Shadows in St. Mungo's II - The Secret of Avalon: Chapter 06

The first sound that reached Harry, still wrapped in a haze of semi-consciousness, was the rain. A persistent, patient, rhythmic drumming — like invisible fingers tapping on the window of a world that no longer recognized him. Then came the others: the whisper of old leaves outside, the slow creak of the oak armchair in the living room, the polite clink of porcelain being set on a saucer. Echoes of a routine that should have been comforting, but now felt misplaced. Like a familiar melody played in a minor key.

He awoke on the sofa, covered by a thin fabric that suggested presence more than it offered warmth. Skin stuck with cold sweat, head heavy as if bearing a ballast of stone, and hands — trembling with a subtlety that would be easy to ignore... if he didn’t know his own limits so well.

But what truly stole his breath wasn’t the physical discomfort.

It was the emptiness.

The memory of the chamber came like the tip of a dagger: the spinning mirror, the whispered voice, the name — Castius. But what followed was fog. Dense. Hostile. Indistinct fragments: the cloak falling, the creak of a door being shut, and, above all, a phrase that may have been spoken aloud... or merely thought:

“You came back. But you left something behind.”

“You’re awake,” said a low, firm voice, from the armchair to his left.

Daphne.

She held a teacup in both hands, like someone seeking security in the warmth of the liquid. Her eyes rested on him with a mixture of vigilance and relief — as if expecting an explosion and, instead, receiving only a whisper.

Harry tried to sit up. The base of his skull protested with a dull, sharp pain, forcing him to lie back down, gasping.

“How long?” he asked, voice hoarse.

“Almost a full day,” she answered, without hesitation. “You showed up at the door alone, soaked, breathless... and your eyes...” She paused, her gaze narrowing. “As if they were trying to escape your face.”

He tried to smile, but managed only a trace. His throat scratched like old parchment.

“Water,” she said, and with a delicate wave of her wand, a mug floated toward him. He drank slowly, as if each sip re-taught his body to remember it was still his.

“I saw something down there,” he said at last. “Or… I was seen.”

Daphne remained silent. Attentive.

“The mirrors,” he continued, “reflected versions. Possibilities. Each one showed a part of me I didn’t know... or preferred to forget. And at the center, there was a man. Or perhaps... a figure. His name was Castius. And he knew me. Too well.”

“And what did he say?” she asked, voice low, but firm as steel beneath silk.

Harry closed his eyes. The words seemed to burn him from the inside.

“That I don’t have enough soul to dissolve. That I’m a host. That Avalon wasn’t an experiment, but a contagion. And that it started... with me.”

Daphne stood abruptly, as if fleeing a memory. She began to pace the room, arms crossed tightly against her chest, as if trying to hold her own body together.

“That would explain my father’s journal,” she said finally. “His insistence that Avalon was a living structure, a process... not a place. He talked about folding spells. Cognitive rewriting.”

“Then it’s not just theory,” Harry replied, staring at the ceiling darkened by the shadow of rain. “I think he did it. Castius. Or whoever’s behind this.”

Daphne turned. Her gaze no longer wavered.

“Do you think you’re contaminated?”

He hesitated. Not because he didn’t know the answer. But because it scared him.

“No. I think...” he said at last, “that maybe I always was.”

The words hovered between them. Solid. Inescapable. And colder than any winter.

Daphne sat again, this time closer. The teacup now rested forgotten on the side table. Her eyes were misty, but there was a steadiness in them — as if within that pain, there was a choice.

“Then we’ll do what’s always done when facing an enigma,” she said. “One step at a time. One thread at a time. And when this puzzle finally reveals itself... you’ll remember who you are.”

Harry wanted to believe in the promise.

He wanted to, deeply.

But somewhere very deep, a shadow smiled.

It had no face.

Nor name.

But it knew all of his.

~HP~

The library at Grimmauld Place, at that hour of the night, had a peculiar kind of breath. It was slow, dense, almost shy. The walls exhaled a discreet dampness, with the scent of ancient parchment mingled with forgotten spices — as if the house still held traces of potions spilled long ago. Every shelf, every crevice, seemed to contain not just books, but secrets that no longer knew to whom they belonged.

Daphne was alone, wrapped in that penumbra of time and silence. The light from her wand illuminated just enough, choosing to respect the surrounding shadows. Harry was sleeping — or so he claimed. Since returning from the chamber beneath the Ministry, his body seemed present, but his soul wavered elsewhere. Something kept calling him back, and it did so often.

She placed her father’s journal on the table. Her hands, though steady, betrayed the hesitation she felt. The grimoire’s clasp opened with the touch of her wand — an old spell, one that recognized blood and, perhaps, love. It was strange to think that even magic could hold affection.

The pages opened as if exhaling memories. There were familiar passages, scribbled in urgency, partially crossed-out phrases, and layers of magical ink that, under that light, revealed hidden meanings. She flipped through them with the familiarity of someone who had read too much — until a subtle fold, like a scar along the margin, caught her attention.

It wasn’t part of the fixed pages.

It was something hidden.

She unfolded it carefully. Inside, she found a loose sheet. No date, no title. Just words.

It was a confession.

"I no longer trust the table. Nor the names.

They speak of containment, but what they seek is control.

Castius is not a man. He is a role.

The next always replaces the previous.

The mind is the new territory. And Avalon, the vessel."

The words carried weight. Not for what they said, but for what they implied. Daphne read in silence. Each line colder than the last.

"They told me the Origin Room would be sealed.

A lie.

The access was redirected. Now, only the Mirrors can open the way.

If you're reading this, Daphne, it’s because you know too much.

And if you know too much, they are already coming."

The edge of the parchment darkened subtly. There was no flame, but the heat was felt — as if the truth itself burned. She murmured a preservation spell with the swiftness of someone who knows time is a skilled enemy. Then, she took a deep breath.

The Origin Room.

She had never heard that name. Not in medical documents, not in the Ministry records she had reviewed. But what truly sent a chill through her wasn’t the novelty of the name. It was the implication. The serene brutality of knowing that Castius was not someone, but something. A function. A wearable face. An entity reenacted like a sinister play — with new actors, but always the same role.

She climbed the stairs with restrained yet determined steps. The door to the room where Harry rested was ajar. She knocked lightly with her fingers. The murmur from within was hoarse, but alert.

“I found something,” she said as she entered. “And you need to read it carefully.”

Harry sat up slowly, like someone relearning how to return to his own body. His eyes were still sunken, but there was a spark in them. An echo of himself. Daphne extended the parchment. He took it without a word. He read.

For a long time.

When he finished, he didn’t return the paper. He simply held it between his fingers and said, in a low, almost absent voice:

“Castius didn’t die.”

Daphne nodded, eyes locked on his.

“No. Castius is reborn.”

And then the silence settled between them — the kind of silence that doesn’t demand respect, but imposes it. Outside, the rain continued to tap against the windows, insistent, monotonous. The fireplace crackled, as if observing.

Harry stood up. He pulled on the sweater draped over the chair with the urgency of someone who had finally found a path. But there was no haste in the gesture — only resolve.

“The Origin Room,” he murmured. “It must be where it all began.”

“And maybe where it all…” Daphne hesitated, then finished, “…where it all ends.”

He looked at her, and in that instant, nothing more needed to be said. She was already drawing her wand. He was already pulling on his boots.

The moment was intimate like a secret, and grave like a vow.

When they left the room, the house remained in silence.

But not indifferent.

For there was something new in the air.

It wasn’t fear.

It was preparation.

~HP~

The kitchen clock marked precisely half past seven when the knock sounded. Three taps. Neither hurried nor hesitant. Simply exact — as if each had been rehearsed.

Harry, who had been standing by the kettle, not really expecting anything, knew immediately who it was. He didn’t need a wand. Nor caution. He simply opened the door with a silent gesture.

“You didn’t answer my letter,” said Hermione, without any preamble, wrapped in a gray overcoat over a light blue pajama set with already faded prints. Her hair, tied in a crooked, hurried bun, seemed a natural extension of her expression — practical, exhausted, and yet absolutely alert.

“Good to see you too,” Harry murmured, stepping aside so she could enter.

Hermione crossed the threshold with that resolute stride that made every visit seem like a mission. Grimmauld Place, with its permanent air of accumulated memory, smelled of burned parchment and warm tea. It was a house she had never liked — but one she had learned to respect, much like one respects an eccentric and essentially inconvenient relative.

The library door was shut. Daphne hadn’t appeared. Hermione didn’t even ask.

She headed straight to the living room and placed a thick envelope on the coffee table, like someone placing the game-ending piece on the board.

“Protocol 19-D,” she said. “Issued two years ago. Restricted circulation. I had to convince half my department it was a security audit, and even then I needed Kingsley.”

Harry sat down and opened the envelope carefully. The paper still carried the acrid smell of magical archives. The words at the top — in an austere, slightly faded font — hit him with the force of something long suspected but never confirmed.

CASTIUS – Internal Confidential Level

Responsible for the control of mental layers in induced dissociation tests.

Project Avalon – Suspended Branch. Status: Active in auxiliary instance.

He lowered the paper slowly. His gaze momentarily lost in the unlit fireplace.

“So it’s real,” he said, in a voice that didn’t expect to be heard.

Hermione crossed her arms. Her expression was a balanced battle between exhaustion and rigor.

“And I want to know how long you’ve known this,” she said.

Harry took a while to answer. He ran his fingers along his unshaven chin, his eyes still lost among the absent embers.

“Long enough to understand that last year’s deaths weren’t isolated incidents. That Rosier wasn’t just a victim... And that Daphne and Astoria aren’t on the margins of this. They’re part of the core.”

Her tone softened. Her brows still furrowed, but her voice now lower, more human.

“Harry, you’re digging into something that isn’t a case. This has no culprit. It has layers. Broken memories. Fragments that belong to no one and yet live in everyone.”

“That’s why I can’t stop.”

She stepped closer and stood before him. There was tiredness in her eyes. But also the same old affection.

“And what if you’re wrong? What if all of this is just accumulated trauma, Harry? What if the enemy you’re trying to find is just the reflection you’ve been avoiding?”

He smiled. It wasn’t a smile for her. It was an intimate gesture. Painful. A reflection of someone who had already asked himself that question on previous nights, with his face buried in trembling hands.

“Then someone needs to find me.”

Hermione grabbed a cushion and sat down, her gaze resting on him with a tenderness protected by layers of reason.

“Ron is worried,” she said, in an almost casual tone. “He tries to hide it, of course. But he is. He’s been walking around the house like a father waiting for news from the son who went out into the world.”

Harry nodded slightly.

“Tell him I’m fine.”

She pulled a cloth-wrapped bundle from her coat pocket and placed it on the table. A familiar aroma escaped immediately — coffee from Diagon Alley, roasted exactly the way Harry liked it.

“I brought the coffee you like. The real one.”

He took the package with a care that came not just from gratitude, but from memory.

“Thank you,” he murmured.

She stood up. Her eyes, now softened, swept the room with a lingering look. Then she turned back to him one last time.

“I don’t know everything you’re facing, Harry. But I know how you face it. Just... remember we’re still here. All of us. Even when you don’t call.”

Harry nodded.

“I know.”

She hesitated at the door.

“And that Daphne,” she said, with a lighter note in her voice. “She’s smart. Much more than many ministers with titles bigger than their conscience. But don’t forget: she carries shrapnel too.”

“I don’t forget.”

When the door closed behind her, silence returned. But it was no longer the usual silence of Grimmauld Place. It was a silence that had heard everything. That understood everything. A silence with name and memory.

And in the midst of it, Harry remained there, seated, the coffee in his hands.

And the certainty that the next step would take him even deeper.

~HP~

The silence of the house was broken not by footsteps or words, but by the hurried flapping of wings against the glass. An owl, large, with glassy eyes and feathers stained by rain, slipped through the window gap with the precision of an old habit. Its claws landed firmly on the back of the chair as if time, in there, were no barrier to duty.

Harry was still holding the cup of coffee — already forgotten between his fingers, the steam dissipating like thoughts that vanish before settling. His eyes, sunken and red from a sleepless night, turned to the envelope.

Red wax. Ministry seal. No unnecessary embellishments. Just the formality of bureaucracy stating, once again, that death needed no fanfare.

He raised his wand with the same gentleness as someone removing a bandage from an old wound. The whispered spell broke the seal, and the fold of the paper revealed more than expected:

Internal Security Bulletin – Level 3 Classification

Subject: Death of Ignatius Rowle

Previous Position: "Nox" Classification – Department of Mysteries

Circumstance: sudden brain death, absence of physical trauma.

Last known record: voluntary appearance at the Sealed Records Room – day before death.

Investigation status: closed. Presumed cause: spontaneous neurological collapse.

Harry read it once. And then, as if the name had emerged from some forgotten compartment of his mind, he murmured:

"Rowle..."

"He worked with my father," said a voice behind him.

Daphne.

She was standing at the entrance of the room, bare feet silent on the old floorboards, her hair down and still slightly damp, as if the night had left marks on her of something more than tiredness.

Harry turned slowly.

"What do you mean?"

"Ignatius Rowle was one of the few who remained loyal to the idea that Avalon should be questioned — not perpetuated. My father used to say he was cautious, maybe the only one on the team who still feared the depth of the project." She stepped closer, with that measured pace Harry had come to recognize as caution disguised as calm. "When the Ministry announced the shutdown of Phase Two, Rowle disappeared. No scandal. No trace. As if he had been... removed, with everyone's silent approval."

Harry turned his eyes back to the parchment.

"Voluntary appearance at the Sealed Records Room. That’s not nostalgia. Nor routine."

"No. That’s a trail," she replied, sitting in front of him. "He must have found something. A document. An encapsulated memory. And paid for it like all the others."

"Selwyn, Burkes, Goshawk, Meredith..." Harry counted on his fingers, the names like scars. "And now Rowle. All touched by Avalon. Or by Castius."

The name hung in the air like a cold draft from nowhere. Daphne took a deep breath and, instead of responding, walked to the shelf at the back of the room — one of the few that hadn’t been reorganized since Sirius’s death. She pulled a book with no title, gray spine, and dried-out edges. A field journal. The pages, protected by old enchantments, still reacted to her touch.

"It was among my father's things," she said. "It’s not official. He wrote in it when he wanted to escape the language of reports."

Harry leaned in as she opened the notebook. Mental diagrams, instability graphs, technical notes scribbled in the margins. Then, at the bottom of one of the pages, a sentence written in hurried handwriting, almost hidden among the lines of a sketch:

“R. – unstable. Suggests cross-link. Avoid repetition.

Origin Room: isolated. Entry only with Castius present.”

Harry slowly ran his finger over the line, as if touching the words might make them speak.

"‘R.’ could be Rosier..."

"Or Rowle," Daphne whispered. "But either way, it means the Origin Room was never sealed. Just restricted. And now... under direct control of whoever holds the post."

Harry closed his eyes for a moment, the fatigue taking shape at the base of his neck.

"And everyone who knew about it... is dying."

The owl still watched them. Its gaze fixed, almost impatient. As if it were part of something larger than its own task.

Harry didn’t write a reply. He simply tied the note back with a decisive gesture and set it aside, his hand steadier than before.

"We need to find that room," he said. "Before we’re the next ones erased from the Ministry’s wall."

Daphne nodded, but didn’t answer right away. Then, as if she didn’t want to be heard by her own thoughts, she murmured:

"The problem is: who holds the key?"

They looked at each other. And in that suspended instant, where not even the owl moved, the answer formed without being spoken.

Because some doors only open from the inside.

And some keys... have been walking beside them since the beginning.

~HP~

The house rested in silence — not the cold, aseptic silence of hospitals, nor the functional, watchful silence of the Ministry corridors. It was a silence that seemed to breathe through the walls, whispering memories in a low voice, as if afraid to wake those who slept.

At the heart of the main room of Grimmauld Place, Harry remained seated on the floor, his back resting against the old sofa, his eyes fixed on the extinguished fireplace in front of him. The wood had not crackled for hours, but the scent of burnt charcoal still lingered in the air, mingled with the faint aroma of tea Daphne had prepared before she went upstairs. She had withdrawn with a mute weariness, leaving him there — not out of neglect, but out of respect. There were things each person had to face alone.

Beside him lay a small, dark wooden box, ancient, with a simple clasp and a leather handle dried by time. Harry hesitated for a moment before touching it, as if asking permission before opening an album of memories he did not wish to revisit.

The subtle creak of the lid sounded almost like a whisper. And there, between still-perfect folds, was it — the invisibility cloak. Immaculate. Untouched. The fabric rippled slightly with the movement of the air, as if it breathed. There was something sacred in its presence: a weight that did not come from the material but from the memory it carried.

Harry ran his fingers over it with a silent reverence. It was the touch of someone holding not an object, but a bond. The memories came like small sparks — he and Ron running through the halls of Hogwarts, breath held and laughter muffled; him, hidden beneath the cloak, watching conversations that would change the course of the war; him, in Hagrid’s arms, covered by it like a child being returned to death.

But the memory that held him most was the one he never spoke aloud: the first time he felt safe. The first night, still a child, discovering there was a cloak that made him disappear. That allowed him to choose when to be seen.

“I can’t erase what you mean,” he murmured, not expecting an answer.

He didn’t light the fireplace. Instead, he raised his wand with a sober gesture and traced a delicate arc in the air.

“Protego totalum.”

The magic enveloped the fabric with a soft, almost imperceptible light, like a blessing closing over something precious. Silently, he wrapped the cloak in a white linen cloth, folding it with almost ceremonial precision. He placed it back in the box and closed the clasp with a discreet spell, the kind of charm that drew no attention — but never failed.

He stood slowly, his muscles protesting with the accumulated tension of the past hours — or days? Time had become too cloudy. He walked over to the mirror hanging between the tall shelves, a forgotten relic of a more opulent era of the Black family. He stared at the reflection that stared back at him.

The man in the mirror was far from the eleven-year-old boy who once ran beneath that cloak. There was in his features the hardness of one who had buried many. The disorder of his hair was familiar, but his eyes... his eyes held a new gleam. It wasn’t innocence, nor fury. It was the gleam of someone who had returned from a place they should never have known — and survived.

“Let the mirrors come,” he said, more to himself than to any other presence.

“I don’t lose myself easily.”

He extinguished the lights with a brief, almost ritualistic gesture. Darkness settled in with elegance, like a cloak the house seemed to welcome with gratitude.

Outside, the night slid over the rooftops like a promise of respite.

And in that brief respite, Harry knew: the silence of that house was not a threat. It was memory. And he was still whole enough to listen to it.