꧁☬⋆ᵞᴼᵁᴿ ᴾᴼᵛ⋆☬꧂

A disgusting smell filled our nostrils, making the three of us pull our house robes up over our noses "Did one of you farted?" I asked, and I earn a smack in the arm by Hermione.

"Ouch."

Eyes watering, we saw, flat on the floor in front of us, a troll even more massive than the one I killed, accidentally because I didn't even know I killed the troll, out cold with a bloody lump on its head.

"Bloody hell," I whispered under my breath.

"I'm glad we didn't have to fight that one," Harry whispered to me as we stepped carefully over one of its massive legs. "Come on; I can't breathe. "

He pulled open the next door, the three of us hardly daring to look at what came next, but there was nothing very frightening in here, just a table with seven differently shaped bottles standing on it in a line.

I wonder what happened to Ron now. . .

"Snape's," said Harry. "What do we have to do?"

We stepped over the threshold, and immediately a fire sprang up behind us in the doorway. It wasn't ordinary fire either; it was purple. At the same instant, black flames shot up in the door leading onward.

And yup, we are trapped.

"Look!" Hermione seized a roll of paper lying next to the bottles. Harry looked over her shoulder to look on it, but I took the paper from her and read it for them.

"Danger lies before you, while safety lies behind,

Two of us will help you, whichever you would find,

One among us seven will let you move ahead,

Another will transport the drinker back instead,

Two among our number hold only nettle wine,

Three of us are killers, waiting bidden in line.

Choose, unless you wish to stay here forevermore,

To help you with your choice, we give you these clues four:

First, however, slyly the poison tries to hide

You will always find some on nettle wine's left side;

Second, different are those who stand at either end,

But if you would move onward, neither is your friend;

Third, as you see clearly, all are a different size,

Neither dwarf nor giant holds death in their insides;

Fourth, the second left and the second on the right

Are twins once you taste them, though different at first sight."

I let out a great sigh while Harry and Hermione looked at me.

"Brilliant," I said. "This isn't magic -- it's logic -- a puzzle. A lot of the greatest wizards haven't got an ounce of logic; they'd be stuck in here forever. "

"But so will we won't we?" Hermione asked.

"Of course not," I added. "Everything we need is here on this paper. Seven bottles: three are poison; two are wine; one will get us safely through the black fire, and one will get us back through the purple. "

"But how do we know which to drink?" Harry asked this time.

"Give me a minute." I murmured.

I read the sheet one more time. I walked up and down the line of bottles, muttering to myself and pointing at them. That's it! I clapped my hands.

"Got it," I said. "The smallest bottle will get us through the black fire -- toward the Stone. "

Harry looked at the tiny bottle. "There's only enough there for two of us," he said. "That's hardly two swallows."

The three of us looked at each other. "Which one will get you back through the purple flames?" Harry asked as I pointed at a rounded bottle at the right end of the line.

"You drink that," said Harry. "No, listen, get back and get Ron. Grab brooms from the flying-key room, they'll get you out of the trapdoor, and past Fluffy -- go straight to the owlery and send Hedwig to Dumbledore, we need him. I might be able to hold Snape off for a while, but I'm no match for him, really."

"But Harry -- what if You-Know-Who's with him?"

"Well -- I was lucky once, wasn't I?" said Harry, pointing at his scar. "I might get lucky again."

"Yeah Hermione, I have died one time or more than one time, but I don't clearly remember it but yeah. You should go, we don't want you to get hurt." I patted Hermione's shoulder.

Harry clear her throat. "You should go with her." He crossed his arms.

"No. And that's final."

"Are you always been this stubborn?" He sighs.

"Always."

"So, go on, Hermione. You should go back to Ron; he needs help." I am worried about him; he just left him in there.

Hermione's lip trembled, and she suddenly dashed to Harry and I and threw her arms around us.

"Hermione!"

"Harry, you're a great wizard, you know."

"I'm not as good as you," said Harry, very embarrassed, as she let go of him.

"She said wizard not witch." You playfully roll your eyes, both of them chuckled.

"And you too, of course, Y/N, you great witch much greater than me." She smiles at me, "I know that."

"Books! And cleverness! There are more important things, friendship and bravery and oh Harry, Y/N, please be careful!" She cried out.

"You drink first," I said. "You are sure which is which, aren't you?"

"Positive," said Hermione. She took a long drink from the round bottle at the end and shuddered.

"It's not poison?" said Harry anxiously.

"No -- but it's like ice. "

"Quick, go. Before it wears off." I smiled at her.

"Good luck -- take care. "

"GO!"

Hermione turned and walked straight through the purple fire.

"It's just us now, Harry; we have to do this," I whispered as I pick up the smallest bottle. Both turned to face the black flames.

"Yeah, let's go," he said, I gulped some of the liquid and passed it to Harry as he did the same.

It was indeed as though the ice was flooding our body. He put the bottle down and walked forward; both of us braced ourselves, saw the black flames licking our body, but couldn't feel them, for a moment I could see nothing but dark fire. Then both of us was on the other side, in the last chamber.

There was already someone there -- but it wasn't uncle Severus like I expected. It wasn't even Voldemort.

But...

It was

Quirrell.

"Oh bloody hell, I knew it!" I screamed as I pointed at him.

"You!" gasped Harry.

Quirrell smiled. His face wasn't twitching at all; he's still creepy.

"Me," he said calmly. "I wondered whether I'd be meeting you here, Potter. "

"But I thought -- Snape--"

"Severus?" Quirrell laughed, and it wasn't his usual quivering treble, either, but cold and sharp. "Yes, Severus does seem the type, doesn't he? So useful to have him swooping around like an overgrown bat. Next to him, who would suspect p-p-poor, st-stuttering P-Professor Quirrell?"

"Oh shut your awful mouth of yours" I glared at the professor.

Quirrell laughed "ah, Y/N~ the lovely, beautiful, ambitious, cunning, loyal and brave girl, Slytherin, Y/N Dumbledore~" He smiled at me in a creep way.

"Ew, my gut was right all along; you are a paedophile." I wince, as I hid behind Harry.

"But Snape tried to kill me!"

"No, no, no. I tried to kill you. Your friend Miss Granger and also that Slytherin Knight accidentally knocked me over as they rushed to set fire to Snape at that Quidditch match. They broke my eye contact with you. Another few seconds and I'd have got you off that broom. I'd have managed it before then if Snape hadn't been muttering a countercurse, trying to save you. "

"See Harry! I told you my uncle is innocent! He wasn't the one who tried to knock you off from your broom! He was saving you!" I pinched his forearm.

"Ow." He murmurs as he rubs the area I pinched.

"Snape was trying to save me?"

"Of course," said Quirrell coolly. "Why do you think he wanted to referee your next match? He was trying to make sure I didn't do it again."

"Funny, really. . . he needn't have bothered. I couldn't do anything with Dumbledore and his granddaughter, watching. All the other teachers thought Snape was trying to stop Gryffindor from winning; he did make himself unpopular. . . and what a waste of time, when after all that, I'm going to kill you tonight."

Then he turns towards me "I don't want to you get hurt, but you're already involved in this Y/N, so I'll kill you too."

Quirrell snapped his fingers. Ropes sprang out of thin air and wrapped themselves tightly around Harry and me.

"You're too nosy to live, Potter. Scurrying around the school on Halloween like that, for all I knew you'd seen me coming to look at what was guarding the Stone. "

"You let the troll in?" My eyes widen, I can feel my anger getting larger.

"Certainly. I have a special gift with trolls; you must have seen what I did to the one in the chamber back there? Unfortunately, while everyone else was running around looking for it, Snape, who already suspected me, went straight to the third floor to head me off and not only did my troll fail to beat you to death, that three-headed dog didn't even manage to bite Snape's leg off properly."

"You're so dead to me." I took my wand out secretly.

"Now, wait quietly, Potter and Dumbledore. I need to examine this interesting mirror. "

Oh no, It was the Mirror of Erised, standing behind Quirrell.

"We saw you and Snape in the forest." Harry blurted out.

"Yes," said Quirrell idly, walking around the mirror to look at the back. "He was on to me by that time, trying to find out how far I'd got. He suspected me all along. Tried to frighten me -- as though he could, when I had Lord Voldemort on my side. . ."

Lord Voldemort? Does he mean Voldermort? He's not even a Lord.

Quirrell came back out from behind the mirror and stared hungrily into it. "I see the Stone. . . I'm presenting it to my master. . . but where is it?"

"Harry," I whispered he turned towards me, I undid the rope but cast magic to look like I am still in strings,

"How did you do that?" He looked at me, "magic." I rolled my eyes, and I did the same thing to Harry as I keep Quirrell from giving his full attention to the mirror.

"But Snape always seemed to hate me so much. "

"Oh, he does," said Quirrell casually, "heavens, yes. He was at Hogwarts with your father, didn't you know? They loathed each other. But he never wanted you dead and also how you're gaining the little Y/N attention."

"But we heard you a few days ago, sobbing, Harry thought uncle Severus was threatening you. . ." For the first time, a spasm of fear flitted across Quirrell's face.

"Sometimes," he said, "I find it hard to follow my master's instructions, he is a great wizard, and I am weak--"

"Yeah, you are weak, letting a dark wizard get to you. Pathetic." I laughed as he glared at me.

"Wait, you mean he was there in the classroom with you?" Harry gasped.

"He is with me wherever I go," said Quirrell quietly.

"I met him when I travelled around the world. A foolish young man I was then, full of ridiculous ideas about good and evil. Lord Voldemort showed me how wrong I was. There is no good and evil, there is only power, and those too weak to seek it. . . Since then, I have served him faithfully, although I have let him down many times. He has had to be very hard on me. " Quirrell shivered suddenly.

"He does not forgive mistakes easily. When I failed to steal the stone from Gringotts, he was most displeased. He punished me. . . decided he would have to keep a closer watch on me. . . "

Quirrell's voice trailed away. I remembered our trip to Diagon Alley, how could I have been so stupid? I'd seen Quirrell there that very day, shaken hands with Harry in the Leaky Cauldron.

Quirrell cursed under his breath.

"I don't understand. . . is the Stone inside the mirror? Should I break it?"

My mind is racing.

What I want more than anything else in the world at the moment, is to find the Stone before Quirrell does. So if I look in the mirror, I should see myself finding it -- which means I'll see where it's hidden! But how can I look without Quirrell realising what I'm up to?

"What does this mirror do? How does it work? Help me, Master!"

And to our horror, a voice answered, and the voice seemed to come from Quirrell himself.

"Use the boy. . . Use the boy. . . "

Quirrell rounded on Harry.

"Yes -- Potter -- come here. "

He clapped his hands once, and so took the spell of the imaginary ropes binding Harry fell off. Harry got slowly to his feet.

"Come here," Quirrell repeated. "Look in the mirror and tell me what you see. "

Harry walked towards him.