The Awakening Power

Chapter 31: Secrets Beneath the Earth

The Awakening Power

by Sib

Chapter 31: Secrets Beneath the Earth

A/N: To the people who are following this story for the action, and sort of tolerated the fluffier aspects of the story, this chapter is dedicated to you. :)

* * *

Ginny slid down a tight ventilation shaft, her wand held in front of her as she cast Tractum spells to pull herself along. She was very glad that Lupin had put the slick charm on her; she was moving along the shafts quite quickly. The series of tunnels were far longer than she expected and if she'd had to crawl within them, she never would have made it very far.

On the other hand, she was growing increasingly frustrated. The tunnels were seemingly endless as she came upon fork after fork. Occasionally, she found duct that angled upward, so she took those, figuring it was better to keep moving higher. One good thing was that the shafts had grown a bit larger, giving her more room.

The air flow in the shafts was very odd; it seemed to flow one direction, and then blew back the other, as if the caverns themselves were breathing. She had tried to figure out what direction the air was coming from, but that proved impossible.

"Tractum!" she cast, pulling herself down yet another stone tunnel. She dead-ended into another tunnel, her wand lighting the smooth wall of a perpendicular shaft. Ginny was about to decide whether to go left or right when she noticed a distinctive gouge in the wall – the same gouge she had seen before.

"Damn it!" she shouted, her voice muffled by the narrow passageway. She felt tears coming to her eyes; she felt helpless and claustrophobic, and now she realized she had been going in a circle.

She pulled herself together, remembering that Harry and the others were counting on her to find a way out. She decided to give herself a minute to think. There had to be a way to do this more efficiently and effectively.

And then it hit her... she had a mapping charm on her wand. "Stupid!" she said, hitting herself in the head. She invoked the display incantation. A small, three-dimensional map floated in mid-air, showing all the cavern spaces and ventilation shafts that had been in her view since the charm had been invoked. The spaces were in a dim red, with a blue line running along the path she had traveled. The news wasn't all bad; she had managed to climb to some extent, and only her recent path had been in a circle.

She studied the map, rotating it around, and then saw something she hadn't noticed before. An opening to a shaft, somewhat larger in size, led directly upward from one of the tunnels she already had been down. She must have missed it when she slid by using the Tractum charm.

That has to be something, she thought excitedly. Checking the map one last time, she figured out a path back to the vertical passage.

* * *

Hermione, Ron and Lupin walked around the edge of the huge pit, gazing down at the enormous amount of magical equipment and supplies. The base of the crater was about two hundred feet below them, emitting a strange glow which illuminated everything but cast no shadow.

"What could they possibly be doing down there?" Hermione whispered.

"Something significant, if Voldemort went to this much trouble to bring in all this material," Lupin replied.

"All I know is, whatever it is, there's a lot here that we can destroy," Ron said, grinning.

"Agreed," Lupin said. "Let's do some scouting, see where everyone is, and perhaps even find out what's going on. It's even possible we may find a way to communicate with the outside."