Menacie

Chapter - 51 : Stone Protection

When they knocked on the door of the gamekeeper's hut an hour later, they were surprised to see that all the curtains were closed.

Hagrid called, "Who is it?" before letting them in and then shut the door quickly behind them.

It was stiflingly hot inside. Despite it being such a warm day, there was a fire blazing in the grate. Hagrid made them tea and offered them some stoat sandwiches, which they refused.

"So - yeh wanted to ask me somethin'"

"Yes," said Harry.
There's no point beating around the bush, Harry thought to himself.

"We were wondering if you could tell us what's guarding the Philosopher's Stone besides Fluffy?"

Hagrid frowned at him.

"O' course I can't," he said. "Number one, I don't know meself." Number two, yeh know too much already, so I wouldn' tell yeh if I could. That Stone's here fer a good reason. It was almost stolen outta Gringotts - I s'ppose yeh've worked that out an' all? Beats me how yeh even know abou' Fluffy."

"Oh, come on, Hagrid, you might not want to tell us, but you do know everything that goes on around here," said Ava warmly, in a flattering voice.

Hagrid's beard twitched and they could tell he was smiling.

"We only wondered who Professor Dumbledore had trusted enough to help him, apart from you."

Hagrid's chest swelled at these last words. The other three beamed at Ava.

"Well, I don' suppose it could hurt ter tell yeh that... let's see... he borrowed Fluffy from me... then some o' the teachers did enchantments... Professor Sprout - Professor Flitwick - Professor McGonagall-" he ticked them off on his fingers.

"Professor Quirrell - an' Professor Dumbledore himself did somethin', o' course. Hang on, I've forgotten someone. Oh yeah, Professor Snape."

"Snape?"

"Yeah - yer not still on abou' that, are yeh? Look, Snape helped protect the Stone, he's not about to steal it."

Ava could hear Harry, Ron and Hermione thinking the same thing - if Snape had been in on protecting the Stone, it must have been easy to find out how the other teachers had guarded it. He probably knew everything - except, it seemed, Quirrell's spell and how to get past Fluffy.

Ava wanted to believe that they were right but something told her that Snape wasn't conspiring, it had to be someone else.

"You're the only one who knows how to get past Fluffy, aren't you, Hagrid?" Harry said anxiously.

"Not a soul knows except me an' Dumbledore," said Hagrid proudly.

"Well, that's something," Harry muttered to the others. "Hagrid, can we have a window open? I'm boiling."

"Can't, Harry, sorry," said Hagrid. Hermione noticed him glance at the fire. She look at it too.

"Hagrid - what's that?"

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I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter!
Thanks for sticking around!

Lots of love!

Always,
Ana