HP: Panem et Circenses

February 23rd, 1996

Patches of conversation and the clatter of cutlery drifted over all four House Tables underneath the cloudy ceiling of the Great Hall. Tristan dodged a group of laughing 'puffs and wrapped the Cloak tighter around himself, slowly creeping down the Ravenclaw Table to the delegation of blue-uniformed students at its front.

'How to do this best?' He lingered a few feet away and twirled Charlus' wand between the tips of his fingers, ignoring the distinct unfamiliarity of the wood. 'First I need to get close enough to actually hear what they're saying.'

Tristan slipped into a wide, empty gap and shifted along the bench until the jumble of rapid French turned audible.

"I've not seen our esteemed Champion since the task," a pig-nosed, ginger-haired girl gossiped. "No doubt she's off bewitching some British boys again."

"Non, Aimee, she's sneaking around with the Hogwarts' Champion, they're both absent." Her brunette friend cast a quick glance over her shoulder to the Slytherin Table. "They tried to trick everyone into thinking they had a fallout after the Yule Ball but we've all seen the way they looked at each other ever since. We're not stupid."

'If only that were true.' Tristan stifled a hollow pang rising in his breast.

The ginger girl sighed longingly. "It's a shame he let himself get bewitched by the Delacour harpy; he was quite handsome, as were Cedric Diggory and Roger Davies."

"You're forgetting who we're talking about," a blonde boy across the table scoffed. "They're still English."

"Oui, but we can have a bit of fun with them, non?" Aimee giggled. "Don't be so jealous, Pierre. Perhaps we can find a nice English girl for you as well, non?"

"Jamais! They're uncultured imbéciles, all of them," Pierre muttered in disgust and poked a sausage on his plate with his knife. "I wish mon père managed to set up the Tournament at Beauxbatons instead."

'An important family?' Tristan piqued up and pointed his wand at the boy. 'Surely you've been to the French Ministry then...'

"Legilimens," he whispered, wiping his mind blank and touching his thoughts to Pierre until his gray eyes swallowed him.

Beauxbatons' elevated marble towers hovered in Pierre's thoughts amidst a tangle of self-importance and stubborn pride. Tristan slipped in an image of downtown Paris, whispering the words 'Incanté, Envoûté, Conjuré' along with the faint urge to know where to go from there.

A white fountain flashed before his eyes, spitting water in a high arch underneath a web of green branches. Coolness washed over his body and Tristan had but the tiniest glimpse at a nearby street sign before his stomach plunged and he was sucked into darkness.

Place de Furstemberg

Joy exploded through him and he tore their thoughts apart. 'That's it!'

"Merde!" Pierre flinched with a cry. Red trickled from his nostrils and he clutched his temples hard.

'Oopsi.' Tristan smothered a flare of dry humor and tugged his wand away. 'If not our girls, I at least hope our British Matron is good enough for you, Pierre.'

He rose from the bench and slipped through the troubled jumble of hysteric French students out of the Great Hall and up the Giant Staircase.

"Dissendium." Tristan tapped his wand against the statue of the one-eyed witch on the third floor and slid down into the tunnel.

"Lumos."

Three orbs of white magic burst forward into the darkness, flickering weakly every so often. Tristan grimaced in irritation.

"No more after today," he vowed. "I'm not returning without a piece of elder."

He walked until the faint tingle of a wardline rippled over his skin, then took a deep breath and apparated.

Towering white cliffs rose against a dark, wild sea and seagulls screeched over the crash of waves upon rock in a strong breeze. Tristan wrapped the Cloak tighter around himself and fixed the white fountain before his mind's eye. Then he forced the world past him with a soft snap.

Lofty muggle houses confined a small roundabout. At its center stood the white fountain, surrounded by four trees that were planted in a square, with their branches intertwined.

'Is it like Platform 3/4 and muggles can't see us enter?' Tristan eyed the spurts of water warily, circling the square once with his wand held out as murmured under his breath. 'I don't have the right wand or time for this. I'll need someone to show me how exactly it works...'

He crept into the shadows of the surrounding buildings. Anxiety nagged at his nerves like a greedy rat with each minute that passed. Finally, a long-robed figure stepped from the Rue de Furstemberg into the square.

'There's my ticket in.' Tristan followed the wizard to the fountain, letting his wand slide into his palm. "Confundo."

The Frenchman's shoulder slumped momentarily before he proceeded and climbed over the dripping edge with Tristan right on his heels. Despite stomping and waddling through the knee-high water, their movements caused no ripples on the surface, nor did they drench his shoes and cloak.

Tristan glanced down. 'Now what?'

The water began swirling like a maelstrom, sucking him in like he was flushed down the lavatory. The roots of all four trees snaked around them like serpents and formed a birdcage elevator that descended into the darkness.

Tristan held his breath and clutched his wand and Cloak tight. The elevator came to a rattling halt and thrust open its doors with a ring, allowing them to step out into a gigantic hall buzzing with noise.

'Impressive.' He craned his head in his neck and glanced up.

Magically domed glass made up the majority of the roof, depicting famous beasts in star constellations. The walls were comprised of colored glass, framed by green steel shaped in long, sinuous lines, and adhered strictly to Art Nouveau.

The fountain from above was mirrored at the center of the hall. Along the fast difference in size came three engraved words that circled around the stone in an endless loop.

'Incanté, Envoûté, Conjuré...'

'Perhaps I should toss in a galleon and pray I won't need any of those verbs today,' Tristan snorted. 'This is supposed to be a stealth mission.'

"Bonjour, Monsieur." A blonde woman called from behind the bronze reception desk, guarding rows of tall green-and-gold cabinets, with narrow, individually numbered drawers. "Step forward please and hand me your wand for registration."

The Frenchman Tristan had arrived with shook his head and staggered slightly. "Desole, Madame, I'm not sure where my head was at." He handed over his wand. "I'm just here to pick up something from my office."

"D'accord." The receptionist nodded and made a weak attempt at stifling a long yawn. She inserted the wand into a rune-covered metal pipe before handing it back. "Et voila, Monsieur. You're good to go."

"Merci, Madame." The Frenchman dipped his head and stepped through a towering stone arch, leaving a faint ripple of air in his passing.

'More wards.' Tristan frowned. 'But I'd best figure out where to go from here first.'

A large sign by the receptionist's desk listed the departments neatly underneath each other in bright golden letters.

Tristan skimmed over the French words. 'Law enforcement, Auror offices, Communications, International affairs, Magical catastrophes... where the hell is it?'

He let his wand slide into his palm and caught the receptionist's eye the next time she glanced up. "Legilimens."

Tiredness tugged heavily at her thoughts and she longed for sleep. Tristan slipped in the image of a steaming cup of coffee; its dark surface rippled into a hooded, cloaked shadow and faint whispers of mystery twirled upward in the steam. The word 'D'enigma' began creeping over the cup like a spider.

A long hallway flashed before his eye, leading past portraits, offices, and blue-robed witches and wizards to an ornate, caged elevator that lingered at its end.

'Past the Auror offices.' Tristan gently eased out of her thoughts, dispersing the hooded figure by adding a spoonful of sugar and quenching the soft whispers back into the steam of coffee.

The receptionist squinted her eyes together and frowned momentarily before stifling another long yawn, longing gleaming in her eye.

'Nice. I'm slowly getting the hang of it.' Tristan turned back to the arch. 'Now then, what about you?'

Countless runes were carved deep into the stone foundation, glowing in faint gold. 'Father said my Cloak is like Death - invisible, intangible, undetectable, and unstoppable...'

He took a quiet breath and stepped through the arch, a small smile curling his lips. 'Looks like Death doesn't care about French wards.'

Mindful not to run into anyone, Tristan slipped through the buzzing crowd to the enormous, white-railed staircase opposite the hall. The next two floors consisted of a long row of glass-lined offices, each packed with desks, work equipment, and archives.

On the third floor, he was met by blue-robed aurors, each of them wearing a sparkling Fleur De Lis badge on their chests. Tristan carefully plodded down the long hallways. Grand paintings of former department heads lined the walls to the sides, all of them posed proudly in their frames, watching the hustle of their successors with sharp eyes.

The caged elevator waited by the end of the corridor, its golden doors were closed.

'A small distraction shall do.' Tristan aimed his wand at the feet of a boy a few years older than him, who came hurrying out of an office, carrying a stack of documents that blocked his view.

The boy stumbled and fell with a cry, scattering parchment and files down the tiles. Tristan prodded the button for down and slipped through rattling doors into the elevator while the boy was scolded by the entire department.

'Sorry, mate. If we ever meet again I'll make it up to you...'

The doors clanked shut and he descended down into the darkness for a few long moments before the elevator finally ground to a halt.

"Department D'enigma," a cool female voice announced.

The doors opened with an eerie ring, revealing a gray-robed figure striding over worn cobblestone a few meters away from him.

Tristan's blood ran cold and he gripped the Cloak tight. 'Shouldn't you be at work?'

The Unspeakable whirled around and his eyes went impossibly wide. "Merde," he hissed and ripped his wand from his sleeve, firing a bright red stunner.

'Merde indeed.' Tristan hurled himself to the side, shielding his eyes from the shower of red sparks as the spell blasted into the mirror behind him.

Crouching low, he dodged another sickly yellow spell and slipped out of the elevator just before its golden grids bend inwards and thrust like spears through empty air. Tristan edged along the rough, wet walls of the circular room and raised his wand underneath the Cloak.

'You're in my way and I can't let you sound the alarm.' Churning fury bubbled through his veins, twisting his lips into a bitter grimace as the first syllables of a familiar incantation drifted to the forefront of his mind. 'Why couldn't you just be at work? Why did you have to become an obstacle?'

"Janvier?!" The cobblestone behind the Unspeakable turned translucent and a second gray-robed figure hurried out. "What is going on here?"

'Fuck.' Tristan lowered his wand. 'What now?'

"There's an intruder, Mars! Someone invisible" Janvier called. "The elevator came back down but it was empty."

"Vraiment?" A short black wand appeared in Mars's hand as his hooded gaze roamed over the scene twice.

'Janvier... Mars... If the French Unspeakables are named after months, then I'm dealing with a maximum of twelve.'

"Perhaps the elevator just malfunctioned, it is quite old after all," Mars suggested calmly after a few seconds. "We shall check, just in case." He thrust his wand out. "Homenum Revelio."

Tristan held his breath, feeling a faint tingle of magic wash over the room.

"Un... et deux..." Mars counted, lowering his wand again. "There's no one here but us. The soul detection spell would've told us so; nothing can hide from it."

'Death can.' A small smile played on Tristan's lips and he took a quiet breath, letting the adrenaline fade back down.

"Well, it's definitely malfunctioning now," Janvier muttered, vanishing the splinters of the burst mirror. "I'll send it back up and tell them to fix it."

"D'accord," Mars nodded. "I will return to our project."

Tristan watched as Mars approached the stretch of cobblestone wall and pressed a bronze ring on his finger against it. A teal spiral marked the flat top of the ring, soft light glimmering within the colored pattern. Mars stepped through once the brick wall had turned translucent and vanished from sight.

'I'll probably need one of those rings to get in and out.' Tristan grit his jaw, turning back to Janvier, who had started fixing up the elevator. A raw, desperate determination settled in his breast, flaring bright with each breath and pound of his heart. 'And you're going to help me.'

He crept closer and pointed his wand at Janvier's back.

"Imperio!"

His magic washed over weak resilience, crumbling it like a tidal wave does a sand castle. A tingling of warmth flared into bright euphoria as Tristan felt his own will seep deep through Janvier's thoughts; his intentions swirled like blood into cold water until everything was crimson and only his will remained.

Janvier heeded his commands and walked over to the blank stretch of wall. Stiffly, like a ragged doll controlled by strings, he touched his ring to the cobblestone.

'Et voila.' Tristan stepped through a faint veil of cool magic and sent the Unspeakable back to the broken elevator. He wiped the last minute from his mind and released his hold just before the wall turned solid again. 'So far so good...'

Tristan turned around and stared into the dark passageway that stretched ahead of him. Low candles flickered where the walls and floor connected. Their eerie shadows danced over the crumbling bricks and the occasional human skull that had been embedded into the old, worn limestones.

'This place is fucking creepy.' Tristan frowned and advanced through the catacombs with a firm grip on his wand. 'Why would anyone want to work down here?'

The first of several weathered wooden doors that were positioned in irregular intervals appeared underneath a crumbling cobweb-stricken brick arch; voices drifted from one of the small gaps between door and hinges.

'Let's see what's in here then...' Tristan gradually widened the gap by fractions of an inch at a time until he managed to sneak through.

Two gray-robed Unspeakables sat around a blackened table in the center of the room. A circle of glowing runes ran around half a dozen small hourglasses that posed between them. A flower bloomed in a small pot, then shed its blooms and decayed only to be reborn over and over again

'Time turners. They're priceless.' Hot temptation whispered through Tristan's veins but he fed it to the void. 'They'll all be warded and if I take one, the Unspeakables might use another to take it back from me and close the loop.'

He slipped back out of the room. "Besides, terrible things happen to wizards who meddle with time..."

Tristan proceeded through the dark until he encounters the next wooden door. A small sign above the handle read 'Flamel' in roman letters.

'Flamel... as in the Alchemist?' Curiosity stabbed at him and he opened the door. 'I almost forgot he was French.'

Timeworn tomes collected dust and cobwebs on the frail shelves along the walls. A mess of silver instruments and potion vials scattered the few tables. It all seemed fairly unremarkable apart from the dark piece of cloth that partially covered a tall, gleaming mirror at the center of the room.

'What's so special about a mirror?' Tristan snorted and turned to leave when suddenly he caught the reflection of his own leg flickering in the cool glass.

"Impossible!" Ice jolted through his veins and he tugged down the piece of cloth in one fluent motion. 'No mirror is supposed to show my reflection when I'm wearing the Cloak.'

Gleaming glass rose as high as the ceiling, with an ornate gold frame, standing on two clawed feet. His reflection stared back at him with a sharp, small smile, standing straight and tall, blue orbs gleaming with purpose like a pair of azure flames. His family faded into view behind him; healthy and strong. All of them were together, all of them smiled in careless laughter and waved at him.

'What is this magic?' Tristan frowned and glanced over his shoulder, catching nothing but dusty tomes and instruments. "What are you showing me, mirror?"

A silver cup rose from his reflection's feet; a familiar name was etched upon its gleaming stem.

"The Triwizard Cup,"Tristan whispered, feeling a spike of bright, hot euphoria. "I won."

Lofty wooden stands rose behind his reflection. A crowd of spectators loomed up there. Their faces were blurred and unrecognizable; only their eyes shone bright with awe, bright as lanterns, bright as the jewels gleaming on the Triwizard Cup.

'They marvel at me because I'm great.' A soft little thrill coursed through Tristan's veins and he pressed his fingertips into the cold glass. "Like I was meant to be."

The Triwizard Cup faded like smoke through his fingers. A single soft shadow took its place, rising to almost his height and stepping to his side, swirling in shining silver into a female silhouette.

"Who is that?" Longing clawed its way up his throat like a fistful of razors. 'An opponent? An equal? A partner?'

Tristan raised a hand to the shadow's face, desperate for the faintest clue but was granted nothing. Frustration grew into anger and he blinked, tearing his eyes away. 'What are you showing me?'

An inscription carved around the top of the mirror in roman letters.

Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi.

Tristan snorted. "Even the French didn't manage to butcher their own language that much."

He read the sentence backward. "I show not your face but your heart's desire."

'My heart's desire?' Tristan peeked back at his reflection. The shadow's head was now leaning against his shoulder and their fingers were intertwined. He hardened his heart and let the longing fade into nothingness. "You're not real; perhaps you might be one day."

He covered the mirror with the same piece of cloth and headed back to the door. 'But until then you give me neither knowledge nor truth and that makes you perhaps the most dangerous piece of magic down here.'

Tristan twisted and turned further through the sheer endless, dark maze of catacombs. He poked his head into each room, stumbled over weird pieces of magic, and dodged the occasional pair of hooded shadows.

'Was Gregorovitch wrong perhaps?' Doubt and impatience slowly began nagging at his thoughts. 'What if it's not even here anymore?'

Behind the next twist, the narrow catacomb widened into a cave. Faint trickles of water ran down the supporting pillars and collected into pools on the weathered stone tiles. A large doorway, reinforced with steel bolts, blocked off the rest of the cave.

'Something more important than mysterious little trinkets?' Tristan thrust his wand at the latch and pushed it out of its anchoring, kicking the door open. 'If this isn't it, I'll force the next Unspeakable to tell me where I need to go.'

Two, thick portcullises thrust their spikes deep into the cave's rough floor on either side of the cavern, enclosing a worn, raised stone dais between them. A long, thin stick levitated at the center of the platform; its tightly intergrown branches slowly span around themselves behind a veil of rippling magic that shimmered like heat haze.

"Finally." Tristan let out a long breath and flipped the Cloak's hood back. "Took me long enough."

Iron determination seized hold of him and carried him over to the platform, eyes firmly locked on the piece of wood. His magic broke free in wisps of black fog and wrapped itself in the air around him, lifting his body up the giant steps.

"This is it." Tristan reached out through the shimmer of wards and dragged his fingertips over the thousands of tiny runes that stretched back and forth across the elder in a dizzying swirl of patterns. A bright little thrill began singing through his veins and his breath quickened.

"I can feel it." A soft, low murmur rose from deep within the wood, whispering with the rapid drum of his heart, urging him on to finally unite what had been apart. "There's so much magic in the wood..."

Tristan flexed his fingers and tightened his grip. Black mist exploded from his sleeve and coiled around his wrist as he yanked the elder wood free from underneath a net of wards.

The door behind him closed with a low thud. Tristan whirled around with a groan. 'Oh fuck.'

A low rumble rippled through the cavern and the two portcullises on each side opened in a piercing screech of steel over rock. A hulking mass of gray and green prodded out of the shadows with reverberating steps.

Tristan's eyes widened and he staggered back. 'Don't tell me that's a fucking troll.'

The troll slobbered and sniffed the air, then curled its massive hands into fists. Its huge, dark eyes fixed themselves on Tristan's floating head, narrowing to slits.

Tristan flipped the hood back on. 'Time to go.' He pressed the piece of elder wood tight to his chest and leaped off the platform.

The second troll from the other portcullis had blundered through the cavern and blocked his escape; its tiny eyes roamed over the scene and he yanked his mouth open in a furious, spit-spewing roar. A foul stench poured from him and thickened into a raw, rotten reek the closer Tristan got.

"Fine." A strange little thrill snaked through Tristan's veins, tingling in his blood as he yanked off the Cloak and stored it in his robes along with the elder wood. "If you want to be an obstacle, I'll treat you like one."

He thrust out his wand; desperate, fierce yearning bubbled into hot, raw hatred and he unleashed a screaming torrent of fiendfyre. The crimson flames curled into an enormous basilisk that coiled itself around the first troll, melting through thick skin, flesh, and bone like boiling water through snow.

The troll howled in agony and plunged to its knees, crumbling away beneath the flames in a pool of steaming blood and molten, charred flesh.

'One down.' Tristan tore at his magic and dragged the flames around. 'Now onto-'

A massive fist connected with his side, tossing him through the cavern like a wet washcloth and sending him bouncing across the rough rock.

Searing pain flashed through him and the air was squeezed from his lungs. Tristan wheezed for breath and scrambled to his knees, summoning his wand and the piece of elder wood back into his palms in a flood of snapping black mist.

"You almost destroyed what I came for." Tristan spat a mouthful of blood, wincing as the scraps and cuts across his body crept back together.

The troll rumbled in triumph and thundered closer, roaring and swinging its fists wildly. The ball of hatred beneath Tristan's ribs exploded, cold as ice, and he thrust his wand out.

His magic leapt forward in a terrifying hiss of black wisps. It screamed and clawed with razor-sharp, ragged teeth like a swarm of bats, stabbing and piercing with long, thin tendrils of dark vapor and smashed the troll's head in a shower of hot red blood.

The troll's upper half was blown away in chunks of red and charred flesh that rained down on Tristan. Its lower half thudded onto the rough floor of the cavern, twitching and spasming at Tristan's feet.

He stared down into the spreading pool of crimson, then wiped the blood off his face with the back of his sleeve.

"Time to get the fuck out of here."

The sharp thrill trickled away like fog through his fingers and he wrapped the Cloak back around himself, wincing at the dull throb in his limbs.

Tristan limped over the steaming, reeking remains of troll to the door and dragged up the last bits of his magic, pouring cherry-hot flames at the reinforced wood. The fiendfyre tore through the wards and melted the door back to its hinges, scarring the floor and ceiling above and pouring dripping, gleaming metal into the cracks on the floor.

'Should've tossed in the galleon.' Tristan winced as he prowled back the way he came through the catacombs, pausing every few steps to catch his breath and clutch his rips. 'This was far from a stealth mission.'

A trio of hooded shadows rushed into his path.

"Juillet assured me she's fed them, but something has to be wrong. I've never heard them make those kinds of sounds."

Tristan held his breath and pressed his back into the cool, wet limestone, dodging the far-right Unspeakable by a finger length.

"Should we ring the alarm and call the Aurors, Octobre?"

"Non, they're already irritated because Janvier blew up the elevator," Octobre decided. "Let's see what's going on for ourselves first."

'You won't like what you find.' Tristan grimaced and forced his protesting legs faster. 'And I won't like what I find, should I still be here by the time you sound the alarm...'

The echo of a single pair of food steps grew louder ahead of him and he raised his wand, hardening his heart.

"Imperio!"

Tristan caught the hooded silhouette as it stepped around the corner. His ironclad will drowned a weak flicker of opposition, washing his victim's effort away like a torrent of cold water.

The Unspeakable began leading the way back through the maze of catacombs, guiding him past the familiar doors to Flamel's mirror and to the room with the time turners.

'Fuck.' Tristan paused with a deep frown. 'I can't let you use one of those to ambush me later... or is it earlier?'

He carved a series of runes into the wood with his wand, then flicked it at his wrist, spattering crimson over the door. Tristan hissed under his breath and shielded his eyes from the blinding flash that followed. The runes glowed in a faint golden light, as did the door knob.

'This won't hold you off longer than a few hours, but that's all the time I need anyways.'

He commanded the Unspeakable to press his ring against the sealed passageway and wiped the last view minutes from his mind, leaving him stunned against the walls of the catacomb.

Clutching the piece of elder tightly to his chest and holding his wand at the ready, Tristan stepped into the caged elevator and ascended up to the Auror Department.

Looks of confusion and annoyance were thrown his way when the golden doors opened back up with a ring.

"Monsieur," The young blue-robed auror Tristan had tripped earlier called out, fiddling nervously with the Fleur De Lis on his chest. "They have sent the elevator back up from the Department D'enigma again. What should we do, Monsieur?"

"Merde! Just ignore it," the irritated reply came from one of the offices. "They're the best in their fields, non? Surely they can fix it themselves."

Tristan stifled a small smile and crept past them up the two floors to the glass-domed atrium. He joined the body of Ministry employees lining up by the exit and slipped into the next best elevator.

Place the Furstemberg faded into view and a soft snap forced the world past him the seconds he felt a lack of wards. Tristan staggered over a cobblestone road towards the throng of Gingerbread houses with their high, timbered gables.

"I did it." He removed the Cloak and stepped onto Gregorovitch's lawn, then leaned against the wandmaker's shield, slowly slipping down into the cool, wet grass with a whimper.

His heart was still pounding ferociously against his aching rib cage. Right underneath it, a sturdy piece of wood stabbed into his skin. Tristan fished it out and pressed the pale elder against his chest.

Its faint murmurs calmed the raging storm inside him and he closed his eyes with a quiet sigh, running his fingers up and down the intertwined length of it. A soft yearning bubbled up in his breast, sending hot whispers swirling in his heart.

"Let's just hope I'll have an easier time with the core..."