Basilisk Eyes

Chapter 108: Basilisk venom and Phoenix tears

"Hey, Gemma, do you want to go to the library with me?" Harry asked as they were leaving the dining hall.

She tapped a slow "yes" on his arm. He thought there might be a question in there.

"Some things came up in my lesson today with Professor Lupin that I want to try to research. Maybe you could help me?"

She tapped a quicker "yes" in response this time and he smiled toward her as he took her offered arm.

They greeted Besel as they entered the library and made their way to their favorite table—but Gemma slowed as they approached and Harry could hear someone turning pages—the newspaper, he guessed by the sound of it. Gemma turned slightly toward Harry and made their sign for Aminah on Harry's chin.

"Hi, Aminah," Harry greeted, "Is it all right if we join you?"

"Sure—there is plenty of room, and yeah, it'd be nice to have company," Aminah said, sounding subdued. "Gemma's with you, right?"

"Yeah, sorry. I should have said so. Thanks. What are you working on?" Harry asked.

"Oh, I'm just reading the newspaper," Aminah said, tapping her reader gently on the table.

Gemma placed Harry's hand on the back of a chair across from Aminah and sat at the end of the table between them—Harry guessed so that she could communicate with both of them. He listened to Aminah's side of the conversation and decided she wasn't just subdued, she was sad. He guessed it had to do with her father and wondered if anything else had happened over the weekend.

Gemma signed "writing" on his palm. He got the notebook and pencil out of his staff for her. He also summoned the anagnóstis out so he'd be ready when she'd written her question for him. She guided his hand holding the anagnóstis to the spot in the notebook where she'd been writing.

"What do you want to research?" Gemma asked.

"Oh, I want to look up Basilisk venom—like what it does to people. I mean, besides kill them. And Phoenix tears. And I want to look up rainbow-colored Reparo charms and Protego charms, but I'm not really sure how to do that. And also, I want to see what I can find out about Remus Lupin, my parents, and even..." he paused and Gemma wrote a question mark on his hand.

"Never mind. Let's just see what we can find about Basilisk venom. That's a good place to start. Is there a card catalog?" he said.

She wrote a question mark on his hand.

Of course, there isn't a card catalog. That's a muggle library thing.

"How do wixen know how to find the books they need?" Harry asked. "Isn't there a way to find out what's in the books?"

I should have listened more closely to Hermione. I bet she knows.

Harry waited as Gemma pulled the notebook back to respond.

"Oh, I think my pa was talking about something like that. He goes to the muggle library sometimes and was describing a big box with lots of drawers that had slips of paper that someone had written all the information about the individual books on. What a lot of work! Is that what you meant by card catalog?" Gemma said.

Harry nodded at the same time that he tapped yes on Gemma's arm. She jumped up and he heard her walking over to the reception desk where he could also hear Besel's chair. Harry got up.

"I guess we're going to ask Besel," Harry said to Aminah who made a small noise in response as if she were absorbed in her reading.

Harry followed Gemma, not bothering to shake out his staff, but instead trailing his knuckles on the backs of the low bookcases along the aisle to the entryway since he was pretty sure there wasn't anything in his path. He hadn't heard anyone else in the library.