Chapter Summaries

Georgiana reconsidered the history of Rais, the Philosopher’s Stone, and the danger of knowledge and power in the wrong hands. She decided to keep moving forward and seek proof that Harry Potter was right, considering whether a gemstone could help her convince him.

• Georgiana connected the haunted mirror’s shifting passage and the Zouwu’s unusual abilities to the limits of time, space, and Apparition.
• She reviewed how Rais was arrested and executed, while rumors persisted that the accusations against him had been fabricated to seize his lands.
• Georgiana wondered whether others had continued Rais’s research and considered how Voldemort’s knowledge and power shaped his actions.
• She considered helping Romania establish a dragon reserve but recognized that she could not take on the Russian and Ottoman Empires alone.
• Georgiana resolved to keep moving forward rather than remain trapped in regret, and thought she might use a gemstone to prove Harry Potter was right.

The narrator reached a storm-bound village, learned about a vampire mystery involving Lucy and missing livestock, and agreed to investigate Rice Castle with Doctor Van Helsing and Doctor Self. In the present, Pomona, Sirius, James, Peter, and Remus cleared a hidden room by shrinking its wardrobes, leaving dozens of crates.

• The narrator took shelter at Mrs. Harker's inn, where Doctor Van Helsing appeared and hinted that the narrator had encountered a vampire.
• The coast guard delivered an order for fifty crates of soil, and Van Helsing discussed the problem with the narrator and proposed going to Rice Castle with Doctor Self.
• Van Helsing described Lucy's disappearance at Rice Castle, her bloodstained handkerchief, and the village's subsequent livestock losses.
• Pomona, Sirius, James, Peter, and Remus returned through the hidden passage to a room of old wardrobes and debated vampires and dragons.
• Sirius used a Shrinking Charm on the wardrobes, and the group cleared most of the room while leaving several dozen crates.

The narrator and Dr. Van Helsing followed a ghostly ship to an abandoned villa, where they discovered crates of soil and a strange stone. Later, Pomona used the stone to arrange Centaur sparring for Severus, while Remus’s unusual howl during a full-moon transformation remained unexplained.

• The narrator ventured out with Dr. Van Helsing and Dr. Self, then saw a ship emerge through the fog and watched Dr. Self leave.
• The narrator and Dr. Van Helsing followed the ship to an abandoned villa, where the narrator briefly experienced a vision of being aboard it.
• Van Helsing entered the ship through a hole in its hull and opened a chest as a storm began; elsewhere, Sirius, James, Remus, and Pomona found crates of soil and a stone in a hidden chamber.
• Pomona later uncovered a raw gem inside the stone and traded it to the Centaurs, who sparred with Severus Snape and repeatedly defeated him.
• Severus practiced his invented spell Sectumsempra on Grawp and became more agile as he recovered from the Centaurs’ blows.
• Pomona recalled Remus’s strange wolf howl during a full-moon transformation and wondered what had caused it.

Pomona reflected on a possible connection between Hogwarts’s hidden rooms and the witch Herodiana Byrne while Remus and Severus dealt with the aftermath of Ron’s poisoning. The Prince asked Pomona to wake him at 2:30 in the morning, and she angrily demanded to know what he was planning.

• The Daily Prophet reported Bellatrix’s wedding, and Remus showed Pomona a small wardrobe made from wand wood.
• Pomona and Remus discussed their discoveries and Remus’s birthday before Pomona left their meeting place.
• After Ron was poisoned, Severus delivered medicine to Remus, who asked about the Half-Blood Prince and Harry’s Potions textbook.
• Pomona connected the hidden rooms behind the fourth-floor mirror, the wardrobes, and the burial chamber to Herodiana Byrne and a werewolf legend.
• The Prince kissed Pomona, asked her to wake him at 2:30 in the morning, and went into her bedroom.
• Pomona demanded to know what he intended to do at that hour.

Pomona and Peter found Sirius living in a cluttered bookshop room after he ran away from home, and learned he was investigating a hidden chamber behind a mirror. After Pomona urged him to return to Hogwarts, Sirius agreed to go back and continue exploring.

• Pomona learned from Peter that Sirius had run away from home after his mother removed him from the Black family tapestry.
• Pomona and Peter found Sirius in his refuge at the old bookshop, where he showed them research about Younon and Artemisia Blackwood and their deadly mazes.
• Peter reported that he had been keeping watch over the Chamber of Secrets after Sirius and James found a skeleton there.
• Pomona realized Sirius believed a Black woman had created the maze behind the mirror.
• Pomona asked Sirius to return to Hogwarts so he could continue investigating the mirror, and Sirius happily agreed to pack.

Pomona encountered Severus, Lucius, and Lily as she tried to understand the fallout from the attack beneath the beech tree and the missing book from the library. Her argument with Lily ended their friendship, and Pomona retreated into Professor Binns’s books.

• Severus refused to withdraw his lawsuit while brewing a potion in Slughorn’s classroom.
• Pomona left the classroom with a turquoise Anti-Disarming wand grip and told Lucius Malfoy she knew nothing about the bloody incident.
• Pomona searched Professor Binns’s History classroom for the old book Sirius had found and spoke with Lily about James and Remus’s absence.
• Pomona challenged Lily over her curiosity and her choices in the Wizarding World, and Lily angrily left.
• Pomona told Professor Binns she wanted a book and returned to reading.

Pomona joined Frank and Alice Longbottom on a nighttime visit to Hogsmeade's cemetery, where they discussed the village's history and the changing relations between wizards and Muggles. They discovered armed-looking strangers camping in the tombs, and Frank went to investigate while Pomona and Alice stayed on guard.

• Pomona celebrated Kettleburn's award and learned that James Potter had returned to school while Remus Lupin remained absent.
• Frank Longbottom invited Pomona to help settle a debate about Hogsmeade's founding, and she joined him and Alice at the cemetery.
• Pomona, Frank, and Alice discussed Hogsmeade's history, witch hunts in Scotland, and the effects of the Statute of Secrecy as they crossed the bridge to the villagers' cemetery.
• Alice spotted strangers camping in the tombs and asked Frank why they were there.
• Frank cast a Disillusionment Charm and went to investigate, while Pomona and Alice drew their wands and waited alertly.

Pomona, Frank, and Alice followed a lead about Death Eaters searching the Forbidden Forest for an entrance. In a moonlit clearing, they encountered Dolan the Centaur, whom Pomona already knew.

• Frank returned from the cemetery and told Pomona and Alice that the robbers had drunk Dr. Lang's Joke Wine.
• Frank sobered one robber, who revealed that Death Eaters had entered the Forbidden Forest looking for an entrance; Pomona stunned and Obliviated him.
• Frank took Pomona and Alice by Floo Powder to Windmill Street, then led them into the Forbidden Forest without using Lumos.
• The group reached a moonlit clearing, where Dolan the Centaur appeared and greeted Pomona.

After Mary MacDonald was mutilated by a Grinning Curse, Pomona organized a spider race to distract Hogwarts students from the attack. Later, Dolan led Pomona, Frank, Alice, and a Centaur into the dark forest after a luminous butterfly.

• Pomona was woken and brought to the Hospital Wing, where she learned that Mulciber and Avery had cursed Mary MacDonald and that Slughorn had delayed coming to treat her.
• Dumbledore prompted Pomona to contain the scandal, and she arranged a broomstick prize and spider race to divert students’ attention from the attack.
• Grubbly-Plank bought the latest broomstick, and students cleared an abandoned courtyard and built a spider track for the competition.
• Mary was discharged, Lily was the only student who remembered the incident, and Barty Crouch Jr. won the race.
• Dolan revealed a luminous butterfly from a stone and led Pomona, Frank, Alice, and a Centaur into the dark forest to follow it.

Pomona, Frank, and Alice followed a magical butterfly through an abandoned mine and across the mountains to a cave behind a waterfall. Pomona sensed that something inside did not welcome them, but the three entered anyway.

• Pomona learned from Dolan that Severus had not trained with the Centaurs for a month and might have been meeting masked people in the Forbidden Forest.
• Dolan stopped at the boundary of Centaur territory as Pomona, Frank, and Alice entered an abandoned mine tunnel.
• Alice gave Pomona and Frank Perception Potion, and they followed the butterfly through the mine and out onto the far side of the mountains.
• The butterfly led them to a waterfall, where Alice sensed a cave behind it and Pomona repaired the broken path with Reparo.
• Pomona sensed an unfriendly presence inside the cave, but Frank and Alice went in, and Pomona followed.

Pomona, Frank, and Alice discovered a hidden chamber behind a mirror and explored its corridors, where Inferi guarded a cache of crates. They escaped and left Pomona heading back to Hogwarts to examine what Frank had taken, while Frank and Alice continued investigating the Forbidden Forest.

• Pomona found Devil's Snare beneath the pool and used a transfigured astrolabe to open the mirror entrance.
• Pomona and Frank entered the passage together, passed a collapsed chamber and more Devil's Snare, and found a skeleton beside wooden crates.
• Frank used an Extension Charm to pack the crates into Pomona's satchel as the pair heard noises deeper in the cavern.
• Frank and Pomona fought charging Inferi with fire and Levicorpus, then retreated after Alice called them out.
• Pomona returned to Hogwarts with the crates while Frank and Alice stayed behind to investigate the Forbidden Forest.

Pomona reflected on the deadly plants and hidden treasures connected to the tunnel before encountering a student who had accidentally turned his friend into a sheep. She let the boys leave without reporting their illegal Animagus practice and chose to skip her nighttime patrol.

• Pomona recalled how Langley had died from poisonous fire lily pollen in the tunnel and how burning the plant would have removed the dodder that restrained it.
• Pomona considered how Sirius Black had destroyed the tunnel without caring whether Death Eaters among his relatives were inside.
• Pomona followed a sheep's bleating to the Hospital Wing, where a student insisted the sheep was his friend, transformed during an Animagus attempt.
• Pomona told the student that sheep were allowed as pets, while Poppy Pomfrey ordered him to leave with the sheep.
• Poppy Pomfrey asked whether they should report the illegal Animagus practice, but Pomona left without reporting it and skipped her patrol.

James celebrated his birthday with Pomona, Sirius, and Peter at the Hog's Head, where they discussed the haunted mirror and exchanged gifts. Back at Hogwarts, Pomona led the others to the relic room and then set off for the nursery, leaving her reason unexplained.

• James, Sirius, Pomona, and Peter drank Firewhisky at the Hog's Head and exchanged birthday gifts, including Pomona's night-vision glasses and Sirius's Two-Way Mirror.
• James and Pomona reasoned that the haunted mirror's passage would next open on June 21, the summer solstice.
• The group worried about where Remus would transform now that Snivellus had discovered the secret of the Shrieking Shack, then left Hogsmeade without using their surveillance map.
• Pomona took James and Sirius to the relic room, where they discussed opening the Goblet of Fire's jewel box with a wand belonging to Sirius's great-great-grandfather.
• Pomona told the others that she had seen Evans in Hogsmeade and that she and Lily had fought; James said he would wait rather than go after her.
• Pomona ordered James and Sirius to follow her to the nursery, but did not explain why.

Pomona reflected on Remus Lupin’s loneliness, James and Sirius’s friendship, and Lily’s struggle to find work before joining the Order of the Phoenix. She brewed a Motivation Potion with peppermint to ward off despair, then went to bed alone.

• Pomona recalled how James and Sirius encouraged Remus to leave the Shrieking Shack and how James insisted that Sirius apologize after nearly causing Remus to become a murderer.
• Lily struggled to find work because of prejudice against Muggle-borns and her advocacy for House-elves, then joined the Order of the Phoenix through James.
• Remus graduated with outstanding grades and chose a lonely life, while Pomona thought about his warmth and the danger of getting close to him.
• Severus improved the Motivation Potion and added peppermint from the Forbidden Forest to counter its negative effects.
• Pomona admired the peppermint in her palm, changed for bed, and fell asleep after regretting that she had not burned incense.

Pomona and Sirius discussed using dust as ink to map Hogwarts and explored the school’s magical connections. Sirius invited Pomona to visit Norway with him that summer, but she refused, and he left the music classroom coldly.

• Pomona heard that James had tried to ask Lily to attend Slughorn's Slug Club with him, while Sirius and Peter Pettigrew waited for James in the music classroom.
• Sirius used an eraser to reveal Hogwarts written on yellowed parchment, and Pomona demonstrated making words with dust on sheet music.
• Pomona explained how the Goblet of Fire might connect to Hogwarts and prompted Sirius to consider the Quill of Acceptance and the Book of Admittance.
• Sirius asked Pomona to visit Norway with him that summer, but she declined, and he put away the parchment and left.

Pomona remembered her youth with Lily and Severus as Dumbledore told her that her long-running identities, “Gorgon” and “Nox,” had to disappear because she should have graduated. The story left her in the 1980s after the war, tending to her bees and preparing for winter.

• Pomona asked Lily and Severus about the encoded recipe for an exploding ginger eyelash, and Severus brought in a jar of ginger-colored hair.
• Pomona offered Lily and Severus pears in sweet syrup with ice cream, distracting them from the frightening potion recipe.
• Dumbledore told Pomona that “Gorgon” and “Nox” should disappear because the students they had known were nearing graduation and she was needed elsewhere.
• Pomona reflected on Eileen’s unhappy marriage, Severus’s childhood, and how Lily and the others had grown older while she had failed to notice her own passage of time.
• Pomona recalled Lily and James’s deaths, the end of the war, and the package from France waiting in Gringotts.
• Pomona descended the stairs and planned to harvest honey before autumn ended, leaving enough for the bees to survive winter.

Pomona investigated the discovery of Phoebe trapped inside a portrait and tried to calm frightened Hufflepuffs as rumors spread about dark magic and Barty Crouch Jr.'s arrest. After sending Joy to see her sister and the students to bed, Pomona returned to her office, realizing the night would be long.

• Pomona found Phoebe trapped inside a portrait on the Grand Staircase and cleared the landing so Minerva, Flitwick, and Patricia Linnaeus could handle the situation.
• Pomona embraced Severus Snape on the stairs, then returned to the Hufflepuff common room with Grubbly-Plank.
• Pomona and Grubbly-Plank discussed the news that Barty Crouch Jr. had been a Death Eater and recalled his school years.
• Pomona reassured the Hufflepuffs, found Joy Pince frightened in the common room, and sent her with Grubbly-Plank to see her sister.
• Pomona ordered the students back to their dormitories, then returned alone to her office and crouched by the door.

Pomona confronted Dumbledore about her response to Phoebe’s attack and challenged his decision to leave Harry Potter with his Muggle relatives. She left the office unconvinced by his reasoning and privately nicknamed him Old Fool.

• Dumbledore questioned Pomona about what she had done after Phoebe was found inside a painting, and she refused to accuse anyone without evidence.
• Dumbledore gave Pomona a copy of The Nightingale and the Rose and warned that her actions could create danger, while Pomona argued that fear would have spread if the children had been left alone with it.
• Dumbledore said he believed Voldemort was dead and had sent Harry Potter to live where his growth would be least affected, but Pomona doubted that his relatives would treat him well.
• Pomona challenged Dumbledore’s belief that Harry needed hardship to become a person with friends and questioned whether Dumbledore could foresee the future.
• Dumbledore told Pomona to give Slughorn his regards, and Pomona left with the book, privately calling Dumbledore Old Fool.

Pomona tried to restore order at Hogwarts by organizing clubs while Phoebe remained trapped in a portrait. Bill Weasley brought news that Phoebe had been freed, but Pomona found her asleep in the Hospital Wing and left without seeing Joy.

• Pomona organized student clubs and activity spaces while Severus and Filch enforced a curfew.
• Pomona thought of Sirius in Azkaban and worried that Harry might be led astray by his inheritance.
• Bill Weasley told Pomona he had been mistaken about the portrait's Extension Charm and led her to the Hospital Wing.
• Pomona found Phoebe asleep after taking a potion, with Dumbledore, Minerva, Flitwick, and Severus nearby.
• Minerva asked Pomona where Joy was, and Pomona left after Dumbledore told everyone to let Phoebe rest.

Pomona tried to persuade Albus to replace Hogwarts’s outdated Quidditch brooms, but he refused and left her with a white rose and a cryptic reminder of his own youth. Returning to the third floor after finding the castle inexplicably dark, she saw teachers confronting Patricia over missing personal belongings.

• Pomona passed the Dueling Club, where Émilie Taylor stunned 203 bats and challenged the record attributed to Gellert Grindelwald.
• Gilderoy Lockhart pulled Pomona aside to ask about Hogwarts’s Occamies and their eggs, and she sent him away for being a graduated alumnus.
• Pomona brought the Quidditch broom replacement request to Albus, who rejected it and argued that students should accept risk and make do with what they had.
• Albus spoke cryptically about his past love, and Pomona found the application form had turned into a white rose he said was his favorite flower.
• Pomona returned to the third floor at night and saw Kettleburn, Sinistra, and Trelawney accusing Patricia of keeping their missing belongings.