Book Three: The Heir and The Champions

XXX - The Devil (Part One)

Harry Potter

It had been a busy two months for Harry after the Yule Ball and after Odin left that night, Harry handed over Balmung to Sirius and told him that he didn't use swords before going to bed. Harry had awakened to the smells of breakfast and writing on his mirror, which he scowled at, and when he had gone downstairs he had found that Sirius had hung the sword over the fireplace in a place of honor, Harry had smiled at the sight before moving to the kitchen. The rest of his stay at Grimmauld Place was quiet with Sirius doing his best not to yell at Kreature while Harry was anywhere near them, but he seemed to hate the old house elf for some reason and the feeling was mutual for the house elf it seemed.

Harry and Zoë's return to Hogwarts was met with happy squeals and house-elf-shaped missiles tackling Harry to the ground with all sorts of thanks for the large collection of mismatched socks that he had gotten for Dobby. Hermione had pulled him aside as soon as she saw him and asked if he really wanted her to have his mom and dads research, and he told her that he couldn't understand anything in the papers and she was the only person he knew smart enough to understand any of it, she had hugged him and told Harry that she would make sure to complete them before publishing them under their names.

Classes and training returned with a vengeance after he had gotten back, classes became harder, homework longer, and training even more vicious. Moody had them study curses and used conjured livestock to demonstrate their effects on them before going on a short break from that horror show to show them the counter-curses and minor healing charms one could use to undo the damage. Flitwick had them learning the shield and stunning charm, which Harry, Ron, and Hermione taught themselves last year much to the surprise of the diminutive charms teacher. McGonagall had them memorize different metals and their properties while showing them how difficult each one was to work with magic, but during Harry's weekend training, she was beating the animation charm for transfigure armor and weapons into his head, along with how to change the appearance of them without changing the compensation of the material. Harry had asked about the rune configuration that made it harder to vanish things, and McGonagall had explained it and even demonstrated it for him, but it wasn't until Harry returned to Dún Scaith that he finally got it down.

As soon as Harry had stepped through the Gate of Skye, his teacher was on him with her dance of shadows and death, spears both conjured and her divine weapon slammed into Harry like a hurricane. Scáthach was no longer holding herself to Harry's level or just above, she came at him fast and hard, blitzing him with an overwhelming force and speed, beating him back and forth. She hadn't lied about mixing Battle Magic into their fights either, walls, swords, shields, animated armor, and spears rained down from her like hellfire pushing Harry harder than ever before. Scátchah mixed in another form of magic Harry had never seen, using either her fingers or the tip of her spear she would carve runes in the air, and from them spilled fire, ice, light, shadow, lightning, wind, water, and other elements. She would enchant her spear with them or shoot them off at Harry to dodge or shield with his magic; she could create shields that could stop magic and physical attacks. it gave a new level of terror to the woman that was Scáthach, and Harry understood why the Roman gods had to use cunning and treachery to beat her because if this was her fighting just one mortal, Harry didn't want to know what she was like fighting at her full power.

Scáthach would conjure suits of armor filled with shadows for Harry to fight against so he could get used to fighting multiple opponents at once without using The Hunt, because as she said "If you fight without the Hunt then you be even more dangerous with it, now get up Greaca, and show me your fangs!" of course she said this right before booting him across the throne room. When Scáthach had stopped using him as a ping-pong ball, Harry had the opportunity to ask her about the runes she used and if she would teach him them.