The Darkening of Your Soul

Chapter 13

“But how big can it really get?” Justin asked for the umpteenth time. As a muggleborn he seemed to have the most difficulty accepting that giant three-headed dogs even existed. Harry understood the feeling. He, too, found the concept of Fluffy hard to believe at first and he’d seen the thing with his own eyes multiple times.

“They can grow to the size of a small dragon,” Tracey explained patiently.

“Yeah, that doesn’t really tell me anything,” Justin muttered and turned back to his homework.

It was Wednesday and they were spending their afternoon off in the library working on a Charms essay. And for over twenty-four hours Harry had to listen to his friends speculate about the Cerberus on the third floor. He let them but mostly kept quiet himself. When he first heard Ernie mention the Weasley twins sneaking into the third floor corridor, his saving people instincts had kicked in and he’d spent the rest of Herbology thinking of ways to keep students away from Fluffy.

And then, sometime after lunch as they listened to Flitwick lecture during double Charms, Harry came to his senses.

Whatever the fuck Dumbledore was scheming was not Harry’s responsibility. And neither was it up to him to save the Weasley twins, or other adventurous students from themselves. Dumbledore wanted to keep an enormous, vicious beast inside a school? That was up to Dumbledore and had nothing to do with Harry. And once Harry came to that conclusion a huge weight lifted off his shoulders.

It wasn’t up to him to save the school. What a concept. Every time Harry repeated this conclusion in his head he had to smile. Dumbledore’s grooming, which had been frightfully successful in his previous life, had apparently lost its power over Harry. Finally.

“What do you think, Harry?” Neville asked him.

Harry blinked at him. “Hm?”

“About the Cerberus,” Neville explained.

“I think Dumbledore’s out of his mind keeping that thing in a school,” Harry said, meaning every word.

“Hear, hear,” Blaise said with a gesture of his hand as though he was toasting Harry.

Harry grinned at him. “Other than that, it’s really not our business.” He shrugged and looked at Susan. “Doesn’t your aunt work for law enforcement? I wonder if Dumbledore isn’t breaking several laws with keeping that thing where students can get to it. A magically locked door isn’t going to keep most of them out.”

“That’s a good point,” Susan said with a little frown.

“Amelia Bones is the Head of Magical Law Enforcement,” Daphne said and gave Susan a significant look. “You should let her know what Dumbledore is doing. I for one will sleep better knowing that monster is gone from the school.”

“I’ll write to her,” Susan said, and with that everyone returned to their homework.

Harry was feeling a little bit torn about involving Amelia Bones. He still planned to steal the Philosopher’s Stone and that would be easier when he knew what challenges exactly awaited him. Yes, Fluffy was fearsome but Harry knew some music put him right to sleep and he was therefore an easy obstacle to overcome. Should Fluffy be forced from the castle there was no knowing what Dumbledore would replace it with.