The Greater Good [GrindelwaldxDumbledore]

~Chapter Eleven~ Stolen Information

"That sounds like a brilliant idea in theory. Perhaps if we are lucky enough to find it we could come to a similar arrangement." Albus rubbed the auburn stubble on his chin, "I would gladly share the power with you, you could go first, of course, I think saving the muggles from themselves comes before my selfish desires." Albus looked in the direction of his house with guilty eyes.

"I wasn't sure when you would be coming so I have hidden something in my room that I think you might be interested in." Gellert smiled, a mischievous glint in his eyes, "it almost cost me a couple of fingers to get it, but I'm sure it will be worth it."

"You haven't... have you... and you haven't been tempted to peek?" Albus sprung to life and rushed for the door. "Her notes?"

"We have to be careful, I don't want her to know I have it, I'm going to have to try and put it back when we are done."

"Couldn't you just duplicate it?"

"It won't let me, I tried that first, if we want to copy it we need to do it by hand."

The two of them padded quietly across the hallway into Gellert's cramped room. Gellert put a detector charm across the end of the corridor and the anti-eavesdropping spell on the door. "Thanks for teaching me that one, I think it will come in useful."

With them both on the bed, Gellert reached into the top drawer of the bedside cabinet and pulled out an old notebook. Only the inside of the leather binding retained the authentic bottle green colour and the pages were well on their way to a creamy yellow at the edges. A few of the front pages had sustained water damage, enough to blur the old ink and warp the paper, fortunately, the words were still legible.

They skipped through the origins of the tale and the evidence that three brothers did indeed exist and that they were powerful enough to create such artefacts themselves rather than accepting them from death. Gellert grew impatient with Albus who stopped every time they came across a familiar name in regards to the cloak he had little interest in, he longed to snatch the book and get to what really captivated his attention, The Elder Wand.

The more intense the tale the closer the two boys squashed together so they could both read and take notes in their respective quest books. Some names were familiar to them both as the person noted held a worldwide reputation. Whereas others such as the wizard who had taken the wand to Australia to find magic within the Aboriginal population was unknown by Gellert as the tale of the Bavarian wizard who tried to put an end to the Black Plague was unknown to Albus.

The two of them shared their own knowledge on the two lesser-known owners of the wand to each other, unable to control their excitement they grew loud enough that both questioned if the charm on the door would be strong enough to stop people hearing them. They were both vibrating with energy as they flicked the page eager to hear the next thrilling instalment, only to find the page completely blank.

Gellert's disappointment hit like a kick to the stomach. He snatched the book out of Albus' limp fingers to fan through the pages for any hint of ink or erased workings, indents from a page written and then removed but found nothing. He felt sick.

"Perhaps," Albus said with a desperate look. He drew out his wand and tapped it on the spine of the book three times.

They both held their breath as they opened the book again. Nothing.

"Well, that's..." Gellert started.

"A step forward." Albus' mind was racing.

"I was going to say disappointing, but feel free to share your thoughts."

"Don't you see we have closed the gap, before we were looking at centuries of history where facts and artistic licence may not be so clear cut, to more recent times with names we can follow up on and places we know a bit about." He could see that Gellert wasn't fully believing him. "You said your grandfather took you to France to chase the wand, well that's not a million miles away from Bavaria is it?"