The autumn day at Hogwarts was sunny and cool. The trees around the castle were covered in yellow and red leaves, with green ones still here and there. After class, Hermione was walking alone, as usual, along one of the castle's long corridors, occasionally glancing out of the windows and quietly repeating a spell she had recently learnt under her breath.
As she rounded the next corner, she suddenly spotted Professor Dumbledore ahead of her. Hermione had been meaning to ask the headmaster about the Relicium Club for quite some time, but the right opportunity had never come up. Now he was walking alone, slowly stroking his beard, apparently deep in thought.
Hermione stopped, hesitating. Was it really worth bothering the headmaster with such a trivial request? Meanwhile, Dumbledore was getting farther and farther down the corridor.
'If I let him get away now, who knows when I'll get another chance like this,' she decided, and hurried after him.
Catching up with the headmaster, Hermione blurted out:
"H'lo-Pro'sor-Dumble'ore! I-heard-y'run-th'licium-Club-th't-studies-'mulets-is-that-right?"
Hermione herself was not entirely sure what she had just said. Dumbledore stopped and stared at her in puzzlement for several seconds, trying to make sense of what he had heard.
"Hmm... I'm afraid my hearing isn't quite what it used to be," he said at last. "Would you mind repeating your question?"
The professor's friendly tone calmed Hermione a little. She took a deep breath, trying to get the sudden wave of nervousness under control, and this time forced herself to speak slowly and clearly.
"Hello, Professor Dumbledore! I heard that you run the Relicium Club, which studies amulets. Is that right?"
Dumbledore looked at Hermione with interest.
"Forgive me, Miss..."
"Granger. Hermione Granger," she introduced herself.
Dumbledore raised his eyebrows slightly, then smiled.
"Ah yes, Miss Granger. Now I remember. Professor McGonagall has mentioned you a couple of times. It seems you've made a very good start to the school year."
Hermione's cheeks turned slightly pink. It was nice to know that even the headmaster had heard about her and how well she was doing.
"Yes... I suppose so," she replied, a little embarrassed.
Dumbledore nodded kindly.
"As for your question, yes, I do run Relicium. Why do you ask?"
"I'd like to join the club," Hermione replied.
Dumbledore looked at her thoughtfully.
"I'm afraid that won't be possible, Miss Granger. I don't take first-years into Relicium."
Disappointment flashed across Hermione's face. She looked at the headmaster, not understanding. Seeing the unspoken question in her eyes, he immediately explained:
"But it isn't because of some silly rule. It's simply that you need quite a broad knowledge of the magical world to take part in the club, especially when it comes to magical materials, and as a first-year you simply haven't had time to learn enough about them yet."
Hermione's spirits visibly sank, but she did not want to give up so quickly.
"What if I learn all of it myself? Could you tell me what I need to read? I'll learn everything. I can do it!"
Dumbledore shook his head.
"Miss Granger, I'm afraid you don't quite realise how much there is to learn. It takes other students months, sometimes even years, to master it. And the first club meeting is only two weeks away, three at most."
"But you just said yourself that Professor McGonagall had mentioned how well I was doing."
Dumbledore raised his eyebrows slightly.
"That is true."
"Then perhaps you could at least let me try?" Hermione continued hopefully. "Give me until the first meeting. If I don't manage to learn everything by then, I won't ask again."
For several seconds, the headmaster looked at her in silence.
"Well then," he said at last. "I suppose Professor McGonagall wouldn't have mentioned your progress without good reason."
He gave a brief nod.
"Very well. I'll make you a list of the books you need to read and have Professor McGonagall give it to you. If you manage to study everything on it before the first meeting, I'll let you join the club. But I should warn you now: I won't make any allowances just because you're a first-year."
Hermione visibly brightened.
"I can do it! I promise!"
"In that case, I wish you luck, Miss Granger."
***
'Magical materials are materials that interact with magic in one of three ways: by absorbing magical energy, conducting it, or releasing energy. Conductive materials are the most common. Almost every witch or wizard owns at least one artefact made using such a material: a wand. As a rule, the material used in a wand undergoes special treatment that allows it not only to conduct magical energy, but also to focus it on a chosen target.'
Ever since Hermione had received the reading list required to join the Relicium Club, she had thrown herself into working through it methodically. Straight after lessons, she would head to the library, gather the books, scrolls and manuscripts she needed, and spend almost all her free time studying them. She now went to bed much later than usual and sometimes barely managed to finish her homework, staying up late in the Gryffindor common room or in her dormitory.
But her efforts were paying off. Hermione had already worked her way through most of the list, and now, sitting on her bed in the girls' dormitory, she was reading the final book, Introduction to Magical Materials and the Basics of Their Use.
'Releasing materials are extremely rare in nature, as they quickly break down after releasing the energy they contain. All known natural sources of such materials have already been exhausted, so only artificial substances of this type are used today. Creating them requires considerable effort, which is why they are produced only for specific purposes.'
'Like magical batteries,' Hermione thought. 'If you needed extra energy, something like this could provide it.'
She pulled out the amulet hidden inside her robes and examined it for several seconds.
'It would be great to have a battery like that around your neck, just in case.'
Hermione turned the amulet over in her hands. As usual, it did not react at all. She tucked it away again and went back to her book.
'Absorbing materials were once widely used in defensive magic. Like a sponge, they soak up magical energy, weakening or completely neutralising the effects of certain kinds of spells. Absorbing materials are also extremely rare. At present, they cannot be studied because no samples are available. The last known specimen was lost in the previous century, and no new ones have been found since. The Ministry of Magic's Oxford laboratory is working on creating artificial equivalents, but so far without success.'
Meanwhile, Lila and Olivia were chatting with Nora, who, as usual, was telling them another story about her mother's veterinary clinic. Hermione paid little attention to their conversation and kept reading until the mention of a unicorn suddenly made her look up from the book.
"What did you say about the unicorn?" she asked.
"Hagrid carried it into the clinic in his arms," Nora repeated, giving her an annoyed look. Lately, Hermione had hardly taken part in their conversations, and Nora was not particularly keen to talk to her either.
"No, before that," Hermione said impatiently. "Something about it being tethered."
Nora pursed her lips.
"Tethered? Oh, right. It looked like it had been tethered before Hagrid brought it to us. There were rope marks around its neck."
"How long ago was that?"
Nora frowned.
"What difference does it make to you?" she asked irritably, but continued anyway. "Sometime around the middle of summer, I don't remember exactly. What mattered much more was that the unicorn was badly injured and completely exhausted. It looked as though someone had tortured it, making cuts all over its body."
"Someone tortured a unicorn?" Lila exclaimed, her eyes wide.
"Yes, we only just managed to save it!" Nora continued, clearly pleased by the reaction she had got. "For some reason, it was less afraid of me than of everyone else, and I spent a whole week sitting beside it. It had lost a huge amount of blood, and the clinic keeps blood from all sorts of animals, but not unicorns. That's because no one wants to end up cursed!"
"But who could possibly have done something like that? And more importantly, why?" Lila asked.
"How should I know?" Nora shrugged. "There were all sorts of rumours going around the clinic, each worse than the last. Some people even said the Death Eaters were back and that this was some new initiation ritual of theirs involving bleeding a unicorn. After doing something like that, no matter how hard you try, you'll never become a good person again."
For a short while, silence fell over the room.
"I'm scared," Olivia said quietly.
She shrank in on herself, and Lila immediately moved closer, trying to comfort her.
"Did Hagrid bring in only one unicorn?" Hermione suddenly asked.
Nora gave her an unfriendly look.
"What, one wasn't enough for you?" she asked in surprise. Lila and Olivia also looked at Hermione in confusion. "Why are you even asking about this? And why are you suddenly so interested in unicorns?"
There was now a clear note of suspicion in Nora's voice.
Hermione looked at the others. Lila and Olivia were watching her too, clearly waiting for an answer. She hesitated for a moment. After McGonagall's strange reaction, she did not particularly want to tell them what had happened over the summer.
"Well? So why are you asking?" Nora repeated, more insistently this time.
'Does she think I'm a Death Eater?' Hermione thought, and finally made up her mind.
"The thing is, I saw two unicorns tethered not far from our house this summer," she said. "Back then, I didn't even know about magic, so I didn't realise there was anything strange about it. But later, when Professor McGonagall brought me my Hogwarts invitation, I told her about them, and she left straight away without explaining anything. So I thought Hagrid might have brought in one of those unicorns."
"Oh, of course. You knew nothing about magic, and you didn't find anything strange about seeing unicorns?" Nora asked sarcastically.
"I thought they were just white horses with fake horns," Hermione explained.
Nora kept looking at Hermione for a few more seconds, as if trying to decide whether she was telling the truth. Then her expression softened a little, though Hermione's explanation still did not seem to convince her completely. Lila visibly relaxed too, but Olivia still looked a little frightened.
The girls started talking again about who could have done such a thing to the unicorn and why. Hermione barely listened to their theories. If Hagrid really had brought in that same unicorn, then she finally understood why McGonagall had left so quickly after hearing her story. Perhaps she had asked the Hogwarts gamekeeper to check the place, and Hagrid had found one of the unicorns there. But that still left one question.
'What happened to the other one?'
Hermione decided that tomorrow she would definitely go and see Hagrid and find out.
***
However, Hermione did not get the chance to visit Hagrid the next day. During Transfiguration, Professor McGonagall came over to her and handed her a short message from Dumbledore.
'The first meeting of Relicium will take place today after the final lesson. Meet in the classroom on the fifth floor, at the end of the corridor in the west wing,' the note read.
Throughout the rest of the day, Hermione's thoughts kept returning to the meeting ahead. For the past few weeks, she had spent almost all her free time working through the books on Dumbledore's list, but now, with only a few hours left before the meeting, doubts were beginning to creep in. Had she prepared well enough? The other club members were bound to be older and might already have been studying magic for several years. Would she seem stupid and slow-witted compared with the older students?
When the final lesson ended, Hermione made her way to the fifth floor. As she walked, she mentally went over everything she had managed to learn: the properties of magical materials, the structure of simple artefacts, and the other topics on Dumbledore's list. One by one, she recalled the chapters she had read, as if testing herself and trying to make sure she had not forgotten anything important. When she reached the right classroom, Hermione paused for a moment outside the door, took a deep breath, and went in.
At first glance, it was obvious that the room was regularly used for Relicium meetings. Most of it was taken up by a large oak table covered with various tools and surrounded by comfortable chairs. A massive armchair stood at the head of the table. Soft light came from numerous glowing spheres near the ceiling and fell across scrolls hanging on the walls, covered in diagrams and symbols Hermione did not understand. Between them, magical instruments stood on small shelves, though Hermione could not work out what most of them were for. In the far corner stood a glass display case. Behind the glass were amulets, small artefacts, and several other strange objects.
Several students from different Houses were already in the room. Some were sitting at the table talking to the person next to them, a couple were standing by the display case, and one girl was turning some sort of instrument over in her hands, apparently trying to work out what it was for. When Hermione came in, several people turned to look at her with curiosity. One of them stood out in particular: a tall boy in Slytherin robes standing by the display case. He gave Hermione a surprised, slightly arrogant look and could not resist making a comment.
"Are you sure you've got the right room, little girl? This club isn't for kids your age."
Now everyone turned to Hermione.
"I'm not a..."
She trailed off, thrown by such an unexpected 'welcome'. A mocking grin appeared on the Slytherin's face. He looked as though he was about to add something when a familiar voice suddenly came from behind her.
"Come in, Miss Granger."
Hermione turned around. Professor Dumbledore was standing behind her. He gestured for her to step inside and followed her in.
"Miss Granger has not got the wrong room, Mr Grimm," he added. "I personally made an exception for her."
The expressions on the students' faces changed noticeably after that. The smirks prompted by the Slytherin's remark gave way to interest. The girl at the table, who had been turning the instrument over in her hands, raised her eyebrows in surprise and whispered something to the student sitting beside her. The other girl listened without taking her eyes off Hermione. The Slytherin himself narrowed his eyes slightly and looked from Hermione to Dumbledore, then back again. The smug look on his face had soured, but there was still clear disbelief in his eyes.
At that moment, a boy in Hufflepuff robes waved to Hermione. He looked about thirteen. His dark hair was neatly combed, and his thin face was slightly pale. When he caught her eye, the boy broke into a broad smile, and small dimples appeared in his cheeks. His brown eyes were bright with curiosity.
"Welcome to the club! Sit next to me." He nodded towards the empty seat on his right.
"Thanks," Hermione replied, embarrassed by all the attention suddenly focused on her. Lowering her head, she went over to the seat the Hufflepuff had offered her.
"I'm Casper," the boy introduced himself. "Casper Honeydew, third year. What's your name?"
"Hermione Granger. I'm a first-year," she replied cautiously, still aware of the others watching her.
"A first-year?" Casper's eyebrows shot up, and he looked at her closely again. "I thought you just looked young for your age. So you really have only just started at Hogwarts?"
"Yes," Hermione replied, even more embarrassed.
She lowered her eyes and began studying the table in front of her very intently. Normally, she was quite happy to talk about her achievements, but all this attention from the older students had unexpectedly thrown her off.
Meanwhile, Dumbledore took his seat at the head of the table and cleared his throat.
"I think we can leave Miss Granger alone now and move on to introductions. Let's start with you, Mr Grimm, as the oldest member of the club."
At last, everyone's attention shifted away from Hermione, and she could finally relax a little.
"My name is Elliot Grimm," the Slytherin introduced himself, carefully pronouncing each word. "I'm in my fourth year. Charms and Transfiguration are my best subjects, and for the past two years I've been studying how magical devices work on my own. That's why I decided to join the club."
"Thank you, Mr Grimm," said the headmaster. "I'd like to add my own assessment as well. You are one of the most capable students in your year. I'm sure your knowledge will come in useful more than once during our meetings."
Elliot accepted the headmaster's words with a satisfied nod, as if he had heard exactly what he expected to hear. The corners of his mouth twitched upwards slightly. He glanced over the other students, then let his gaze linger on Hermione. A smirk appeared on his face again. Hermione quickly looked away.
At that moment, Dumbledore turned to her.
"Miss Granger, would you like to go next?"
"Me?" Hermione asked, slightly taken aback, but quickly pulled herself together. "My name is Hermione Granger," she said, pronouncing each word just as carefully as Elliot had, unconsciously copying his manner. "I'm in my first year. Not long ago, when I visited Diagon Alley for the first time, I went into an antique shop and saw some amulets there. They interested me, so I decided to learn more about them."
A noticeable stir went through the room. The girl who had been turning an instrument over in her hands when Hermione first came in leaned towards the student beside her again and whispered something in her ear. The other girl was barely holding back a smile. Elliot gave a loud snort.
Hermione had not expected her words to get that kind of reaction, and she felt uncomfortable again. But Elliot's snort quickly replaced her embarrassment with irritation.
"Did I say something wrong?" she asked him, now with a challenging edge to her voice.
"An antique shop... Yes, that's about what I expected. Perhaps the headmaster shouldn't have made an exception for you after all."
"Mr Grimm," Dumbledore cut in. "Please stick to the point."
"Of course, Professor," Elliot replied, turning back to Hermione.
"As everyone knows," he said, putting particular emphasis on the word 'everyone', "amulets are considered an outdated type of artefact. Most of the tasks they were once used for can now be performed far more accurately and reliably by modern magical devices. That's why these days amulets tend to interest collectors more than people who actually work with magical devices."
He paused briefly.
"I hope you had enough sense not to be tempted into buying one. If you happen to find yourself in an antique shop, things like that are better looked at than bought."
Hermione looked at Dumbledore in confusion. He made a slight gesture with one hand.
"Broadly speaking, Mr Grimm is correct," he said, "though he could have put it more tactfully."
"But this club is supposed to study amulets, isn't it?" Hermione blurted out.
"That's right. Studying amulets is part of what we do here," Dumbledore replied calmly.
Elliot had already opened his mouth to add something, but Dumbledore raised a hand slightly to stop him and continued, now addressing everyone in the room.
"However, modern magical devices are indeed more effective than old amulets in many cases, so we'll be spending most of our time on them."
Dumbledore then continued with the introductions, giving the other students a chance to speak one by one. The two girls, one of whom had already whispered something about Hermione to the other several times, turned out to be Ravenclaws. There was another Ravenclaw boy as well, and a second-year Slytherin besides Elliot. The club also included a quiet third-year Gryffindor whom Hermione had seen several times in the common room but had never spoken to.
At last, it was the final member's turn, and the headmaster turned to the boy sitting beside Hermione.
"Mr Honeydew, your turn."
"My name is Casper Honeydew," he said. "I'm in my third year. Not that it's done me much good so far."
One of the Ravenclaw girls giggled quietly.
"My family has been magical for ten generations, and I've got hardly any talent at all. So I decided I'd invent some sort of magical device that could do everything for me."
This time, almost everyone laughed. Casper looked around the group with satisfaction, while Elliot shook his head.
"I think you're the only person who can talk so calmly about having no magical talent."
"What do you mean, no talent?" Casper said in mock outrage. "I said hardly any. That's exactly what the device is supposed to fix."
"Of course. As if anyone would doubt it," Elliot replied with a smirk.
"You'll see, I'll make it," Casper replied calmly. "You'll be asking me to make one for you too."
After Casper and Elliot's exchange, the atmosphere around the table became much more relaxed. As it turned out, almost all the club members were in their second or third year. Hermione and Elliot were the only exceptions. Most of them already knew one another, and Casper kept drawing Hermione into the conversation. Thanks to him, she quickly began to feel at ease and got to know the other students better.
Once the introductions were over, Dumbledore picked up a small greyish stone from the table.
"Imagine that you have an unknown magical material in front of you," he said, showing the stone to the students. "No books have been written about it. No one knows its properties. What would you do?"
For a few seconds, everyone was silent.
"I'd test how it reacts to magic," Elliot answered first.
"Sensible. What else?"
"Try combining it with other materials," one of the Ravenclaw girls suggested.
"Heat it," Hermione added.
"Or break it," said Casper.
Elliot turned to him.
"A very sensible approach."
"At least we'd find something out straight away."
Laughter went around the room.
"Possibly even more than you'd want to, Mr Honeydew," Dumbledore remarked. "Though that is roughly how the first researchers of magical materials had to work: largely at random. The results of their experiments were sometimes far more unpleasant than simply breaking a stone."
He placed the sample on a small metal stand and touched it with his wand. Thin bluish lines immediately spread across the grey surface.
"Does it conduct magic?" Hermione was the first to guess.
"Exactly, Miss Granger. Now imagine that you are among the first witches and wizards to discover this property. And that immediately raises a question: can it be used somehow?"
Dumbledore walked over to the glass display case, opened it, and took out a long, translucent needle.
"Does anyone know what this is?"
Elliot raised his hand.
"A crystal needle. It was used to inscribe magical patterns."
"Quite right, Mr Grimm."
Dumbledore passed the needle around. When it reached Hermione, she carefully took it between two fingers. It looked as though it were made of glass, but it was surprisingly heavy.
"An ordinary metal tool could damage the structure of certain materials," the headmaster continued. "So craftsmen had to make special tools for almost every stage of the work."
Next, he took out a small spool of silvery thread.
"And this?"
This time, everyone was silent.
"Was it used to tie things together?" Hermione finally suggested.
"A good guess, but no. It was used for cutting."
Casper looked doubtfully at the extremely fine thread.
"With that?"
Dumbledore pulled the thread taut between his fingers and easily sliced a small piece off the stone resting on the stand.
Then he invited the students to come over to the display case. Behind the glass were other tools, samples of rare substances, dried magical plants, and small bottles of essences. Dumbledore took them out one by one, explaining what they were used for. Some amulets required several different materials, each processed in a completely different way, and some stages could take days or even weeks.
"All that for a single amulet?" Hermione asked in surprise.
"Sometimes for a rather mediocre amulet," Dumbledore replied. "The amount of work involved in making them was one of the reasons amulets gradually gave way to modern magical devices, as Mr Grimm has already mentioned. They are easier to make and adjust, and as a rule, considerably more effective."
Hermione looked back at the display case. She now realised that there had been some truth in what Elliot had said about the antique shop after all. But that did not mean he had any right to talk to her as if she were a little child.
"Professor, where do amulets whose purpose is unknown even come from?" she suddenly asked, remembering her own. "And can't you tell what they do from what they're made of?"
"As everyone knows..." Elliot began in a lecturing tone, but Dumbledore did not let him continue.
"If you'll allow me, Mr Grimm, I'll answer that question myself."
He turned back to Hermione.
"Usually, we are talking about amulets that were once lost and then rediscovered decades, or sometimes even centuries, later. By then, information about their makers and their purpose had long since been forgotten. As for their properties... Perhaps, Miss Granger, you have already noticed that making an amulet involves many different steps. What matters is not only which materials were used, but also exactly what was done to them and in what order."
Dumbledore gestured towards the tools in the display case.
"The same set of materials, treated in different ways or in a different order, can produce completely different results. So even if you know exactly what an amulet is made of, you still cannot always determine its purpose. Sometimes all you can do is wait until its properties reveal themselves in some way."
Hermione thought about his words.
"So if some amulets still haven't been figured out, that means they've never shown any sign of what they do?" she asked, trying to hide her sudden excitement.
She remembered the strange feeling that had come over her when she first put on her amulet. If that had been a sign of its properties, then she already had her first clue and might eventually be able to work out what it did.
"Exactly, Miss Granger," Dumbledore replied.
For a moment, his eyes narrowed slightly, as though he had noticed her unusual reaction. Then he asked everyone to return to their seats and moved on to how modern magical devices worked.
"Every magical device contains a material that redirects magic in a particular way and produces the desired effect," Dumbledore continued, settling into his chair. "Modern devices mostly use conductive materials, though there are a few rare exceptions."
He picked up a small device from the table. There was an identical one in front of each student.
"Does anyone know what this is?"
"A Sneakoscope," Elliot answered before Hermione could.
"Correct. And does anyone know how it works?"
"It detects hostile magic and warns its owner," the Slytherin answered again.
"That's right. But how?"
This time, Elliot paused to think.
"Maybe the material inside picks it up?"
"Exactly. It then redirects the energy it receives and turns it into a signal."
Dumbledore touched his Sneakoscope with his wand. It immediately began spinning on the table and let out a piercing squeal.
Hermione looked at the device with interest.
"Professor, does that mean a Sneakoscope doesn't use its owner's magic? It can pick up someone else's magic and use that energy to function?"
"Exactly, Miss Granger," Dumbledore replied. "In this case, the device reacts to an external magical influence and converts the energy it receives into a signal."
Next, Dumbledore placed a wand on the table. He asked the students to name the materials that might be used to make one, then explained why the core conducted and directed a wizard's magic and what role the wood played.
That was how they gradually worked their way through the rest of the devices. Sometimes Dumbledore explained how they worked himself, sometimes he asked the students questions, and he even let them take some of the objects apart or test them right there at the table.
When the last device had been put back in its place, the headmaster glanced at the clock.
"I think that is quite enough for our first meeting. Next time, theory will give way to practice: each of you will try to make a Sneakoscope."
Casper looked at the device in front of him.
"A real one?"
"That, at least, is what I hope, Mr Honeydew."
Laughter went around the room again.
"That will be all for today."
It was only when the students began getting up from the table that Hermione looked at the clock and realised with surprise that three hours had already passed. She had been so absorbed in Dumbledore's fascinating explanations that she had completely lost track of time. Going to see Hagrid today was now out of the question. There was very little time left before dinner, and besides, she still had homework waiting for her.