Of Monsters, Of Men

Chapter 8

Second Term

Harry and Tom spent Yule Break at Hogwarts, marveling at the absence of people and vastness of the castle. Out of the entire Slytherin population, which was about three-hundred students, only fifteen had remained.

Without the majority of Slytherin breathing down their back, they were able to talk freely and, even better, explore to their hearts' content. They inspected floor to floor, looking for special nooks and crannies. They were still trying to find the elusive door, although it was to no avail. On top of that, each night after curfew, they read late into the night, relentless in their quest to conquer the contents of the school library.

The 31st of December—Tom's birthday—came and passed like any other day. He had a special hatred of birthdays, particularly his own, as he believed there was no reason for such "contrived frivolity." Moreover, Tom was a penny-pincher, and he did not wish for Harry to spend money on useless trinkets.

Having spent over a decade together, Harry knew well enough not to get him a present. However, that never prevented Harry from feeling bad about it—Tom always gifted thoughtful presents to Harry because he knew how much Harry treasured the idea of a birthday, regardless of his own feelings on the matter.

So the duo spent the second half of break finishing homework and reading ahead in their assigned curriculum. The secret to their success was that they mastered the content before it was taught it. It was the only viable method of competing with purebloods for the top spots. Therefore, breaks were the perfect time to rapidly cram content until they were exhausted.

And not a week later, all students returned to the castle.

On the 9th of January, there was a great fuss in the Great Hall when the paper-owls came swooping in, delivering newspapers clutched between their talons. Tom stole one from an unsuspecting Hufflepuff to see what all the harried conversation was about.

The Daily Prophet headlines screamed 'GRINDELWALD ESCAPES AZKABAN!'

Harry furrowed his eyebrows at the title. Grindelwald was a hushed name in Slytherin circles. From what Harry and Tom had gathered, Grindelwald was a Dark Lord that terrorized much of Europe in the 1920s. However, that was about as far as their knowledge stretched.

Ignorance of contemporary politics was practically a death sentence in Slytherin, since being known as ignorant labeled one as "naive." Therefore, they went into the library to remedy their lack of knowledge. Of all the books on the Dark Lord, they settled on Grindelwald: The Rise of a Contemporary Dark Wizard.

"The Dark Lord Gellert Grindelwald is best known today as a post-Great War revolutionary and terrorist. During his reign, he assassinated political opponents, orchestrated terrorist attacks across Europe, and greatly endangered the International Statute of Secrecy. His political reactionary party, the United German Magical Nationalist Party (UGMNP) infiltrated many European ministries that led to many stricter policies regarding muggles and muggleborns.

But who was Gellert Grindelwald?

Gellert Grindelwald was born in Austria-Hungary in 1883. He attended Durmstrang Institute until he was expelled in 1899 due to his twisted, dark experiments that nearly killed students. Following his expulsion, he was silent for ten years before he served as a German lieutenant in the Great War. After the war, the charismatic public figure used the growing discontent of Dark Wizards in the former territory of the German Empire in the late 1910s to amass a secret army of followers, aptly named Grindelwald's Acolytes, as well as publicly heading the birth of a German ultra-conservative party, the UGMNP, in late 1920.