[Living For Tomorrow] Chapter 10 - No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

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Matt cried out in a scared voice when no less than eight Dwarves zeroed in on him.

“Harry, help!” 

Alas, at that moment, his reliable and overprotective older brother that he always depended on backstabbed him. Just like in the story of the man who tripped his friend to get eaten by the bear, Harry pushed his younger brother towards the Dwarves from behind and broke into a sprint towards the Ravenclaw table.

It was a betrayal that Matthew would never forget.

⁂

The red-haired boy ran towards the end of the Gryffindor table, hoping that he would lose the dwarves, but he had been overoptimistic. The poor boy’s face turned as red as a ripe apple when the dwarves started reciting some of the most embarrassing poems he had ever heard in his entire life. 

"His eyes are as green as a fresh pickled toad,
His hair is as dark as a blackboard.
I wish he was mine, he's really divine,
the hero who conquered the Dark Lord."


The students nearby burst into laughter, with Harry being louder than them all. Laughing, pointing, and beating the table with his fist, he was almost crying from the hilarity of the situation. 

His friends were sniggering at his little brother’s misfortune too, but Elspeth, in particular, was torn between laughing and crying at the sight in front of her eyes. 

“Jesus Christ, these dwarves are a fucking embarrassment.”

It was not like her to cuss like that, but she was in disbelief. Unlike Elora, Simon, Harry, Luna, and Florent, Elspeth was a half-blood witch who had been raised in a Muggle environment. 

Tolkien’s novels had greatly impacted her childhood; because of them, she had always pictured the dwarves as a proud and noble race. In her mind, they were ale-loving, valiant warriors with a fierce loyalty to their friends, an unshakeable code of honour, and great skill in crafting armour and weapons.

But seeing the short, muscular, bearded men strutting about in frilly Cupid robes and reciting love poems was like watching her childhood heroes being dragged through the mud. The skin on her forearms broke into goosebumps from the second-hand embarrassment she was getting on Tolkien’s dwarves’ behalf.

Harry was still in the midst of laughing his ass off at his little brother when a dwarf headed towards the part of the Ravenclaw table he was seated at as well. 

‘Who is he heading to? Lizzie? She’s pretty cute and fun. She’s quite popular with the guys.’

Then there was also the obvious choice, Florent Delacour. The French boy was bound to get entire serenades dedicated to him. 

He wasn’t wrong. One by one, dwarves started coming to their table and reciting poems for Florent, who could do nothing but laugh awkwardly. He looked like he wanted nothing but to dig up a whole and hide. 

Harry snickered at the thought of how much fun he was going to have at his friends’ expense once the shit show was over. 

But then, it happened. As the saying goes, what goes around comes around. He had been laughing with tears at his younger brother’s misfortune and then had great fun laughing at Florent too. . . 

As a dwarf stopped in front of him, Harry’s smile froze on his face. Why would a dwarf come to him? As far as he knew, he wasn’t exactly popular with the students in his year. He was more of a loner and, since the end of the last year, many bad rumours started circulating about him when people heard he had been somehow involved in the death of Quirinus Quirrell, their previous DADA teacher. 

It made no sense that someone would send him a love message. 

‘Unless. . . ‘

A thought came to his mind, and he quickly looked at the Gryffindor table where his brother was seated. Next to Matthew, two twins with red hair were watching him intently, with shit-eating grins on their faces. 

‘Those bloody bastards!’

It only took one look at their grins for him to realise that the dwarf coming to him was Fred and George’s doing. 

“I got a musical message to deliver for you,” said the dwarf before clearing his throat. 

The dwarf’s voice as he began to sing should be labelled as a crime against humanity. But the lyrics of his serenade were, somehow, even worse. 

"Your socks are mismatched, and they sit by my bed,
Sometimes I imagine their smell in my head.
Your trunk is exploding with half-eaten snacks,
But Harry, my dear, my resolve never cracks.

You burp in the dorm like you haven’t a care,
Yet somehow I’m dreaming of ruffling your hair.
It’s mad, it’s absurd, but I’ll just have to say:
Oh, Harry, you’ve stolen my heart anyway.”

The entire Ravenclaw Table burst into laughter. Some of the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs nearby started howling with laughter at him too. 

Harry turned to look at ‘Florent’, the movement of his body stiff and almost mechanical. 

Fleur herself could not believe her ears too. Her blue eyes widening in disbelief, she almost shouted in a high-pitched voice:

“It wasn’t me, ‘Arry! I swear!”

Florent’s outburst made people burst into laughter anew, with even the professors starting to chuckle at the scene. 

“Merlin’s beard, Florent, I did hear the rumours that you liked boys, but sniffing his socks?” Simon said, snickering. 

“I said I did NOT write that poem!”

“My, my, I can’t help but wonder what you are up to when you’re alone in your dorm at night, only the two of you,” Elspeth also said slyly.

“Lizzie, don’t you start it too!”

As if to pour salt on the raw wound, Fred and George shouted from the Gryffindor table:

“Didn’t know you swung that way, Harry!”

“You should’ve told us sooner! Fred and I are very open-minded. I might say interested even!”

Harry let his forehead fall onto the table with a thud. 

“Those idiots! Those arseholes! I’m going to kill them. I swear I’ll kill them!”

Not in the mood to stick around and hear everyone heckling at him, Harry just grabbed his backpack and stood up. He was going to the kitchens to have his breakfast in peace and quiet, with the house elves. 

⁂

The rest of the day did not get any easier either, with Simon, Elspeth, and Elora ripping into Harry at any chance they got. Such occasions when they could one-sidedly tease and bully Harry were rare to come by, so they abused this moment as much as they could. 

By the end of the day, Harry lost count of how many expletives he had spewed at the Weasley twins’ address. 

However, after the end of a DADA class where Lockhart poked fun at him too, talking about how ‘love transcends genders,’ Harry switched his vengeance target from the Weasleys to Gilderoy Lockhart. 

‘Everything that happened is because of this imbecile.’

It wasn’t enough that he was an utterly useless fool in class, but now he was pulling this sort of stunt too? 

“I can’t understand what are girls seeing in this pillock,” said a fifth-year Hufflepuff to his friend as they all left through the door when the class ended. 

“He has such a punchable face, I swear to god.”

“Did you see Emily? She was eating him with her eyes.”

The boys' envy was not without reason. Gilderoy Lockhart, with his lilac robes, flowy golden hair, and famous smile, which had won him the Witch Weekly’s Most-Charming-Smile-Award five times in a row, was the heartthrob of most girls in the castle. He had a mountain of chocolate on his desk and other gifts from girls. 

A thought came to his mind at that moment, and he told his friends:

“You guys go ahead; I think I forgot something. Can you save me a spot next to you in Herbology?”

“Don’t worry, we’ll save you a spot right next to Florent,” Elora said.

“Cut it out, you!” Fleur said in exasperation while Elspeth giggled. 

Not paying her teasing any mind, Harry left the group of students and started walking back towards the DADA class. 

He did not rush; he took his time, walking at a slow pace. When he noticed the corridor was empty, he took out his wand and cast a Disillusionment Charm on himself. His mastery of the spell was so great that he turned himself completely invisible. He also cast a Silencing Charm on himself before breaking into a run.

⁂

Around the same time, after finishing her Transfiguration Class with the second-year Gryffindors and Ravenclaws, Professor Minerva McGonagall grimaced at the sight of the short and burly dwarves cornering Matthew Potter in the corridors to recite or sing their poems. 

Her lips stretched into a thin line, and she started walking towards the Headmaster’s Office at a brisk pace. 

She was going to be late to class for the first time in ages, but her frustration and anger had reached a boiling point. She could no longer bear with it. 

Dumbledore suffered the brunt of her anger for nearly 10 minutes after she entered her office. 

“This can’t go on, Dumbledore!” McGonagall said for what had to be the sixth time. “Dwarves walking around half naked and singing poems, Professor Slughorn turning a blind eye to students brewing Love Potions in his class after finishing their assignments, mistletoes all over the place, and couples frolicking in every broom cupboard nearby!”

“This is Hogwarts, the finest magical school in Europe, not a circus! Where is the discipline we were once known for?”

“Is it not enough that Gilderoy Lockhart is a fraud who doesn’t belong in this school? Why are you allowing him to do this sort of nonsense?!”

By the time she finished her rant, the old witch was breathing laboriously.

“You’re being too harsh, Minerva. Valentine’s Day is only one day a year. There is no harm in allowing the children to have some fun and enjoy their youth once in a while. You were their age once as well, were you not? I seem to recall a particularly dashing seventh-year Slytherin boy and a terribly squeaky carriage back when you were 16. . .”

A hint of red appeared on the old lady’s cheeks. 

“How-, how do you know about that?!” she asked in disbelief before she could stop herself. 

“It may sound vain coming from me, but there aren’t many things that escape my notice in this castle, especially when it comes to students whom I keep an eye on,” Dumbledore said, chuckling. 

As realisation dawned on her, Minerva McGonagall flushed even harder. 

But the old Transfiguration Professor was spared from further embarrassment when a silvery being suddenly came out from the walls of Dumbledore’s office. At first, she thought it was a ghost but its small silhouette banished that idea. 

The silvery creature flapped its wings and landed on Fawks’ empty perch. It was a bird. Unlike Fawks, who was the size of a mute swan, the ghostly, silvery bird was quite a bit smaller, and its appearance less majestic. It looked like a crow or a raven. 

The ghostly bird opened its beak, and a strange, but unquestionably human voice came out of its mouth. It was a loud, harsh whisper that made the words it said easy to understand but very difficult to distinguish whether it was the voice of a male or a female. 

“Gilderoy Lockhart is having sex in the Defence class with a fifth-year Hufflepuff girl. This is not a prank.”

Dumbledore’s amusement and McGonagall’s embarrassment all vanished instantly, and they jumped up to their feet as though they were burnt. 

⁂

Having sent the Patronus Charm to Minerva McGonagall, Harry was filled with an evil joy of anticipation as he waited for the Deputy Headmistress to arrive and catch Lockhart in the act. 

‘I can’t believe this cretin would actually do something like this in school.'

His intention had been to just sneak into Gilderoy Lockhart’s personal quarters and maybe find some inappropriate letters or objects to get some dirt on him. He had never expected him to actually have sex with a student and an underage girl at that. 

He had no particular interest in watching two people have sex, but he couldn’t miss out on the spectacle once McGonagall arrived. His face twisted in a grimace when Lockhart and the fifth-year girl stopped kissing, and he saw her dropping to her knees in front of him. 

“Professor, I’ve wanted you for so long,” whispered the Hufflepuff girl as she unbuckled his belt.

“You’re a good girl, Emily," he said, petting her head.

Harry shivered in disgust and turned away. He glanced down at his wristwatch, a round, silvery watch with a black leather strap. It was a simple but classy watch. It was the gift that Florent had offered him when they returned from the Christmas holiday. 

Just as the girl unzipped his trousers and pulled them down, the doors of the DADA classroom were blasted open with a loud bang.

Harry’s heart leapt into his throat when he saw Albus Dumbledore bursting through the room with his wand out and Minerva McGonagall right behind him. 

A spell shot from Dumbledore’s wand, and the half-naked Lockhart and the kneeling girl were separated harshly, with Lockhart slamming painfully into the wall behind his desk. He did not have time to even take out his wand before McGonagall waved her wand at him, and Lockhart’s robes turned into enormous pythons that coiled around him, constricting his body tightly. 

She could have Transfigured his clothes into ropes, chains, or even vines, but she purposely chose to turn them into snakes. It took only one look at her face for Harry to realise that the old witch was enraged. 

Her anger, however, paled in comparison to Dumbledore’s. 

The air seemed to be filled with static energy, and Harry felt as though an extremely heavy weight started pressing on his shoulders, making it hard for him to stand. 

For the first time in his life, Harry got a small taste of the Headmaster’s true power. 

‘Overwhelming.’

It was the only word that came to his mind.

That was the magic power of the man who had defeated Gellert Grindelwald, one of the worst Dark Lords of all time.

With Gilderoy Lockhart immobilised by Professor McGonagall’s pythons, Dumbledore cast the Patronus Spell, and a silvery Phoenix came out of his wand before flying out of the room, through the wall. 

In the meantime, Lockhart was shaking and thrashing around in terror, but he couldn’t even scream due to large snakes covering his mouth, let alone move. 

“Miss Wells? Return to your dorms. Pack your belongings; this is your last night at Hogwarts,” Dumbledore said calmly. 

“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! Please don’t expel me!” the terrified girl begged and burst into tears. 

“Miss Wells!” 

Something in Dumbledore’s tone immediately silenced the crying girl, and she got up, running out of the classroom without saying a word more. 

“As for you, Gilderoy, the Aurors are on their way.”

Muffled moans and groans came from Lockhart. He looked like he was screaming on the inside, desperate to say something, but Dumbledore did not pay him any mind. 

“I welcomed you into the school with open arms. I even took your side and allowed you to perform your little extracurricular activities when the rest of your colleagues protested against them. But you spat on my trust. Not only did you underperform severely at your job, but you even dared to lay your hands on a student.”

Dumbledore’s voice was cold and menacing when he spoke next:

“Mark my words, Gilderoy. Your fame will not save you. Your connections will mean nothing. I will bury you. I will use all my resources and influence to make sure you will spend the rest of your life in Azkaban.”

Once he said that, the old wizard suddenly pointed his wand in Harry’s direction, to the corner of the classroom, and his Disillusionment Charm was cancelled. 

Minerva McGonagall looked at Harry in surprise, never having expected to see another person, a student no less, in the classroom. His spell had been so good that she had not noticed his presence in the least. 

“Mr Potter?! What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be in Herbology now?”

Harry’s back broke into a cold sweat. In the first place, he never thought that his spell would bring over Dumbledore. He had sent his Patronus to McGonagall. He had been confident that his invisibility spell would allow him to slip away undetected. 

“Um, yes, but I thought I forgot something and came back to look for it,“ he explained himself quickly. “I’m the one who sent you the Patronus, Professor.” 

⁂

Those students who had been outside, in the middle of their Care For Magical Creatures class, had gotten a front-row seat at watching how the Aurors dragged a crying and desperately pleading, tied-up Gilderoy Lockhart out of the castle.

Because of them, the news of Gilderoy Lockhart being caught having sex with an underage student spread like wildfire. By the evening of the same day, there was virtually not a single person at Hogwarts who had not heard of it. 

Nobody among the students knew that he was the one who had caught Lockhart red-handed, and Harry preferred it to be that way. 

However, the fact that Harry Potter was missing from the Herbology Class when Lockhart was caught and the fact that his friends knew that he had gone back to the DADA classroom for something he had forgotten immediately led many people to suspect that he had been involved in this whole thing somehow. 

⁂

The news that a professor was caught having sex with a student took not only Hogwarts by storm but the entire British Wizarding World too. Merely a day after Lockhart’s arrest, the incident made it to the first page of the Daily Prophet as well. 

SEX SCANDAL AT HOGWARTS WITH GILDEROY LOCKHART AT THE CENTRE OF IT

[...]

“She was 16! That is not below the age of consent in Great Britain! Our affair may have been unprofessional, but I am in no way a criminal! I demand to be released!” Gilderoy Lockhart, the former professor of Defense Against Dark Arts shouted as he was taken by the Aurors. 

[...]

Euphemia Potter shook her head and clicked her tongue incredulously as she read the article in the newspaper. 

She would not be surprised if she were to hear that some students among the older years got caught having sex at school—she had been young too, so she knew what was going on in abandoned classrooms and broom cupboards. But to hear that a professor had laid their hands on a student was unthinkable. That's because the number of wizards and witches in Great Britain was rather small; committing such a crime would ensure the fact that the offender would be forever ostracised and shunned wherever they went. 

Noticing the arrival of a customer, Mrs Potter put down her newspaper and greeted them with a smile. 

“Welcome to Potter’s Apothecary. How may I be of service today?”

That was the name of their small Potions business. It was just a tiny little shop that Euphemia operated in Pitt-Upon-Ford, the village where they lived. 

Although she and her husband were retired and set for life due to their wealth, the old lady liked to keep herself busy. 

“Good evening, Auntie. May I have some more of that Invigoration Draught?” spoke the young man. 

Euphemia giggled softly when she saw the young woman next to him hiding her face in her partner’s shoulder in embarrassment. 

“Here you go, deary,” she said amiably when she returned from the shelf with a flask filled with a bright orange colour. 

The young man put a galleon on the counter and scurried away together with his girlfriend, not even waiting for her to give him his change. 

The old lady laughed yet again.

“Ah, young love. How adorable.”

Pitt-Upon-Ford was a small village where everyone knew each other. She guessed that if not for how late it was, the young couple would not have come to her little potions shop to buy an Invigoration Draught. They would have definitely gone to Hogsmeade to maintain their anonymity. 

‘Maybe it’s time for me to close too.’

It was almost 9 o’clock in the evening. It was February, and while it was not cold inside her shop thanks to the neat bit of spellwork that she and her husband had cast on it, it was pitch dark outside, and the streets were empty. 

Just as she was about to pull down the blinders of her little shop, two goblins appeared in the plaza of the village.

“Help! Help us, please!” he cried out. “My friend here was injured by a thornback!”

The goblin was carrying his wounded friend in a piggy bag, leaving a serious trail of blood behind them.

“Right away! Was he poisoned?” Euphemia asked in a loud voice as she ran to the shelf, grabbed a Wiggenweld Potion, and started looking for her stash of Anti-venom flasks too. 

“I don’t think so. But his leg was mangled!”

Euphemia grabbed her potions and came out of her shop in a rush, running faster than one would expect from someone her age. 

“Put him down, let me see him!” she said in a hurried voice as she knelt next to them and took off the cork from the Wiggenweld Potion’s flask. 

At that moment, loud sounds of footsteps belonging to more than one person came from behind her. The old lady instinctively turned around to see the source of the noise . . . and it was just in time to see how a goblin wielding a large war hammer jumped up into the air and smashed his weapon into her head with both hands. 

⁂

The old lady woke up with a groan. She felt as though someone had split her head open with an axe. She opened her eyes, but it was so dark outside, she couldn’t see a thing. She also tried to move, but it appeared that she was tied up. She couldn’t move an inch. 

“What if you killed her, you imbecile? I told you using the war hammer wasn’t a good idea!”

“The hag is not dead; she still has a pulse.”

“No thanks to you, that’s for sure. Stupid brute.”

She couldn't understand the words they were speaking - it was a different language - but, hearing the voices of the goblins, her memories returned to her. . . Two goblins came in front of her shop. . . They were bleeding and asking for help. . . She came out in a rush to help them, and then everything went dark. . .

‘Why did they attack me?’ she wondered, panic starting to settle in. 

Sirius had warned her that he had seen some hostile goblins lurking around the village last Christmas, but she had not paid it much importance. 

“What are you after?” she tried to ask, but no words came out of her mouth, only muffled moans. She was gagged. 

“Looks like the old witch woke up.”

One of the goblins yanked the gag off her mouth roughly and said in a harsh voice:

“Don’t bother screaming. We’ve already set up a silencing ward around the area.”

“What do you want from me? Do you have any idea whom you have kidnapped?” she said in a sharp tone. 

The goblin laughed nastily, and a heavy slap twisted the old lady's head to the side, making her cry out in pain. 

“It’s because we know exactly who you are that we kidnapped you. Euphemia Potter. Fleamont Potter’s wife. The grandparents of the Boy Who Lived. Right?”

When she didn’t say anything, the goblin grabbed her roughly by her grey hair, forcing her to meet his eyes. 

“I’m going to make this simple for you. That sword your thieving husband has been keeping in his possession. . . I want it. It does not belong to him. That sword is ours! We designed it! We forged it! We enchanted it! It is goblin property! And you are going to give it to me, if you want to live, that is.”

“Do you think I am stupid? As if I would believe that you would let me live after that.”

Despite the way the goblin was holding her by the hair, the old lady suddenly, and completely unexpectedly, smashed her forehead into his long and ugly nose. 

An audible crack was heard as the goblin’s nose shattered, and he fell on his back, grabbing his face with both hands and squealing in pain like a dying pig. 

The other goblins quickly grabbed the tied-up old woman and pulled her back. The goblin whose nose got smashed lunged at her, intent on beating the crap out of her, but the other goblins around held him back. 

“Get your hands off me! I’m going to kill that old bitch with my bare hands!”

“Stop it, you idiot. We need her alive!”

The one who looked like the leader of the goblins spoke at that moment:

“It’s fine even if she doesn’t cooperate. Let’s just take her to her husband. Once he sees we have her at knifepoint, he’ll do whatever we want him to do.”

In truth, the Goblins had been trying to breach the wards of the Potter home since before Christmas, but they had yet to find a method of infiltrating the house without alerting the Potter couple of their intrusion. 

Now, after wasting almost two months and having nothing to show for their efforts, the Goblins decided to take some drastic actions. If subtlety was not possible, they were not averse to taking what they needed by force. 

Once they gagged her, the goblins carried the old witch on their shoulders towards her home. The sky was cloudy, so the visibility was poor, but she could see just enough to recognise that she was still in Pitt-Upon-Ford. However, it appeared as though all the street lamps had been extinguished by the goblins after they kidnapped her. 

Soon, they arrived at her home, and she saw her husband outside, in front of the door. 

Hearing their footsteps, Fleamont walked out, saying in a relieved voice:

“Thank Merlin you’re here; you had me worried for a minute. I was just about to head out after-”

His words died in his throat when the goblins stepped into the light coming from his house’s open door and he saw his wife tied up, gagged, bruised, and bleeding from her head. 

“What are you doing to my wife?!” he screamed, whipping his wand out at them. 

The goblins clenched their hands around their weapons in wariness. They had been lucky to sneak attack the old woman and capture her, but they had no doubt as to what would happen if an old and experienced wizard were to attack them in a rage. Half of them would die, at the very least. 

“Put your wand down if you care about her,” the leader of the goblins said in a calm voice and brought his knife closer to Euphemia’s neck. 

The old witch shook her head and made noises as if to tell him not to listen to them, her eyes filled with defiance. 

Fleamont’s wand hand trembled. 

“What do you want from us? Just tell me what you need. Let her go, and I’ll give you anything!”

“First of all, put your wand down.”

When Fleamont didn’t immediately obey, the goblin pressed the sharp edge of his dagger into Euphemia’s neck, drawing blood. 

“I’m not playing, wizard. Do it or the hag dies.”

“Alright! Alright! Calm down!” he shouted. 

“But I am calm,” said the goblin mockingly. “Put your wand down if you care about your wife.”

Terrified for his wife’s safety, Fleamont let the wand drop from his hands.

As soon as he did that, two goblins charged at him, knocking him down with their shields while a third one slammed his axe down, chopping Fleamont’s wand in half. 

“I did what you said!” Flemaont shouted while being pinned down on the ground, with the two goblins holding him at swordpoint. “Tell me what you want, and let my wife go!”

The leader of the goblins threw the old woman’s body into the arms of two of his lackeys and walked to Fleamont. 

“The Sword of Bruncvik. The Potters have been hoarding it for over 800 years. It does not belong to you, thieving wizards. Give it to me and I shall let you live.”

“I’ll give it to you. Just don’t hurt her!” Fleamont pleaded.

“Quit whining already! Give me the sword! Now!” the goblin leader shouted and kicked him viciously in the stomach, making the old man curl up in a foetal position and groan in pain. 

“Get up! Get up, you old fart!” the other goblins also shouted and poked him with their swords, forcing him to stand up despite the pain that made it hard for him to even breathe. 

“A-Alright. . . let’s. . . let’s get inside. I’ll . . .I’ll give you the sword. . .” Fleamont said with difficulty. 

The goblin leader sneered at him.

“I’d have to be an utter fool to set foot inside your home, where you can trigger your warding spells. . . no, we’ll wait here. You go inside alone, take the sword, and bring it back to us. We’ll wait for you right here. You have one minute. If you're not back in one minute, she dies."