Harry Potter: The art of divination

The war chamber in the Veiled Citadel pulsed with a low, infernal hum. A floating platform of dark steel hovered in endless twilight, suspended in the void between realms. Runes along the outer rings shimmered softly wards of enforced neutrality, old and binding.

The gathered leaders sat in tense silence.

On one side, the demon commanders: Vekhael of the Third Infernal Legion, Satra'el the Hollow Flame, and Magrok, High Warden of the Southern Abyss. Their armor still bore scorch marks from the last battle. Their eyes held nothing but fire and fatigue.

Opposite them stood Michael, clad in burnished celestial plate, a radiant sword sheathed at his back, his face stony and unreadable. Two lesser angels flanked him wings tucked tight, eyes wary.

Vekhael broke the silence first.

"We are not endless," he said. "Despite what Olympus seems to think."

Michael's gaze flicked to him, but he said nothing yet.

Satra'el leaned forward, talons steepled before her. "When did this war become a numbers game? We burn thousands to buy ten seconds for one of their golden sons to escape. Tell me, what's divine about that?"

Michael closed his eyes, briefly. "We're all burning."

"No," Vekhael snapped. "They are watching. From towers of marble and lightning. And we we bleed in the mud."

"They sent Odin," Michael countered. "And paid for it."

"They sent him to die," Satra'el hissed. "Just like they send us. You think they mourn him? No. They're already arguing over who gets his share of command."

Magrok let out a low growl. "Demons have always been the foot soldiers of other people's wars. And now the angels join us in the trenches. Welcome to the pit."

Michael's wings tensed slightly behind him.

"We're not enemies."

"No," said Vekhael. "But we're not equals either. Not in their eyes."

The silence pressed in, heavy with unspoken truths.

"They justify it because we have the numbers," Satra'el continued. "Demons breed fast. Angels endure. We die, and they call it strategy. Collateral. Expected attrition."

Michael finally spoke again, his voice quieter.

"I know."

The word fell like a weight. A crack in the marble of restraint.

"I've sent too many of my own to die for plans I wasn't allowed to shape," he said. "They talk of glory. I dig graves."

Vekhael's fiery gaze softened, just a flicker.

"Then why do you stay?"

Michael met his eyes.

"Because if I leave, they'll kill even more of us."

That sat with the demons longer than expected. Even Magrok gave a slow nod, deep and thunderous.

"No one's leaking to the mortals," Vekhael said, shifting the tone. "We may hate this war, but we fight it clean. If the humans get lucky, it's because they fight like animals with teeth. Not because we hand them blades."

Michael nodded. "That's what I wanted to hear."

Satra'el looked toward the darkness beyond the platform, voice colder now.

"But the gods don't fear death like we do. They've ruled so long, they've forgotten what losing feels like."

Vekhael leaned back, arms crossed. "Maybe it's time they remembered."

Michael didn't respond right away.

The runes around the room pulsed gently.

"Not yet," he said.

And none of them liked the way he said it.

"Plans are in motion, that even they are unaware about." 

***

Rain slicked the sidewalk in mirrored patches of neon and oil. Car horns blared as yellow cabs wove between delivery trucks and late-night wanderers. Somewhere in the distance, a saxophone cried through a cracked window, rising above the constant hum of New York.

Elias kept his hood low and his hands in his coat pockets, dodging a cluster of tourists snapping pictures of a brick alleyway near 27th. The signage above the narrow iron gate was subtle: D'Aubrey's Bookbindery – Est. 1829. Most passed by without a glance. A few didn't.

Tonight, Elias did not.

He slowed as he approached. Across the street, just behind a discreet wrought-iron archway cloaked in illusion, shimmered the barely visible gateway into the magical quarter of New York—The Woven Path. Normally hidden from mundane eyes, tonight the veil thinned enough for Elias to see its shifting facade.

He hesitated, eyes narrowing on the arched doorway.

Then he turned away.

Instead, he crossed the street, slipped into the dim foyer of an old brownstone, and climbed a narrow flight of stairs that smelled faintly of dust and old ink. On the second floor, he passed empty offices until he reached a plain wall at the corridor's end—no markings, no door, just smooth plaster.

Elias glanced behind him, then knocked three times.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

The wall shimmered, then rippled outward like a curtain of water. A seam opened soundlessly, revealing a small, torchlit corridor. He stepped through without hesitation.

The passage opened into a wide, low-ceilinged room filled with people seated on benches and makeshift pews. Lanterns flickered overhead, casting strange, long shadows. The room was quiet hushed like a chapel before a sermon.

A few heads turned as Elias entered, but most returned their attention forward.

He spotted someone in the second row curly-haired, sharp-eyed. A friend from another life.

"Jonas?" Elias murmured, sliding into the seat beside him.

Jonas turned, recognition lighting his face. He leaned in.

"You made it."

"I heard whispers," Elias said quietly. "Didn't believe it until now."

Before Jonas could reply, a figure stepped up onto the raised platform at the far end of the room a man in a long dark coat with grey at his temples and an old, heavy ring on his left hand. He raised a hand for quiet.

The murmuring stopped instantly.

The man's gaze swept across the room and let his hand drop slowly, as if savoring the stillness that followed.

"Welcome," he said, voice calm but cutting through the quiet like a knife through silk. "I won't waste your time with pleasantries. We've all been overlooked long enough."

He paced once across the stage, hands clasped behind his back.

"Each of us knows what it means to be born into power and still live as less."

A few murmurs of agreement rippled through the room.

"We are the unwanted," he continued. "The children of ancient bloodlines—Rosiers, Shafiqs, Sargents, Peverells—born with noble magic in our bones… yet no wand would answer our call. No spell would stir at our fingers. Our families whispered. Our parents pitied. And the world discarded us."

Jonas sat stiff beside Elias, his jaw tight.

"But tonight," the speaker said, stepping forward, eyes burning now, "you will know the truth."

He raised a single finger.

"We are not broken."

A pause.

"We are robbed."

Gasps rang from the front row.

Elias frowned. Robbed?

The man went on, voice sharpening.

"There is a force… a parasite. A false guardian of balance. His name is Morpheus Everglade."

That name ignited sparks through the crowd—whispers, tensed shoulders, clenched fists.

"He walks among the magical elite. They whisper his name with reverence, dread. But we know what he is."

The man's voice rose—deeper now, resonating with fury long suppressed.

"A demon. A deceiver. The architect of the Veil. And the thief of our birthright."

The room fell into stunned silence.

"He feeds on the latent gifts of our lineages. Ripped our magic from us before it ever manifested. All to fuel that barrier he guards so carefully the Veil that divides the living from the divine."

A cry rang out from the back "How?!"

"I don't yet know the ritual," the speaker admitted. "But I know this: there is no such thing as a Squib. Only victims."

Gasps. A woman began to sob. Another pounded her fist into the bench before her, knuckles going white.

Jonas turned toward Elias, eyes wide. "Is this real?"

Elias said nothing.

"We could've had it all," the speaker thundered. "Wandwork. Flight. Duels. Destiny. But he took it. And he continues to take it, to feed his power."

He held his arms wide as if to embrace the fire he'd just lit.

"And if he stole our magic then maybe we can take it back."

The crowd erupted. Shouts of rage and longing filled the chamber. Some wept. Others pounded the benches with fists. The energy shifted no longer desperation, but momentum.

The man simply stood there, letting the fire rage.

A/N: if anyone is still reading this, thank you.