bookishwench (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bookishwench) wrote2015-01-09 09:24 pm
bookishwench) wrote2015-01-09 09:24 pm
Entry tags:
Fic: The Three Billy Go(on with You, Now!)ats Gruff (HP)
The next chapter in the "Muggle Fairy Tales Are Mad" series.
Previous chapters:
Cinder-What-the-Hell?-a
Snow Wh-at-Are-You-Kidding-Me?-ite
Sleeping Bea-You-People-Are-Mad-ty
Little Red Riding Ho-w-Is-That-Possible?-od
Rumple-Still-As-Crazy-As-Ever-tskin
The Frog Pr-in-What-Way-Is-That-Possible?-ince
Rap-solutely-mental-unzel
Jack the Giant Kill(-Me-Now!)-er
Hansel and Gr(eat-Now-I'm-Hungry)etel
Goldilocks and the Three B(e-Serious-Now!)ear
Beauty and the (Un)Be(freaking-lievable!)ast
The Little Mer-(eally-Deeply-Disturbing)-maid
The Three L(acking in Any Sanity)ittle Pigs
Puss in B(onkers, Absolutely Bonkers!)oots
The W(hat Is in These People's Tea?)ild Swans
The Twelve Danc(incerely Madder Than Hares)ing Princesses
The Pied Piper of H(ow Do You People Sleep?)amelin
The Snow Qu(ite Nutty, Aren't They)een
The Elves and the Sh(ocking, Just Shocking!)oemaker
The Princess and the P(lease Say You’re Making This Up)ea
The Emperor's New Clo(se to Bonkers)thes
The Gingerbread M(an, What Are You People On?)an
The Little R(ight Bunch of Nutters You Lot Are)ed Hen
Bluebe(reasonable, now!)ard
N.B. It was pointed out to me that Harry does not know the story of the Deathly Hallows until later in the book than this fic could be set (not that I'm following the timeline very strictly; Ron should have deserted months ago), so though at one point earlier in the series he knew it, he has now conveniently forgot it again. Oops. For other notes and disclaimers, please see the first chapter.
The Three Billy Go(on with You, Now!)ats Gruff
Harry sighed and stretched. It had been another long day. Hermione had come up with the idea of tracking down places associated with Salazar Slytherin’s life, and they had spent today in a mostly vacant field in Lincolnshire that had apparently been the site of his wedding. Harry still had trouble believing Slytherin had ever actually gotten married, but Hermione had managed to find a tiny annotation in one of the particularly ancient books she was lugging about with them that mentioned the detail.
“We know he had descendents, after all, so it’s reasonable to assume he was married,” Hermione had said logically. “From what you’ve said the Gaunts were fanatical about making sure everyone knew that he was a direct ancestor of theirs. Apparently he chose a pureblood bride and set about increasing the population of witches and wizards with what he felt was the proper ancestry: his.”
She had grimaced at these words, but the three of them had carefully combed over the field, looking for anything that might be a Horcrux. Their search had yielded four opened crisp bags, two empty beer bottles, several cigarette packets, a broken umbrella, a few quid of Muggle money in coins, a dirty nappy, and three manky gloves.
“I don’t think any of this lot have a bit of You-Know-Who’s soul in them,” Ron had said, nudging the umbrella with his trainer. “Granted, the Portkey to the World Cup was a boot, but still.”
“No,” Harry had agreed. “Dumbledore said that he would probably use things that were important historically, stuff related to the founders.”
“Then unless that’s the nappy of Slytherin’s first born, I think we’ve dropped the Quaffle on this one,” Ron had said.
“At least it was worth a try,” Hermione had said defensively before Vanishing the rubbish. “I suppose we can give ourselves credit for cleaning up the area.”
“Yeah, and we’ve picked up enough Muggle money to buy a decent dinner the next time one of us uses Polyjuice to slip into a town,” Harry had said, “so there’s that too.”
Ron was all for that, so he agreed to turn into a random middle-aged Muggle man who had left a comb sitting on a park bench in Sussex, complete with a few hairs still in the teeth, and hurried off to a nearby take-away spot. He’d returned victoriously about half an hour later with burgers and chips, still piping hot, which had made really rather a jolly meal. Now they were sitting about, rather contentedly patting their full stomachs and idly watching as Ron’s face began to change back to his usual appearance.
“So are there any other spots with a connection to Slytherin?” Ron asked as he idly examined his hands, the left one of which was now his own and the right still the one that belonged to the Muggle.
“His birthplace, obviously, which shouldn’t far away, and then there’s the spot where his home was with his wife, and possibly his children’s homes, and there’s his burial site, and perhaps a few other places. Unfortunately I don’t know where any of those are, though,” Hermione said. “At least not yet. I have some more research to do.”
“Oh good,” Ron said, a bitter edge in his voice. “Just think of all the old, worn-out gloves we can find at all those spots. We might even wind up with a pair.”
“I know the odds are long on the Horcruxes being there, but they must be someplace. If you have a better idea, say so,” Hermione said, glaring at him.
“Going home?” he said, suddenly looking up at both of them with a bit of hope. “We could go back to the Burrow and plan some more, and use that as our base of operations. Then when we think we’ve got a real lead, we can go out and get the bloody Horcruxes, but in the meanwhile we can eat regularly and sleep in real beds and not be bouncing around a bunch of vacant, boring wilderness all the time.”
“And what do we do when the Death Eaters who are undoubtedly watching your parents’ house show up to kill us all?” Hermione said, though Harry noticed her tone wasn’t actually unkind, just weary.
“Are we sure they’d really be looking for us there? I mean, I’m supposed to have spattergroit, so that’s taken care of. Why would they look at the Burrow?” Ron said stubbornly.
“Because they’re evil, Ronald, not stupid,” Hermione said, sighing. “I’m fairly sure they already know the ghoul in your parents’ attic isn’t you, and they’re just waiting for you or better yet all three of us to turn up on their doorstep. It just isn’t sensible.”
“Well, I’m tired of sensible!” Ron said so loudly that Harry jumped. “Nothing about this stupid search has been sensible so far. Rooting about in some bloody field for hours just because Slytherin might possibly have got married there about a thousand years ago and maybe You-Know-Who stuck a piece of his rotten soul in some random piece of junk and hid it there is pathetic!”
“Not quite as pathetic as complaining about being bored while people are disappearing or dying elsewhere,” Hermione said coldly. “At least we’ve been somewhat safe. Others aren’t, you know.”
“Yeah, because thinking of Death Eaters watching my mum and dad’s every move is definitely going to make me feel better about all this,” Ron said. “Your parents are safely stowed away, so you’re fine.”
“Yes, I’m so lucky to have parents who don’t even remember that I exist,” Hermione said, folding her arms.
“So? That was your choice,” Ron said. “Deal with it.”
“And it was your choice to come along on this trip knowing full well how much we’d be blundering about,” Harry finally broke in, his temper having finally blown. “If you can point out where the next Horcrux is, Ron, please, enlighten us. The field didn’t work out, but it was at least a fair try.”
Ron waved his hand dismissively as if to say Harry wasn’t making any sense, but his expression said he was uncomfortable. On a hunch, Harry got up, strode to what passed for their kitchen table, grabbed the ugly locket that housed Voldemort’s soul, and shoved it in a cupboard. As soon as the door closed on it, he could almost physically feel the air in the room grow less charged, like opening a window to chase out a terrible smell. When Harry turned around to look at the others again, there was a slightly less angry angle to their postures, but damage had still been done.
“I guess the Horcrux couldn’t stand to see us well fed and content for once and had to louse everything up,” Harry said almost apologetically.
“Yeah, I guess so,” Ron said, though he didn’t sound particularly certain that was the problem, and Harry was more than a little uneasy himself. “Do you think it really can see?”
“I don’t know,” Harry said. “Maybe not literally, but it definitely senses things somehow. Like the diary. It could tell what was going on around it and even think for itself some.”
They all looked at the closed cupboard door, feeling like there was an intruder in their midst.
“I really hate that thing,” Hermione said in barely more than a whisper.
Harry nodded. Things were difficult enough without the locket starting to ramp up their frustrations and turn them against each other. He was reminded of something Luna had said to him, that Voldemort would want him to feel alone. Harry wondered if it was possible the Horcrux realized that their greatest asset now was one another, and it was trying to undo their friendship and support in whatever way it could. It certainly sounded like an idea Voldemort would concoct.
“How about a story, then?” Harry asked Hermione. “There’s got to be some more you haven’t told us yet.”
“I’m turning into a right little Scheherazade, aren’t I,” Hermione said, still looking glum.
“Bless you,” Ron said.
“I didn’t sneeze. That was a queen’s name in a story. Her husband threatened to kill her, but every night before bed, she would begin to tell him a story, and then promise to finish it on the following night if he permitted her to live. She told stories for a thousand and one nights, by which time she had given birth to at least two children, and he decided to let her live since she’d been so amusing,” Hermione said, becoming less gloomy when she had something to talk about.
“Your lot have weird marriages,” Ron said. “Do you know enough stories for that long?”
“I don’t think we’ll be out travelling for quite that long. At least I hope not. But I’ve still got a fair few,” Hermione said.
“Well, then, favor us with a tale, m’lady,” Harry said with an exaggerated bow. Hermione laughed, but Ron gave him a slightly dark look.
“Fine, as there are three of us, let’s have ‘The Three Billy Goats Gruff,’” Hermione said.
“But you’re not a billy goat,” Ron said sagely. “You’d be a nanny goat.”
“Once again, well spotted,” Hermione said, obviously remembering their fourth year. “I don’t suppose the gender of the goats actually matters all that much in this story, though. It really could be just as easily ‘The Three Nanny Goats Gruff,’ I suppose.”
“Doesn’t have as good of a ring to it, though,” Ron said, squinting at the ceiling.
“Perhaps not, although the repetition of the long e sound is present in both versions as a device to tie the words together. In any case, once—,” Hermione began.
“Wait, wait, what do you mean gruff?” Ron said. “We’re not even past the title yet and I’ve got questions that need answering!”
Hermione took a deep breath and seemed to be praying for strength for a moment before she said, “It basically just means that they’re rather rough and uncouth, which really isn’t all that unusual for goats.”
“Okay, I’ll accept that,” Ron said. “You can go on now.”
“Thanks ever so,” Hermione said with a sarcastically simpering smile. “Where was I? Once—“
“—upon a time,” Ron finished, and Harry noticed that whether she realized it or not, she had waited for the interruption to occur.
“Yes, there were three billy goats, all brothers, who lived in a green meadow near a river,” Hermione said.
“Do they have names?” Ron asked.
“No, not that I ever heard,” Hermione said.
“Oh, well that’s fairly normal. Wait, do they talk?” Ron asked.
“Yes, actually, they do,” Hermione said.
“Oh,” Ron said, looking crestfallen. “I suppose there has to be something odd in these things or they’d be boring.”
“A story that was simply a retelling of mute goats roaming about the hills and eating grass more than likely wouldn’t meet your discriminating tastes in plot development and characterization,” Hermione said primly. “The three goats were, as usual, eating on the hillside, but they had such voracious appetites that they had already eaten up almost all of the good grass.”
“I know how they feel,” Ron said. “I wish I could eat grass sometimes.”
“It’d make life a lot simpler at the moment,” Harry agreed.
“Unfortunately, none of us is experienced in partial animal-to-human transfiguration, so as we don’t have goat stomachs or those belonging to any bovine species, grass really isn’t among our options,” Hermione said.
“It’s a bad sign when grass starts to sound as good as one of Florian Fortescue’s sundaes,” Ron said.
Hermione said nothing but looked wistful at the memory of those ice cream confections. Harry had to admit that Ron had a point. They had all become a bit obsessed with food. If Harry didn’t get a slice of treacle tart again soon, he was going to wonder if his tongue were going dead.
“So what did the goats who had literally eaten an entire hillside of grass do?” Ron asked, breaking their reverie.
“Well, the smallest goat noticed there was a fresh, green field full of the most delicious grass just across a river that bordered their field, and there was a little wooden bridge that went across from their side to that one,” Hermione said.
“From the way these things usually go, I’m guessing the goat didn’t just try to cross the bridge but did something daft like diving into the river and being swept away by the current or trying to build a boat out of rocks or flapping his horns and flying across or something,” Ron said.
“Flapping his horns?” Hermione said, giving him a look of patented disbelief.
“You told us one once where two kids rode a duck across a pond, and another where a boy outran a giant and cut down a huge beanstalk before it caught up to him,” Ron said. “Are horn-flapping goats all that far out of the range of possibility?”
‘When you put it that way, not really,” Hermione admitted.
“Now I can’t get the Crumple-Horned Snorkack out of my head,” Harry said.
“They are not three Crumple-Horned Snorkacks nor Nargles nor Wrackspurts nor Blibbering Humdingers nor Galumptious Whowhatsits or anything else Luna goes on about,” Hermione said crossly. “They’re just goats.”
“The weird stuff Luna believes in kind of annoys you, doesn’t it?” Ron said.
“I suppose a bit. She’s a nice girl and a good friend, but I wish she wouldn’t be quite so gullible about things that can’t possibly exist,” Hermione said, sounding exasperated.
“So it gets your goat, then?” Ron asked, grinning.
“Oh, for Merlin’s sake,” Hermione grumbled while she rubbed her forehead as Harry laughed. “Yes, fine, it gets my goat, but let’s get back to the other perfectly normal, barnyard quality goats on the hillside.”
“That all talk,” Ron pointed out.
“All right, then, normal goats except for their ability to speak,” Hermione said. “Let’s not split hairs, shall we.”
“Fine. So the smallest Crumple-Horned… I mean goat is going to try for the nice green grass in the neighbor’s garden,” Ron said. “So what exactly does he decide to do?”
“He crossed the bridge,” Hermione said.
Ron looked at Harry, then back at Hermione.
“He did?” Ron asked in stunned disbelief.
“Yes,” she said. “What’s so odd about that?”
“Nothing,” Ron replied. “That’s what so odd about it.”
“Notice that I didn’t say he got to the other side, though,” Hermione said. “He was going across the bridge, clickety-clackety-clickety-clackety, when suddenly—“
“Clickety-clackety?” Ron said, giving her a look that plainly meant he thought she’d gone mad.
“It’s supposed to be an onomatopoeia for the goat’s hooves going across an old wooden bridge,” Hermione said.
“I got that, but it’s rather twee,” Ron said. “Also, why is there now something on a mat of peas?”
“No,” Hermione said, smiling. “Onomatopoeia. It means a word that is supposed to sound similar to the sound it represents, like pop or buzz or boom. In this case, it’s a bit less formal.”
“There’s a specific word for a word that sounds like what the sound it sounds like sounds like?” Ron asked.
Hermione worked that sentence out in her head for a moment before answering, “Yes.”
“That’s just beyond the level of specificity any language needs,” Ron said. “What’s next? A word for spot between your eyebrows?”
“The glabella,” Hermione said at once and continued on, ignoring Ron’s look of desperate disbelief leveled at Harry, who was now completely convinced Hermione had not only read the entire dictionary but had taken copious notes on it. “The littlest billy goat gruff was almost across when he heard a thunderous voice bellow, ‘Who is that crossing my bridge?’ With that an enormous troll appeared from underneath the bridge.”
“But who was it who asked who was crossing the bridge?” Ron asked, confused.
“The troll,” Hermione said.
“But trolls just point and grunt,” Ron said. “Back me up on this one, Harry.”
“I do have to go with Ron in this case,” Harry said. “Trolls don’t exactly have a great ability to speak English.”
“Recall that the troll is speaking to a goat,” Hermione pointed out. “Give your imagination a stretch.”
“Okay, but even so, I’m betting a goat learns English before a troll does,” Ron said. “Come on, Hermione, you nearly got pulverized in the girls’ toilet by one. He wasn’t exactly quoting Shakespeare at the time, now was he?”
“No, he most certainly was not,” she said with a shudder. “And by the by, thank you for that, both of you.”
Ron preened a moment while Harry merely said, “No problem” and looked modest, both conveniently forgetting to mention they were the ones who had locked it in the loo with her to begin with.
“You need to understand that Muggles think of trolls a bit differently than they really are,” Hermione said.
“Like fairies,” Ron said with a frown, bringing up his favorite example for the hundredth time.
“Yes,” Hermione said, “a bit like that. They’ve got parts of it right. They know trolls are big, very strong, and inclined to attack without provocation, particularly if they’re hungry. They think they live in the mountains, which is at least partly true for mountain trolls, as well as under bridges, which is true of river trolls, so they got bits of their nature correct, but they mixed them together here. Muggles also seem to think they’re a tiny bit brighter than trolls really are. Oh, and they’re usually supposed to be native to Scandinavia for some reason.”
“Fine, fine, at least parts are almost right. Let’s say this one’s a paragon of trolls and he speaks English really well… to goats,” Ron said, shaking his head. “I ask you. So the troll pops up and eats the goat?”
“No, the goat said, ‘Oh, don’t eat me! I’m far too small. My big brother will be along in a minute or two, and he’s much tastier than I am!’” Hermione said, using an oddly high-pitched bleating voice for the goat.
“Do you need a lozenge?” Ron asked kindly.
“No, that’s just, oh skip it,” Hermione said.
“Right, so after the troll ate the smallest goat as an appetizer, what did he do?” Ron asked.
“He didn’t eat the goat at all,” Hermione said. “He thought about it and decided he’d rather have the bigger goat, then let the smaller one pass by into the meadow to eat grass to his heart’s content.”
“He didn’t think to eat both of them?” Ron asked.
“No, apparently it didn’t occur to him,” Hermione said.
“Considering he’s a troll, that actually makes sense,” Ron said. “So the rotten littlest goat, whom I am now christening Percy, throws his family to the troll to save himself and gets to romp about in a meadow of happy daisies?”
“Well, yes,” Hermione said, “but there’s more to the story. You see, the smallest goat was right, and the middle-sized goat also decided to cross the bridge to the better pasture. He too went to cross the bridge, going lompety-bompety-lompety-bompety.”
“Lompety… bompety…” Ron said slowly.
“It’s supposed to make it sound like his footfalls are heavier than the one that went clickety-clackety,” Hermione explained.
“Lompety… bompety…” Ron repeated, looking ill.
“Ehm, I suppose it is a bit over the top,” Hermione said, blushing. “I can use clompety-clompety instead, if you like?”
Ron looked helplessly at Harry.
“Let’s just assume he made a louder noise and move on before Ron has an aneurysm or something,” Harry said.
“Fine. The troll popped out from under the bridge once again, saying ‘Who is that crossing my bridge?’, and this goat gave the same defense as his little brother,” Hermione said.
“What? He said, ‘Don’t eat me because I’ve got an even bigger brother coming along and you don’t want to stuff yourself too much’?” Ron said.
“In so many words, yes,” Hermione said. “Considering the troll had believed the first goat and he turned out to be telling the truth, I suppose there’s a bit of a reason to suspect this goat might be as well, so there’s a tiny smidgeon of rational thought happening.”
“Okay, so Percy the Second goes over to the pasture to romp with Percy the First,” Ron said.
“Shouldn’t Percy’s older brother be Charlie and the next Bill?” Hermione asked.
“No,” Ron said, looking scandalized. “Charlie wouldn’t do a thing like that! There are two Percys in this story, and that’s final.”
Harry couldn’t help wondering if the rift in the Weasley family was ever going to mend. Percy was a prat, no doubt of that, but he was certain Mrs. Weasley missed him terribly, and he wondered if his brothers, sister, and father would ever really be able to let go of their anger towards him, even if Percy managed to apologize one day. As much as he had never been particularly fond of Percy, he hoped they could for Mrs. Weasley’s sake.
“By this time, the largest billy goat gruff had realized his two younger brothers had gone to the other pasture, and he decided to join them as he was still very hungry. He went across the bridge as well, going STOMP-STOMP-STOMP-STOMP!” Hermione said, ending by yelling the last four words so abruptly that Ron almost jumped into Harry’s lap in surprise.
“Too much?” Hermione asked, a little concerned.
“Just a little, yeah,” Ron said. “Is this goat the size of Fang or something?”
“Some goats do reach fairly good size, up to as much as three hundred pounds in some cases, so theoretically, yes, he could be quite a lot larger than Fang,” Hermione said.
“Goat size,” Ron said. “I’ll add that to the list.”
“List of what?” Hermione asked.
“Random things you know that make me think you might not quite be human,” Ron said.
“I’m still trying to wrap my head around a three hundred pound goat,” Harry said shuddering. “And I thought the most disturbing thing about them was those freakish horizontal pupils.”
“I admit, I find those a little disconcerting myself,” Hermione said. “They just don’t look right somehow.”
“Okay, so there’s a three hundred pound ungulate with horizontal slit pupils stomping across the troll’s bridge. I suddenly feel pity and empathy for a troll. Now what?” Ron asked.
“The troll came out from under the bridge, saying, ‘Who is that crossing my bridge?’ and with that the third and largest of the billy goats gruff lowered his horns, picked up speed, and butted the troll right off the bridge and into the gorge where the river flowed far below, and he died,” Hermione said.
“A goat of few words,” Ron said.
“Also some pretty impressive butting skills there,” Harry said.
“True,” Ron said, nodding his approval. “I do feel a little sorry for the troll, though, since he didn’t actually eat anyone in this yet, but I’m not all that fussed. Maybe a two on a scale of one to ten. So I take it the biggest goat, who really is obviously either Bill or Charlie, then went to the meadow?”
“Would that make him named Barlie or Chill?” Harry asked.
“Oh, Chill, definitely,” Ron said with a grin. “Much cooler. But the goat did get to stuff himself full of grass?”
“Yes, he and his two brothers ate on the other hill and got tremendously fat and could travel back and forth over the bridge without fear. And they lived quite happily ever after,” Hermione said.
“Hurrah for the happy goats, I suppose, even if two of them were a couple of rotten turncoats on the big one,” Ron said.
“Or they knew that the oldest goat would be able to take care of himself and just trusted in his abilities,” Hermione pointed out.
“I guess,” Ron said uncertainly. “Still, it keeps reminding me of another story I’ve heard, but I can’t quite remember what it is.”
“Probably ‘The Three Brothers’ by Beedle,” Hermione said, nodding in the general direction of her little beaded bag where the book Dumbledore had left her in his will rested along with all the other tomes she’d taken along on their journey. “There’s even a bridge in that one, too.”
“There is?” Harry asked, looking curious.
“Oh yeah, that’s the one,” Ron said, and he looked distinctly uncomfortable. “Would you mind not telling it tonight, though? It always gave me nightmares when Mum told it when I was little.”
“It’s awfully late now anyway,” Hermione said. “We should be turning in.”
Harry was a little disappointed that he wouldn’t get to hear a wizarding fairy tale, but he had to admit he was very tired himself. As the three of them found their beds and slumped into them, exhausted but in better tempers, it was Ron and Hermione who remembered the enemy who had confronted the Peverell brothers upon the bridge, and while Ron still shuddered at the thought of confronting Death itself, Hermione remembered the ending of the tale. The last enemy to be defeated was Death, though not in the way Voldemort had tried. Perhaps there was some hope in that.
As the wind blew fiercely once more against the fabric of the tent, the Horcrux remained out of sight, and for once, their dreams were peaceful.
Onward to Stone S(o Very, Very Wrong)oup
Previous chapters:
Cinder-What-the-Hell?-a
Snow Wh-at-Are-You-Kidding-Me?-ite
Sleeping Bea-You-People-Are-Mad-ty
Little Red Riding Ho-w-Is-That-Possible?-od
Rumple-Still-As-Crazy-As-Ever-tskin
The Frog Pr-in-What-Way-Is-That-Possible?-ince
Rap-solutely-mental-unzel
Jack the Giant Kill(-Me-Now!)-er
Hansel and Gr(eat-Now-I'm-Hungry)etel
Goldilocks and the Three B(e-Serious-Now!)ear
Beauty and the (Un)Be(freaking-lievable!)ast
The Little Mer-(eally-Deeply-Disturbing)-maid
The Three L(acking in Any Sanity)ittle Pigs
Puss in B(onkers, Absolutely Bonkers!)oots
The W(hat Is in These People's Tea?)ild Swans
The Twelve Danc(incerely Madder Than Hares)ing Princesses
The Pied Piper of H(ow Do You People Sleep?)amelin
The Snow Qu(ite Nutty, Aren't They)een
The Elves and the Sh(ocking, Just Shocking!)oemaker
The Princess and the P(lease Say You’re Making This Up)ea
The Emperor's New Clo(se to Bonkers)thes
The Gingerbread M(an, What Are You People On?)an
The Little R(ight Bunch of Nutters You Lot Are)ed Hen
Bluebe(reasonable, now!)ard
N.B. It was pointed out to me that Harry does not know the story of the Deathly Hallows until later in the book than this fic could be set (not that I'm following the timeline very strictly; Ron should have deserted months ago), so though at one point earlier in the series he knew it, he has now conveniently forgot it again. Oops. For other notes and disclaimers, please see the first chapter.
Harry sighed and stretched. It had been another long day. Hermione had come up with the idea of tracking down places associated with Salazar Slytherin’s life, and they had spent today in a mostly vacant field in Lincolnshire that had apparently been the site of his wedding. Harry still had trouble believing Slytherin had ever actually gotten married, but Hermione had managed to find a tiny annotation in one of the particularly ancient books she was lugging about with them that mentioned the detail.
“We know he had descendents, after all, so it’s reasonable to assume he was married,” Hermione had said logically. “From what you’ve said the Gaunts were fanatical about making sure everyone knew that he was a direct ancestor of theirs. Apparently he chose a pureblood bride and set about increasing the population of witches and wizards with what he felt was the proper ancestry: his.”
She had grimaced at these words, but the three of them had carefully combed over the field, looking for anything that might be a Horcrux. Their search had yielded four opened crisp bags, two empty beer bottles, several cigarette packets, a broken umbrella, a few quid of Muggle money in coins, a dirty nappy, and three manky gloves.
“I don’t think any of this lot have a bit of You-Know-Who’s soul in them,” Ron had said, nudging the umbrella with his trainer. “Granted, the Portkey to the World Cup was a boot, but still.”
“No,” Harry had agreed. “Dumbledore said that he would probably use things that were important historically, stuff related to the founders.”
“Then unless that’s the nappy of Slytherin’s first born, I think we’ve dropped the Quaffle on this one,” Ron had said.
“At least it was worth a try,” Hermione had said defensively before Vanishing the rubbish. “I suppose we can give ourselves credit for cleaning up the area.”
“Yeah, and we’ve picked up enough Muggle money to buy a decent dinner the next time one of us uses Polyjuice to slip into a town,” Harry had said, “so there’s that too.”
Ron was all for that, so he agreed to turn into a random middle-aged Muggle man who had left a comb sitting on a park bench in Sussex, complete with a few hairs still in the teeth, and hurried off to a nearby take-away spot. He’d returned victoriously about half an hour later with burgers and chips, still piping hot, which had made really rather a jolly meal. Now they were sitting about, rather contentedly patting their full stomachs and idly watching as Ron’s face began to change back to his usual appearance.
“So are there any other spots with a connection to Slytherin?” Ron asked as he idly examined his hands, the left one of which was now his own and the right still the one that belonged to the Muggle.
“His birthplace, obviously, which shouldn’t far away, and then there’s the spot where his home was with his wife, and possibly his children’s homes, and there’s his burial site, and perhaps a few other places. Unfortunately I don’t know where any of those are, though,” Hermione said. “At least not yet. I have some more research to do.”
“Oh good,” Ron said, a bitter edge in his voice. “Just think of all the old, worn-out gloves we can find at all those spots. We might even wind up with a pair.”
“I know the odds are long on the Horcruxes being there, but they must be someplace. If you have a better idea, say so,” Hermione said, glaring at him.
“Going home?” he said, suddenly looking up at both of them with a bit of hope. “We could go back to the Burrow and plan some more, and use that as our base of operations. Then when we think we’ve got a real lead, we can go out and get the bloody Horcruxes, but in the meanwhile we can eat regularly and sleep in real beds and not be bouncing around a bunch of vacant, boring wilderness all the time.”
“And what do we do when the Death Eaters who are undoubtedly watching your parents’ house show up to kill us all?” Hermione said, though Harry noticed her tone wasn’t actually unkind, just weary.
“Are we sure they’d really be looking for us there? I mean, I’m supposed to have spattergroit, so that’s taken care of. Why would they look at the Burrow?” Ron said stubbornly.
“Because they’re evil, Ronald, not stupid,” Hermione said, sighing. “I’m fairly sure they already know the ghoul in your parents’ attic isn’t you, and they’re just waiting for you or better yet all three of us to turn up on their doorstep. It just isn’t sensible.”
“Well, I’m tired of sensible!” Ron said so loudly that Harry jumped. “Nothing about this stupid search has been sensible so far. Rooting about in some bloody field for hours just because Slytherin might possibly have got married there about a thousand years ago and maybe You-Know-Who stuck a piece of his rotten soul in some random piece of junk and hid it there is pathetic!”
“Not quite as pathetic as complaining about being bored while people are disappearing or dying elsewhere,” Hermione said coldly. “At least we’ve been somewhat safe. Others aren’t, you know.”
“Yeah, because thinking of Death Eaters watching my mum and dad’s every move is definitely going to make me feel better about all this,” Ron said. “Your parents are safely stowed away, so you’re fine.”
“Yes, I’m so lucky to have parents who don’t even remember that I exist,” Hermione said, folding her arms.
“So? That was your choice,” Ron said. “Deal with it.”
“And it was your choice to come along on this trip knowing full well how much we’d be blundering about,” Harry finally broke in, his temper having finally blown. “If you can point out where the next Horcrux is, Ron, please, enlighten us. The field didn’t work out, but it was at least a fair try.”
Ron waved his hand dismissively as if to say Harry wasn’t making any sense, but his expression said he was uncomfortable. On a hunch, Harry got up, strode to what passed for their kitchen table, grabbed the ugly locket that housed Voldemort’s soul, and shoved it in a cupboard. As soon as the door closed on it, he could almost physically feel the air in the room grow less charged, like opening a window to chase out a terrible smell. When Harry turned around to look at the others again, there was a slightly less angry angle to their postures, but damage had still been done.
“I guess the Horcrux couldn’t stand to see us well fed and content for once and had to louse everything up,” Harry said almost apologetically.
“Yeah, I guess so,” Ron said, though he didn’t sound particularly certain that was the problem, and Harry was more than a little uneasy himself. “Do you think it really can see?”
“I don’t know,” Harry said. “Maybe not literally, but it definitely senses things somehow. Like the diary. It could tell what was going on around it and even think for itself some.”
They all looked at the closed cupboard door, feeling like there was an intruder in their midst.
“I really hate that thing,” Hermione said in barely more than a whisper.
Harry nodded. Things were difficult enough without the locket starting to ramp up their frustrations and turn them against each other. He was reminded of something Luna had said to him, that Voldemort would want him to feel alone. Harry wondered if it was possible the Horcrux realized that their greatest asset now was one another, and it was trying to undo their friendship and support in whatever way it could. It certainly sounded like an idea Voldemort would concoct.
“How about a story, then?” Harry asked Hermione. “There’s got to be some more you haven’t told us yet.”
“I’m turning into a right little Scheherazade, aren’t I,” Hermione said, still looking glum.
“Bless you,” Ron said.
“I didn’t sneeze. That was a queen’s name in a story. Her husband threatened to kill her, but every night before bed, she would begin to tell him a story, and then promise to finish it on the following night if he permitted her to live. She told stories for a thousand and one nights, by which time she had given birth to at least two children, and he decided to let her live since she’d been so amusing,” Hermione said, becoming less gloomy when she had something to talk about.
“Your lot have weird marriages,” Ron said. “Do you know enough stories for that long?”
“I don’t think we’ll be out travelling for quite that long. At least I hope not. But I’ve still got a fair few,” Hermione said.
“Well, then, favor us with a tale, m’lady,” Harry said with an exaggerated bow. Hermione laughed, but Ron gave him a slightly dark look.
“Fine, as there are three of us, let’s have ‘The Three Billy Goats Gruff,’” Hermione said.
“But you’re not a billy goat,” Ron said sagely. “You’d be a nanny goat.”
“Once again, well spotted,” Hermione said, obviously remembering their fourth year. “I don’t suppose the gender of the goats actually matters all that much in this story, though. It really could be just as easily ‘The Three Nanny Goats Gruff,’ I suppose.”
“Doesn’t have as good of a ring to it, though,” Ron said, squinting at the ceiling.
“Perhaps not, although the repetition of the long e sound is present in both versions as a device to tie the words together. In any case, once—,” Hermione began.
“Wait, wait, what do you mean gruff?” Ron said. “We’re not even past the title yet and I’ve got questions that need answering!”
Hermione took a deep breath and seemed to be praying for strength for a moment before she said, “It basically just means that they’re rather rough and uncouth, which really isn’t all that unusual for goats.”
“Okay, I’ll accept that,” Ron said. “You can go on now.”
“Thanks ever so,” Hermione said with a sarcastically simpering smile. “Where was I? Once—“
“—upon a time,” Ron finished, and Harry noticed that whether she realized it or not, she had waited for the interruption to occur.
“Yes, there were three billy goats, all brothers, who lived in a green meadow near a river,” Hermione said.
“Do they have names?” Ron asked.
“No, not that I ever heard,” Hermione said.
“Oh, well that’s fairly normal. Wait, do they talk?” Ron asked.
“Yes, actually, they do,” Hermione said.
“Oh,” Ron said, looking crestfallen. “I suppose there has to be something odd in these things or they’d be boring.”
“A story that was simply a retelling of mute goats roaming about the hills and eating grass more than likely wouldn’t meet your discriminating tastes in plot development and characterization,” Hermione said primly. “The three goats were, as usual, eating on the hillside, but they had such voracious appetites that they had already eaten up almost all of the good grass.”
“I know how they feel,” Ron said. “I wish I could eat grass sometimes.”
“It’d make life a lot simpler at the moment,” Harry agreed.
“Unfortunately, none of us is experienced in partial animal-to-human transfiguration, so as we don’t have goat stomachs or those belonging to any bovine species, grass really isn’t among our options,” Hermione said.
“It’s a bad sign when grass starts to sound as good as one of Florian Fortescue’s sundaes,” Ron said.
Hermione said nothing but looked wistful at the memory of those ice cream confections. Harry had to admit that Ron had a point. They had all become a bit obsessed with food. If Harry didn’t get a slice of treacle tart again soon, he was going to wonder if his tongue were going dead.
“So what did the goats who had literally eaten an entire hillside of grass do?” Ron asked, breaking their reverie.
“Well, the smallest goat noticed there was a fresh, green field full of the most delicious grass just across a river that bordered their field, and there was a little wooden bridge that went across from their side to that one,” Hermione said.
“From the way these things usually go, I’m guessing the goat didn’t just try to cross the bridge but did something daft like diving into the river and being swept away by the current or trying to build a boat out of rocks or flapping his horns and flying across or something,” Ron said.
“Flapping his horns?” Hermione said, giving him a look of patented disbelief.
“You told us one once where two kids rode a duck across a pond, and another where a boy outran a giant and cut down a huge beanstalk before it caught up to him,” Ron said. “Are horn-flapping goats all that far out of the range of possibility?”
‘When you put it that way, not really,” Hermione admitted.
“Now I can’t get the Crumple-Horned Snorkack out of my head,” Harry said.
“They are not three Crumple-Horned Snorkacks nor Nargles nor Wrackspurts nor Blibbering Humdingers nor Galumptious Whowhatsits or anything else Luna goes on about,” Hermione said crossly. “They’re just goats.”
“The weird stuff Luna believes in kind of annoys you, doesn’t it?” Ron said.
“I suppose a bit. She’s a nice girl and a good friend, but I wish she wouldn’t be quite so gullible about things that can’t possibly exist,” Hermione said, sounding exasperated.
“So it gets your goat, then?” Ron asked, grinning.
“Oh, for Merlin’s sake,” Hermione grumbled while she rubbed her forehead as Harry laughed. “Yes, fine, it gets my goat, but let’s get back to the other perfectly normal, barnyard quality goats on the hillside.”
“That all talk,” Ron pointed out.
“All right, then, normal goats except for their ability to speak,” Hermione said. “Let’s not split hairs, shall we.”
“Fine. So the smallest Crumple-Horned… I mean goat is going to try for the nice green grass in the neighbor’s garden,” Ron said. “So what exactly does he decide to do?”
“He crossed the bridge,” Hermione said.
Ron looked at Harry, then back at Hermione.
“He did?” Ron asked in stunned disbelief.
“Yes,” she said. “What’s so odd about that?”
“Nothing,” Ron replied. “That’s what so odd about it.”
“Notice that I didn’t say he got to the other side, though,” Hermione said. “He was going across the bridge, clickety-clackety-clickety-clackety, when suddenly—“
“Clickety-clackety?” Ron said, giving her a look that plainly meant he thought she’d gone mad.
“It’s supposed to be an onomatopoeia for the goat’s hooves going across an old wooden bridge,” Hermione said.
“I got that, but it’s rather twee,” Ron said. “Also, why is there now something on a mat of peas?”
“No,” Hermione said, smiling. “Onomatopoeia. It means a word that is supposed to sound similar to the sound it represents, like pop or buzz or boom. In this case, it’s a bit less formal.”
“There’s a specific word for a word that sounds like what the sound it sounds like sounds like?” Ron asked.
Hermione worked that sentence out in her head for a moment before answering, “Yes.”
“That’s just beyond the level of specificity any language needs,” Ron said. “What’s next? A word for spot between your eyebrows?”
“The glabella,” Hermione said at once and continued on, ignoring Ron’s look of desperate disbelief leveled at Harry, who was now completely convinced Hermione had not only read the entire dictionary but had taken copious notes on it. “The littlest billy goat gruff was almost across when he heard a thunderous voice bellow, ‘Who is that crossing my bridge?’ With that an enormous troll appeared from underneath the bridge.”
“But who was it who asked who was crossing the bridge?” Ron asked, confused.
“The troll,” Hermione said.
“But trolls just point and grunt,” Ron said. “Back me up on this one, Harry.”
“I do have to go with Ron in this case,” Harry said. “Trolls don’t exactly have a great ability to speak English.”
“Recall that the troll is speaking to a goat,” Hermione pointed out. “Give your imagination a stretch.”
“Okay, but even so, I’m betting a goat learns English before a troll does,” Ron said. “Come on, Hermione, you nearly got pulverized in the girls’ toilet by one. He wasn’t exactly quoting Shakespeare at the time, now was he?”
“No, he most certainly was not,” she said with a shudder. “And by the by, thank you for that, both of you.”
Ron preened a moment while Harry merely said, “No problem” and looked modest, both conveniently forgetting to mention they were the ones who had locked it in the loo with her to begin with.
“You need to understand that Muggles think of trolls a bit differently than they really are,” Hermione said.
“Like fairies,” Ron said with a frown, bringing up his favorite example for the hundredth time.
“Yes,” Hermione said, “a bit like that. They’ve got parts of it right. They know trolls are big, very strong, and inclined to attack without provocation, particularly if they’re hungry. They think they live in the mountains, which is at least partly true for mountain trolls, as well as under bridges, which is true of river trolls, so they got bits of their nature correct, but they mixed them together here. Muggles also seem to think they’re a tiny bit brighter than trolls really are. Oh, and they’re usually supposed to be native to Scandinavia for some reason.”
“Fine, fine, at least parts are almost right. Let’s say this one’s a paragon of trolls and he speaks English really well… to goats,” Ron said, shaking his head. “I ask you. So the troll pops up and eats the goat?”
“No, the goat said, ‘Oh, don’t eat me! I’m far too small. My big brother will be along in a minute or two, and he’s much tastier than I am!’” Hermione said, using an oddly high-pitched bleating voice for the goat.
“Do you need a lozenge?” Ron asked kindly.
“No, that’s just, oh skip it,” Hermione said.
“Right, so after the troll ate the smallest goat as an appetizer, what did he do?” Ron asked.
“He didn’t eat the goat at all,” Hermione said. “He thought about it and decided he’d rather have the bigger goat, then let the smaller one pass by into the meadow to eat grass to his heart’s content.”
“He didn’t think to eat both of them?” Ron asked.
“No, apparently it didn’t occur to him,” Hermione said.
“Considering he’s a troll, that actually makes sense,” Ron said. “So the rotten littlest goat, whom I am now christening Percy, throws his family to the troll to save himself and gets to romp about in a meadow of happy daisies?”
“Well, yes,” Hermione said, “but there’s more to the story. You see, the smallest goat was right, and the middle-sized goat also decided to cross the bridge to the better pasture. He too went to cross the bridge, going lompety-bompety-lompety-bompety.”
“Lompety… bompety…” Ron said slowly.
“It’s supposed to make it sound like his footfalls are heavier than the one that went clickety-clackety,” Hermione explained.
“Lompety… bompety…” Ron repeated, looking ill.
“Ehm, I suppose it is a bit over the top,” Hermione said, blushing. “I can use clompety-clompety instead, if you like?”
Ron looked helplessly at Harry.
“Let’s just assume he made a louder noise and move on before Ron has an aneurysm or something,” Harry said.
“Fine. The troll popped out from under the bridge once again, saying ‘Who is that crossing my bridge?’, and this goat gave the same defense as his little brother,” Hermione said.
“What? He said, ‘Don’t eat me because I’ve got an even bigger brother coming along and you don’t want to stuff yourself too much’?” Ron said.
“In so many words, yes,” Hermione said. “Considering the troll had believed the first goat and he turned out to be telling the truth, I suppose there’s a bit of a reason to suspect this goat might be as well, so there’s a tiny smidgeon of rational thought happening.”
“Okay, so Percy the Second goes over to the pasture to romp with Percy the First,” Ron said.
“Shouldn’t Percy’s older brother be Charlie and the next Bill?” Hermione asked.
“No,” Ron said, looking scandalized. “Charlie wouldn’t do a thing like that! There are two Percys in this story, and that’s final.”
Harry couldn’t help wondering if the rift in the Weasley family was ever going to mend. Percy was a prat, no doubt of that, but he was certain Mrs. Weasley missed him terribly, and he wondered if his brothers, sister, and father would ever really be able to let go of their anger towards him, even if Percy managed to apologize one day. As much as he had never been particularly fond of Percy, he hoped they could for Mrs. Weasley’s sake.
“By this time, the largest billy goat gruff had realized his two younger brothers had gone to the other pasture, and he decided to join them as he was still very hungry. He went across the bridge as well, going STOMP-STOMP-STOMP-STOMP!” Hermione said, ending by yelling the last four words so abruptly that Ron almost jumped into Harry’s lap in surprise.
“Too much?” Hermione asked, a little concerned.
“Just a little, yeah,” Ron said. “Is this goat the size of Fang or something?”
“Some goats do reach fairly good size, up to as much as three hundred pounds in some cases, so theoretically, yes, he could be quite a lot larger than Fang,” Hermione said.
“Goat size,” Ron said. “I’ll add that to the list.”
“List of what?” Hermione asked.
“Random things you know that make me think you might not quite be human,” Ron said.
“I’m still trying to wrap my head around a three hundred pound goat,” Harry said shuddering. “And I thought the most disturbing thing about them was those freakish horizontal pupils.”
“I admit, I find those a little disconcerting myself,” Hermione said. “They just don’t look right somehow.”
“Okay, so there’s a three hundred pound ungulate with horizontal slit pupils stomping across the troll’s bridge. I suddenly feel pity and empathy for a troll. Now what?” Ron asked.
“The troll came out from under the bridge, saying, ‘Who is that crossing my bridge?’ and with that the third and largest of the billy goats gruff lowered his horns, picked up speed, and butted the troll right off the bridge and into the gorge where the river flowed far below, and he died,” Hermione said.
“A goat of few words,” Ron said.
“Also some pretty impressive butting skills there,” Harry said.
“True,” Ron said, nodding his approval. “I do feel a little sorry for the troll, though, since he didn’t actually eat anyone in this yet, but I’m not all that fussed. Maybe a two on a scale of one to ten. So I take it the biggest goat, who really is obviously either Bill or Charlie, then went to the meadow?”
“Would that make him named Barlie or Chill?” Harry asked.
“Oh, Chill, definitely,” Ron said with a grin. “Much cooler. But the goat did get to stuff himself full of grass?”
“Yes, he and his two brothers ate on the other hill and got tremendously fat and could travel back and forth over the bridge without fear. And they lived quite happily ever after,” Hermione said.
“Hurrah for the happy goats, I suppose, even if two of them were a couple of rotten turncoats on the big one,” Ron said.
“Or they knew that the oldest goat would be able to take care of himself and just trusted in his abilities,” Hermione pointed out.
“I guess,” Ron said uncertainly. “Still, it keeps reminding me of another story I’ve heard, but I can’t quite remember what it is.”
“Probably ‘The Three Brothers’ by Beedle,” Hermione said, nodding in the general direction of her little beaded bag where the book Dumbledore had left her in his will rested along with all the other tomes she’d taken along on their journey. “There’s even a bridge in that one, too.”
“There is?” Harry asked, looking curious.
“Oh yeah, that’s the one,” Ron said, and he looked distinctly uncomfortable. “Would you mind not telling it tonight, though? It always gave me nightmares when Mum told it when I was little.”
“It’s awfully late now anyway,” Hermione said. “We should be turning in.”
Harry was a little disappointed that he wouldn’t get to hear a wizarding fairy tale, but he had to admit he was very tired himself. As the three of them found their beds and slumped into them, exhausted but in better tempers, it was Ron and Hermione who remembered the enemy who had confronted the Peverell brothers upon the bridge, and while Ron still shuddered at the thought of confronting Death itself, Hermione remembered the ending of the tale. The last enemy to be defeated was Death, though not in the way Voldemort had tried. Perhaps there was some hope in that.
As the wind blew fiercely once more against the fabric of the tent, the Horcrux remained out of sight, and for once, their dreams were peaceful.
Onward to Stone S(o Very, Very Wrong)oup
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