You Look More Like a Ghost Than I Do

Late at night, in the shadows of the Astronomy observation platform atop Hogwarts' North Tower.

Professor Quirrell slumped against the stone railing like a discarded rag doll. The night wind lifted one corner of his purple turban, revealing the grotesque features bulging beneath the pallid skin at the back of his neck.

His eyes rolled back, but a snake-like hiss spilled from his throat. "You... are late... Caesar..."

Caesar emerged from the shadows of the spiral staircase, his steps half a beat slower than usual.

His left foot lingered on the ground for an almost imperceptible moment. Just then, moonlight pierced a gap in the clouds and illuminated half his face.

Faint silver-gray currents now seemed to writhe beneath his skin like living things, sliding from his cheekbone to the side of his neck before disappearing beneath his black robes.

Voldemort sniffed through Quirrell's senses, and the hiss suddenly sharpened. "Your body is rejecting the magic? No, the magic is eating away at you!"

Caesar stopped ten feet from Quirrell, close enough to talk but far enough to be out of range of any sudden spell attack.

He didn't deny it. Instead, he slowly raised his left hand and unfastened his cuff.

Spiderweb-like, dark blue cracks covered the skin from his wrist to his forearm.

It was like shattered porcelain hastily pieced together with cheap glue. A mineral-like, icy glow that didn't belong to flesh and blood shone from deep within the fissures.

Though this was only a simulation, the pain was real.

He had been careless.

But he couldn't let Voldemort notice anything was wrong. If he admitted there was something abnormal about his body...

Then the bald egghead was mentally abnormal.

Their partnership could turn into betrayal at any moment, jeopardizing the outcome.

"A price." Caesar's voice was steady, but each word seemed to be painstakingly chiseled from beneath a sheet of ice. "When you study certain forbidden ancient contract magics, you have to give something up."

He lowered his sleeve, hiding the horrifying cracks. "The Philosopher's Stone can stabilize it. At least it'll let me live a few more years."

Quirrell's head snapped backward at a bizarre angle, exposing the face on the back of his skull in full. Two black holes stood where its nostrils should have been.

"Cure yourself? Hah. A wizard like you would debase himself just to stay 'alive'?"

"You have to be alive to keep researching." Caesar's right hand unconsciously pressed against his chest, where the jade pendant burned through his clothes, scorching his very bones.

"And the Philosopher's Stone happens to be both my most effective research subject and the best ingredient for a potion."

Silence filled the air for several seconds, broken only by the wind wailing through the cracks in the tower.

Voldemort was weighing his options.

A badly wounded, near-death collaborator with vast knowledge was easier to control than one in his prime, but also less predictable.

"Tomorrow night..." The hiss returned, testing him like a coiling serpent.

"After moonset, Snape will be the last guard on duty watching over the Philosopher's Stone. I can make sure he 'happens' to leave his post for fifteen minutes."

"Enough." Caesar pulled a roll of tanned Thestral Hide Map from an inner pocket of his robes and unfurled it with a flick.

Seven routes to different paths through the restricted area on the fourth floor of the castle were marked on the map in Goblin-blood ink. Each route was annotated with the guards' weaknesses and ways to avoid them.

Then he tapped the map with a fingertip, and several lines of shifting Runes appeared:

"Hagrid's three-headed dog needs to be kept under a continuous sleeping spell. I've prepared a powerful sedative mixed with dragon nerve powder.

"Sprout's Devil's Snare doesn't fear light. It fears sound waves of a particular frequency. As for the Mirror of Erised..."

"Dumbledore's trick." Voldemort's hiss seethed with suppressed fury. "Only someone who doesn't want to use the Stone can take it out! Absurd!"

"That's why we need to make it 'think' we don't want to use it." Caesar rolled up the map, the eerie gleam in his eyes deeper than the night. "I have a way to deceive the mirror temporarily and make it 'hand over' the Stone of its own accord."

Quirrell's body convulsed violently. Voldemort was clearly shaken. "What way?"

"Meet me in front of the mirror at midnight tomorrow, and you'll see."

Caesar turned, his black robes billowing in the foul wind. "You only need to take care of two things. First, station all the forces you can command near Hogwarts. Once you have the Philosopher's Stone, attack Hogwarts immediately. Second..."

Caesar looked back, fixing his gaze on the face at the back of Quirrell's head. His eyes were as cold as if he were inspecting an experiment about to be discarded.

"Keep your curiosity in check, Tom. Some ancient and powerful magic in this world won't let you go once you've seen it!"

Then he disappeared around the bend in the staircase, his steps still marked by that strange hesitation.

Quirrell crumpled to the ground. The face on the back of his head twisted as the hiss became a crazed chuckle. "Won't let me go, hahahaha. Caesar Black... you look more like a ghost than I do..."

Meanwhile, below the tower.

Hermione held her breath behind the giant shield raised by the Knight William II Statue.

She had used three layers of magic:

The Disillusionment Charm blended her outline into the stone wall, while a silver thread of the Eavesdropping Charm snaked from the tip of her wand to a crack in the rooftop.

Most crucial of all was a strand of hair wrapped around her left wrist. It was one of the silver-black hairs she had "accidentally" saved last year, when Caesar tutored her in Ancient Runes.

Now, it was growing faintly warm under a variation of the bloodline-tracking spell, pointing toward the top of the tower.

She saw it.

She saw Caesar's left leg stiffen for less than half a second as he stepped onto the rooftop.

She saw the faint blue cracks beneath his skin flash and vanish in the moonlight, like a glacier splitting apart in the dark.

She saw the terrible marks running from his wrist to his forearm when he unfastened his cuff, as if invisible blades had repeatedly cut him open before his skin was clumsily stitched back together.

Hermione's nails dug deep into her palm, and the One-Winged Bird Necklace burned against her chest.

This was no longer the warmth of a shared bond, but a sharp warning. The other end of the contract was coming apart.

She heard it.

She heard the hoarse, inhuman voice rolling from Quirrell's throat. "Your body is rejecting the magic?"

She heard Caesar calmly admit the cost in a voice so cold it was cruel. "There's always a price to pay."

She heard, "The Philosopher's Stone can stabilize it," and, "Tomorrow night, after moonset."

When Caesar said, "I have a way to deceive the mirror temporarily," Hermione nearly rushed out.

The Mirror of Erised was Dumbledore's final line of defense. How could Caesar possibly...

But she bit down hard on her lip.

Sixteen-year-old Hermione Granger had already learned to keep secrets to herself.

So.

She watched as Caesar turned away, the black robes barely concealing an unnatural bulge beneath his left shoulder blade, as if something foreign were lodged in his flesh.

She listened to his footsteps recede, each one dragging with the sluggishness of magic struggling to flow, like rusted gears being forced to turn.

She slowly backed away, inch by inch.

She dispelled the Eavesdropping Charm, lifted the Disillusionment Charm, and finally severed the tracking spell on the strand of hair around her wrist.

The strand of hair turned to ash at her fingertips, ending the one-way connection.

She ran through the empty corridor. The pendant on her chest grew hotter and hotter, and red streaks of blood had already soaked through her underwear, leaving a small damp stain on her robes.

She rushed into her bedroom.

She locked the door.