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Too late now.
"My Patronus Charm seems to be acting strange. Can you take a look and see if it can be adjusted?"
Ian didn't have time to waste wandering back to Hogsmeade or Hogwarts. He had to use what little time he had left to learn from Rowena.
After all, Professor Flitwick, Head of Ravenclaw House, had already noticed that Ian's magic had shifted. And if he could sense it, then surely the founder of Ravenclaw herself might be able to help correct whatever had changed within his spellcasting.
"Of course," Rowena agreed without hesitation.
She didn't even wait for Helena to whisper a suggestion in her ear. She already knew what Ian needed. With a flick of her hand, she conjured a wand and offered it to him.
"The power of Cognition?"
Ian studied the wand. At first glance, it was identical to the one Professor Morgan had crafted for him, except that one had been made with a proper framework, while this one looked as though it had been plucked from a roadside stone and simply willed into existence.
"Who taught you this?" Rowena raised an intrigued eyebrow.
Helena, eager to mimic her mother's ability, attempted the same but found it impossible, just as Ian had when he had first tried casting magic without a wand.
"My other teacher, Ms. Morgan."
Ian grinned, answering honestly.
He had always entertained the idea of watching Morgan and Rowena face off in some sort of intellectual duel.
But it was clear that Rowena Ravenclaw had no interest in competing.
"You certainly have an interesting way of choosing your mentors."
Rowena Ravenclaw's voice held no reproach, only mild astonishment.
"I suppose I've always had good luck." Ian adjusted his grip on the wand, feeling the fleeting sense of time pressing against him, then raised it to cast the spell.
"Expecto Patronum!"
Brilliant silver light burst from the tip, unraveling into countless shimmering strands like celestial threads weaving together to form a radiant, flowing tapestry. The glow stretched across the volcanic landscape, illuminating the darkness like a cascade of shooting stars.
But it was more than just light.
Even the sweltering heat around them seemed to ease, the suffocating atmosphere lifting as the Patronus Charm radiated warmth beyond the physical.
"That's… incredible!" Helena gasped, mesmerized by the sight. She had seen many cast the spell before, but never like this, never so much silver light sustaining itself for minutes without taking form.
Rowena Ravenclaw studied Ian's magic with a calm, knowing expression. She was not surprised, merely intrigued. "It seems that by expanding your magical limits, you have uncovered an alternative approach."
With a wave of her hand, the silver radiance abruptly faded, retracting into Ian's wand in a smooth, controlled motion as if it had never been there at all.
"What did you just do?" Ian asked, stunned.
"I overlaid my Cognition upon yours," Rowena explained simply, her gaze flickering toward the pocket where Ian had stored the Resurrection Stone. After a thoughtful pause, she added, "With your current magic, you cannot yet bridge the gap between life and death to summon an entire world… But if you anchor onto a specific presence, you may be able to cast a fragmented Patronus Charm."
Her tone was calm, but Ian understood; she had just provided him with a viable method.
"Using the Resurrection Stone?" He asked, retrieving the ring once more.
"No, creating a replica of the Resurrection Stone."
Rowena Ravenclaw knelt down, picked up an ordinary stone from the ground, and placed it in Ian's hand. He stared at it, dumbfounded.
"You may need to find a master of alchemy to assist you, but I doubt that will be much trouble for your current headmaster. Once, he even brought an alchemist to Hogwarts… they visited my portrait together."
Ian blinked.
"You know about events in the mortal world?" He had always been aware that Rowena could track the passage of time from beyond, but it was only now that he fully realized that Hogwarts' portraits were more than mere paintings.
They were watching.
All the time.
"That's—! That's completely unfair! You can cheat too?!" Ian spluttered, sounding remarkably like a Gryffindor portrait caught off guard.
Rowena chuckled softly. "Call it what you will, but I hope you understand, life and death are eternal mysteries. Throughout history, any wizard with a spark of curiosity has sought to unravel them."
She spoke without arrogance, only certainty. "And the greatest among them have always found a way to ensure they could continue observing the world, even after departing it."
"This isn't about immortality, it's about knowledge."
Her voice was steady, matter-of-fact, as if discussing a simple inevitability. And truly, no one could deny that Rowena Ravenclaw was one of the greatest minds in wizarding history.
"Can something like this really be replicated?"
Ian turns the Resurrection Stone ring in his fingers, deep in thought. He recalled the old wandmaker's claim that his wand had been modeled after the Elder Wand, though who knew if that was true?
But this…
These alchemical runes. These intricate, swirling patterns.
They were completely alien.
And worse still, he doubted he would find any books explaining them in detail. To decipher them from scratch would be an impossible task.
"You need not understand the entire thing," Rowena said, watching as Ian's form gradually grew translucent. "You need only isolate the single segment of runes you require."
Helena gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth. Though she and her mother bore the same face, their reactions could not have been more different. Rowena remained unshaken, while Helena's wide-eyed expression was one of pure alarm.
"Remember this," Rowena Ravenclaw warned, "Do not take lightly the relics of Death. They bring misfortune."
Her voice was as firm as it was final.
Before Ian vanished completely, he gave her a casual, two-fingered salute. "Understood. Thanks for the help."
Then, with a slight bow, he was gone.
Rowena and Helena remained still for a moment, watching the space where he had stood.
Finally, Rowena inclined her head ever so slightly. "We are the ones who should be grateful. May you, little raven, one day fly safely to the destination you seek."
And with that, Ian Prince was no more than a memory in the Twilight Realm.
"Mother… Are we moving forward?"
Helena's voice was quiet, almost reluctant.
She still remembered what Rowena had once told her, that this was the very edge of the Twilight Zone. That beyond here, there was only the unknown.
And though she had wandered as a ghost for a thousand years, she found herself lacking the courage to take that next step.
Rowena turned the Diadem over in her hands, its once-faded brilliance now fully restored.
"Not yet, my child," She answered. "There is something I must finish first."
Her gaze lifted toward the towering volcano, watching the molten rivers flowing within.
"I need to use this place to reforge it."
Helena swallowed, looking down at the Diadem, the very object that had once consumed her with greed and sorrow. Now, she felt neither. Only quiet apprehension.
"But… this land belongs to a powerful entity. A being that defied Death itself. Won't they refuse to let you use their domain freely?"
It was a fair question.
Rowena, however, only smiles.
"I think this is precisely what that one intended for me to do."
She traced the gemstones embedded in the Diadem, shifting them ever so slightly as though adjusting a delicate mechanism.
Helena's lips parted in shock. "Wait… have you already met the god of this place?"
Rowena's expression remained serene.
"My dear, fate would not have so easily brought you back to me. This is a story that should have taken centuries to unfold… but someone has rewritten that future."
Helena's breath hitched.
"You bargained with a god?"
Her voice trembled, thick with fear.
"Just as Death struck a deal with the Three Brothers, so too did He strike one with us."
Rowena ran her fingers over the Diadem with quiet reverence.
"To forge a crown for Him was the price. But I do not believe it to be a terrible bargain."
She smiled at her daughter. "After all, you are standing here beside me. And that alone speaks of His mercy."
"IAN—!"
Helena suddenly clutched her chest, eyes widening in horror as realization dawned upon her.
Rowena merely nodded.
"Yes, my child. You have already met Him." She reached out, brushing a streak of ash from Helena's forehead with quiet affection. "And tell me… He was not so difficult to get along with, was He?"
Rowena's soft voice lingers in the realm of the dead.
No one answered.
(End of Chapter)