When the castle is almost empty, even the wind seems to calm down.
Behind an orange-tinted stained-glass window in Ravenclaw Tower, Sean watched Whitey fly further and further away with a letter in her beak. The Void Rune hung at his chest like a pendant, and he felt a quiet firmness and pride there — the fullness of a messenger's enthusiasm.
Sean felt like he understood something. When he lowered his head, the twig-like creature crawled out of his bag and headed toward a nest perched on the bookshelf, glowing warmly in the lamplight.
Tilla had always had a place in the Ravenclaw dormitory. When she turned to look at Sean again, he could sense much more than before.
Saturday.
Headmaster's office.
"Yes, you already know… some people need a very long time to understand; some people never will. Only those with character and courage dare to feel it. Such people are lucky — and rare."
Headmaster Dumbledore gently guided Sean's thoughts toward where he wanted them to go.
"In songs and legends of thousands of years, the boundary-land is always filled with lost souls. They do not wish to become ghosts, because that would strip them of feeling; they do not wish to go on into the depths of death, because they believe they must still wait…
Wait for… love to redeem them. Can you imagine that, my boy?
Endless waiting, without limit and without measure, just for a faint possibility. That is the key to why souls linger there: a soul that still holds love is always a little more stubborn in clinging on…"
Sunlight fell across the open window, scattering rainbows around the office. Even within Hogwarts, Dumbledore's office was surely one of the most fascinating places.
If students weren't terrified of being expelled every time they were called here, they would all be delighted to have the chance to look around.
It was a spacious, beautiful circular room, filled with all sorts of odd little noises. On a spindly-legged table sat many strange silver instruments, gently rotating and puffing out thin coils of smoke.
The walls were covered in portraits of former headmasters and headmistresses, men and women both, all snoring softly in their frames.
Over that soft snoring, Dumbledore spoke calmly to Sean.
His meaning was very clear.
In the boundary-land, whether a soul belongs to the dead or to a living wizard carried there by the Void Rune, becoming lost is the most normal thing in the world. The difference is that the dead eventually move on; the living find their way back.
And love is like an anchor, a fixed point that keeps a soul from drifting forever.
That night, Sean naturally stayed a little longer than usual at the boundary. Once he came to understand a few things, the fog all around that place thinned a little.
In the dream he kept hearing the panel chime:
[You have practiced Soul Transformation once at journeyman level within the master domain, Mastery EXP +10]
[You have practiced Soul Transformation once at journeyman level within the master domain, Mastery EXP +10]
[You have practiced Soul Transformation once at journeyman level within the master domain, Mastery EXP +10]
It chimed three times in a row.
Sean had good reason to suspect the panel's voice was one of the reasons he was so slow to lose himself there.
Morning.
The first ray of sunlight fell across the blue silk canopy. The flowing curtains were drawn back a little, lighting up the open Dream Stories and the lines on the page:
[He dreamed many dreams before he realized he was an eagle, swooping down on rabbits in the grassland; when he failed to catch one, he went hungry. Later he became a rabbit, and then he pitied those terrified, struggling rabbits.
He crossed prairie, mountain stream and desert, and found in the end that the forest suited him best, for it held the most creatures.
He was their kin, the firstborn of the forest. He found he could stay longer and longer.
At first, the beautiful dream shattered in seconds; later he remained there seven hours. By then the sky had already gone dark and the stars were blazing, and the priest told him that here the stars burned brightest… and so he learned to divine the future from them…]
Seven hours…
Sean quietly noted the number. At the moment, he couldn't stay in the boundary-land for more than two minutes.
Coming down from Ravenclaw Tower, Sean opened the panel out of habit:
[Transfiguration Categories:
Material Transfiguration: Novice (10/300)
Magical Transfiguration: Novice (30/300)
Soul Transfiguration: Novice (10/300)]
Evaluation: A novice master of transfiguration whose combat capability among masters now exceeds five points.
Soul Transfiguration was advancing quickly, but it wasn't what Sean planned to rely on first.
In truth, the master-level transfiguration he'd leaned on most was magical transfiguration — things like fire dragons and snowmen. And, of course, the little stone soldiers.
But against the thick hide of a basilisk, Sean doubted his magical transfiguration alone could overpower it. Basilisks, dragons, giants — those kinds of creatures had real resistance to magic.
To break through that resistance, you either hit it with far stronger magic… or use a more roundabout method.
The first method is what dragon keepers do. The Monster Book of Monsters recorded it: each dragon handler would haul out their wand and cast together:
"Stupefy!"
The stunning spells streaked like rockets toward the dragon, sparks raining onto its scaly hide — then the dragon went down.
Based on that standard, Sean guessed he'd need at least the combined spell output of four adult wizards just to punch through.
So he looked more kindly on the second approach: physical means.
The Monster Book of Monsters also described an older method of catching dragons:
[They dug a massive pit, filled it with delicious raw meat. The dragon dropped in without hesitation. Then the wizards transfigured a boulder to block the opening. After a few days of hunger, the dragon weakened, and that was the best time to capture it.]
That was Material Transfiguration at work.
To be safe, Sean decided to push both branches — magical and material — up to journeyman level.
Right now, he was headed to the Transfiguration office to work on Material Transfiguration.
Not long after, at the edge of the Forbidden Forest—
A rolling green lawn as far as the eye could see had become Sean's practice ground. Professor McGonagall stood nearby, watching him wave his wand.
The grass bucked like waves, and suddenly both Sean and McGonagall heard someone shouting:
"Merlin's beard — an earthquake!"
The giant came thundering out at top speed. He had Fang under one arm and a handful of Bowtruckles clinging to the other — the poor tree-guardians were taking out their fury on his hand for being dragged away from their trunks.
"Good t' see yeh, Professor McGonagall — and you too, Sean — but no time ter explain — we're havin' an earthquake here—"
Hagrid panted.
~~~
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