Breakfast sounded like breakfast again. Forks scraped plates. A portrait outside the Hall complained about Peeves. Ron was trying to reach the sausages without leaving his seat.
Percy had to admit, it was nice.
He sat at the Gryffindor table between Harry and Ron, a steaming plate of sausages in front of him, when Ron elbowed him hard enough to nearly knock over his pumpkin juice.
"Watch this," Ron whispered, grinning.
On the far end of the table, Fred and George were waving their wands over a stack of toast. One by one, the pieces flapped into the air like butterflies and buzzed around the heads of the Ravenclaws. A few shrieks and laughs echoed through the hall before Professor McGonagall's sharp voice cut through:
"Mr. Weasley. Mr. Weasley. Sit down this instant!"
The toast collapsed mid-flight, falling onto heads and laps. Ron snorted into his juice.
Percy smiled. "Your brothers are going to get banned from meals one day."
"Eh," Ron said with a shrug. "Worth it."
Harry laughed, then glanced at the Slytherin table. Percy followed his gaze but saw nothing unusual. Harry looked away before Percy could ask.
Percy left him alone for the moment. Harry had listened when he needed quiet. He could return the favor.
Later that morning, the Gryffindors filed into Charms. Professor Flitwick stood on his stack of books at the front, beaming as usual.
"Today we will try the Summoning Charm," Flitwick said. "It is advanced work. Bring your quill across the desk before you attempt anything farther away."
Hermione's hand shot into the air before he'd finished speaking. Flitwick chuckled and gestured to her.
"Yes, Miss Granger?"
"Sir, the Summoning Charm allows the caster to bring objects to them, even from a great distance, as long as they are clear in their intention," she rattled off.
"Five points to Gryffindor! Exactly right. Now, wands out, everyone!"
Percy stood beside Ron, wand at the ready. He muttered under his breath, "Accio quill."
His quill shot toward him. He missed the catch, and the blunt end struck his forehead.
Ron snorted. "Careful, mate, or you'll end up speared."
Harry managed to move his quill halfway across the desk. Hermione caught hers twice, then turned to help Neville.
Then Percy made the mistake of trying it again. Except this time, his magic surged harder than he meant.
"Accio—"
Every quill on the nearest row of desks jerked into the air. Percy ducked as they flew past his head. Ron started laughing, then grabbed an ink bottle before it fell.
"Wands down, Mr. Jackson!" Flitwick called.
Quills bounced off desks, ink bottles toppled, and Seamus ended up with one stuck in his hair. By the time the chaos settled, Percy was red-faced, muttering apologies as Flitwick restored order with a flick of his wand.
Hermione waited until Flitwick had checked him. "Tell him about the changes since the Eye. He needs to know before the next lesson."
Percy rubbed his forehead. "I was hoping to tell him without throwing stationery at everyone."
After classes, the four of them wandered down to the Black Lake. The sun was unusually bright, glittering off the surface of the water. Students lounged along the banks, books open but mostly forgotten.
Ron skipped a stone across the lake. "Bet I can get it farther than you, Percy."
Percy smirked. "You sure you want to make that bet?"
He flicked his wrist. The stone skipped once, twice, three times, then suddenly shot forward as though propelled by something beneath the surface. It bounced nearly a dozen times before vanishing into the distance.
Ron's jaw dropped. "That's cheating!"
"I did not use my wand," Percy said. Ron pointed at the water. Percy sighed. "Fine. It counts."
Harry chuckled. "No, just your other kind of magic."
Hermione rolled her eyes. "Honestly, you two. It's supposed to be relaxing out here."
Still, there was laughter in her voice.
For a while, they just sat. Harry lay back on the grass, staring at the clouds. Hermione read a book but didn't seem to turn the pages often. Ron kept trying and failing to match Percy's stone-skipping.
Percy stayed until the sun dropped behind the castle. For once, nobody asked him to translate a warning.
That evening at dinner, the chatter in the hall was lively. The Hufflepuffs were buzzing about a mishap in Herbology, where an entire greenhouse had been filled with runaway vines. The Slytherins were boasting about a new broom someone's uncle had bought.
Dean Thomas leaned over from further down the Gryffindor table. "Oi, Percy, someone said you summoned every quill in Charms today. That true?"
Ron snorted. "Not just quills. Nearly summoned half the classroom."
There was laughter up and down the table. Percy groaned and dropped his head into his hands.
"Better than setting off fireworks in Potions," Seamus called down cheerfully.
"Or falling into Devil's Snare," Neville added with surprising boldness.
Seamus offered him a quill at dinner and told him to keep it away from his eyes. Percy took it. The joke was already getting old, which somehow made him feel better.
That night in the common room, Harry and Ron were playing wizard chess while Hermione scribbled notes beside the fire. Percy leaned against the arm of a chair, watching.
Ron was crushing Harry, of course. "Knight to E5, checkmate!" he crowed.
Harry groaned. "Why do I even bother?"
Percy laughed. "Glutton for punishment?"
A school cat leapt onto the board and scattered the pieces. Ron shouted. Hermione lifted it away while Harry watched his defeated king escape under a chair.
"Looks like I win after all," Harry said.
It was silly, and small, but Percy felt the tension in his chest ease.
Percy stayed by the fire after the others went upstairs. He could still feel water moving in the pipes. Tonight he let it move without trying to listen.
He went to bed before the fire burned out.
The next few days were quiet. Percy attended every lesson and every check with Flitwick. Nobody declared the danger over.
Ron complained about homework. Hermione compared the temple script with reference books on Ancient Runes. Harry went to Quidditch practice, although he sometimes missed a question when someone spoke to him.
The first change came during an ordinary library visit.
It started in the library.
Hermione had finished helping Neville with Charms. When Percy and Harry found her, she was comparing three books with her temple drawings.
"Hermione?" Harry asked, sliding into the chair beside her. "You've been here all day."
She didn't look up. Her quill was moving furiously. "I've been… remembering things."
"From the temple?" Percy asked carefully.
She put down her quill. "Some of the marks are instructions. I copied them when we were there, but I remember details that are missing from the drawings."
Harry frowned. "What kind of instructions?"
"Bindings," she said. "I think they describe how the sealed routes were held together. There is a gap in one sequence."
A chill crept over Percy. He remembered the collapse of the temple, the roar of water, the way his powers had surged after.
"You think whatever was sealed there… isn't anymore?" Percy asked.
Hermione tapped her notes. "Possibly. I keep remembering one title: the Sleeper in the Deep. I have not found a name beside it."
Percy pulled up a chair. Hermione moved one book so he could see the drawing.
Harry swallowed. "That's what I saw. In the vision. A shadow rising under the water. Like it was… waking up."
None of them spoke for a moment. The quiet was filled only by the rustle of Madam Pince turning pages at the front desk.
The next day, during Defense Against the Dark Arts, Professor Lupin led the class through counter-curses. Percy was partnered with Ron, while Harry and Hermione paired up nearby.
Lupin moved through the classroom, offering corrections with his usual calm patience. But when he passed by Percy, he paused.
"Your last counter-curse pulled the water in that vase toward you," Lupin said quietly.
Percy stiffened. "Different how?"
Lupin pointed to the vase on his desk. "It moved when you raised your wand. Did you mean to do that?"
Percy's grip on his wand tightened. "And if I can't control it?"
"Then stop when you notice it," Lupin said. "Call me over. We can practice with one spell at a time."
Before Percy could respond, Ron muttered, "Oi, Percy, help me with this counter-curse, will you?"
Lupin stayed beside them until Percy had completed the exercise.
That night, Harry couldn't sleep. He tossed and turned in his four-poster bed until he finally gave up and padded down into the common room. To his surprise, Percy was already there, sitting in the armchair closest to the dying fire.
"You too?" Harry asked, sitting opposite.
Percy nodded. "Dreams again?"
Harry rubbed his eyes. "The same shadow was there again. This time it turned toward me. I know I was asleep, but it felt like it saw me."
The fire popped, and Harry jumped.
"We need to tell Dumbledore about the new part," Percy said. "Hermione has her notes. You have the dream. I can show him what happened in class."
Harry stared at the fire. "How many things can be hiding under one school?"
"Maybe it's older than all of that," Percy said quietly.
Harry's eyes flicked to him. "Older than Voldemort?"
Percy hesitated. Then he whispered the words Hermione had repeated in the library: "The Sleeper in the Deep."
Harry pulled his feet closer to the chair. Neither of them felt ready to go back upstairs.
Two days later, Percy and Harry crossed the grounds for a supervised lesson with Hagrid. Ron and Hermione had gone ahead with the rest of the group.
That was when Percy felt it, a pulse, faint but undeniable, beneath the water. The hairs on his arms stood up.
"Harry," he said sharply, grabbing his arm. "Did you feel that?"
Harry froze. Then, slowly, he nodded.
Ripples spread across the surface of the Black Lake, though no wind blew. For just a heartbeat, Percy thought he saw something beneath the water, vast, shifting, too deep to make out.
Then it was gone. The surface stilled.
Harry exhaled shakily. "Tell me that was just the giant squid."
Percy didn't answer.
The Whisper in the Hall
That evening, as the four of them walked toward the Great Hall for dinner, Hermione suddenly stumbled, clutching her head.
"Hermione?" Ron caught her arm, alarmed.
She squeezed her eyes shut. "I heard it again. A voice. Not English, it's the same language as the temple."
Harry and Percy exchanged a look.
"What did it say?" Harry asked.
Her voice shook. "It said… 'The chains are broken.'"
The corridor was suddenly very cold, though not a breeze stirred. Percy swore he heard a low echo himself, like the sea rushing in his ears.
Ron's face was pale. "Bloody hell. What does that mean?"
Ron kept his hand on Hermione's arm. "We are going to the hospital wing," he said. "You can explain it on the way."
Percy called to a passing prefect for help.
The phrase stayed in his head as they walked.
Someone was speaking through the fragments Hermione had brought back. He wanted an adult to hear it before she heard anything else.
The next morning, Ron ate breakfast beside Hermione and checked that she was actually eating hers. Madam Pomfrey had let her return to the dormitory after the pain stopped.
Percy watched her pick up her toast.
Because Harry kept jerking his head toward the enchanted ceiling, as though it might suddenly crack and let the Black Lake spill in. Hermione, meanwhile, was barely touching her toast, her quill scratching furiously across parchment balanced on her knees.
"What are you writing?" Ron mumbled through a mouthful of bacon.
Hermione didn't answer right away. She finally glanced up, her eyes shadowed with exhaustion. "I can't stop it. The symbols from the temple, they just keep… appearing. In my head. If I don't write them down, it feels like they'll burn through me."
Percy leaned closer. She had copied several lines of temple script. His eyes watered when he followed the longest line, so he looked away.
"Does it make sense?" Harry asked quietly.
"Not yet," Hermione admitted, tucking her hair behind her ear. "But I think… it's building toward something."
Ron pushed his plate away, looking queasy. "Yeah, well, could it build toward not ruining my breakfast?"
The juice in Percy's cup rose along the side nearest the parchment. He set the cup down and showed Hermione.
That afternoon, Harry suggested a short practice on the Quidditch pitch. "We have reported it," he said, taking his Nimbus. "We can do something else while they read the notes."
Percy agreed. Flying gave him something to concentrate on besides water.
They used school brooms for an informal passing game. Harry passed the Quaffle to Ron, and Hermione watched from the stands.
Then Percy caught the Quaffle, soared upward—
And the sky answered.
Clouds gathered over the pitch. Wind drove across the grass. Percy lost his grip on the Quaffle as a sheet of water struck his face. He tasted salt.
"Percy!" Harry shouted, diving toward him.
Water circled him and held his broom in place. He tried to descend. The broom would not move.
For one wild second, he thought he saw something moving in the storm clouds. A shadow, vast and coiling. Watching.
Harry caught the back of his robes and pulled. Percy's broom tipped free of the water. They landed hard on the grass as the current broke apart above them.
Percy sat in the wet grass, shaking. Harry stayed beside him while Ron ran for the nearest teacher.
"What—what was that?" Ron panted, running up.
"I didn't—" Percy gasped. "I didn't do it on purpose."
Percy tried to move the puddle beside his shoe. It moved before he finished deciding where it should go.
That night, Harry dreamed again.
He knew he had gone to sleep. Inside the dream, he could not remember that.
He stood before the Black Lake. The surface was perfectly still, reflecting the moon like a silver coin. But as he leaned closer, the reflection changed. His face vanished. In its place was a shadow that had no shape, no eyes, no mouth, yet it seemed to smile at him.
"Chains are broken."
The words weren't spoken, but they rang in Harry's mind.
"The sea remembers. The Sleeper stirs."
Harry stumbled back. "What do you want from me?"
The reflection rippled. And then, horrifyingly, it spoke in his own voice.
"To make you remember."
Harry woke with his hands pressed against his scar. He lit his wand and called Percy before the details faded.
The following day, Hermione took her new translation to the library so the four of them could check it before their meeting with Dumbledore.
"I've translated part of it."
Ron groaned. "Brilliant. Can we eat first—"
"No, listen!" she snapped. She pointed at the curling script. "It says: 'The temple was built not as a shrine, but as a prison.'"
Ron stopped turning his quill.
"A prison for what?" Harry asked.
Hermione swallowed. "It doesn't give a name. Only a title. The Sleeper in the Deep. And… something else. A warning. 'If the chains break, the sea itself will rise against the land.'"
Percy's stomach twisted. His powers surging, the storm over the Quidditch pitch—it all lined up.
Ron's ears had gone red. "So you're saying… we knocked over some ancient underwater jail, and now a sea monster's about to eat Britain?"
Hermione shook her head. "I cannot tell what it is from a title. The warning describes damage to the bindings. That is what we can show the professors."
Harry wrote down the words from his dream beside her translation.
They matched closely enough to frighten him.
That evening, Dumbledore entered the common room with Professor McGonagall. She asked the four of them to come to his office.
The room fell silent. Even Fred and George froze mid-prank.
"Harry. Percy. Miss Granger. Mr. Weasley." Dumbledore's gaze swept over them, calm but piercing. "I believe we must speak."
He led them to his office, where the firelight flickered across ancient tomes and the slumbering shape of Fawkes the phoenix.
"I have read your notes and the report from the pitch," Dumbledore said. "The damaged route is still affecting this school."
Percy leaned forward. "You know what it was, don't you? What it held."
Dumbledore opened a book at a marked page. "This account uses the same title. It describes a sleeper beneath the water, held by bindings. I cannot yet tell whether the title refers to a prisoner or to the keeper of the prison."
"Until we broke it," Harry said bitterly.
"The damage began before you entered the temple," Dumbledore said. "Your account may help us find where it spread. It does not tell us that you caused all of it."
Hermione's voice trembled. "Then what do we do?"
"First, we keep students away from the lake," Dumbledore said. "Professor Flitwick will continue your control lessons, Percy. Miss Granger, please leave copies of your notes here. Harry, tell us if the dream returns."
Percy looked through the office window. The lake was dark beyond the grounds.
He wished the meeting could have ended with an answer.
To be continued...
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Yay another chapter!
I just felt like writing another chapter lol :0