The Potter Clan's Vengeance

Chapter 18 : Confrontations with Foe

"Langauge Mr Potter," said McGonagall dryly, still waiting for him. "If you're done, are you going to follow me?" she asked with a withering glare.

"Come on in," said Dumbledore gently right as Thomas Potter was about to knock on the door, and the heavy door swung open dramatically to reveal the Headmaster of Hogwarts and a thin wiry old man that Thomas recognised from his set of chocolate frog cards that he had accumulated over several years.

"You're Nicholas Flamel!" said Thomas, his mouth hanging agape as he walked into the room.

"I am, boy, and I would greatly appreciate it if you would shut your mouth. You catch a blibbering humdinger if you keep it open any longer," Flamel snapped grumpily making Thomas blush and snap his mouth shut.

"Now now Nicholas," began Dumbledore jovially, "be a little nicer. The boy's just surprised, that's all," he said gesturing for Thomas to take a seat. Thomas sat upon a heavily decorated plush armchair in the office, his cheeks ablaze. "Now, Thomas, we just have a few questions to ask you." Thomas nodded, letting him continue. "Firstly, have you been near the third corridor?"

Thomas's heart stopped all of a sudden- how did they know? "No, sir," he managed to squeak out.

"Do you know what currently lies in the third corridor?" Dumbledore pushed on relentlessly.

"No, sir," Thomas squeaked again, his eyes drifting to Flamel who was staring intently at him. He averted his eyes quickly, lookong into his lap.

"Are you sure about that?" asked Dumbledore, eyes cold and hard.

"No sir," Thomas repeated.

Dumbledore took a long, hard look into Thomas's eyes, which had almost involuntarily come up to meet the Headmaster. "Very well," said Dumbledore eventually. "You may go," he said and the door swung open dramatically. As Thomas left, the door swung closed but he could hear the hard voice of Nicholas Flamel yelling at Dumbledore.

"You said he knew where the stone was, you lemon-drop sucking dingbat!"

"Are you sure about it?" asked Harry, looking Neville dead in the eyes.

"Of course I'm sure. You idiot of a brother was rambling on about it so loudly in the common room that the giant squid could hear it," snapped Neville having explained to Harry about the situation with the stone Neville was the boy who was known as squib in Hogwarts but one day near the lake he had met Harry and his friends and they had got together very well Harry used to teach Neville how to perform magic and Neville used to spy in Gryffindor for Harry.

"Then what are we going to do?" Harry asked everyone in the room, pacing frantically. "If Flamel finds out it was us, we could get arrested. I'm too handsome to go to Azkaban!" Harry whined.

"We could return the stone, but you know, not say it was from us," suggested Rigel.

"That's brilliant," Harry said, his cheerfullness returning. "If things go our way, we could even get him to agree to a favour or two." He jumped up from his crouching position on his bed and pulled out a sheet of parchment and a quill. Dipping it in the pot of ink on his desk, he began to write. "Dear Nicholas Flamel..." be began aloud.

"Awww," cooed Perenelle Flamel in their manor on their extensive estate in France, letting the small, ruffled brown owl into their house. Generally the wards would have stopped the owl but this time they had detected something important in the package and had decided to let the owl through. "Nicholas dear!" she called out, taking the ltter from the owl which came with a small pouch. "There's a letter for you!"

"Coming Perenelle," replied the rough voice of Nicholas Flamel. The effects of not having the stone's elixer were already starting to show, and he had given all of their remaining stock to his wife and had taken none for himself. "How did this get through the wards?" he asked, and Perenelle simply shrugged. "Dear Lord Flamel," he began aloud.