Chapter Summaries

Charles met Grindelwald at the Centaur Liaison Office, where Grindelwald asked him to reserve a private room to meet Dumbledore on Halloween Eve. Charles tested alchemically treated lead and found that it could become highly conductive, leaving him hopeful about creating superconducting materials.

• Harry frightened Malfoy by saying Charles was looking for him, while Charles walked with Lavender and the Pettigrew sisters as Lavender asked about Trelawney’s prediction.
• At breakfast, Charles told Seamus that his restaurant’s lottery now offered vouchers and discount coupons, prompting Fred and George to seek out Ron and Percy.
• Grindelwald asked Charles to reserve a private room for a Halloween Eve meeting with Dumbledore, and Charles warned that Hogwarts might face another Halloween incident.
• Charles tested untreated and alchemically altered lead wire with a resistance tester, discovering that one treated batch behaved like an insulator and another had resistance of about three milliohms.
• Jack and Grindelwald discussed borrowing goblin gold and joining Voldemort against the goblins while Charles continued his experiments.
• Charles found that a batch of lead with an increased melting point had resistance in the micro-ohm range and decided to pursue alchemy-based superconducting materials.

Charles bought an old parchment containing a spell for controlling objects, but Dumbledore uncovered a hidden message that revealed the method for creating the Sorting Hat’s core. The seller’s identity remained unknown, and Dumbledore warned Charles not to experiment on the Sorting Hat.

• Aberforth complained that the Dancing Grass Restaurant’s food service had reduced the Hog’s Head Inn’s business, while Dumbledore asked about Charles’s working elves and their conflict with Hogwarts’s House-elves.
• Charles arrived with a parchment he had bought from a destitute wizard, and Dumbledore recognized that it concealed a cipher beneath an ordinary object-control spell.
• Dumbledore and Aberforth deciphered a sentence that Charles answered aloud, causing the parchment’s letters to move and rearrange themselves into the Sorting Hat’s creation method.
• Dumbledore asked Charles to recall the seller, but Charles could not remember the person’s appearance, and Dumbledore suspected a Confundus Charm.
• Dumbledore told Charles not to study the Sorting Hat, and Charles promised not to take it apart.

Charles commissioned a steel-framed humanoid doll from Zonko's Joke Shop, intending to assemble and strengthen it himself for use in his restaurant. He learned that the next Hogsmeade weekend had been moved to Halloween Eve and was invited to a village council meeting.

• Ron petrified Crookshanks after it took a Chocolate Frog box, and Hermione angrily freed her cat.
• Charles received a costly estimate for a life-sized silicone doll and decided to seek a smaller, sturdier humanoid instead.
• Ginny directed Charles to Zonko's Joke Shop, where he drew a golden-haired doll and added weapons to keep Ruby out of the kitchen.
• Charles commissioned Bilton Bilmes to make a steel-framed doll with replaceable outer skin, paying with Dancing Grass Restaurant vouchers.
• Bilmes invited Charles to a village council meeting at The Three Broomsticks and told him Hogsmeade weekend had been moved to Halloween Eve.

Charles built and awakened a humanoid doll, then tested its magic and intelligence in the Room of Requirement. Satisfied that it could be mass-produced, he planned to make dolls for the restaurant and eventually for security and other work.

• Harry helped Ron and Hermione settle their conflict by building a fence around the space beneath Ron's bed so Crookshanks could stay there safely.
• Charles assembled a humanoid from metal parts, enchanted it into an intelligent doll, and sealed it inside a blank book when Dumbledore and the other boys saw it awaken.
• Charles released the doll, named Shanghai Unit 0, in the Room of Requirement and tested its systems, spells, and ability to think and play games.
• Charles concluded that Shanghai Dolls could be mass-produced and planned to use restaurant funds to make a batch of waiter dolls before expanding production.
• Charles headed to Transfiguration class and saw Lavender Brown crying outside the classroom.

Lavender’s rabbit died, convincing the students that Professor Trelawney’s predictions might be coming true, while Charles prepared for Hogsmeade’s protest against Dementor searches and his restaurant opening. He arranged more automaton staff and invited prominent guests, including Harry, to the ribbon-cutting ceremony.

• Lavender told the students that her rabbit Binky had died after being frightened by a radio program, and they argued over whether the event proved Trelawney’s prediction right.
• Neville worried that Trelawney’s prediction about Harry dying upon seeing a dog might also come true, but Professor McGonagall dismissed the class’s fears and reminded Charles about the Hogsmeade residents’ meeting.
• McGonagall told Charles that Hogsmeade residents planned to protest the Dementors’ frequent searches, and Charles joined them in signing a letter to the Ministry.
• Charles showed Bill the Shanghai Automaton Unit Zero and ordered rainbow-colored uniforms and bows for more restaurant automatons.
• Charles invited prominent figures to the restaurant’s ribbon-cutting, including Grindelwald, Dumbledore, Scrimgeour, and Harry, and gave Rita Skeeter vouchers and a VIP card to promote the opening.

Charles opened the Dancing Grass Restaurant in Hogsmeade with a crowded ceremony attended by Fudge, Dumbledore, Setina Worbeck, and Grindelwald, who concealed his identity. The restaurant welcomed its first customers, while Jack and Fudge chatted and Dumbledore glared at Grindelwald in a private room.

• Dumbledore expanded the street to control the crowd as guests gathered for the restaurant's opening, and Setina Worbeck praised Jack and Charles.
• Worbeck revealed that her rescuer was researching a werewolf-treatment potion in the Himalayas, drawing a crowd of eager questions from Fudge, Aidan Lynch, and other guests.
• Grindelwald arrived in disguise, and Charles and Jack pretended to meet him as a foreign benefactor who had sponsored the restaurant.
• The opening ceremony featured a lion dance, speeches, and three songs performed by Worbeck before the guests cut the ribbon at eleven.
• Charles led the guests to private rooms while Hogwarts students entered the expanding restaurant, where Harry helped his friends settle in and Ron ordered salt-and-pepper spider legs.
• Jack chatted with Fudge in one private room as Dumbledore glared at Grindelwald, who calmly ordered food in another.

Charles oversaw the Dancing Grass Restaurant’s opening-day business and attended Hogwarts’s Halloween feast, where he expected trouble based on the previous two years. The students returned to the dining hall after an urgent castle-wide announcement, leaving the cause of the alarm unknown.

• Charles heard that Dumbledore had nothing to say about the day’s events and arranged for an owl to deliver the restaurant’s business data.
• Charles gave Dobby records on stray House-elves to recruit and told him the staff could celebrate at the Hog’s Head Inn after work.
• At the Halloween feast, Charles told Seamus that Aidan Lynch would send him a signed Golden Snitch.
• Charles warned Professor Delacour that Halloween Eve had brought trouble in each of the past two years, and Delacour said he was prepared.
• A voice ordered every student back to the dining hall, and they returned in confusion without knowing what had happened.

After Sirius Black attacked the Fat Lady’s portrait, Hogwarts students spent the night in the dining hall under guard while the professors searched the castle. Professor Delacour’s cannon accidentally blasted Professor Flitwick, and the chapter ended with Snape questioning how Black had entered Hogwarts.

• Colin Creevey told Charles and the others that Black had torn down the Fat Lady’s portrait, while students speculated about how he had entered the castle.
• Dumbledore ordered everyone to sleep in the dining hall while the professors searched the castle, and Professor Delacour guarded the students with heirloom cannons.
• An owl carrying the Dancing Grass Restaurant’s business report knocked at the entrance, triggering the cannon and a net that caught Professor Flitwick.
• Professor Delacour learned that the restaurant had received a week’s expected customers in one day, then told Charles to rest.
• Dumbledore returned during the night, and Snape reported that the search had found no sign of Black before asking how he had entered Hogwarts.

Snape accused Charles of helping Black enter Hogwarts, and Charles threatened to expose Snape’s past unless he apologized. Dumbledore mediated the dispute, and Snape apologized before Charles returned to his sleeping bag.

• Snape suggested that Charles could have helped Black by leaving Hogwarts and using Polyjuice Potion, and hinted that Black’s wealth might tempt him.
• Professor Delacour defended Charles, while Charles threatened to reveal Snape’s past to the newspapers unless he publicly apologized.
• Dumbledore urged Snape to apologize and asked Charles not to involve his grandfather or expose private matters.
• Charles offered to settle the matter if Snape apologized immediately or face a Wizengamot lawsuit, and Snape quietly apologized.
• Dumbledore told Charles the matter was over, Charles returned to his sleeping bag, and Snape left without a word.

As Hogwarts students speculated about Sirius Black’s entry into the castle, Charles discovered that Slytherin might be manipulating the Quidditch schedule by getting Malfoy injured. Harry tried to stop the plan, but the match was changed to Hufflepuff, and Charles prepared him for the stormy game before Dobby’s apology prompted a new idea.

• Hannah Abbott told Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil that Black had sneaked into the castle disguised as a flowering shrub, while students spread a rumor that Snape had tried to frame Charles.
• Professor Sprout told Charles that Slytherin students were claiming Snape was his father, and Charles denied the rumor.
• Harry told Charles that Anthony Goldstein, Padma Pettigrew, and other students had beaten Malfoy after he bullied a first-year Ravenclaw.
• Charles suspected Malfoy had arranged to be injured so Slytherin could avoid playing in the storm, and Harry went to Wood and Professor McGonagall to protest.
• Harry returned to report that Hufflepuff had replaced Slytherin in the match, and Charles gave him Shield-Charm thermal underwear.
• Dobby apologized to Harry and started to punish himself, but Harry stopped him; as thunder boomed, Charles thought of something interesting to do.

Charles gave Ginny a charm to help Harry during the rainy Quidditch match, while Hermione punched Peeves after he tried to steal her bag. Peeves then publicly mocked Slytherin’s team, and a fight within Slytherin left Marcus Flint and several others in the hospital wing, ruling them out of Saturday’s match.

• Charles gave Ginny instructions for the Water and Fire Repellent Charm so she could help Harry during the rainy match, and Hermione realized he was trying to bring the two together.
• Hermione threatened Charles with a bottle of dulled Exploding Liquid, then used a spell to return a first-year student’s belongings to his schoolbag.
• Peeves tried to steal Hermione’s heavy schoolbag, hit the wall, and was punched into it by Hermione; Charles peeled him off and vanished him.
• Peeves returned to the Entrance Hall and loudly insulted the Slytherin team over its change to the match schedule and its players’ reputations.
• A conflict broke out within Slytherin, and Marcus Flint and several others were taken to the hospital wing, leaving them unable to play on Saturday.

On the day of a stormy Quidditch match, Ginny waterproofed Harry's glasses while Charles stayed in the greenhouses to study fertilizer data and considered how to measure magical fertilizer. As the match dragged on, Charles and Dumbledore spotted Dementors flying toward the stadium.

• Wood made the Gryffindor Quidditch team eat a hearty breakfast before the match, while Charles told Seamus he would stay in the greenhouses.
• Ginny cast a rain-repelling spell on Harry's glasses, then used it on the faces of the Gryffindor players as they headed into the storm.
• Seamus noticed Hermione was missing from the Gryffindor stands, while Hermione watched the match concealed in the Slytherin stands.
• Charles filed the latest soil reports and found that plants given both chemical and magical fertilizer consumed nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium faster than those given chemical fertilizer alone.
• Dumbledore advised Charles to ask Snape about measuring magical content, but Charles considered seeking advice from potion experts through Lupin instead.
• Charles saw Preserved Egg run toward the stadium, and later he and Dumbledore spotted Dementors flying toward it from the Forbidden Forest.

During a stormy Quidditch match, Harry and Cedric searched for the Snitch as Gryffindor fought back against Hufflepuff. When Dementors swarmed the pitch, Charles summoned armed Ship Girl Patronuses to drive them away, while Harry was blown off course on his broom.

• Harry and Cedric traded feints and chased the Snitch while the storm made the match increasingly difficult.
• Gryffindor capitalized on Hufflepuff’s exhaustion to build a 110-point lead, but Hufflepuff defended and scored twice on the counterattack.
• Harry and Cedric spotted the Snitch above the Slytherin stands, but Harry’s senses changed as a mass of darkness approached from the Forbidden Forest.
• Hermione saw Snape rise as Harry began to sway and set fire to the back of Snape’s robes with Exploding Liquid.
• Charles summoned six Ship Girl Patronuses, whose cannons and fighter planes attacked the Dementors and drove them away.
• A black figure struck a Dementor above the pitch, while Harry clung to his Nimbus 2000 as the wind carried him away.

A band of rebellious Dementors planned to disrupt Hogwarts, but Smith drove them off with six Patronuses. Granger chased after Potter and uprooted the Whomping Willow to rescue him, leaving Black stunned by Granger’s strength.

• A group of young Dementors decided to surround a flying student and cause trouble at Hogwarts.
• Smith confronted the Dementors and used six Patronuses to beat them into retreat.
• Granger hid among the Slytherin stands, then chased after Potter when the Dementors approached him.
• The Whomping Willow caught Potter and smashed his broom after the wind carried him into its branches.
• Granger reached the tree, pulled the Whomping Willow out of the ground, and tossed it aside.
• Black witnessed Granger uproot the tree and thought she was a supernatural angel.

Charles praised Cedric for persuading the Hufflepuff team to request a rematch after the Dementor interfered with their Quidditch match, and encouraged him to consider becoming a leader. Charles and Cedric visited the shaken Harry in the Hospital Wing, where Ginny was on her way to see him when Charles pulled her aside to speak privately.

• Charles asked Cedric about Potion Championship preparations and said Professor Horace Slughorn would help train the contestants after Christmas.
• Cedric explained that he had persuaded his teammates to agree to a rematch because he did not want them to treat the Dementor as an ally in their victory.
• Charles praised Cedric's leadership and suggested he could become Minister of Magic, then teased him about Cho Chang.
• Charles and Cedric discussed Harry's damaged broom and Hermione pulling the Whomping Willow out by its roots before visiting Harry in the Hospital Wing.
• Harry stared blankly at the fragments of his Nimbus 2000 as Charles and Cedric left him snacks and fruit; afterward, Charles pulled Ginny aside when she came to visit.

Charles inspected the nearly completed Farbaton Castle and heard how Moss Jeff’s team turned a one-Galleon Icelandic warehouse test into a lucrative Ministry of Magic security contract. After realizing the company needed a finance officer, Charles planned to visit a Squib candidate that afternoon.

• More than a dozen Howlers screamed at the Slytherin Quidditch captain and Seeker, disrupting the Great Hall, while Charles’s article about their cheating appeared in the Daily Prophet.
• Charles showed Seamus and Neville the lounge and other renovations at Farbaton Castle, where he planned to move his department after Christmas.
• Moss Jeff reported that his team found many vulnerabilities in Iceland’s Ministry of Magic and won a contract worth several thousand Galleons.
• Charles offered to fix the new clients’ Grade C and D vulnerabilities for free and warned Jeff not to create new security problems.
• Jeff pointed out that the company had no finance officer, so Charles proposed hiring a Squib and arranged to visit him that afternoon.

Charles and Jeff visited Esk Pruit to recruit him to oversee their company's finances, but Esk hesitated because he feared being rejected as a Squib. After Charles returned to Farbaton Castle alone in the rain, someone pulled a sack over his head.

• Mrs. Prewett prepared for Charles's visit and hoped he would offer Esk an important job.
• Charles and Jeff met the Prewett family, and Mafalda questioned them excitedly about magic and other wizarding schools.
• Charles invited Esk to manage the company's finances, but Esk worried that the wizarding world would reject him as a Squib.
• Jeff reassured Esk that the company welcomed people with talent, and Charles offered him a five-year term with compensation if he quit.
• Esk said he needed more time to decide, and Charles left for Farbaton Castle with Jeff.
• Someone pulled a sack over Charles's head as he walked alone toward the castle in the rain.

Charles was kidnapped and taken to Bergen, where he suspected his captors wanted the Werewolf Antidote. At Hogwarts, Dumbledore received Charles’s wand and a ransom note, while Charles discovered that his young guard was a werewolf with a troubled love life.

• Harry noticed Charles was missing from breakfast, and the students learned he had not returned to the dormitory the previous night.
• An owl delivered Charles’s wand and a note to Dumbledore, prompting Neville and Ron to conclude that Charles had been kidnapped.
• Dumbledore read the note and left with Lupin, while he told McGonagall and the other professors not to worry about Charles.
• In Bergen, Charles ate breakfast under guard and noted that his kidnappers were an American family who had taken his wand and brought him abroad.
• Charles guessed that his guard was a werewolf seeking the Werewolf Antidote, then deduced that the young man had been rejected by a woman he loved.

Charles was rescued from his kidnappers, and Sirius Black secretly delivered two objects for Dumbledore. The chapter ended with Dumbledore taking Charles to his office while McGonagall went to reassure Jack.

• Sirius Black climbed into Charles's room, explained Jacob Black's identity, and offered Charles a private room at the Dancing Grass Restaurant.
• Black gave Charles two boxes containing a Horcrux and a fake Horcrux to pass to Dumbledore, then fled when someone knocked.
• Dumbledore and Lupin arrived with the kidnappers, and Charles revealed that Black had left Dumbledore a gift worth ten thousand Galleons.
• Charles teased Jacob about his future, then returned to Hogwarts, where Rita Skeeter arranged to interview him.
• Dumbledore took Charles and Lupin to his office and sent McGonagall to tell Jack that Charles was safe.

Dumbledore, Lupin, and Charles discussed Regulus Black’s letter, Charles’s connection to Black, and the public response to the Werewolf Antidote. Lupin guessed that researchers had succeeded in cultivating Marifasa on a large scale, and Dumbledore planned to promote werewolf treatment internationally.

• Dumbledore and Lupin read Regulus Black’s letter revealing that he had stolen the real Horcrux and intended to destroy it.
• Dumbledore told Lupin they would visit a place with keys that could resolve their doubts, then questioned Charles about how Black had found him.
• Charles explained that Black had lent him money and that his unnamed teacher was involved in researching the Werewolf Antidote.
• Charles proposed using the misunderstanding about his kidnapping to change public views of werewolves and offered funding for expanded trials.
• Lupin guessed that researchers had succeeded in cultivating Marifasa on a large scale, and Dumbledore resolved to contact them and promote treatment through the International Confederation of Wizards.