A Tale of Two Brothers

Chapter 21

Harry and Montague struck an odd deal between them.

Montague would take Harry down to Salazar room once a week and leave him there by himself. Nobody disturbed him, so Harry essentially holed himself up in the library of that room.

The library.

Harry did not know what falling in love meant, but if it was what he felt whenever he was in that precious room, Harry was sure he was in love. The plethora of books in there put the entire Hogwarts curriculum to shame. Most of them were on dark magic, but he did find many books on the subjects discontinued from teaching at Hogwarts in there too. Magical theory, ghoul studies, music, xylomancy, magical art and elemental magic.

In return, Montague insisted on teaching Harry dark arts. He had his doubts about the whole thing. Harry was taught to abhor that kind of magic from his childhood, but he had always been a curious person. He was sure that the curiosity might kill him someday, but for now, Harry was ready to take whatever was given to him. What harm would learning a different kind of magic do anyways? 

"You accepted this pretty well, Potter." Montague had said, before he'd started teaching.

"I am a learner, Montague." He'd replied. He'd do anything.

Learning and reading the books wasn't the bad part. Though it felt weird and wrong to do anything related to dark magic, something which he was taught to frown upon his entire life, Harry did not actually mind it. It felt good to practice and use dark magic, exciting even. 

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"You're a fast learner, Potter."

Harry smirked in response, sitting in front of several mice with their guts spilled around. Those poor things had a very painful death, but he was proud of getting the entrails expelling curse right on the first try. It took people at least a week to even make a cut on the victim's body, let alone cast it correctly over a dozen of times.

"This was good. I'll teach you the blinding spell next week." Montague stood up and looked down at him. "You're staying back again?" He might've posed it as a question, but Montague already knew what he was going to do.

"Obviously." Harry eyed the stack of books he'd kept on the table before they had started. Magical theory was officially his favourite subject right now.

Montague sighed and went out of the room in resignation, but not before saying something. "Get a life, Potter. Or at least learn a better subject. I swear that stuff is for nerds."

The door shut behind him as Harry spelled the rodents away and went over at the table, letting out a string of colorful words aimed at Montague.

Learning magic wasn't difficult. Lying was the hardest part.

He might fool Montague since the boy liked to believe anything he wanted. Harry knew why the older boy was doing this. He would be a fool otherwise. But Harry went along quietly.

Montague wanted to become a Death Eater; it was clear from the way he spoke. That might've been a fantasy, a dream, a few years ago. But now that Voldemort was back, becoming a Death Eater wasn't just a dream for him anymore. It was an opportunity, a goal. But Montague did not want to settle as some Death Eater like his father. He wanted to be known, to be remembered. 

And what was a better way to climb the ranks than to give Voldemort something he would never imagine? Or maybe something he always wanted. Someone, he always wanted within his ranks.

A Potter.

Harry was not sure how he felt about it. If he wanted to do what Regulus had failed at, that would be one of his goals. But in doing so, he'd lose the trust of his family. No, he'd lose his family altogether. Harry was ready to do that, theoretically, but not emotionally. Not yet.