The days passed. There was no use. The words engraved on the parchment seemed to live on their own, dancing in an unintelligible cadence that only deepened my frustration. I had spent hours locked inside the hidden room, the curtains drawn and a single candle lit, casting long shadows across the stone walls. The silence was thick, broken only by the sound of my fingers turning page after page, searching for meaning in what refused to be read.
Philip remained unconscious, his breathing steady yet distant, and I… I was running out of options.
"I don't have time to wait," I whispered, clenching my teeth as I stared at the text that simply refused to speak to me.
I snapped the book shut where I had hidden the parchment and leaned back against the chair. The decision had been made before the thought fully formed: I needed Alphonse. Even if he refused to help me, even if he was the very one who had taught me to distrust everyone, he was the only one who knew enough to give me a starting point, and the only one I could trust.
That was when I made a risky decision.
That night, under the faint glow of my wand, I opened an ancient compartment in my trunk where I kept things no one was meant to see. I took out a small cylinder of dark silver, its engravings worn by time. It was a Protected Memory Seal, a method my family had developed generations ago, back when war had forced us to safeguard vital information.
I placed it on the desk and wrote a letter in precise, urgent strokes, explaining to Alphonse only what was necessary:
"Alphonse,
I know you didn't expect to hear from me again so soon. Neither did I imagine I would need your guidance like this again. I can't explain everything—not here, not now. But I've found something… ancient, very ancient. And I can't do this alone. If you ever believed I was ready to understand what you left behind, now is when I need to prove it.
—D."
Before sealing it, I made a handwritten copy of the information I had, written in invisible ink so it wouldn't be easy to decipher either. When I finished rewriting everything, I affixed the seal and let the magical ink dry as an owl descended from the perch, as if it had been waiting. I tied the parchment to its leg, then placed the metal, read-proof cylinder on its back. It was an ancestral receptacle, a design from my family, reinforced with enchantments I had learned in my future life, in another war. Enchantments he had never even considered teaching me.
But I remembered. Everything.
"Go. Only he will know how to open it," I said as I stroked its feathers, and the owl vanished into the closed night.
Two days passed before I received a response. I was reviewing runic reading formulas, drowning in my desperation, when I heard a sharp knock against the window. The same owl had returned. It carried an envelope heavier than the first letter.
I opened it carefully.
"Dion,
I can't say you surprise me easily, but this… this is something else.
How did you learn that protection? I didn't have time to teach it—at least not yet—but that doesn't matter now. What you've found is not just anything. This isn't part of the known records, not even among the forbidden texts. The encoding, the structure, the energy it emits… it's alive. It moves. It's magic older than the academies, older than the seals.
I'm going to need time. Don't do anything reckless.
—A."
I sighed. At least I wasn't alone in this anymore.
During the days that followed, the school resumed its usual rhythm. Professors returned to teaching their classes with a false calm, the corridors filled once more with laughter and whispers, though the echo of the tragedy still lingered like a dull vibration in the air. Not many spoke of what had happened. It was easier to look forward. To pretend it didn't hurt.
I couldn't pretend.
Philip, for his part, still hadn't woken up. His room was bathed in constant dimness, and the healers came and went without much noise. I stopped by every afternoon, hoping to see some sign. And finally, one afternoon, just as the sun began to set behind the stained glass of the east wing, I saw his fingers move.
I approached in silence, holding my breath.
"Philip," I said softly. "Can you hear me?"
His eyes opened with difficulty. They were dull, disoriented. He tried to move, but his body didn't respond. He only murmured something unintelligible.
"Easy," I added, more for myself than for him. "You're safe now."
He stared at me for several long seconds… or maybe he was only looking at my outline. He didn't seem to recognize me.
"Where am I?" he asked, his voice rough.
"At Hogwarts, to be precise, in the infirmary. You've been here for weeks."
Philip frowned. He looked at the walls as if they were unfamiliar. His gaze met mine… but without recognition.
"Do we know each other? Who are you?"
I felt the blow in my chest. Not because of any bond—we didn't really have one—but because every possibility of answers had just collapsed in front of me.
"I just… helped you. You were in danger."
"I don't remember anything…" he murmured, lowering his gaze.
A long pause settled between us. I stood up, intending to leave, but stopped at the threshold.
"When you remember something—anything—look for me. My name is Dion."
He nodded slowly, and I left, leaving behind a room as silent as the answers I was searching for.
Several days had passed since we escaped that cursed dungeon. Although my wounds had healed on the outside, something inside me still throbbed strangely. Every free moment I had, my thoughts returned to the book… or whatever that ancient parchment covered in layers of incomprehensible magic truly was.
I tried everything. Revelation charms, translation spells, even old runic decoding formulas I had learned on my own. But nothing worked.
Some parts of the text seemed to flicker as if responding to my mana, but whenever I tried to read them, the letters faded or distorted, as though reality itself were protecting them.
I had to do something. I needed answers. Philip… remained the same. I visited him in the infirmary a couple of times. Madam Pomfrey told me his physical wounds were healing well, but something in his mind was trapped. Sometimes he murmured unintelligible things; other times he simply breathed with difficulty. I couldn't rely on him for now.
Life at Hogwarts never stopped.
In History of Magic, Professor Binns didn't even mention the tragedy.
"More than two hundred years ago," he droned on, floating in front of the classroom, "similar defensive mechanisms were used in the ruins of Morcroft, very useful against intruders…"
In Defense Against the Dark Arts, the new interim professor asked us to write an essay on "magical trauma and its effect on bodily mana."
Ironic.
I found it impossible to fully concentrate. The parchment never left my mind.
Astronomy class, for example, used to be one of my favorite moments. In times of war, nights were difficult; calmly observing the stars was a privilege.
So when I arrived here, I discovered there was something hypnotic about watching the sky from the highest tower, the cold brushing against my cheeks as Professor Sinistra spoke of constellations as if they were ancient, forgotten songs.
"Can anyone tell me what pattern the constellation Lyra forms?" she asked one clear night, pointing her wand at a bright figure among the stars.
I blinked, as if waking from a dream, and raised my hand.
"A lyre," I replied. "According to ancient texts, it represents the instrument of Orpheus."
"Correct, Mr. Dion," she said with a faint smile.
My mind, however, remained fixed on Philip. On his closed eyes. On that silence of his that gave me no answers.
In Care of Magical Creatures, Hagrid introduced us to creatures resembling felines with iridescent wings. They were gentle, but sensitive to human emotions.
One of them, curiously, approached me and didn't leave my side for the entire class.
"It likes you, Dion," Hagrid commented. "These little ones can tell when someone's heart is… stirred up."
I only nodded, stroking the creature's soft back. If even magical creatures could sense what I was hiding, how much longer could I pretend?
It was after that class, in the library, that I found it.
An old tome, bound in worn leather, tucked among the intermediate-level potion sections.
"Partial Memory Recovery: Alchemical Approaches."
The title was modest, but its contents sparked a flicker of hope within me.
The potions didn't promise miracles… but small advances. Mental clarity. Stability. Maybe even answers.
"Philip might remember who he is. Maybe even why he's here…"
That night, I couldn't sleep.