Fred and George and the Toilers of Trouble (Year 1) ✔

Chapter 17:6

Flipping to the inside cover of her most recent comic, Angelina pointed out a few of the enchanted illustrations from the index of characters. The first was a wizard who dressed like Professor Parsimonae. He brandished a sparking wand and whirled in place to show off a fancy maneuver. The next wizard pressed a long finger to his temple, which caused the words around him to quake. And lastly was a beautiful woman in a dark gray cloak. When she noticed them watching, she covered her head with a voluminous hood and reached for an item on her belt, before vanishing from the page.

"The Master of Mystery, Psychus, and the Moving Muggle needed to escape Goblinmouth Grotto...for the second time. Only now they had to face a Sphinx in order to get through the Labyrinth and back to safety. The Sphinx's riddle was quite similar to this. I have to think."

After a few seconds, Lee was squinting so severely at the fiery text above the stone that his eyes almost disappeared. "Crypts, coffins, hens, and hares...where do we even begin?"

"You need to change your perception of the problem," she asserted sharply. "Stop using the mind of a wizard and start thinking like a Commoner."

"A what?" asked Nettles vacantly.

"She means Muggle," said Alicia in an irritated whisper, revealing to the Gryffindor boys that the girls had grown accustomed to Angelina's unique sensitivities.

"Why should we be forced to think like Muggles?" George asked in a hoot of laughter.

"They have to use their minds differently in order to survive without magic. Which is precisely why I should've brought along my comic book collection, because it wasn't the Master of Mystery who solved the riddle of the Sphinx...it was the Moving Muggle! Only she could find the solution. So we have to begin by forgetting everything we know...which shouldn't be hard for one of us," she said abrasively, shooting a sideways glance at George, "then we'll focus on the problem, as if it has nothing at all to do with magic."

"But Professor Parsimonae said they're wizards," Towler interjected. "Twenty-four of them, actually."

"It's misdirection, don't you see?" Angelina responded with a grin.

"This riddle has me plenty misdirected," said Patricia glumly.

"I think that's the point," Fred replied, as two of the Ravenclaws stood to bring up their answer.

"No way!" Lee grumbled with sudden indignation. "They've done it?"

The other houses were relieved when Parsimonae sent them away. The pair fussed over their parchment during their sluggish return to the Ravenclaw tables. All the while, Angelina was dipping her quill and scratching down half a page of chaotic notes.

"At its most rudimentary, this is nothing more than a clever way of hiding a riddle inside another riddle. The way I see it, we're faced with two problems. Who are the figures in the empty crypts, and what are the questions? Once we've figured that out, the answers should be clear. I think you'll find that —"

"Hang on. Questions?" Lee blurted. "There was only one question, and it's bloody confusing."

"No, there's one riddle. We need to discover the who and the what," Angelina defined. "It says right there, In the last lies the question...which is the mystery hiding within the overall riddle."

"So," Fred began, scratching his head, "the answer is in the form of a question?"

"Presumably, yes. But it says, Of the mysteries they hold dear. Mysteries, not mystery. That means the answer is likely two questions, based on clues from the empty coffins."