LIGHTNOVELONLINE The Sivril Seekers
The Next Day:
I was invited on a treasure hunt (just the thing to cheer me up). Lotty was with us (me, Anita, Jeffrey and Emily) and she brought the Memory Sivril.
"Now to resume our search for the Locked Door,"Anita announced.
Ed and Jared had been asked to join too, but they were both busy. Ed with studying, and Jared with 'important prefect business' whatever that may be. Sitting in front of the fire, sipping tea, I suspect.
It turns out Anita and Lotty have been trusting the Sivrils to Hoppy for safekeeping while we're at Hogwarts. Lotty had asked the Golden Sivril if there was a particular way to use the Silver Sivril, and it had provided her with a detailed answer. Lotty didn't tell us what it said, just that she was going to 'test it out' and 'explain along the way'.
We followed her to the fountain where we'd found the key to the Locked Door.
"Show us the memory of how the key got into the fountain,"Lotty asked the Sivril, as she dropped it into the stone basin.
The water began glowing with silvery light, we stepped into it and we're drawn into the memory.
It was sometime in the past, a lot longer ago than we'd imagined. An elderly wizard with a troubled expression on his face was walking rapidly up the path that leads towards the fountain. He withdrew the key from a pocket in his robes and stared at it, turning it over in his fingers, nervously.
Then, after a few moments, he said,"may you remain lost, until discovered by those of truly honourable intent!"
With that, he flung the key into the fountain and hurried away. The memory ended, we looked at each other surprised.
"At least that means we have 'truly honourable intent',"Jeffrey said, cheerfully.
Next, we followed Lotty to the fountain where she'd discovered the Memory Sivril. This time she asked it to show us the memory of when the Silver Sivril was hidden.
To our interest and surprise, we saw the same elderly wizard as had hidden the key. He was hurrying towards the fountain, holding the silver ball in one of his hands, and warily looking around as though he didn't want to be seen by anyone. He placed the ball in the hand of the statue on the fountain, then cast a non-verbal spell with his wand, and the ball appeared as a stone part of the fountain.
Then he said,"and there may you remain until you are found by the one who is destined to discover you."
This time we all looked at Lotty.
"Looks like you were destined to find this,"Emily remarked.
"I'm not sure how much I like the sound of that,"Lotty said,"it sounds like a lot of responsibility for something I don't even know!"
"You do realise,"I said, thinking,"this means the key to the Locked Door has something to do with the Sivrils?"
"And whatever it is, it must be important,"Emily observed.
"Let's go to Wise Wizard's Walk next,"Anita suggested.
I couldn't follow them there, as it was outside the school grounds, but they told me they were taken into a memory of the same wizard hurrying along again. He took out the Golden Sivril and dropped it into the lake.
"And there may you remain,"he said,"until the time is right for you to be found again."
After that, we weren't sure where to look, so we rolled the Silver Sivril around random parts of Hogwarts. We even asked the Golden Sivril for clues, but it wouldn't give us any; and when we asked it to give us clues on how to find any of the other Sivrils, it wouldn't give us any for that either.
Beginning of October:
I haven't written in a while, I've been studying a lot. I've also been very occupied with certain other matters... I've gotten Oliver to keep an eye on Anita if she ever goes to the Treehouse. There's still no sign of Silas, or any news of him.
Earlier today, Professor Livia was going on about us Slytherins being 'takers' in a rare class with the Hufflepuffs (we usually have DADA with the Gryffindors).
"Any questions?"she asked, following a long lecture on the inherent differences between the two Houses, with particular emphasis on relationships between the two being problematic. I put up my hand.
"If everyone in the world gave, then everyone would receive,"I said.
"Well put, Carrow,"Professor Livia responded,"but if I everyone took, we would be left with nothing."
"Yes, but if everyone receives, they would also all be takers,"I went on.
"What would you describe yourself as then?"Professor Livia asked me,"a Giver or a Taker?"
"I give and I receive - a giver and a taker,"I answered.
"Well, then, Carrow, what have you ever given?"Professor Livia replied, in a tone that very much annoyed me.
It annoyed me a little bit too much, so my response wasn't as wisely thought out as I would have liked,"well, for example, I'm giving you my opinion right now!"
Laughter followed my statement.
"Miss Carrow - that's like giving a rotten apple in exchange for a fresh one!"Professor Livia quipped back.
The laughter doubled. I was glad when the class was finally over.
The next class had been Herbology, and I'd noticed Professor Longbottom had been holding a Rememberall through a lot of it, he looked confused. This made me think of the Obliviated Memories Potion again, and the potion from Professor Park's 'deadly class'. I still have plenty of my own OM Potion, and I know Priscilla has hers. I have some ingredients remaining, so I've been thinking of brewing some for Lotty, Max and Antonius. Unfortunately I don't have enough ingredients for anyone else. There is the Forgotten Dreams Potion though... I wonder what ingredients are required for that one...
Anyway, it's the end of the day now, and I'm in the common room, sitting by the windows. Some of the 6th Years are making a lot of noise over by one of the fireplaces. Clara Goyle appears to be using her broom to clear away cobwebs.
"Why not just use a vanishing spell?"Gerald Casper just suggested to her.
"I don't want to accidentally vanish the ceiling,"Clara answered.
I'm pretty sure there's a Protection Spell inside Hogwarts that prevents us from using vanishing spells for that very reason...
Jared is playing Wizards' Chess with Anita. They play it a lot. I don't know where Antonius is. I haven't seen him much, lately. I know he has been studying a lot more than usual. He's probably in the Library.
I feel comfortable sitting here, I want to remember all of this and take it all in. This is my final year at Hogwarts, and after it is over, I'll never experience this again. Just a casual, peaceful evening in the common room, writing in my diary as life goes on around me. I'm going to make the most of it while I still can.
Gerald Casper has just transfigured Clara's broom into a cake! An admiring crowd is gathering around it...
"Don't eat it!"I just heard Clara yell,"he's bitten a chunk out of my broom!"
Gerald just swished his wand and transfigured the cake back into a broom. Eric Macmillan (of course it's him!) is coughing and spluttering, spitting out bits of the end of Clara's broom!
"I hope you know I use that broom for all sorts of things!"Clara is yelling at him.
"There's plenty of spiders nesting in it,"Gerald just added,"you probably ate a few of them. They're crawling around in you alive, likely enough right now!"
Eric just burst into tears and ran off. It serves him right. He shouldn't be so greedy!
A Few Days Later:
Jared is in the Hospital Wing. Apparently he 'kicked a cauldron too hard in Astronomy Class'. I'm not even sure what a cauldron was doing in Astronomy Class!
I tried visiting him, hoping to get an explanation, but apparently he wants peace and quiet, so visitors are prohibited.
Later:
After dinner, Anita asked me to follow her. She lead me into the Library where we met Emily, Lotty, Jeffrey and Ed. They were sitting around a smallish table in a corner.
"What's this about?"I asked.
"We had an idea,"Anita explained,"it was Ed's idea actually. To find out more about that wizard we saw in the Memory Sivril."
"Why don't you just ask the Golden Sivril?"I asked.
"We did,"Anita responded,"and it gave us his name, Patrick Moonwood. We're going to see if we can find out anything about him in this Library."
Ed cast a Revealing Spell combined with a Summoning Spell and using the newly discovered name. We were not prepared for what happened next...
A lot of books began flying from bookcases all around the Library, stacking themselves into large, tall piles on our table, which looked as though it was going to collapse under the weight. Most of them came from the highest shelves, and they brought clouds of dust with them, as they smacked themselves down heavily onto the building piles.
"Ed! Can't you stop it?"I yelled above the noise of stacking books.
It was chaotic! It seemed as though we were going to be buried! By the time it was over, we were coughing and sneezing as the dust settled around us. The books all seemed to be really old...
"Let's have a look then,"Ed said, taking up a book,"he must have been a really famous wizard. Weird how none of us have heard of him."
"Oh!"Emily suddenly exclaimed, while looking at one of the books.
"What?"several of us asked at once.
"He was a librarian! Here at Hogwarts!"she responded, then she showed us his name written on the inside of the cover of the old book she was holding.
"That explains why we got so many books,"Ed observed, he was also examining the inside cover of the book he'd picked up.
"This is even better!"Emily went on,"we've got dates! He was a librarian at Hogwarts during 1661 and..."she looked in another book,"1697, 1656..."
"Well, now we know what century he was from,"I remarked.
"I wonder if he invented the Sivrils?"Jeffrey suggested.
Anita asked the Golden Sivril.
Patrick Moonwood, it turns out, is one of four wizards involved in the creation of the Sivrils. We also managed to find out that he was a Hufflepuff, and each of the four wizards were from a different house. Though today, that was all we were able to find out.
Then we got to work on the difficult task of finding out where the books belonged, and returning them to their places... I'm not sure they were all returned to the correct shelves, but they were tidied away, at least.
"Maybe Moonwood has a portrait somewhere in this castle?"Emily suggested,"if he does, that would be excellent!"
"We should look for one!"Jeffrey agreed.
"I think two good places to start would be here in the Library and in our common room,"Emily went on.
"Why?"Anita asked.
"Because he was a librarian, and he was a Hufflepuff,"Emily explained.
As we were putting the last pile of books away, the conversation turned to Jared.
"I'm still wondering how he managed to end up in the Hospital Wing from kicking a cauldron,"I said.
"It was an enchanted cauldron,"Anita said,"didn't you know? Someone pranked him. They enchanted the cauldron to follow him around everywhere, and it was following him all day! He must have gotten annoyed with it, and kicked it!"
I had not noticed this!
"I saw,"Lotty put in,"I didn't realise it was a prank, though. I thought he was bringing it around with him because he couldn't be bothered to carry it. He was coming out of Potions Class when I saw him."
"Did it have anything in it?"I asked.
"No, just an empty cauldron,"Lotty answered,"noisy though!"
"It was annoying everyone with it's noise wherever it went,"Anita added.
"But - Astronomy Class?"I said,"that was in the daytime! I didn't even know they had Astronomy Class in the daylight."
"Well, that's where it happened,"Anita said, shrugging her shoulders,"maybe he was planning on throwing it off the top of that balcony place with the big telescope."
"They do sometimes have Astronomy Class in the daytime,"Ed said,"not very often, though, and usually in the summer because it gets dark really late in June. You don't have to look at the night sky all the time when you're learning Astronomy. There are books, charts, things like that."
We looked at all the portraits in the library before leaving. None of them were of Patrick Moonwood. I don't know why we didn't think of asking any of the portraits about him. Some of them were asking us why we were staring at them so intently, and some told us to mind our own business, but we still didn't think of talking to them. I just thought about it now, while lying in bed, writing about today in my diary. We could also use the Golden Sivril and get Hoppy to help. If there is a portrait of Patrick Moonwood in this castle, I'm sure we'll find it before the week is over.