and brass. These were hung high on the walls, stacked on tables, lined up on shelves, and left in great piles on the floor. After a thousand years of accumulating kitchen implements, Hogwarts had amassed an incredible collection, many of which not even the house elves knew the intended purpose of.

Throughout it all scurried the elves. They hovered food out from the storerooms in crates and bags, washed it with magic in enormous tubs of water, animated knives to chop it, made it fly through the air into cauldrons and ovens and skillets, and sent it on its way to the tables when it was time for meals.

Few places in the castle were so blatantly, overwhelmingly magical. Even the Headmaster's office seemed somewhat ordinary in comparison.


The elf Albus had come to see was named Zent, and was the closest thing to a leader among the Hogwarts elves. Zent was very old. He had been old when Albus was a student, and was ancient now. Albus found him on a throne of rags in a dark corner near the fireplace.

Over Dumbledore's tenure as Headmaster, Zent had become more and more sedentary—too frail to walk and lacking the energy to apparate, it was simplest for him to remain in one place and have the world come to him. In fact, Albus hadn't seen him move from his pile of rags in decades, and even back then it had only happened when he had been summoned to the Headmaster's office. The other elves had begged Albus not to do that again, because Zent was too proud to admit his abilities were deteriorating, and they were afraid he might hurt himself in a bad apparation. And so on those rare occasions—perhaps a few times a year—when the headmaster's duties involved contact with the elves as a group, it was now Albus who came to Zent.

The pile of rags had grown steadily over the years from a small bed to an enormous mound, bringing the old elf almost to eye level for a wizard. There in the shadows, dressed in rags of his own, it was easy to overlook Zent entirely until he moved or spoke. Zent's throne (as Albus thought of it) had inched closer and closer to the fire, too, over the years, and the lighting nearby had been turned down. Albus could see adequately by the warm orange glow of open ovens, but a comfortable temperature for an elderly house elf was downright sweltering for an old wizard. Even after surreptitiously casting a personal cooling charm, he was sweating by the time he had conjured a stool and sat down.

"Zent?"

The elf was either asleep, or feigning it. This could get awkward, because touching him to wake him up seemed rude, and raising his voice risked coming off like yelling. Sometimes Albus had gotten another elf to wake Zent for him. Today that was unnecessary; a small head turned in the pile of rags, and eyes opened, shining a little in the light from the ovens.

"Zent, do you feel up to talking now? How are you?"

"Ehhhhhhh. Zent is here. A moment." Very, very slowly, the elf turned and sat up. "Ehhh." He squinted. "Albus Dumbledore? Zent is still alive, Zent is still here in the kitchens. Too old to work! Too old to move! Without the young ones . . .," he gestured around the room. "Without the young ones, Zent would not eat! Zent would slip away . . . All come to Zent for advice, they do, respect Zent. But Zent is so very, very old."

"'Still here' will do, won't it. At least so long as our minds are with us. You know, I am considered old now myself! A hundred and ten this summer." Albus shook his head. "It is good to have you around to give me some perspective." He sat and stroked his beard for a moment. "But I am afraid this is not a purely social visit. Do you recall our conversation a few weeks ago? About the wards?"

"Oh. Yes, yes, the wards. Zent remembers. Zent has discussed this, yes, asked the youngsters. Zent told them it was just in case, not to worry, Albus Dumbledore has not said bad wizards send their elves here. They is scared, Albus Dumbledore—do not like to think about things that scare them!"

Albus nodded. Serious fights between house elves were terrible, massively destructive events, given the elves' power, tenacity, and mental instability. From his point of view as Headmaster of the school, this made it all the more valuable to find a means of warding the grounds against unauthorized house elf apparation. He sympathized with the elves' aversion to conflict, though, and felt bad about making them contemplate it.

"Albus Dumbledore, sir, house elves is not to be messing with wards. It is not allowed. But Albus Dumbledore is very clever—he will find a way! And elves can test it for him." Zent nodded insistently.

"Is that so? Very well, then. It was something that affected you, and I had thought you would like to have a hand in it. I will, of course, as you say, ask for help testing my experiments. Ah. That is unfortunately not my only reason for coming down here." Zent looked at him expectantly. "You are, of course, aware of the paralyzed students in the hospital wing?"

"Paralyzed? Zent has not heard this. Elves do not get told news, sir. No one talks to elves."

"Oh. I am sorry. On Monday morning, or perhaps late Sunday night, a dozen students were found in the halls paralyzed. I am afraid this was the effect of a basilisk's gaze." The old elf's eyes widened. "Indirect, of course, the direct gaze would kill. That is what happened to poor Myrtle, as you remember." The elf nodded; he probably remembered Hagrid being blamed for it, but had complete trust in the words of Albus Dumbledore.

"Myrtle is displeased with me right now, since I sealed off the bathroom she has been haunting. I have reason to suspect it houses an entrance to Salazar Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets. Myrtle . . . said she heard someone come in, that night, and then hid in her toilet, refusing to come out and see who it was. I'm afraid I was rather cross with her about that." Albus sighed, and realized this was all irrelevant to the elf, probably. "In any event, I have been unable to find anything of use in that room, and would like you to—discreetly—send an elf up there to look for any secret passageways they can find."

"Of course, Albus Dumbledore! An elf will look. But if great wizards cannot find it, it is well-hidden."

"Thank you. My next request is simply to keep an eye out, so to speak, for a basilisk. We could probably subdue it if we could locate it, but it also seems to be, as you say, well-hidden. Tell the elves not to try to fight it themselves, but to come straight to me if they think they have found it."

Zent nodded again, as if he were making mental notes. He looked much more alert than when Albus had first come down. Giving him a mission he could actually undertake—even if his role was leadership only—made a world of difference to him.

"Again, I thank you. Now, along with the students who were paralyzed, our caretaker, Argus Filch, also fell victim to the basilisk's gaze. He is in the hospital wing, and we have not had time to, um, hire a replacement." Zent looked neutrally on, presumably guessing where this was going and not wanting to show emotion. "This is an unusually bad time to lose him, since, as you must have noticed, we have introduced a number of roosters to the castle in the hopes their crowing will prove fatal to the basilisk. Hm. I am creating too much tension, and I apologize—please have the elves clean up the chicken poop, as it is currently beyond our ability." Zent's eyes widened, unsure if he grasped the situation properly. "Yes, yes, discreetly, of course, but I am giving permission for the elves to clean the corridors of Hogwarts."

"Is Albus Dumbledore sure? We has not been allowed, must be a human . . . all my life! Too scary to see us! Not good enough to sweep the floors of the Great School!" Zent went through several expressions, then looked resolute. The elves had never liked Filch, and the rules about where they could and could not clean were one of the few things about their status that the elves actually perceived as oppressive results of prejudice. Albus was offering them a huge honor, and even Zent must know that there could be trouble if the public discovered it. No doubt, Albus thought, the elves would now try their best to discourage the hiring of a new caretaker, but that was not today's problem. Today's problem was a wholly unsubtle, unpolitical excess of chicken manure.

"We will be very careful, sir! No one will see! No one will know! Thank you, sir! Thank you!" The elf paused. "Albus Dumbledore comes to Zent, even though Zent is old and cannot work! But Albus Dumbledore finds things for Zent to organize, here from his pile of rags, in the corner! He is far too kind, he is! More than Zent deserves. He will not regret it! Zent will see it all gets done!"

It would, too, Albus thought, as he left. The golden glow of the kitchens reminded him of a Gringotts vault. Hidden treasures, both, and both valuable only to the extent they are made use of.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


It was now around nine AM. He was to meet this morning with Minerva, to go over the report he had asked her to prepare for the Board of Governors. Lucius had demanded it, professing his Deep Concern over the Situation at Hogwarts, but his concern had so far not been so deep as to actually visit the school, or insist on calling a meeting, or in fact to do anything other than complain.

It was pointless, really, and he regretted making Minerva stay up late finishing it, especially after the far more important letters to parents she had handled the previous night. He could ignore Fudge and Skeeter easily enough, but the parents would have to be dealt with as they decided whether to keep their children at Hogwarts. He, of course, would strongly discourage them from pulling their children out of school, as he had instructed Minerva to convey in the letters. Interruptions in education were very disruptive and had long term effects, it was important in a crisis to maintain normalcy, Hogwarts was in fact extremely safe given the current precautions, everything was being taken care of, and so on. He had Minerva neglect to mention—in the letters as well as the report—his doubts about the efficacy of roosters in dealing with the basilisk, or the fact that the basilisk could probably remain hidden for centuries. Moreover, the letters and reports entirely left out any mention of other schools, lest the idea of transferring be placed in anyone's heads—education was not a commodity, and there was no comparing Hogwarts to the other institutions in the country. They were hardly peers or rivals! He had worked hard to keep the admission process as opaque as possible to ensure that his picks for his school would actually attend. No sensible person would turn down Hogwarts, but people could be so insensible at times!

He also neglected to mention that the basilisk could probably only have been summoned by an heir of Slytherin, and that only one of those had been known in recent years. The implications of this were not lost on him, but no one else needed to know. Of course, he had gotten another one of those damn notes promptly after the incident, suggesting a possible (and extremely plausible) location for the Chamber's entrance, assuming the basilisk was real, and suggesting the whole thing could only have been undertaken by a parselmouth. Albus knew of no living parselmouths who would be willing to help him scout around the school, randomly trying potential magic words. Heck, so far as he had known there were none living in Europe at all, but the writer claimed to know of one, withholding their identity for the moment "for your own good, because I do not want you trying to go into the Chamber and confront the basilisk yourself right now."

What exactly was he supposed to do, then? Wait around? Who was supposed to kill the thing—some student stumbling upon it by accident, or going out past curfew to find it? And so he blocked off the bathroom, scolded Myrtle for being a terrible witness, examined everything, and asked the elves to check it out when he failed to find anything himself. He didn't have very high hopes. Tom or one of his horcruxes was probably behind this, and, as Slytherin's actual heir, Tom could no doubt keep the damn thing hidden, even from the headmaster, if he pleased. The monitoring device Albus had been working on—now in pieces due to the incident this morning with the rooster—was probably pretty futile. Tom was certainly the higher priority compared to the monster, anyway.

Albus planned to set a trap if he ever found the basilisk himself, rather than taking the thing on right away. He had at least set the wards on the bathroom to alert him should anyone try to mess with them. He was pretty good at that sort of thing. Right now he had a confundus charm on the door, so anyone coming there would either have to be looking for the Chamber, or, he supposed, visiting Myrtle. He wasn't sure the latter ever happened. Poor girl.

The most recent note had also told him to keep an eye on Quirrel, if he could do it without giving himself away. Albus resented this. It was opaque, and Quirinus had never given the headmaster any reason to worry about his loyalties. He didn't like having some ex-Death Eater, or whoever it was, casting aspersions on faculty members without giving out any reasons for doing so. Besides, if the note writer was so good, why didn't he just watch Quirrel himself?

He sighed as sat back down at his desk, waiting for Minerva to arrive. When he had received the note tipping him off about Peter, he had jokingly said that if he didn't act immediately, he was sure it would grow to a hundred times its size and start eating students before the day was out. It had now been two months since he had been warned about the basilisk, and all his preparations had so far yielded no obvious benefits. Other than the simple action plan he had developed with the other faculty, he had, in fact, mostly ignored the note-writer's other advice.

He dug around in his files and pulled out the note. Doing so immediately brought back a feeling of too many things happening at once, spiraling out of his control, with everyone, note-writer included, expecting him to somehow deal with it all.

He went down the list in the note.

He had done some research on detecting spirits, and possession thereby, but the literature on the topic was notoriously unreliable. He should really have delegated that one. Asking Eeles to cover signs of possession seemed like too much of a give-away, though, so the item about preparing students was a non-starter. He didn't like the situation, of course, but anyway he wasn't sure there were consistent signs of possession. Albus hated to admit it, but Alastor's "constant vigilance" and insufferable question-posing were probably the best method for detecting possession that he knew of.

What if he caught Tom while possessing someone? Great question. What would he do? The literature on trapping a spirit was also notoriously unreliable. Fine. He'd try to get help. He certainly had plenty of friends abroad who were not involved in the whole wizarding war thing.

The locket. The writer had said the goblins had asked for 20,000 galleons to uncurse the ring. Maybe he should stop trying to get it to open himself—it was clearly trying to influence him every time he touched it, and he was increasingly unenthused about the prospect of further work with it.

Did he know how to get the cup from the LeStranges' vault? Yes, there were legal procedures for getting at suspected dark artifacts, but that would tip his hand entirely and he didn't want to do that until he was sure he controlled the other horcruxes.

Blocking spirits with wards. If he could reliably detect them, which he couldn't, he was sure he could block them, too. He wondered whether that would be a good one to delegate.

Blocking house elves—well, he had actually tried to do something with that, right? He had tried delegating, even! In retrospect maybe delegating to the house elves themselves was a poor idea to start with, though.

Getting rid of ministry-dependent wards—he had in fact done this on Longbottom Manor, which had previously had an unplottability enchantment that he replaced with something he had dug up himself. Nobody else seemed to be using that one, though, so that was an item for the "done" category. Small comfort.

Strengthening the Hogwarts wards—he knew hundreds of ways to do this, all requiring resources he didn't have readily at hand.

Fiddling with the Dark Mark had not been high on his list of priorities, although maybe it should be. He would just give in and ask Severus about it soon.

Keeping the basilisk out of the castle—damned if he knew.

The unicorns, now, were a straightforward problem, and probably fairly solvable. And their importance was obvious, too—a spirit trying to form any sort of temporary body would go straight for unicorn blood if they could get it. He started mentally going over possible approaches in his head, but was interrupted by Minerva before he could get any further down the list. He hastily tucked the note back in a drawer when he heard the gargoyle sliding out of the way for her.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Her report was excellent, of course. He had nothing to add to it, told her so, and sent her off to make copies and owl them out to the Board members. He was left alone in his office again, listening to the distant crowing of roosters. They seemed rather noisier than usual, at least as best as he could tell, given the past few days as a baseline.

He wondered, briefly, if he should have left the engorgement charm on that one this morning. Give it more of a fighting chance if the basilisk actually showed up. No, he thought, no doubt the basilisk would be his problem in the end, battling it out in some ridiculous blindfolded duel that would show off his power and get him accused of orchestrating the whole thing.

"Br-kawk!"

Yes, the crowing outside was definitely getting more frequent. He contemplated going down to shoo the nearest roosters away, getting them to defend other parts of the castle. Roosters did not understand the concept of strategic deployment. Actually, they were pretty hard to shoo, too, if this morning's incident was representative.

He heard footsteps in the hall below, stopping just in front of the gargoyle. Then, muttering. Two people, male voices, arguing about something. It seemed unlike any of the professors, and any students down there were definitely out of bounds given the current security program. Huh. He let the gargoyle slide aside, but said nothing. He had to keep up his advantage in mysteriousness, after all.


The first thing he saw coming up the stairs was a wooden crate, being levitated in front of his visitors. This was followed by an embarrassed-looking Remus Lupin and a cheerful Sirius Black. Albus smiled, but waited for them to make the first move.

"Greetings, Professor!" Sirius called out. "It has been brought to my attention that you have a bit of a situation here. A slithery little problem?"

This was a relief—it was nice to see friends, especially ones who seemed pleased to see him. Even if, as was at least the case with Sirius, they looked like they thought they had just gotten away with something.

"It would seem so, I'm afraid," Albus replied. "I gather, by your unexpected presence in my office, bearing an expression of glee and a mysterious box, that you have something to say on the matter? Perhaps something that I could not, in fact, stop you from saying, short of using a silencing spell? I must admit you are the first people this week to look remotely happy to see me. So." He gestured at the box and raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"We have brought you chickens! Well, roosters, actually. At least we think they are all roosters. We're not sure how to tell, and some of the muggles who sold them to us seemed awfully amused. Nevertheless, they are probably all roosters. Male members of the species Gallus gallus, brought to Hogwarts in its time of need!" Sirius gestured dramatically, pointing at nothing in particular.

Albus spoke slowly and carefully. "Would I be correct in assuming your . . . gift . . . is contained in that crate, complete with air-freshening and silencing charms?"

"Oh no, no," said Remus, shaking his head, "the crate contains chicken feed. I, being the responsible one, convinced Sirius to provide that as well. It seemed unfair, otherwise."

"Oh," said Albus. "I see. Then, the roosters . . .?"

"Are making themselves at home in the castle, of course. You can hear them now, making friends with each other already!"

The distant "krawk!"-ing noises did not, in fact, sound friendly, but under the circumstances Albus let it slide. He sighed. "You wouldn't happen to know, would you, how many roosters you have just released in Hogwarts?" If these were students, he thought, he would have delivered that line while peering sternly over his glasses.

"One hundred twenty-eight!"

Albus leaned back in his chair, sighed again, and conjured chairs for his guests. "You might as well have a seat, I suppose, while I go through the obvious questions, since no doubt you would be gravely disappointed if I did not. Ah, good. Now then, is there anything magical about these birds? Special enchantments?"

Sirius glanced at Remus with a look Dumbledore interpreted as 'Damn it, why didn't we think of that!'

"Er, no. Do you actually need any, for them to work on the basilisk?"

"No, no, not that I have ever heard. Unenchanted, ordinary roosters are perfectly acceptable. Preferred, even, I would say."

"Sooo . . . why did you ask, then?"

Albus smiled. "There was a rather amusing incident in my office this morning . . . I have told precisely one person about it so far, so naturally I expect the story to have made it through the entire school by the end of dinner. Since I believe you are getting your gossip through your cousin, Miss Tonks, I think I will leave her the pleasure of sharing that one with you."

"You just don't want us getting any ideas on the way out!"

"Perhaps. Be that as it may, let us move on to your own story—how exactly did you get one hundred twenty-eight roosters into the castle? Did you have help?"

Sirius glanced once more at Remus, who shrugged. "Not really. Not once we got here, at least. I guess it depends on what counts as 'help'. We just sort of shooed them along, and in they went!"

"Through the front door?"

"We have to keep some secrets."

There were wards to keep out people with hostile intentions, and these applied to the tunnels as well, but they weren't very reliable. Anything else had to be activated affirmatively, and Albus wasn't interested in keeping the school on a near-war footing without a genuine, imminent threat. The benefits of leaving the tunnels alone—or at least, what he considered benefits—usually outweighed the risks. He could just picture Remus and Sirius herding the roosters along in front of them, down a narrow tunnel from Hogsmeade.

"Did anyone see you?"

"One or two residents of Hogsmeade, but they promised to be discreet about it."

"You didn't threaten anyone, did you?"

Sirius looked indignant. "What? No! My charming good looks were enough, of course!"

Albus knew better than to take that bait. He drummed his fingers on his desk, thinking. There were probably several other questions they were itching to answer, such as 'Why one hundred and twenty eight, precisely?'. This did not mean Albus would ask them.

"You are aware, of course, that there is no proof that the crow of a rooster is efficacious against a basilisk, nor is there any proof that a basilisk is present in Hogwarts?" Albus smiled. "Under the circumstances I am genuinely grateful for your efforts, of course, but please understand that the problem is not necessarily solved." He really was grateful, actually, even if Sirius and Remus did think they were getting away with something. It would provide him with some political cover, at least, being able to claim the roosters were not his doing.. "Hm. Do you wish this gift to be attributed to you, should anyone ask?"

"I hadn't thought of that, actually. Remus?"

Remus thought for a moment before speaking. "If we actually have a choice . . . I would mildly prefer if you kept my role out of it, please. It might irritate certain factions . . . and the papers will jump on it . . . not that we could make Lucius Malfoy dislike us more than he already does, I suppose. How about this—if you absolutely need to blame someone else, go ahead and use our names—"

"—Hey!" interrupted Sirius, "speak for yourself. Volunteering my name . . . of course, I agree. We will cheerfully take the blame if need be, since we are secure in the knowledge that we had the purest of intentions, doing our part as conscientious alumni who look fondly back upon our days at our alma mater, looking after the children, who are of course, the future, and, since surely anyone else would have done the same—"

Albus cut him off, waving his hand. "That will do, that will do. Enough. You know, I think this is the first time I have seen you in this office after you have pulled off something helpful and constructive, so you may be justly proud of yourselves. Good show, and thank you."

"Oh." Sirius looked unsure what to make of this. "You are, of course, very welcome. Do you have any other problems we could address for you in an equally spectacular way?"

Albus had to think about that. "None that I would care to suggest to you, no. Nothing springs to mind."

"You know," offered Remus, "while I suspect this was a unique opportunity, I want you to know that I, at least, am capable of subtlety. I don't know about Sirius." Sirius snorted. "In all, well, seriousness—not his kind—, though, it seems like there has been a string of unexpected events in the past half year, some prompted by anonymous tips sent to you. Honestly I am worried by this. Albus, I know it's complicated, but the fact that you wanted to put wards on my house suggests you are worried about something you aren't telling us. If something is going on, especially if it concerns us, we would like to help."

Albus sighed, again. "Hm." He sat, thinking, trying to decide how much to say. "I wish, in this case, there were more that I could tell you. In the last war, the Death Eaters were usually careful to take credit for their acts, and those acts unfortunately were usually very deadly. Anyone behind the incident Sunday night has so far done an excellent job of evading detection, and if it was, indeed, a basilisk, the lack of fatalities suggests that great care was taken on their part to ensure its gaze was always indirect."

"So you think they put sunglasses on it?" asked Sirius.

"Yes, actually."

"Maybe it was a warning," suggested Remus, "meant to show us what might have happened. Let us stew in our fear for a while, then make a demand later?"

"That would be one possibility, yes. If we cannot locate them or the basilisk in the meantime, that in itself would be, effectively, a real threat. It would be very impressive. Just because well meaning friends are able to sneak a hundred chickens into the school does not mean Hogwarts is an easy target for our enemies."

"Threat or not," asked Remus, "why now?"

"I truly wish I knew. It is, of course, possible the release of the basilisk is related to the release of Sirius and capture of Pettigrew, or perhaps to Harry's appearance in the news, but I have no working theory as to how."

They all sat in silence for a moment. Sirius broke it, saying "still, I think you should consider reconvening the order. Or at least, giving us something to work on, so you aren't doing it all yourself. Honestly, I'd enjoy the excitement."

"No doubt." Albus smiled. "Now, I believe it is time for me to go make an appearance at lunch. You two should be on your way. I'll have the house elves take care of the chicken feed."


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Lunch was uneventful, relatively. It was also a poor time to make announcements, so as much as he wanted to say something about the rooster in his office this morning, he would need to wait until dinner, when there wasn't so much random coming and going. He kept alert for repeats of yesterday's incident between the Slytherins and Hufflepuffs, but, while the Slytherins certainly seemed amused by something, no one seemed to be picking any fights. Good. That was a relief.

Unfortunately peace at the students' tables did not necessarily guarantee peace right next to him. Madam Pomfrey leaned forward, looked down the table past him, and cleared her throat.

"So, Severus." The potions master looked up at her, with a non-committal look honed over years of similar pestering. "A student told me today that Erasmus here has been mentioning dragon repellant in class, and wondering why you haven't taught them anything about dealing with the basilisk. They're going to be disappointed when they learn we aren't letting them make the mandrake draught, once the plants are mature, since I'm sure they'd like to help their friends . . . besides if the dragon repellant works, it would be a shame not to teach them about it right now, wouldn't it?"

Severus smiled, slightly. "I wonder," he said, giving her a questioning look, "if you have actually smelled any of the products to which Erasmus has been referring."

"I can't say I have. I'm sure it's very pungent, of course, in order to work, but we can't very well expect it to smell like roses and cake, now, can we?"

Severus shook his head, realizing where this was going. "Madam Pomfrey," he drawled, "perhaps you would tolerate its smell in your hospital wing, but I do not think the rest of us would want it in our classrooms. I suppose," he said, thoughtfully, "given that you believe medicine should taste like medicine to discourage its abuse, you would have me teach the dragon repellant with extra ingredients added—perhaps to make it smell more authentic? I assure you it is vile enough as it is. I can't imagine students would need any further deterrent from using it as perfume, if that is your concern."

"Why, Severus, it's almost as if you know me, after working together for years!" She smiled sweetly. Albus was never sure whether Madam Pomfrey's ribbing was affectionate or not; usually she just seemed to be trying to get a rise out of Snape for her own amusement. They certainly worked closely together well enough when necessary, but that working relationship never seemed to carry over to mealtime conversations, or really to any time Albus was actually present.

"Well," mused Pomona, "he could at least demonstrate the potion for the class, when the time comes—still a few months off, as you know—I'm having the students start another crop of mandrakes, just in case. Of course, I do hope you will see no more cases in your wing, Poppy. There ought to be plenty more mature mandrakes by midsummer if there are more, though—need to let some flower and go to seed, of course. Very noisy when that happens. But yes, there ought to be plenty."

"Oh?" Madam Pomfrey raised an eyebrow. "How convenient." Her voice dripped with sarcasm, but she didn't follow up. When Albus had commandeered the mandrakes on Monday for Poppy's eventual use in restorative draughts—forbidding Sprout to use them for anything else—Sybill's plans for the plants had become common knowledge.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


They had met in the greenhouse late Monday afternoon—Albus, Poppy, Pomona, and Severus—to take stock of the mandrake crop and determine if it would be adequate for the paralysis victims. The consensus was that the thirty or so existing plants would probably be enough, provided there were no more attacks, but there would not be much left over.

"Sybill will be unhappy about it, poor thing," Pomona had said, once Severus had double-checked his calculations.

"Sybill?" Madam Pomfrey had a look of dawning realization. "You wouldn't . . . please tell me this is for her own personal use, and not for the students?"

"Oh dear. Yes, her plan was to use them in class, but only for the seventh years, you know, as a sort of treat at the end of the year."

Madam Pomfrey looked horrified. "A treat? Do you have any idea how dangerous that could be? I can't imagine she would have the good sense to do it one at a time, either! A whole roomful of students in an altered state, any one of whom might have a bad reaction to it! Is this going to be a new trend in her teaching, offering 'treats' to her favorite students and leaving it to me to deal with any ill-effects? Pomona, how could you possibly go along with this?"

"Now, now," said Sprout, trying not to look too flustered, "do leave me out of this. You know very well I have the students growing ingredients for many of us, you included. You don't see me second-guessing the safety of your own healing potions, do you?"

"Of course not! Because I am sane and reasonable, and competent in my own field! When was the last time Sybill successfully 'divined' anything? At least before this year she seemed harmless enough."

Albus cut in—this had gone too far. "Please. This is all neither here nor there. The mandrakes will be reserved for Poppy's use in the hospital wing, and that is final, so there is no use in us fighting over them further." He sighed. "As to Sybill, Poppy, I urge you to treat your colleagues with more respect. I myself was given mandrake extract as a third-year, when I took Divination, and no harm came to me or my classmates. Of course," he mused, "it didn't make up for my lack of natural gift in the subject, and I dropped the class halfway through."

Poppy snorted. "No doubt because you were one of the only ones sensible enough to realize it wasn't real magic, while the rest continued to fake it."

Severus raised his hand, and looked questioningly at Albus. "If I may," he began, "Professor Trelawney,"—he emphasized the word 'professor', although Albus wasn't sure what he was implying—"despite her total failure to give an impression of professionalism—"

"Severus!" Albus wanted to cut that off, before Poppy forgot what the conversation was about and started in on whether swoopy cloaks and greasy hair were good indicia of professionalism in Snape's opinion, and how maybe they should all try it for a day. She had actually suggested that, once.

Snape looked as if he were dealing with an especially inept student. "Perhaps," he said, looking at Albus, "someday in the future you might let me finish, instead of assuming I am the one disrupting the harmony between your staff." He smirked, slightly, knowing that this was something Albus worked very hard to preserve. "Alas, I fear it is a vain hope. Professor Trelawney, issues of professionalism aside, has had some . . . limited dealings with me, and I have been left with an impression of someone with more cunning than you give her credit for. I may, in fact, adopt her calming-draught technique in my own class." Madam Pomfrey sighed, looking aggravated.

Severus glared at her. "Surely you do not think I enjoy it when students are squeamish about potions ingredients? I imagine you think I awake every morning saying 'Ah! Newt eyes today, I think! Assuredly that shall make them vomit all over my classroom! What fun!'"

Albus would have preferred to have never heard Severus use that tone of voice, ever, and would now be trying hard to forget it.

"No!" Snape said, "if a simple potion can alleviate any of the woeful incompetence of the dunces I am given to work with, even if it only lets them ascend to making errors of greater sophistication, I will gladly use it. I do not seek to give myself headaches, and I commend Professor Trelawney for having the good sense to avoid them herself, however unorthodox her methods."

"Making a bad idea easier to pull off," said Poppy, "is in no way a commendable teaching method, in my opinion. You all are acting like it is normal and healthy to force children to slaughter their own pigeons for magic that probably doesn't even work! Tarot cards, crystal balls, tea leaves—if bird entrails naturally come next in the list, and it seems that they do, we would all do well to keep a close eye on Sybill's 'innovations'."

"We would all do well to watch our tongues," countered Severus, "as our Divination professor has been corresponding with my good friend Mr. Malfoy, who, in his capacity as a member of the board of governors, has been encouraging her to reintroduce old traditions into her pedagogy. Perhaps that news had not reached the hospital wing?"

"It had not." Madam Pomfrey looked disturbed, and dropped the issue.

Albus pretended nothing had happened, although the business with Lucius had been news to him too, and fairly unsettling news, at that. "Well, then, now that that is settled, I think we all have work to do," he said, brushing his hands together. With that he had herded Poppy and Severus back to the castle, and sent them—separately—on their way.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


It was with this conversation in mind that Albus was cringing, grateful that Poppy had declined to comment further (even if she was sure to express her displeasure in his office later). For once, fear of Lucius Malfoy had done something positive in his school, although he would never admit it to the man. No doubt Lucius would get wind of the commandeering of the mandrakes soon enough, and find some way to exploit it to make Dumbledore's life difficult. Albus, though, had no fear of Lucius Malfoy, and had on numerous occasions simply told him to stuff it. Politely, of course.






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Author's notes:

I am finding this section extremely hard to write. The "day in the life" concept was something I wanted to try, but I don't think I will do it again. It is just not my natural style.

I've written 3.5k words of the next chapter -- the second half of this one--, but it is going very slowly. I'm posting this first part by itself partly because I don't think further editing passes will accomplish anything, and also because I'm hoping for positive reinforcement from readers.

Now would be a good time to give me encouraging reviews. :P Or, heck, any indication that my reader statistics are not from search engines and me refreshing the page as I fix stuff.