September 17 – Ravenclaw Tower
Rain fell like curtains against the tower's windows, streaking the glass with thin lines of silver. Outside, the lake churned. Inside, most of the tower's inhabitants huddled near the enchanted fireplace or scribbled away at Charms homework.
Rowan sat by himself near the far end of the common room, where a narrow archway opened onto a smaller, mostly forgotten reading nook. He didn't need the company. He needed quiet.
His wand lay on the table before him, next to a copy of Magical Structures and Spontaneous Manifestation. Its pages were thick with diagrams of enchanted places—shrines that whispered thoughts, forests that rearranged themselves, and schools that developed minds of their own.
The margin bore a single note in his hand:
"What if the castle is not enchanted to contain learning, but to create it?"
He stared at that line for a long time.
Then, as if summoned by the thought, the enchanted stone in his pocket warmed.
The Pull
Rowan had mapped out the corridor to Aurem with obsessive care—but this pull led elsewhere. He trusted it immediately. The stone was not a compass. It responded only to proximity with powerful, intent-driven magic.
Tonight, it tugged him east.
He slipped quietly from the common room, past the bronze eagle knocker, which asked no question tonight. Almost as if it wanted him to leave.
The halls of Hogwarts after curfew were a different world. The portraits were asleep, or pretending to be. Suits of armor stood a little straighter when no one watched. The magic in the air was louder somehow—like the quiet hum of a violin string being plucked just beneath hearing.
Down one corridor, left past a statue of a centaur archer, then down a spiraling back stair so tight Rowan had to turn sideways to descend.
The stone pulsed stronger.
A corridor stretched before him—one he'd never seen.
Dustless.
Silent.
And at the far end, a door stood open.
The Room That Wasn't
It was not marked on any map.
The room was vast, windowless, and shaped like an oval chamber turned on its side. Every inch of its surface—floor, walls, ceiling—was covered in script. Not carved. Not painted. Written.
Runes in black ink that shimmered faintly, pulsing as if they were breathing. Hundreds. Thousands. From dozens of magical languages.
Rowan stepped through the threshold.
The door behind him closed without a sound.
No fear. Just knowing.
The script closest to him blinked once, then changed.
He stepped closer. It changed again.
This time, it rearranged into English.
"Lesson One: What You Know Can Bind You."
Rowan's eyes narrowed. "A classroom?"
The ink shifted.
"Knowledge is weight. Knowledge is light. You must learn to carry both."
Then—the floor beneath his feet rippled. Not physically—but visually. An illusion. A test.
Suddenly, Rowan stood at the edge of a stone bridge over a chasm of black water. No railings. No path forward—except straight ahead.
Rowan reached into his robes. The stone was glowing steadily now.
He stepped forward.
The Trial
The first step was easy.
The second, less so—the stone trembled under his boot.
On the third, the wind began to howl. From nowhere.
By the fifth, the bridge cracked behind him.
He stopped.
This was not physical. Not real.
"An illusion," he whispered.
The ink on the walls responded immediately:
"Then treat it as such."
He took another step—and the wind vanished.
Two more steps—and the bridge stabilized.
When he reached the center, a shimmer formed in front of him. A figure emerged from the mist—robed in silver and blue, hooded, face obscured.
Rowan raised his wand. "Are you real?"
The figure said nothing.
Instead, it raised a hand and cast.
A blast of force—real, not illusion—slammed toward him. Rowan dove, rolled, flicked his wand.
"Protego!"
The shield barely held. Sparks flew. The bridge underfoot cracked for real this time.
The figure spoke—not aloud, but inside his mind.
"Knowledge is not safety. It is permission."
Rowan gritted his teeth. "Then I give myself permission."
He whipped his wand through a pattern he'd been practicing in private for weeks—an experimental layering of Disarming and Binding Charms.
"Expelliarmus Vinctus!"
The spell hit.
The figure staggered—then dissolved into mist.
The chasm vanished. The bridge became stone again.
Rowan stood in the middle of the oval room, heart pounding.
The walls shifted again.
"Lesson Two: What You Fear Is Not What Hunts You."
Then, the door reopened behind him.
He left the room—slowly, calmly.
But the stone in his pocket continued to glow.
There were more lessons to come.
September 19 – Breakfast in the Great Hall
Rowan was halfway through toast and eggs when Hermione sat down across from him, uninvited.
"You disappeared last night," she said.
Rowan blinked. "Is that a statement or a question?"
She frowned. "I noticed."
"So you're watching me."
"I'm watching everything," she said stiffly. "There are things happening at this school. Strange things. Books that vanish from the library. Stairs that lead nowhere one day and to the fourth floor the next. And you—you—seem to already know why."
Rowan folded his napkin. "Is this an interrogation?"
Hermione leaned closer. "It's an invitation."
He tilted his head. "To what?"
"To share what you know. Before someone gets hurt."
There it was again. That certainty. Hermione didn't understand what she was stumbling toward—but she felt it. And she was right to worry.
"Have you ever heard of a classroom without teachers?" Rowan asked softly.
Her expression changed.
"I found one," he said. "It teaches… differently."
She hesitated. "You're serious."
"Yes."
"Can you take me there?"
Rowan's eyes narrowed. "No. Not yet."
"Why not?"
"Because you don't ask the right questions."
Hermione flushed, but didn't argue. Instead, she pulled out a folded parchment.
"I copied this from the third-floor corridor last night. I swear the door wasn't there the day before."
He opened it.
His expression shifted.
Aurek runes. The same kind he'd seen etched into the hidden room.
She had seen something.
"Be careful," he said at last. "The castle listens."
Then he stood, taking the parchment with him.
That Evening – Library
Rowan returned to the misfiled tome.
The map of secret places had changed.
Where once there had been blank space beneath the east wing, now a new chamber was marked in golden ink.
Aurek: Third Branch
The Unspoken Classroom.
It hadn't shown up until now.
Until he had passed its first test.
Rowan ran his fingers across the page.
It was not the last.
And he wasn't the only one looking anymore.