In the Harry Potter Without Harry Potter

Chapter 401: Ghost Castle (2 in 1)

As if the cry had stirred up some memory, Nick had a look of surprise on his face and then without hesitation he drifted in the direction from which the sound had come.

"Aha! It's Myrtle!"

Soon Nick led Jon and the gang to the ghostly girl who was hiding behind a tree and crying in private.

It was a girl with freckles all over her face, not very pretty looking, having a bitter look on her face.

Myrtle froze for a moment at the sight of Nick, then saw Jon and became incredibly flustered after realising he was a living person.

"It's over! It's over! I've got Mr Baron in trouble again! I've been spotted by a muggle!"

She drifted up in a panic and was just about to flee when Nick called out to her.

"Don't say anything silly, Myrtle, the fact that he came with me proves he's a wizard. Come on, take us to that Baron fellow."

Myrtle, who was already a little on edge, seemed to respond only now, lowering her still sobbing face in mid-air to look at Nick and then at Lady Grey, who stood with a haughty look on her face without saying a word.

"Tis, erm, Nick?"

"Bollocks! You haven't seen me for just over ten years and you've forgotten me! Come on, it was Dumbledore who sent us over, you're following Baron, right? Come on, take us to him."

Only then did Myrtle fly back to Nick's side, wiping her eyes, only this time noticing what Jon was wearing and the end of his wand that stuck out of his pocket.

"Oh! It was Dumbledore who sent you!"

Her mood seemed to shift quickly, one second she was in the midst of grief, and the next she was getting excited.

"I thought that he had forgotten about us! We've heard about Dumbledore here too, we know he's in France now, and Mr Baron is still planning to wait for the next good news to hit, to re-sell the castle to some vampires, extort them for a fortune and then get back to Dumbledore with us!"

Myrtle led them in the direction of the Ghost Castle, all the while floating around happily in mid-air.

"Is this a Hogwarts student? How long has it been since I've seen a student of the school, I used to be one of the students just like you, but an accident turned me into a ghost."

As she said this it seemed like her mood had turned sad again, but soon the tone of her voice was ramped back up!

"And we've heard about the Triwizard Tournament recently! Baron read us the newspaper and told us that Dumbledore would soon be reclaiming Hogwarts Castle! Everyone is overjoyed!"

Nick asked at this time when he had the chance to interject.

"Who else besides you followed Baron here back then?"

"Professor Binns, who taught me the history of magic, and the Fat Friar who used to stay at Hufflepuff all the time, and about a dozen other Ghost Gentlemen and Ladies are here with Baron."

Myrtle gave Nick a giddy account of their time here.

"Baron pitted the vampires badly by using the connections of Professor Binns' family over here in Germany to contact the Ministry of Magic and also found one of the Fat Friar's descendants to help him dig up the treasures hidden by one of our ghosts who had died in the Goblin Rebellion. Half of those treasures were taken by the Fat Friar's descendant, and at the same time he helped us to complete our dealings with the German Ministry of Magic and put the previously uninhabited castle under the Baron's name. We then used the money to hire professional wizards to set up muggle-repelling spells and concealment magic around the castle, and we also transformed this castle to look like Hogwarts Castle, except it wasn't as big as the real Hogwarts"

Listening to her gushing, Jon realised that the ghosts who had left the castle were all still doing well under Baron's charge.

Soon, with Myrtle leading the way, Jon passed through what felt like a cold barrier of water, but in reality, he could see no difference, but as he went deeper, an increasingly chilling aura began to sweep over him, and at some point the dense woods around him disappeared, replaced by a wasteland of rubble. And in the middle of this wasteland was a towering grey and black castle!

It was a small castle, not nearly as big as Hogwarts Castle or Durmstrang Castle, but to be called a castle meant it couldn't be small either.

Just as he reached the front of the castle, Jon saw an old, grizzled ghost sitting on the steps of the main entrance, propping his chin up and staring at a stone tablet mumbling something inaudible that made one feel subconsciously drowsy.

"Professor Binns!"

Myrtle's loud cry seemed to wake the ghost, and he looked up to see Jon approaching along with Nick and Lady Grey floating beside him.

"Ah, Sir Nicholas and Lady Grey, have you come to join Baron as well, that's good, after all, we've all been together for so long before."

His voice was not loud, a bit like an old monk reciting a sutra, and he addressed Nick and the others with an old-fashioned salutation without being distant.

Then he looked back to Jon.

"There's another living person, ah, a child you saved in the middle of your journey? A place where ghosts gather is not a place for the living, but that's okay, I wonder if he's interested in the first all-wizarding village that Hengist of Woodcroft founded, it's a memorable history"

Myrtle didn't seem to want to interact with him much, which would make for a very draining experience.

"I'm going to take them to Baron, Professor Binns."

With that, she led the way and led Jon as she floated past the ghost professor who had once been in the castle and drifted inside.

As Myrtle had said, although the whole castle wasn't very big, it had been deliberately decorated by the ghosts to look like Hogwarts, even if the ghosts didn't enjoy any sort of material things at all, it did give them some solace in their minds.

Nick met quite a few acquaintances along the way; he had been well-liked among the ghosts as well as the students at Hogwarts before, and now he was pleased to see many old friends here.

Soon they were led by Myrtle to where Baron would be.

They went to the highest floor of the castle, to an empty office.

It claimed to be an office, but there wasn't really a desk or chair in it, and there were no bookshelves around, just some portraits of Hogwarts Castle and the Four Founders that hadn't been topped up with a developing solution.

Baron looked just as Jon had seen him depicted in the original book, with his hollow eyes, slim face, and silver specks of blood on his robes, a look that would have scared the faint-hearted even if he had just stood still without moving.

At the sight of Nick, who had been brought in by Myrtle, a friendly smile was evident on Baron's thin face, but it froze at the sight of Lady Grey.

That didn't mean the smile faded, though, but rather it was then replaced by an even bigger pleasant reaction.

"Hel."

He opened his mouth as if to call out Lady Grey's name, but eventually swallowed back the words later with an ashamed look on his face.

"There you are, just in time, we were recently discussing finding Dumbledore, the students he is leading have been settled, and I am almost done with my preparations here, it is time to go to see him."

Lady Grey acted as if she hadn't seen him, her eyes not even glancing towards Baron.

Nick acted enthusiastic on the contrary, but Jon could sense that even Nick himself was actually a little intimidated at the prospect of dealing with Baron.

"That's exactly why we're here, Baron, let me introduce you to none other than the champion representing us in the Triwizard Tournament this year - Jon Green."

It was at this time that Baron's eyes fell on Jon, there was a look of scrutiny in his eyes, but Jon didn't avoid it.

"I have heard of you, your exploits have spread throughout Europe in the last few months, is it Dumbledore who has sent you to find me to return?"

As the main ambassador of this "mission", Jon was of course the only one qualified to communicate the true purpose of their visit.

"It was not exactly Professor Dumbledore, who sent me to find you, Mr. Baron, but one of the founders of Hogwarts, Salazar Slytherin."

After hearing the name, Jon could tell that Baron's entirely transparent and hollow eyes tightened violently.

"Lord Salazar Slytherin."

"Yes, the very same gentleman, except that the one who conveyed his wishes was a portrait left behind by that man himself a thousand years ago. He sent me to find you to ask if you had kept what he had once told you to keep when he left Hogwarts."

As if in tears, Baron covered his face, making it impossible to tell exactly what kind of expression he was sporting at the moment, but his raspy and low voice rang out nonetheless.

"Of course. That thing, I don't dare forget it even for a moment"

***

Malfoy Manor, Britain.

Lucius had a rare period of leave after the second task had ended and the Hogwarts castle side had learned that Dumbledore had temporarily returned to France for a while.

Draco still had to attend school, so he and his wife Narcissa were the only ones at home today.

Oh yes, there was also Dobby, the house elf, to count.

"I told you to let the tea cool before you brought it over! What are you doing!"

Lucius, who was always in a tense mood even back at home, looked like he was holding fire in his belly and was trying to find an outlet for his boiling-hot emotions.

Dobby was unfortunate, as he had to be the one to handle this outlet every time it would appear.

"But, but lord, Dobby wanted to leave it here to cool as per your instructions, it was the lord who had come over in advance"

"So the fault is mine!" Lucius was full of anger, "Punish yourself!"

The next moment, Dobby rushed to the wall and kept banging his big head against it while screaming shrilly.

"Bad elf! Dobby is a bad elf!"

It was only when his forehead was bleeding from the impact that Lucius let him roll out of the drawing room.

Narcissa heard the commotion and came down from the bedroom upstairs.

She was pale and thin, looking like she had been having a tough time since Draco had been chosen as a Champion.

"Why aren't you at school keeping an eye on our son?"

She couldn't help but question her husband at the first sight of him.

Lucius walked around the drawing room in annoyance.

"With three or four months until the next task begins and Dumbledore taking all those students of his away from the school for the time being, there is little to no danger around Draco."

"It's not for us to say whether there's danger or not."

"Well, I know! But you have to trust me with this as well, I won't harm my son."

Eventually, Lucius sat down on the couch with a thump.

"The point is, I always felt something was wrong somewhere, Narcissa, especially in the castle, something was very wrong."

Narcissa couldn't contain her red eyes whenever she talked about what was going on with Draco these days, she sat down next to Lucius and grabbed his hand.

"Is it because of Dumbledore and the lot of them?"

"They're definitely up to something petty, everyone knows that, but it's not where something's wrong." Lucius stated the source of his annoyance, "It's the two of them, Crouch and Snape, they seem to be hiding something from the others, I can feel it, they think they can fake it, but who's a fool after being under our lord for so long?"

"What do you think it is? Something to do with this tournament?"

"I have a feeling it's going to be much more troubling than even this tournament itself." Lucius said gruffly, "I've been in touch with that Jon Green, and he has promised to keep our son safe during the tournament."

It was only when she heard him say this that Narcissa let out a long sigh of relief and looked much better.

She wasn't interested in all the rivalry among the Death Eaters, the only thing she cared about was her son's safety.

And there was no more dangerous figure in the Triwizard Tournament than Jon, even her own sister and brother-in-law's side of the family had died at the hands of that boy, so how could her poor son possibly survive.

"But they rejected my private intention to offer them some help, the reason actually being that they couldn't trust my character."

As he said this, Lucius' face visibly darkened a little, he was clearly still reeling from those blunt words Jon had spoken at the time.

Narcissa reassured her husband by saying.

"There's no need to rush, the situation isn't really clear yet, is it? Even if they do win this Triwizard Tournament they'll just have France and Hogwarts Castle, our lord still controls the whole of Britain, and we'll have plenty of chances later."

Lucius didn't say anything more.

Narcissa stayed at home all day or else had afternoon tea with the pureblood wives, so she wasn't aware of what was really going on at the forefront of Voldemort's conflict with Dumbledore.

After the second task, and especially after Draco had survived a narrow escape from underwater, shivering and hugging him, a sense of unease rose up inside Lucius.

He could only hope now that this premonition would not affect his family, especially Draco, who was in the middle of the vortex.

----

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