Harry Potter: The Invincible Stag
Chapter 145: Speak Open

Disclaimer:

Harry Potter and all of its characters belong to J.K. Rowling.

I own nothing but the original characters I make.

"Dialogue"

'Thoughts'

-Author notes-

Chapter 145: Speak Open

"Mmm… I thought this would be easier, once I found the entrance." James frowned.

He had dived into the murky waters and located what should be the entrance of the tomb. It was inside the mouth of the skull.

However, the gate was closed shut, and no spell that he had tried so far was able to unlock it.

"And I thought this would be more exciting…" Andromeda had conjured herself a chair and was comfortably sitting at the side of the pond.

"Why not blow it up? I bet I can knock these rocks with a single Bombarda," Bella suggested.

'Why am I not surprised that she would say something like that?...' James sighed.

"I had considered it. But it's risky. We don't know what kind of protections and countermeasures were set in place down there. For all we know, the entire tomb could collapse, burying and destroying everything inside," James explained.

"Hey, James." Bella called for him as he was getting out of the water.

"I already told you that I'm not blowing this thing up," he repeated.

"It's not that." She huffed, looking annoyed at him. "Have you seen the marks down here?"

"Marks?" James glanced over at her. He had seen the runes carved on the surface of the rocks, but hadn't found anything where Bella was looking now.

"Let me see…" He approached and knelt down next to her.

She was right—there were more symbols that had been carved on the side of what would be the top of the 'beast's skull.'

"They are not runes, right? I have never seen symbols like these," Bella added.

"Let me see too." This had pricked Andromeda's interest, so she jumped from her chair and went toward them.

"I have studied runes since my third year of school. These don't look like any runic language I have seen before. And they don't seem to be ordered to create any array either…"

"It looks like an eastern language," Bella commented before turning to James. "Do you know what it says?"

"You are almost right. These are not runes of any kind, it's just a clue on how to open the entrance. 'Μίλα ανοιχτά. Πιο κοντά στην πηγή.' It's written in Greek," James said.

"Greek? Why would they write something in Greek here? Wasn't the guy buried here a Briton?" Andromeda asked.

"Yes, but many wizards of that era also studied older languages like Latin or Greek. There is power in words… that's why we use them to cast spells," James commented to the girls.

"Do you understand its meaning? You said it was a clue to open the gate," Bella said.

"My Greek is a bit rusty, but...it could be roughly translated to 'Speak openly. Closer to the source'..."

"Speak openly?" Andromeda tilted her head in confusion.

"Closer to the source? The source of what?" Bella was making the same expression.

"The source… could it be that easy?" James stood up.

"Wait, did you figure it out already?" Andromeda asked.

"Perhaps… let me try something." He jumped on the largest boulder and looked down at the 'mouth of the beast.'

"उद्घाटित" James's tone of voice sounded strange to the two girls. He had just spoken a single word, but it sounded completely alien to them.

Bella was about to question him about what he said, when all of a sudden, the ground began to shake.

"It's open?!" Andromeda ran to the water and watched as the mouth of the skull opened up slowly.

"'Speak openly' actually meant to speak the word 'open.' And the other part of the text was telling you which language to use...one that was closer to the source than Greek. There are only two languages that would fit the criteria, and this one was the oldest," James explained.

"Great! Let's go inside," Bella said with excitement.

"Let me put a full-body Bubble-Charm on you," Andromeda told her sister.

James did the same on himself. "The water is not going into the hole," he pointed out.

This meant that the creator of this tomb must have placed some type of barrier that prevented the water from going inside and filling the tomb.

Had they tried to blow their way in, the barrier would have been destroyed. Just like James had predicted… everything inside would have become ruined.

"Let's go!" Bella jumped into the waters, followed closely by her older sister.

"Wait, let me go first!" James shouted at them. But the two didn't seem to be listening anymore and sank into the murky waters.

"Damn it… children never listen…"

James was about to jump when he got a strange sensation in his body. "What is this?..." He took a moment to look around but found nothing out of place.

'Just now… I felt a faint trace of some foreign magic… could it be from the tomb, or?...'

He had a bad feeling about this. There was this nagging feeling at the back of his neck that made him feel someone had been spying on them.

Unfortunately, he could not delve into this. Those two girls had already gone inside the tomb, and James knew how deadly that place was. The book he had read, warned him of the traps waiting inside for them.

If he took too long to follow them, he might find them dead.

"Tsk!" After making his annoyance palpable, he jumped into the water.

The entrance was narrow—just enough for a person to pass by diving headfirst.

Inside the mouth of the beast, there was a semi-translucent layer. As soon as James crossed it, he saw all the water disappear and his body was once again pulled by gravity toward the ground.

He found Bella and Andromeda just a few feet away from where he landed. Bella was sitting on the ground while Andromeda tried to help her up.

The room they were in was square in shape and made of a dark grey stone that had been smoothly carved.

Some light came inside from the small entrance, but it wasn't much.

"You okay?" James asked.

"She just fell on her butt," Andromeda responded.

"I'm fine!" Bella shouted to hide her embarrassment.

James shook his head. "You need to stop being so reckless… this place is dangerous. So from here on, you let me go first."

He glanced at the dark corridor ahead of them.

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