NOVEL NEXT Chapter 26: Panic at the Ministry of Magic
From what she had been told, the archway was located in the Death Chamber, at the very heart of the Ministry of Magic's Department of Mysteries. She couldn't hear any alarms, but she was certain that Unspeakables would soon be swarming in. There was no time to lose!
The magic she was about to perform was the one she would have tried using in the Mirror of Erised's room, had she not looked into the mirror and scrambled her brains. Unfortunately, at that moment, she had run out of trees, as Quirrell had burned them all down, so she had gone on autopilot and travelled to another world, as one usually does in such circumstances.
All kidding aside, she had thought of this magic while reading Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling, which was one of her course books. One passage detailed what was probably one of the earliest forms of magic that had existed; Sympathetic magic. By creating a facsimile of an original object, one could affect it, or imitate its powers from a distance, through the power of wishes. Voodoo and Idol Worship are examples of such magic.
In Oleandra's case, she was going to borrow the powers of the world tree Yggdrasil on a much smaller scale, using her small oak sapling. If one were to use a tree as an analogy, the nine realms would be on different branches, or roots in the case of Niflheim. Instead of jumping to another branch, she would simply travel along the Earth branch, basically achieving Apparition! Except she could only travel from a tree to another tree that she had previously marked.
Still, travelling through space-time was a difficult endeavour for a nearly second-year student. She would have to maximize the power of her runes through their Stadha.
"Berkana, Raidhu, Eihwaz, Dagaz!" cried Oleandra. "Let the wise oak become a doorway. Carry me through time and space to where I once stood!"
Oleandra's figured danced to the rhythm of the runes as she called them one by one. She was home free!
Or not. Why was she still here? Oleandra was beginning to feel very foolish, when more than twenty Unspeakables Apparated into the room, their wands trained on her. Oleandra's feelings of foolishness soon turned into feelings of panic. "Why aren't you working!" she yelled silently to her sapling.
Oleandra didn't know it yet, but she had caused a major panic at the ministry. Aurors were busy evacuating all Ministry personnel and were ready to burst in at a moment's notice the moment the Unspeakables gave the signal.
For as long as the Ministry has existed, the Archway and the Veil have always been there. Perhaps the Ministry was even built around them. In all of its years, such a thing had never happened. The Veil was supposed to be a one-way trip into the afterlife, no one had ever made the reverse journey!
Most of the Unspeakables looked visibly spooked, their hands clutching their trembling wands, while others looked fascinated, watching her every move. To tell the truth, they weren't combat specialists. They were arcane researchers, more at ease with experimenting with obscure magics than fighting dark wizards. They were proficient at all kinds of sealing magics in case experiments went wrong.
"Identify yourself!" shouted a man. "If you can understand us, give us a response! We will attack if we feel threatened!"
At this very moment, Oleandra did not look like a little girl. Around her swirled the mists of Hel, and her appearance constantly shifted and twisted in a rather nightmarish way, due to Perthro's reaction to the probing magics they were silently sending her way, trying to divine her true form.
That is when she realized why her spell had for all intents and purposes failed. How could she have forgotten! She lived in Hogwarts's basement, for Merlin's sake! She was the only person in the world who knew star magic didn't work properly underground! If she was lucky, the magic would only be delayed for a while. If the Chamber of Death was too far underground, then all bets were off!
Realizing her only hope was to buy time, she chuckled, eliciting a shudder of fear from her audience. Her voice was altered, as if ten different people were speaking at the same time. She was going to lay it on thick to temporarily scare them out of the idea of outright attacking her. If she were to be unmasked, she had no doubt she was going to be in big trouble!
"Whoever gave you the permission to take my gate?" she said coldly. "Humans weren't this conceited six thousand years ago."
Oleandra recognized the man. In the netherworld, she had heard his wife drone on and on about him while they were walking. The married couple worked at the Department of Mysteries. From the dead she had known, they all seemed to be extremely chatty. It appeared as though being dead was very boring. Oleandra decided to stay alive for as long as she could, if she could help it.
"The Veil is the property of the Ministry of Magic of the United Kingdom," Broderick Bode said coolly. "It has been in our possession ever since its foundation. Now, what gives you the right to demand it of us?"
As he said this, multiple Unspeakables began to slowly encircle her. She ignored them. It wasn't as if she could fight them, and her charade would fall apart the moment she launched an attack.
"The archways are mine," she said. Technically, she wasn't lying. Only those who truly wielded the power of runes could open the gates to other worlds, as far as she knew. "What use could you possibly make of them, mortals?"
She pointed upwards, at the golden lettering that was slowly disappearing. Once the archway was used, it was returning to its state of rest. The Unspeakables, well versed in all sorts of ancient scripts, immediately recognized the ancient runes for what they were. Also, they noted her usage of plural. Archways? There were more of them?
"Enough of this!" said another Unspeakable. "Subdue him! We'll learn all of his secrets if we can study him! Don't let him near the Veil!"
Oleandra began to feel a familiar tingling, and it was growing stronger. Her magic was about to take effect! She laughed derisively. "Sorry, Madam Bode, but I'll need to scare your husband a little to buy a few more seconds," she thought with a small amount of remorse.
"Fools!" she thundered. "You would do well not to provoke me. Allow me to remind you that the souls of every single one of the dead is under my dominion. Broderick Bode! Your wife, Bryn, misses you dearly. I would not mind sending you to her in advance, for she has served me well in death!"
Broderick Bode's already poor complexion paled in shock. This gave his other colleagues pause as well. What sort of existence had they provoked? Wizards had never faced this sort of threat before. As far as they knew, there were no aliens, they had never been invaded by parallel worlds, and they never had to face gods nor demons. This was completely new. The Unspeakables were also certain the mysterious figure had emerged from the Veil, and not simply Apparated in front of it. They knew for a fact that the Veil led to the world of the dead. This gave the mystery person's words a fair amount of weight.
Oleandra continued to laugh. "I think I shall enjoy myself greatly on my vacations here! Now, I bid you good-bye!"
She slightly misjudged her timing. An awkward second and a half passed, before her magic whisked her away under the shocked eyes of the Unspeakables, who had just finished laying down extra Anti-Disapparition Hexes.