Ouroboros || harry potter

Chapter Thirty

(Harry)

Pre-dawn glowed off the thin layer of snow on the Gryffindor manor grounds. The ocean could be seen in the far distance on one side, a streak of blue against a dark gray sky, and some of the village with clouds of smoke rising from the various chimneys on another side. His brother grumbled quietly in the background as he slowly got ready. They needed to head to Hogwarts. It was Christmas and she was waiting for them. He could literally feel her attention through the bond.

It had been a long night with Cassiopeia. Moving this early was a drag. While the walk from the village to the manor was pleasant, they needed to connect the Gryffindor Manor to the floo. Trudging all the way back here after everything yesterday had been exhausting.

Salazar leaned his cheek against the cold glass of one of the many glass walls of the conservatory and sighed as his thoughts inevitably turned to the utter mess Arcturus made. After everything they had set up with the contract, it had still spread beyond the involved parties. Hannah now knew. The Blacks either knew or would soon. It was only a matter of time before it would spread.

He shifted to press his forehead against the soothingly cold glass instead. He should have just taken Godric's original idea: broken into the prison and ripped Black's mind to pieces as he pulled out the needed information. If he had, he wouldn't have had to deal with another child knowing the truth. He wouldn't have had to deal with House Black. Maybe he would have even avoided the Malfoy Ball too.

"Stop mopping. It's done with," Godric grumbled, pulling Salazar's gaze from the wintery scenery. Godric stuffed the last of his things into Salazar's satchel. "If it's the dancing lessons, I had to go through them too. Just when I was eight . And I certainly didn't have a gorgeous woman as my dance partner."

Salazar scoffed, "She's three times our age—physical age."

"Doesn't mean I can't appreciate the view," Godric stated back.

"Really?"

Godric shrugged. "At least I don't feel like a pedophile. Obviously, the physical age difference is an issue—and gods we're not talking about this." His brother grimaced as he seemed to realize what they were talking about.

"I wasn't the one who brought it up," muttered Salazar as he picked up his satchel and led the way out.

Godric caught up after a moment as he pulled his hat on. "So...Floo to Hogsmeade and walk to Hogwarts?"

The brunet made a face and grumbled as he stuck his hands into his coat pocket, "We need to set up the floo. Or I should build a mirror door from here to Hogwarts."

His brother stilled at the remark. Salazar glanced back at Godric when he didn't hear the crunch of snow underfoot. The Gryffindor's hazel gaze gleamed with excitement. "Absolutely. What needs to be changed to allow a longer distant connection? Or would one work as is now?"

"If we do this, we should set it up for multi-to-multi destination which complicates things," Salazar offered as they headed out into the snow, "The original mirror pairs I created are each tied to very small spatial side dimensions enchanted for the short walkway, you're literally stepping into a pocket dimension when you step into a mirror. Very similar to what Rowena did with the hidden passages..."

He frowned thoughtfully as he considered what would be needed to expand the concept. "To do multi-to-multi, we would need a pocket dimension that had more than two openings and magic to...uh–" He looked up at the cloudy, still dark sky as he rambled. "–spin...yes, spin. We'd need it to spin the dimension so that the correct exit is in front of the person."

"Maybe we should test it out at Hogwarts before expanding the distance between mirrors?" Godric remarked thoughtfully, "Having the dimensional entrance stand before another dimension that spins to give different exits could allow multi-to-multi as long as no one attempts to exit through the same mirror."