Harry potter The Boy Who Remembers

Chapter 66: The Crest's Curse



The feeling continued for a few seconds, but it felt like hours. When the pain subsidized into soreness. Harry tried to walk only for the world to slowly darken. Mere seconds later, he fell down unconscious from the strain of what happened to him.

Harry blinked his eyes open and tried to remember why his body felt so sore. It was as if he had run a marathon the day before. Thinking back on the events of the previous day, he sat up abruptly and gasped.

The ritual! What happened after the ritual? The initial part was intoxicating, but the rest, what he assumed to be the Crest activation ritual was practically torture. He had never felt such pain in his life, and hopefully, he will never do so again.

The young Slytherin looked around and noticed that he was in his dormitory. Everyone was still asleep. Crabbe and Goyle were heavily snoring, and Blaise, Draco, and Theo looked passed out wearing their normal pyjamas. If it wasn't for the ache he felt whenever he moved his body and his memories, he would have thought that it was a normal morning.

Wait a minute, they were wearing their pyjamas? Harry looked down and froze as he saw that he was in fact wearing his own sleepwear. The Potter scion distinctly remembered passing out in the ceremonial robe provided to him for the ritual.

Did someone dress him to sleep? Harry blushed in embarrassment at the thought but shook his head and decided to figure out what happened. He palmed his wand which happened to be on his nightstand and muttered, 'Tempus!'

Pain. That was what he felt. Absolute pain. It was like pulling a muscle. Oh, the spell worked as the date and time had appeared out of thin air. But the very act of casting magic was agonizing. What was going on with him?

Harry grimaced until the spell fizzled out, sighing in relief afterwards. Did the ritual somehow screw with his magic? He needed to see someone like it. From the previous spell, he knew that it was the morning after the ritual, which happened to be a Friday. Luckily, he only had a History of Magic double class, a theoretical Charms double class, and practical Herbology. It was usually a pretty dull day, all things considered, without any magic casting, but Harry was glad for it, because it gave him time to figure out whatever happened to his magic.

Seeing that it wasn't even six in the morning yet, Harry decided to go into the common room and leave his classmates to their blissful sleep. He needed some time to himself, and he could still interrogate them about what happened to him the day before. The young Slytherin sneakily went to the bathroom to change his uniform, and when he removed his shirt, he froze at the sight of a tattoo on his chest. It was far bigger than anything he could have reasonably put on his body.

Here on his chest, a jet-black raven looked as if it was taking flight. It was so detailed. It looked like it was about to leave his body at any moment. No artist, no matter how talented, could have done something like this. It was beautiful, Harry would admit it, but he never felt the need to do something like this on his body before.

Numbly, Harry just put on his uniform and walked down to the common room.

He was met with silence, which was somehow deafening. Harry sat down on his usual couch and started to think. Casting spells becoming painful was a big issue for a wizard to have. The ritual was far more painful than it should have been. There were a few reports of slight pain and discomfort, but not something like what happened to him.

The raven was a clue about what happened. Harry's book did say that crests could manifest physically in certain ways, it was mostly just small marks or tattoos. In fact, they were rather common as a declaration of who is the head of the family – which would have a special mark in some way.

The raven was the manifestation of Harry's crest, but he had never read anywhere about any connection between the Potter family and the bird. These tattoos were often designed by the first holder of the crest and were often similar to certain family symbols or signets, which for some reason, wasn't the case for Harry.

The young Slytherin decided to just take a walk to the castle. He needed answers, and he needed to stop the pain whenever he used magic. Harry walked out of the common room and instinctively started to walk up the stairs. He passed by a few paintings, and it was then that he noticed that something was different.

It was subtle, but Harry could tell. The songs were different. Oh, their properties were the same, but Harry could hear more. It was like before, it was muffled, but now he could hear it clearly. Oh, it wasn't even the melodies themselves that were clear, but also the addition of something more. When Harry decided to focus on the painting of a beautiful landscape and listened to its song. There was this feeling of wonder and pride emanating from it.

He decided to look at the painting of a beautiful young woman and felt love and warmth woven into the painting's song. It was like he could feel the emotions tied to every enchantment. He needed to experiment on this further, with artefacts other than paintings as well.

Harry kept walking up the stairs while marvelling at the extra sense of magic that he had gained. He would need to understand how it worked and how he could use it properly, but it was an unexpected boon from the ritual. Additionally, the fact that he could use his magical hearing without pain boded well for the health of his magic.

.....

Want to read ahead by more than 60 chapters. Then join my p@treon Right Now.

Link: p*atreon.com/BookReaderBoy (Remove the *)

Also Free members get 2 advanced chapters for Free as well.


Tip: You can use left, right, A and D keyboard keys to browse between chapters.