Chapter 77: 6th September 1991, Friday: Part 6

After their heart-to-heart, George and Gemma made their way down the moving staircases until they reached the dungeons. Gemma took the lead as she walked ahead down the dark corridor filled with the poorly labelled doors of the potion classrooms, she was carefully reading every label proving that even the prefects found it difficult to find the right class. George took this opportunity to dig his nails into the wounds on his palm so that they reopened and started bleeding again.

Ten minutes had passed and his body had almost finished closing the cuts caused by the glass shards. George needed to make sure that there would still be something worth healing by the time Gemma administered the healing potion. The two of them reached the end of the corridor where there were two classrooms opposite each other, both of which were the locked advanced potion classrooms. He had determined that the book would have to be in at least one of them since he had already checked every other classroom it could have been in. The only thing George could do was cross his fingers and pray the classroom they would enter would be the one that contained the book.

Gemma looked back and forth between both of the doors before she started murmuring a song aloud whilst pointing at the doors in rhythm with the song. It seemed that Gemma was using eeny-meany-miny-moe to decide which classroom they would be entering. George found it quite humbling knowing that a silly song was going to be used to determine his fate, his mission would come down to the flip of a coin. The song finished and Gemma was pointing at the door on the right, she nodded her head and walked up to the door. She pulled out her wand from her sleeve and pointed it at the door, George had a pretty good guess about which spell she was going to use.

She said the words, "Alohomora!", and the tip of her wand glowed whilst the door started to rattle.

Unfortunately, that was all that happened and the door remained locked. George presumed that the door must have had some sort of anti-theft charm placed on it which prevented the use of unlocking charms such as Alohomora. Gemma lowered her wand and appeared to be trying to think of another way to open the door. She must have gotten an idea because her eyes focused back on the door, she raised her wand again ready to cast another spell. Gemma flicked her wand and was about to speak, but, she stopped just before a word could leave her lips.

She looked nervously at George before saying, "if Professor Snape ever found out…"

Gemma stopped herself after hearing the sound of liquid dripping against the floor, she looked down and saw George's hand was still bleeding and blood was pooling on the ground beside him. He mustered his best innocent puppy dog face, he gently smiled and lowered his head whilst looking into Gemma's eyes. His act appeared to have the desired effect, Gemma saw George in such a miserable state and it seemed to strengthen her resolve.

She swung her wand with great force while shouting, "Dunamis!"

An orange light flew out from the tip of her wand and sank into the door. At first, nothing seemed to have happened just like before. After a couple of seconds passed, the sound of wood creaking could be heard getting louder and louder from the door. The wooden boards that made up the door started to bend and buckle. Some of the nails started to fall out onto the ground creating loud clunking noises. Then the hinges detached from the door which caused the entire wooden panel to fall forward and slam into the ground, the noise echoed through the entire corridor repeatedly.

Both George and Emma looked at each other with the same 'oh no, that's not good' expression. It was highly unlikely someone didn't hear that racket, the slamming probably echoed back to the moving staircases. Filch's spider senses would have started tingling and there was no doubt he would be hobbling over in this direction. Their deadline had just shortened massively, they had at most a few minutes to get this done. So without any reservations, Gemma walked over the top of the fallen door and entered the room, she looked left and right before waving George in to follow her.

After one last look back at the way they came, George followed Gemma into the room, but, he didn't forget to let a droplet of fire drip off his injured hand. The flame landed in the pool of blood and set it alight as if it was petrol. This wasn't a good place to leave blood evidence. George passed the threshold of the door and saw a narrow spiral staircase that only led downwards, the potion classroom must have been down there. Gemma pulled George off the door he was currently standing on as he was preventing her from lifting it back into place, he agreed to stand to one side and watched her try to lift the door.

Whilst using both of her arms and bending her back at a crooked angle, Gemma wasn't able to lift the door more than a couple of inches off the ground. George could tell she needed his help, he leaned over and grabbed a corner of the door with his non-injured hand. He breathed in a large breath of air and then exhaled whilst putting all of his efforts into lifting the door. The door suddenly lifted off the ground and swung back into place with another loud bang, George had given it his all because he thought the door was going to be heavy after referencing Gemma's struggle.

Having not expected the sudden assist, Gemma stumbled backwards. She almost fell down the stairwell, but George quickly reached out with his opposite hand and grabbed her robes. Her momentum pulled him along until he was able to grab the pillar in the centre of the stairwell. George was now holding the pillar and Gemma whilst she was dangling off the first step with her entire body being suspended at a forty-five-degree angle. Both of her hands were gripping George's blood-soaked sleeve for dear life.

George took another deep breath and pulled Gemma back up onto the flat ground. Then he released her but Gemma still held tightly whilst locking her eyes on him. She still seemed to be in shock after almost falling down the stairs, her nails were digging into his skin. Luckily, George had thicker skin than most. He moved his uninjured hand to his mouth and coughed awkwardly whilst using his eyes to point towards his injured hand which she was still grasping. Gemma seemed to be awoken from her stupor after hearing the cough, she looked down and let go of George's hand. The front of her robes and hands were now covered in his blood.

She looked back at him and said apologetically, "I'm so sorry. Did I hurt you?"

George raised his hand which was still bleeding and smiled, "no more damage than what had already been done. It was my fault anyway for lifting the door too suddenly. I should be the one apologising for almost knocking you down the stairs and covering you in my blood."

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It was at that point Gemma looked back towards the door that was now resting back in its original position. She appeared to be shocked by the ease with which George had managed to lift it back into place with only one hand. She was both older and taller than George and yet he seemed to be way stronger, she probably thought that couldn't be normal for someone his age. She walked towards the door and reached out to touch it as if it might have been an illusion before looking back at George in confusion.

She asked him, "how did you do that?"

George just shrugged his shoulders innocently, "I lift a lot of weights in my spare time. My dad seems to think I will be a weightlifter when I get older, maybe he's right if that door was meant to be heavy.

Anyway, do you think you can fix the door? I think I remember hearing about a spell called Reparo but I haven't had the opportunity to practise it."

Gemma seemed to be impressed by the nonchalant way George had brushed off his strength. She most likely doubted that any normal boy his age would be so humble. Hopefully, that attitude would come across as endearing and not humble-bragging. She looked back at the door and appeared to be trying to think of the best way to fix the mess she had put them in. Thankfully George had conveniently put her on the right track. It was obvious that the right spell to use was Reparo, also known as the Mending Charm, since it was literally in the name.

However, spelling it out didn't seem to be enough for Gemma. She started gritting her teeth whilst clicking her fingers, how hard could it be to recall a spell she had learnt only a year ago? Of course, George would have befriended that one student who couldn't remember one of the most important spells. Gemma looked to be really struggling to recall that spell, so George felt like throwing his hat into the ring. He might not be able to perform the magic, but that didn't mean he couldn't help jog a few of Gemma's brain cells.

"Maybe I can help. What are you struggling to remember?"

Gemma looked back at George and squinted her eyes. Surely George, an eleven-year-old boy with next to no experience practising magic, wouldn't be able to help her? George could see her thoughts plain as day.

She didn't look very convinced in his capabilities, "unless you know the Latin for gate, you're not going to be much help."

George looked up at the ceiling for a second in contemplation before saying, "porta."

Gemma's eyes went wide after hearing George's response, porta must have been the Latin word she'd been desperately trying to remember. It's a good thing George had bothered to learn Latin via a few translation books during his time with the Linwoods.

She turned back around to the door whilst brandishing her wand, "Porta Reparo!"

The door immediately lifted an inch off the ground and the deformed boards started to straighten out. George could hear the sound of nails rolling along the ground and then flying into the air. They hovered briefly before embedding themselves back into the door. Finally, the hinges, which had exploded into chunks of iron, reassembled themselves seamlessly and reattached to the wooden frame. The door finished its repair and fell onto the hinges mounted to the wall with a final bang, it looked identical to how it had been moments ago.

Unfortunately the mending spell wasn't a total repair, George was well aware that whatever anti-theft spell had been placed on it would have been permanently damaged. The once strong enchantment radiation remained in tatters on the floor, the magical waves were diffusing into the stone floor. It was inevitable that the damaged security enchantment would be found by either Filch or Snape. Seeing that as a problem for the future, he chose to ignore it for now and began to head down the stairwell with Gemma in tow. Right now, he had a book to find.

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