Troll: 57. Preparing for the Worst (Patreon)

Chapter 57: Preparing for the Worst

Blaise Zabini
Hogwarts, Great Britain

I missed art club. I missed Clara. I missed trolling the fuck out of every muggleborn and muggle-aware halfblood. Coming up with interesting ways of scaring the shit out of people had been one of my few joys last semester.

When Clara and her friend came to confront me on the train, I’d felt a degree of fulfillment I’d only associated with getting my master’s degree in my previous life. It was the kind of soul-deep satisfaction that came from knowing that I’d done a good job. And, there was so much to do. I’d walked the path of the troll, but not to its ultimate destination.

Alas, such pleasures were denied me this semester. I simply didn’t have the time nor energy. Divination wasn’t free and I spent most of my efforts looking into different ways to unfuck this double-Voldemort kerfuffle I’d found myself in. For similar reasons, I hadn’t attended a single one of Padma’s study sessions. In my defense, neither had many of the students who’d attended last semester.

It was just like back in university: The first semester, freshmen felt the need to get out there and try every club or organization. By the time the second semester rolled around, most of them realized that they’d overcommitted, if not in terms of time, then certainly in terms of their limited social batteries. They began to prune what they didn’t enjoy until they figured out the kinds of students they wanted to be.

I’d largely given up on taking commissions as well. If I didn’t have time to amuse myself, I sure as shit didn’t have time to entertain anyone else’s questions. It left a lot of people frustrated, especially Daphne, who lost her private suite to Lyra, but that wasn’t nearly as important as navigating this mess.

No, the only extracurricular activity I allowed myself after classes was my dueling practice with Cheryl. Funny enough, I could kill the building-sized danger noodle. It was Tom Riddle that scared the shit out of me, because I had no idea how much of his magical capacity he retained as a diary. Training was mandatory, just in case I needed to duel the fucker.

I skipped out of the way of a cutting charm. It was followed by an aqua eructo, the fourth year version of the aguamenti charm. If the aguamenti was like a strong hose, the aqua eructo was like one of those riot suppression water cannons cops had. I raised a protego, full well knowing it wouldn’t hold. In the split second it took for the shield to crack, I’d already repositioned to the side.

This was how our spars went ever since she stopped pulling her punches. Each session, we began with whatever Cheryl wanted to work on. She usually came in having read some spell or tactic from a top duelist and wanted to see if she could cast the necessary spell-chains.

Then, we jumped into duels. We had four to six matches each session, with time to rest and review what we did right and wrong between them. After dozens of these matches, I could honestly say that I wasn’t anything close to her peer.

I won maybe one in ten. Even if I could see the future, we dueled in an enclosed space. My spell repertoire wasn’t large enough. She had greater mana reserves than me. And, it wasn’t as if she wasn’t learning; she grew wise to my tricks and approached each duel with the kind of intensity only found in those who truly loved the sport.

These duels really put into perspective just how much more mana Cheryl had than me. She only had three years on me, but those three years counted for a lot. In the same way that a seventeen year old could easily wrestle a fourteen year old, Cheryl had no issues blowing past my guard.

The development of a wizard’s magical core paralleled the development of our body. In our teenage years, our cores expanded rapidly. It was a big reason why wizarding education started at fourteen, to take advantage of this accelerated growth period and immerse young wizards and witches in a spell-heavy environment.

Cheryl cut off the water cannon and transitioned the end-stroke of the spell into a reductor. Before I even began to dodge that, a stunner followed. She knew damn well that letting me get close would end in my win. So, she simply refused to give me that opportunity. She’d gotten annoyingly good at crafting spell-chains from seemingly unrelated spells.

The dueling prodigy could cast two or three spells for every one I managed, but that didn’t mean I was entirely helpless. In the past few months, I mastered the protego, cutting, and bludgeoning charms to the point that I could cast them all with either hand, on the move. I also picked up a small selection of spells from upper years to complement my style.

I’d lost every match this session, but that was the norm. At this stage, my goal was to eke out at least one win each time we met and I’d been preparing her all evening for this.

I tossed my bog oak walking stick at her face. Shifting my wand to my right hand, I called, “Carpe retractum!”

A stream of golden threads lashed out from my wand. They wove through the air, reaching for the freckled girl. She ducked out of the way with a smug grin. “You missed, Zabini.”

“I did. Don’t mind me.”

She was about to say something in response, but noticed that the threads didn’t dissipate. Instead, they tightened on something behind her and drew taut. Her eyes widened in surprise as she threw herself to the ground.

Carpe retractum, the seize and pull charm. Or, as I called it in my head, the spidey special. It was exactly what it sounded like. It launched magical strands that entangled an object and pulled it towards the caster. Or, if the object was heavy enough, it could be used to yank the caster towards the object.

We were dueling in an unused classroom. Though the tables had been pushed and stacked in one side of the room, the teacher’s desk was not. It was a large-ish oak desk pushed into the corner, a fair bit heavier than me. I’d spent the past several minutes maneuvering Cheryl for this exact spell.

I cackled as the spell drew me forward, closing our distance in an instant. It felt a little like bungee jumping sideways. And though Cheryl managed to get out of the immediate trajectory, she wasn’t ready for me to cancel the spell halfway and simply dive atop her.

I straddled her chest and caught her wand arm at the wrist before she could recover. Grinning smugly, I gave her nose a triumphant boop. “My win.”

She glared up at me with an annoyed pout. “Still four to one.”

“Still my win.”

“Fine, this one’s yours. Seriously? Who does that? Are you a monkey?”

“I prefer spider.”

She blinked in surprise. “Was… Was that a Spider-Man joke?”

“Wait, you know who Spider-Man is?”

“Halfblood, remember? I don’t spend much time in the muggle world, but he’s a famous comic book character. My muggle cousin loves him. I should be asking you that.”

“Seer,” I said in lieu of an explanation. It was such a convenient excuse for basically everything. “I sometimes get junk information while I’m looking for something else. Or, I sometimes dream weird dreams that may or may not be possible futures.”

“Huh. One of these days, I’ll stop being surprised at your strangeness, Zabini. How does that work exactly?”

“Uh… Imagine you’re trying to look for a store that sells the design of an acromantula silk scarf your mom likes. You want strong, stretchy spider silk. And then…”

“Spider-Man. That’s hilarious,” she giggled. 

“Sure, let’s go with that.”

“And how long are you going to sit on me, huh?”

“Oh, sorry,” I chuckled sheepishly as I shimmied off her. “Thanks for teaching me that spell, by the way.”

“Eh, it’s not a big deal. You’ll learn it in third year charms. In fourth year, that’ll turn into the proper summoning charm,” she waved me off. “That’s a pretty risky trick, though. It won’t work twice.”

“It is. I had to slowly maneuver you until you were in front of the desk, then wait for you to commit to a distraction.”

“Which was why you threw the stick.”

“Yup.”

“Have you wondered if you’re leaning too… muggle?”

I let out an exaggerated gasp. “Dupree! That’s racist! And from a halfblood!”

She didn’t hesitate to punch me in the arm, hard. “Shut up, you prick. I mean it. You know that armored robes exist, right? They’re basically standard fare for duelists, aurors, and anyone else worth a damn. They’re not infallible or anything, but a stick just ain’t gonna cut it.”

“Hmm… You might have a point.”

“Of course I have a point. I’m your senior.”

“Which is why I should bonk them on the head,” I nodded sagely. “No robes there.”

“Which is why–No! Which is why you should keep your distance like a normal bloody duelist,” she said with a frustrated growl. “You have great mobility. You dodge damn near everything. Why make it harder for yourself by closing the distance?”

Because I expected to receive a goblin steel sword-cane. Because I would soon have a basilisk venom weapon. Because the wand was the most important weapon a wizard had, and thus the first thing to be taken from him. 

Well, practical concerns aside, it wasn’t as if I wasn’t learning to cast spells. Practicing with Cheryl served both to improve my foresight as well as expose me to a greater breadth of spells. I’d been carefully taking notes on the spells that seemed useful so I could learn them when I had more mana to throw around.

“Because it’s fun,” I said instead. “There’s something really enjoyable about clubbing people on the head. Yes, like a muggle.”

“Ugh, stubborn firstie,” she grumbled without any real heat. She got up and smoothed her robes before walking to the door. That had been the last spar of the day.

“I learned from the best,” I chuckled as I followed behind. “And, I realized that most wizards are even more lost than you up close. Sure, I’m giving up some advantages, but relatively speaking, I think I’m making you suffer more by closing the gap.”

“That’s a very high risk, high reward mentality.”

“It is. Besides, I need to get creative if I want to beat you since I lose a direct clash every time and you have better magical stamina.”

“That’s because I’m older. I wasn’t anything like you when I was a firstie, that’s for sure. You’re going to be such a monster if you ever decide to hit the circuits.”

“Meh, not my thing. If I want everyone to know how I fight, I’ll join the dueling club.”

“They’d hate you. A big part of the club activities is about learning the proper etiquette.”

“Yup, that’s not me. I’m interested in winning, not looking posh doing it.”

The two of us headed down to dinner. I made the conscious decision to eat with the students from Cheryl’s year. Older students had that aloof, “I’m better than a firstie” vibe, which suited me fine. It meant I could spend dinner discussing past dueling champions with Cheryl.

She really was a font of information. Reading about those spells and tactics in the library was well and good, but she attended the international tournament every year. She was happy to provide insights into the spells they used, in what sequence, why, and most importantly, point out when they failed.

The table filled with magically conjured food. We were having roast chicken and vegetables with heaping piles of mashed potatoes. I kicked Cheryl under the table as she reached for the gravy boat and subtly shook my head. That left Miles Bletchley to reach across from the fifth year section and claim it first.

It didn’t take long for his hair to begin falling out. He only noticed when a clump fell into his mashed potatoes and he took a bite. His sputtering sent dollops of potatoes and gravy across the table, causing a big commotion. The hall erupted into laughter as our house glared at the Gryffindor table. No one needed three guesses to figure out the culprits.

The Weasley twins weren’t laughing for a change. If anything, they looked a little concerned. I did have bigger problems, but I also made a habit of scanning for threats every morning; this was one. Rather than let them hit the first and second years, I willingly sat with the upper years so the drugged gravy boat would follow me.

The twins were third years. They were creative, but they knew their limits and avoided hitting older Slytherins, especially fifth through seventh years. Bletchley, in fifth year, was also our house keeper, and everyone knew the quidditch players were vicious fuckers.

I leaned back and watched the chaos unfold. If anyone asked, I merely reminded them that unless I had my crystal ball, I could only foresee direct threats upon my person. Limits were dead useful things and I was glad to have established them so early.

This would undoubtedly kick of a not-so-friendly prank war between the houses. The boggart thing was annoying, but Bletchley felt personally attacked now and he had plenty of friends. This would keep both parties from bothering me for the near future.

Was it right to set them against each other? No, but no one asked the Weasleys to drug the gravy. A bit of manufactured chaos was just what I needed to cross them off my to-do list.

All the while, Cheryl ate her food wordlessly. She was a true Slytherin, smart enough to know when shit wasn’t her problem.

X

That night, I stared down at my desk with a tired sigh. Divination was hard. Having the Sight meant the results I got back weren’t junk, but interpreting them was another matter entirely.

In front of me were a tarot deck, a cup of tea, and my trusty crystal ball. I was hoping that I’d be able to cross-reference different readings, allowing me to reinforce some interpretations while eliminating others.

The tarots were annoying. Again and again, I drew three cards and received the same, ambiguous advice: Emperor. Chariot. High Priestess, reversed.

The Emperor was patriarchal in generally positive connotations. It could mean fatherhood in a literal sense, but not always. It symbolized leadership and responsibility. It advised decisive command in the pursuit of security and stability in all aspects of life.

The Chariot was similar in its meaning. It suggested that I should charge ahead and take the initiative. Simultaneously, it was a call for self-discipline, to “take the reins” of my desires and focus on the destination ahead.

Taken together, the two were pretty self-explanatory. They were telling me to take responsibility for the present situation. I fucked up with Lyra. I’d gotten too involved in making convoluted plans that I failed to take her into account. It was now time to lock in and take pragmatic steps to fix things.

Fair enough, but the reversed High Priestess made me question my assumptions. Upright, it broadly meant that I should trust my gut. Intuition and instinct would carry me on the right path more often than not. Reversed implied the opposite. It implied that my knee-jerk response wouldn’t be the right one and that I didn’t have all the information.

The problem was that I felt I’d taken the right steps already. I had an army of roosters. I cut out all extracurricular commitments to improve my combat abilities. Soon, I’d get a very lethal toothpick. Those were all pragmatic steps I’d taken. And yet, the High Priestess advised caution. Not introspection, more… a look outward.

This was what I found annoying about tarots. They didn’t ever give concrete answers, not even to me. They were images and symbols that contained multiple concepts. Guides who spoke in poetry and metaphor rather than a recipe I could follow. It was why I’d prepared so many different divination methods.

I took a deep breath to center myself and reached for the tea. Tasseography, tea reading, was one of the most widely distributed forms of divination. It was practiced by diviners in China, Romani witches, and pretty much every civilization that took a liking to soggy leaf juice. And because of it, there was never a unified ritual for the practice. 

The art involved sipping a cup of tea while thinking intently about a question. In my case, I wanted to know when Lyra would first enter the Chamber of Secrets. Alone, she and the diary would never be more vulnerable than at that moment. It would also give me a good idea of the time I had.

When I had about a teaspoon of tea left, I swirled it in my hands for three, clockwise rotations, an arithmetically significant number. I then placed the saucer on top of the cup and flipped it so it’d drip down onto the plate. With any luck, the leaves would form shapes foretelling the future.

I lifted the cup and frowned in annoyance. Surprise, surprise, I saw… two snakes. The leaves curled into two, danger-noodle-y shapes that wound across the plate. One was noticeably larger than the other. That was… unhelpful. Every tasseography tome said snakes were bad omens.

Voldemort and Tom, that didn’t need clarification. Then, I thought of the High Priestess. If my gut wasn’t to be trusted, then… since I only asked about Tom, the two snakes could represent Tom and Lyra, possessor and host. Or, it could be Tom and the basilisk.

The problem was that none of those explanations particularly struck me as true. Even the size difference, which could represent age or literal size in the case of the basilisk, wasn’t any use.

I looked for anything that could be an indication of time. It’d be nice if the leaves spelled out a date, but I was never going to be so lucky. I found what could be four circles. Or stars. Or full moons. Or suns. A four count of… days? Weeks? In four months, we’d be in June, but maybe the leaves were being nice and “four” literally meant April.

The crystal ball had the opposite issue. In one sense, I found it to be the most honest of divination mediums. I saw a series of images in its depths, a silent film of either the future or the dreams of others. There was little need for creative interpretation in that regard.

However, that narrow band of clarity had its drawbacks. I received no context that might explain how the event came to be. A few months back during the holidays, one of the muggles at the fencing studio I attended said he was eager to receive a new pair of protective gloves for Christmas.

To practice, I scried his future and received a vision of a boy I didn’t know getting carted into the back of an ambulance. I didn’t tell him that, of course. I learned a week later that he received a bike, the very bike I saw mangled in the background of the car crash. His little brother took it for a spin and had a small accident.

The crystal ball had given me exactly what I asked: the present my acquaintance received for Christmas. I just had no context as to who the boy in the scene was or how he related to the question. Even had I wanted to warn him, I wouldn’t have known the time. Getting more specific with my questions helped sometimes, but not always. And the further out I searched, the hazier things got.

That metaphor of a foggy London evening I gave to Violet wasn’t wrong. The diary made it worse. Quirrell, I didn’t even dare to try to scry. That left me looking for other subjects, signs that might indicate either Voldemort making his move. Hagrid’s chicken coop was one. Moaning Myrtle was another. Fluffy’s harp was a third.

I spent many hours watching the half-giant’s chickens. The visions came in segmented scenes of rural homesteading, which was a bit of a problem. One second, they were pecking at worms and shitting on everything, as chickens do. The next, the fog rolled in. When it cleared, I saw the half-giant standing over his chickens with a dejected look on his face.

Similar scenes played out. Moaning Myrtle cried in her bathroom for a while. Some students came by to throw books through her ghostly head. Then, the ball went dark when the image returned, she’d been petrified. It was bound to happen given her toilet stall was right next to the Chamber’s entrance, and quite soon after the Chamber’s opening.

The harp was missing altogether. That made sense; Quirrell was the one who put it there to lull Fluffy to sleep after getting the info from Hagrid. It wasn’t going to appear until he was ready to make his move.

First one week, then two, I began to scry ahead. I was used to doing so several days in advance to finish my coursework early, but I’d never peeked so far into the future before. I found it to be a strange balancing act, and far too draining on my reserves and mental focus.

There was what was presented in space, and the distance in time I was crossing to get that image. The two pulled against each other like the opposite ends of a lever, forcing me to compromise. Much like something shrouded in fog, the visions became blurrier the further I tried to see. I could “adjust the lens” so to speak, but I found that I lost the timeframe even as the image came into clearer focus. 

We were in late February now. I estimated that we were likely to have a peaceful March. Tentatively, I pinned those visions to late March, possibly the end of April. Given the four “stars” that the two serpents were reaching for in my tea reading, I was reasonably confident about this timeframe.

Which brought me back to the tarots. Emperor. Chariot. High Priestess. Take responsibility. Seize the initiative. Be disciplined. But don’t trust your gut. Look outward.

Apparently, I was on the right-ish track. I had a month to figure out what that last card could mean.

Author’s Note

Carpe retractum is not a spell I made up. Flitwick and Lupin both cover it in Harry’s third year. 

Writing this story, I learned that I’m not very good at this divination thing. I keep being constantly tempted to rehash the stations of canon. Then, I get a knee-jerk reaction to do something unusual, like force two Voldemorts active. It’s a weird balancing act.

Animal Fact: Continuing from the previous chapter, male damselflies have a pair of hook-like protrusions that scrape out the sperm of predecessors. This is likely why damselfly pairs form the "mating wheels" for so long. He needs to make sure his swimmers win the race.

Damselflies can sometimes be infected by water mites, which feed on body fluids like haemolymph (equivalent of blood in arthropods). They leave the water by hitching a ride on a damselfly and jump off on their own when the damselfly next nears the water's surface. They don't hurt the damselfly's survivorship, but some studies found that females are less likely to mate with infected males.