The Chalice and the Wand

by poetheather
Story ideas by poetheather and Wintermoon3
Beta by Redpiratemel

Chapter Seven

After a very long hiatus it returns.

Luna and Rhonda continue to search for the Lair of Helga Hufflepuff and Hermione is still coping with the transformation of her fiance and their breakup.

“Come on Luna, we’re almost there.” Rhonda and Luna were nearing the next possible spot on their list, the Wasserfalle Triberg. It was a Muggle tourist spot so they had to be very careful about how they were approaching it so as not to give themselves away. They were dressed very Muggle and Luna wore her radish earrings to help her blend in. They were getting a few looks to not too many.

As they walked down the trail, they could hear the waterfall before they could see it. This fit with what Rhonda knew of Helga Hufflepuff: it was in a valley, it was remote but not too remote, and it would be easy to hide behind. With the badger as her symbol Rhonda was sure that her home had been underground and somewhere easily defensible. This was the best lead she had and she had almost run out of other possible ideas at this point. If they couldn’t find the lair here they had two more places to check before giving up on finding Hufflepuff and heading off to Italy to search for Ravenclaw.

The two reached the falls and stood by the wooden railing, watching the water fall onto the rocks. It was a very soothing sight and sound and certainly made Rhonda relax some. There was a feeling of familiarity about this place, something that felt like home, almost welcoming. The crowd dispersed, as the tour group headed back to their bus, and the two of them moved quickly, acting to make use of this time.

Luna cast a muggle repelling charm to keep people away from the area for a short while as Rhonda climbed over the fence and gingerly made her way over to the side of the falls. The red head pulled out her wand and began to check on magical masking spells that could be hiding the lairs entrance. After a few spells, she reached into her bag and pulled out some of her more specialized detector items that she had brought with her from the Unspeakables offices where she worked. Once activated, she made a few readings and noticed that there did seem to be a large energy signature to the waterfall that had nothing to do with the natural ambient energy here. This could very well be it.

Was there a password? Rhonda knew very little about the Hufflepuffs except that they all worked hard and stuff. She knew more about Helga than about her house and nothing she knew gave her any clue as to any possible passwords. Would anything about that be involved here? Besides she didn’t know any old German from that time period, so that was another problem. What about a simple opening charm? Surely it couldn’t be that easy, could it?

Rhonda moved closer to the rushing water, trying to be careful so she did not fall in. She reached out with her wand tip barely into the stream of water when she cast. “Alohomora!”

Nothing happened. Maybe the door had been locked by Colloportus? That would certainly stop most things from getting in as it was a much more secure spell. What could she use to make it through that? Maybe Relashio? It might work, after all the spell was used to get things to let go of something. It was certainly worth a try. She focused and said, “Relashio!”

Nothing happened. This was really frustrating Rhonda. Hermione had been the one with the encyclopedic knowledge of spells, having basically any and every spell practically at her fingertips. She would know what to cast pretty quickly. She was just so bloody smart that is was scary some times. It was one of the things that was so very sexy about…

Rhonda shook herself to clear her thoughts. If Hermione didn’t need Rhonda than she didn’t need the curly headed girl, but thinking of her reminded Rhonda of another spell, or rather a derivation of a spell that she had picked up from the bossy know-it-all. “Specialis Revelio Portus.”

The water slowly shifted away from the rocks into two curtains of water and a faint doorway was outlined in yellow. This had to be it. She had found the lair of Helga Hufflepuff! “Luna, come on.”

The pale haired girl hopped over the railing, joining Rhonda up by the door. They quickly moved up to the door and went inside once Rhonda was able to undo the locks, the portal swinging open easily. The passage way was dry and remained that way when the water closed back over the entranceway, allowing them to look out at the area just below the waterfall as through a wavy gauze curtain.

They had a clear but wavy view of everything down from the falls, which would certainly have given Hufflepuff an excellent overlook of the land. With this, it would certainly be harder to set an ambush for her. Harder yes but not impossible. If there were other spells for scrying set up around here, then it would be much safer but they would have to look for those later. There were probably more devices inside the cave.

After a short walk into the cave, with both of them holding hands, the two explorers noticed that the rough cave changed from rock into a tile floor done in yellow and brown. They came to a large room, with lots of old furniture scattered about. Things were nice and dry with no moisture in the air. There were several tables loaded with different magical implements as well as dishes. Several bookcases were against the walls, helping to shape the space better. The tile floor was covered with a few rugs, mostly plain, but a few that were more decorative. Rhonda stopped Luna before the young woman stepped onto one of the rugs. “Let’s check things out first. Hermione always says to think before you jump in. With a site like this I would have to agree. Who knows what she might have left. What I wouldn’t give to have Bill with us right now. This is his area of expertise after all.”

Rhonda paused, her heart aching over the loss of the girl she had loved for most of her life. She sighed, trying to not think about the two of them hanging out, making love, planning the wedding, any of that. It made her sad; however this situation was what Hermione had made it, not her. She had tried to keep things going, working on the assumption that Hermione would solve this and if not that they would make the best of things. Hermione had not chosen her, had decided that her transformed fiancé was not worth keeping.

A few analysis spells later Rhonda was sure that it was safe to walk on the rug and that there were no obvious magical tripwires that they could trigger by just moving about in the room. The same spells made sure that there were no traps on any of the items in the room as well. That was a great relief as it would mean that they might be able to actually do something in the room. They had pretty well made it into the lair of Helga Hufflepuff and had access to all of her materials. It was a heady realization. This would certainly be of help in Rhonda’s research on the Chalice as well as how her condition came about.

Luna was flipping through one of the books, trying to make sense of what was in there. It did not look in any way familiar. That might be a bit of a problem. “Uhm…Rhonda, can you read German?”

“No. Why do you ask?” The thought that all of these books could be in some language other than English or Latin had never occurred to Rhonda and would only serve to make her more irate than she already was. That would certainly complicate matters as she didn’t have the language skills that Hermione had. She needed the curly haired woman even if Hermione didn’t need her. That thought soured her mood completely. She kicked the carpet angrily cursing, “Bugger all!”

* * * * *

Hermione rubbed her forehead in frustration. The amount of research she was doing into powered artifacts and their bleed over effects was making her head hurt. If what she was seeing were true, she would have to do a few things first in order to cure Ron of this particular effect. It was possible, but it wasn’t going to be easy. There were a few spells and a potion that would be needed to make this work, and that was where the problem lay.

She had the recipe for a rather complex potion and despite being good at potions it would take a true master to make this correctly as it took longer to make than polyjuice and was more complex. Her only hope was to talk to Harry and Snape in the hopes that Severus would make the potion for her as he was the only potion master she knew with the needed skill and the available time to brew such a thing. Now all she had to do was make sure that Harry and she were all right before she could ask such a big favor. Just flooing him wasn’t going to be enough. No, she needed to talk to him. Maybe floo him and ask him over to talk?

She headed over to the fire, tossed some of the powder in, and announced her call. She stuck her face in the fire and waited, looking back and forth to try and spot either of the two that lived there. Harry soon came over, looking a bit disheveled. “Hermione?”

“Hey Harry, could you come over and talk.” plead Hermione, clearly a bit emotional.

Harry smiled gently at her, “Sure thing Hermione. Let me get ready and I’ll be right over.”

Shortly Harry came over, looking a good bit more put together and only stumbling slightly as he stepped through her fireplace. “So, what’s up?”

“I… I... well you see Harry it’s like this… uh…” Hermione’s voice trailed off as she was unsure exactly what to say in this situation. After everything they had been through what could she say to ask him this question? “I…”

“Hermione, are you alright?” asked Harry, clearly a bit worried about her. “Here have a seat. I’ll be right back.”

While she was trying to come to grip with the words she wanted to say she could hear Harry banging away in the kitchen. That made her smile. He was probably making the extra noise on purpose as out of the trio he was easily the best cook, having gotten far too much practice growing up with the Dursleys. This was clearly all for her benefit, to help her relax and it was working. Good old Harry. What would she ever do without him?

That made her think about Ron and how she had basically driven him, her, whatever off because she had been acting like a right cow and not listening or really even trying to understand. Why had she been fighting so hard against this? Why had this whole thing been so difficult for her to accept? She sighed and rubbed her right temple, trying to stave off the headache that was building.

Harry came out with cups of tea and even some biscuits. “Here you go. I know it’s not quite a proper serving but I thought you might just want something to help you relax.”

“Thank you. I… Harry, I just wanted to make sure that you and I, that we’re okay.”

Harry narrowed his eyes a bit in confusion, trying to figure this out, “Well, yes, we’re okay. Why do you ask?”

“I know with everything with Rhonda and all of that I haven’t been, well I haven’t been the best friend that I could have been to her or to you.” admitted Hermione.

“That’s true but you are trying Hermione, I know you have.”

She smiled in thanks. “And that’s why I wanted to ask you over for… to see if we were okay and to check to see if you could ask Severus to brew a potion for me. It is a bit on the tricky side and he is a Potions Master with a great deal of experience. If I am right this potion could turn Ron back.”

Harry nodded following her reasoning. “That makes sense. And asking Severus to brew it makes sense as well. Have you checked with Rhonda and fixed things with her?”

Hermione looked down, abashed. “No, Ginny is still making me prove myself before she will let me get in contact with her. I know I was a cow to Rhonda and that I hurt her. I miss Ron and I don’t know why I have an issue with Rhonda but I am trying. I… I don’t know why this is so hard Harry.”

Harry pursed his lips, thinking. “Look, I’ll talk to her and see what I can do about getting her to tell you. But you also have to think about what you are going to do if this potion does not work. After all there is no guarantee that it will work because you aren’t even sure why this happened in the first place. And if that is the case you have to decide if you will choose Rhonda or not.”

Hermione sighed and sagged in her seat, sounding defeated. “I don’t know. This really is a huge thing for me and I feel overwhelmed.”

“That just means that it is important. I felt like that all the time I thought about Voldemort and trying to fight him, and look how that turned out.” Harry grinned, looking years younger.

Hermione chuckled, some of her tension fading.

“Now drink your tea. I went to a lot of effort to make it.”

Hermione looked up at him and smiled weakly, “Prat.”

“Yep and proud of it.”

“You would be. Honestly Harry, I don’t know how Severus puts up with you.”

“It’s because of my charm.”

“Git.”

“Feel better about things?”

“Yes. Thank you Harry.” replied Hermione, her words filled with emotion.

“Good. Now, you work on talking to that girl of yours and I will get Severus to agree to take a look at this potion of yours. Do we have a deal?” asked Harry, his humor masking the seriousness of his question.

Hermione knew that he was serious, having been able to read him since their third year at Hogwarts. “We have a deal. I have no idea what I am going to decide but I will talk to Rhonda and see what happens.”

“Good. Well, let me get going. I got things to do. Do you have a copy of that potion anywhere?”

Hermione handed over her small stack of papers that were her extra notes on this particular potion, copied just in case she were able to convince Harry of this. Harry looked at the stack and whistled. “You never do anything by halves do you Hermione.”

She just looked at him with a look that clearly answered his statement.

“Right. Talk to you later.” And with a flash of green fire and a called out destination Harry was gone.

Hermione slumped into her seat and had some more of her tea. Harry really did make an excellent tea. He probably made Severus an excellent housewife.

* * * * *

Rhonda was going through things carefully after using her wand to first make an accurate rendition of the state of the room before she touched anything. She did the same thing when it came to details on the bookshelves and the tables, as she was going through and simply categorizing everything. This was going to take a while.

Luna looked on and was at a bit of a loss for what to do, not having trained for this kind of work. Sure she had some skills from tracking creatures with her father but those skills were not as useful at this precise moment. She rocked on her heels briefly and instead made sure that Rhonda had the tools that she needed. Since that did not really take all that long, Luna pursed her lips and looked around for another easy task that would make sense. She found a decent cleared out space and opened their tent up, figuring that staying in the cave was a smart plan.

She was busy thinking and that was always a tricky proposition when there were nargles about. Things were going well with Rhonda and that was both good and bad. The woman was relaxing about her body and actually enjoying things. The sex wasn’t bad but Luna could tell that something was still haunting the redhead and that the something was Hermione. This was not a bad thing in her mind, if she wanted to get them back together then having Rhonda think about Hermione was a good thing.

Luna’s biggest worry right now was what to do about Hermione herself. If the woman was having issues with intimacy with women then Luna would need to see to that before these two would be able to get back together. That might mean that she would have to head back to London and seduce Hermione to make the woman better with sex with women. Then maybe she would be able to have sex with Rhonda and make it easier for them to get back together. She had to fix this. It was important. She knew it was but didn’t know exactly why.

Maybe if Rhonda was spending her time here working on the site or if she went when they found Ravenclaw’s place, Luna might have a chance to rush back to London and spend some time with Hermione. The mere thought of such a journey made her feel exhausted but if it had to be done for the greater good then it had to be done. She had to do whatever it took to ensure that Rhonda and Hermione stayed together, even if it cost her her heart. She teared up a little at that and shook her head. No, she did not have time for silly thoughts. She had a relationship to save.

She had the tent fully prepared and was now working on making some lunch for the two of them. She knew that ensuring that the two of them had plenty to eat while they were working was an important task and one she was much better at than Rhonda, who could burn water. One thing that had carried over from Ron to Rhonda was the appetite. So she certainly wanted to make sure that she was kept fed. It was a simple meal of moderately fresh black bread, some local cheese and some local wurst of some kind that she had picked up in town before they had started up the trail. She had heated the wursts along with some vegetables, sliced a few pieces of bread and cheese, laying it all out for the two of them. That should provide plenty of fuel for the both of them to work with.

She went back outside and saw that Rhonda was now busy in a far corner of the main room examining what looked to be a small greenhouse off towards the back of the cave. Luna headed on over and rested a hand on the redhead’s shoulder. “What have you found here?”

“Apparently, Hufflepuff had a collection of really rare plants here. Some of them seem to be incased some sort of stasis spell. I am not sure which one exactly so I am not going to fiddle with those at the moment. But all of this is really is pretty fascinating. There is just some truly amazing stuff in here. I mean it looks as if Hufflepuff closed things up as if she had expected to come back here. I wish I were able to find out why. You know, I don’t know why no one has ever looked for this place before, but I guess no one planned on using the chalice in that manner so it just never occurred to anyone to track her down.” commented Rhonda, as she was scribbling down some notes in a leather bound notebook she had.

“I guess people were just too lazy to do the work.” replied Luna in that dreamy voice of hers.

“Makes sense. Kind of stupid if you ask me. Blimey, what Hermione wouldn’t… never mind.” Rhonda ground her teeth in frustration and turned away from what she had been looking at, wanting to make herself stop thinking along whatever track she had been thinking along.

“I wanted to let you know, lunch is ready.”

“Great. I’m starving.” commented Rhonda, glad for the topic change. That and her stomach had been gurgurling lately.

As they were seated, Luna had handed Rhonda over a plate filled with good things and the jar of stone ground mustard. Once Rhonda started eating, she said, “So you were wondering what Hermione wouldn’t give to be in this cave with all this stuff?”

Rhonda choked on a bit of sausage, managed to swallow it down with some effort, trying to clear her throat with a few coughs and then said, quite loudly, “Bloody Hell! What was that for?”

“Well, wasn’t that what you were saying outside? I quite agree with you, you know. Hermione would give almost anything to see all of this. She really does have an insatiable curiosity. She would be quite useful in all of this exploring. Butterbeer?”

“Uh… thanks?” Rhonda took the drink offered to her, not sure what was going on.

Luna continued on, quite unfazed by Rhonda’s red face and distress, “I am quite certain that she would love to see all of this but not before she was being nice to you again Rhonda. That is an absolute first step.”

“Uhm… yeah. Sure.” Rhonda was getting confused. She had no idea what the hell Luna was going on about. As far as she knew, girls that you snogged and slept with did not usually blather on about other girls or mention them in this caviler a fashion. It was really making her more and more confounded. Part of her wanted to hide until the madness blew over.

“Oh good. I am glad you agree. I am sorry we have no treacle tart, I think that the snifflerbats may have gotten into the supplies. I am dreadfully sorry Rhonda. I think I should go shopping tomorrow while you work, would that be okay?” said Luna with a smile.

“Sure. That will be fine. I mean, we are going to be here for a few days why I am trying to figure out all this stuff, to see if I can get any clues as to the powers of Hufflepuff’s Chalice. If you can find something to help translate the books while you are out that would be great.” replied Rhonda as she cut some more of the wurst.

“No problem. I have an idea where to look for something like that.”

“Great. That will help speed things up in here. If I had glasses or something that translated languages or something like that, it would be perfect. I think Hermione may have… never mind. Forget about it.” grumbled Rhonda, her thoughts heading back to the curly haired girl.

“I think you have nargles. Once you finish lunch, I know a great way to check for them and maybe chase them off. That is… if you are interested.” said Luna coyly.

“Really? I think I like that idea. Tell me more…”

* * * * *

Concentrating when such a good looking man was in the room, working on something else, was not easy. Hermione kept telling herself that she was still engaged, that she was just having a slight hiccough in her relationship and that she would never cheat on Ron or Rhonda. However, Derek was so near and he smelled so good and he was so attractive and she so wanted to peel his clothes off and nibble his muscular body that it was completely distracting which was of no help to her mental state right now. How could she be sure of her cure for Rhonda if Derek and his scent of clean, rugged manliness was so close.

His work was too good and too useful to just sack him and send him far, far away. No, she just had to fight against this temptation and do the right thing, no matter how much she wanted to be bad. And by the right thing, she meant go home to her empty apartment and maybe frig herself into sleep again, while she cried in her half drunken stupor over what a total disaster her life had become. It was a terrible way to live and Hermione hated it. She hated feeling bad for feeling attracted to an attractive man. She hated feeling bad for not being attracted to Rhonda. She hated feeling bad that she was not sure she could live up to the ideals that both Harry and Ginny seemed to hold her to.

It was unfair. Why did she have to always be the perfect one? Why did she have to be the one who suffered while Rhonda got all the sympathy in this crazy situation? Derek’s muscular arms would surely comfort her through the long night alone but that would be wrong and she just couldn’t do that to herself or to Rhonda. If she wanted to make this work and salvage her relationship then she had to fight against these urges, but every day it got more and more difficult. All she really wanted to do right now was strip off her clothes, let Derek shove the books off and have his way with her on the tables. The thought of that whole scenario excited her, made her so wet that it was a bit uncomfortable and she was randier than she had been since this whole misadventure had started.

She swallowed hard and shook her head to clear it of the bad thoughts that were clamoring for control. No, she couldn’t do that, if she did it would be something she would regret for a very long time, but perhaps she could do something about the feelings and urges that were playing havoc with her. Getting up she walked to the loo and locked the door. After a quick cast of the appropriate privacy charms, Hermione dropped her pants, threw off her skirt and leaned against the wall, letting her fingers move within her sopping wet cleft. Her other hand moved under her shirt and under her bra to play with her breasts and the tightening nipples. As her hands were busy at work her mind thought of Derek and what he would look like, smell like, feel like, as he moved upon her.

That train of thought continued and it was very pleasant. The images of that muscular Texan in nothing but chaps and riding her, maybe breaking her like an errant horse got her so damn close but the images changed as her thoughts drifted, dragged along by the tidal pull of the sensations, from the image of a broad shouldered Texan to a more familiar red headed man, with a different scent and feel, with a far more familiar and practiced hand. Her own hands slowed from the frantic pace she had been rushing with, desperately trying to find some sort of release to a much more slow build to the final peak, moving her up closer and closer up towards what was sure to be a thunderous orgasm. She could picture clearly Ron’s thighs, his back, his shoulders, his arms, his abs, the feel of his Quiddich roughened hands moving across her skin. His rough lips on hers, the way his skin felt under her hands, the way the muscles bunched under his back as he thrust into her, the smooth muscles of his arms, the rounded curve of buttocks, the soft globes of her breasts and the way that they fit just so in her…

Hermione screamed out her orgasm and her legs buckled under her, dropping to the floor in tears, sobbing for a lust that she wanted, had had before and, in the case of her husband, utterly reviled and she did not know why.