The scent of old paper and stifled secrets filled the air like incense. The Hogwarts library always held a certain magic, but tonight — tonight it was different. The shelves whispered, not from students' idle hands or restless ghosts, but from something beneath. Something forgotten.
Elias stood still in the Restricted Section, eyes scanning rows of leather-bound tomes. Most were harmless in a historical sense — warnings, records, lost alchemical theories. But Elias wasn't looking for safe. He was looking for truth.
And tonight, he had found a lead.
A sliver of ancient resonance had flared beneath the floor, unseen to the naked eye, but as loud as a scream to his senses. His Heaven-Defying Insight picked it out instantly — the magic of concealment, of memory rewriting, of deliberate erasure.
He tapped a wandless sequence across the base of the shelf. The wood shimmered.
Hermione, crouched beside him with a look that mixed awe and fear, hissed, "Are you sure about this?"
He didn't answer. The section of wall split open with a hiss, revealing a narrow staircase descending into the dark earth beneath the library. Each step was carved from blackened stone, engraved with runes that pulsed a dull red as Elias descended.
Hermione followed, heart pounding, whispering the light spell softly. "Lumos."
It didn't reach far. The air swallowed sound and light both.
When they reached the bottom, they entered a small chamber sealed by a vault of glass-like crystal. Inside floated books. Dozens. Some leather. Some bound in iron. One wrapped in veins. Each hovered around a dais carved from silver and obsidian.
"What… is this place?" Hermione asked, shivering.
"I don't think even Dumbledore knows," Elias murmured. "These books weren't banned because they were dangerous. They were hidden because they were true."
He stepped forward, placing a hand on the edge of the crystal. His magic reached out — not to break, not to command — but to understand. And the barrier responded, shifting just enough for a single book to pass through.
It dropped into Elias's hands like it had been waiting centuries for him.
The cover changed under his fingers, letters rearranging in blood-colored ink:
"Of Severed Souls and Splintered Bonds."
Hermione recoiled slightly, but Elias didn't. His hands trembled, not from fear, but recognition.
He opened the book.
And something inside him fractured.
---
It wasn't a memory — not quite. More like a scream echoing across time, surging from the marrow of his soul.
Images. Sounds. Cries. A baby. Two babies.
One marked by prophecy. One left in its shadow.
Then a crack — not of thunder, but of severance. A magic that ripped through destiny itself.
The bond between the twins — gone.
His vision blurred.
Hermione's voice came faintly through the storm. "Elias, stop—what is it?"
He couldn't answer.
The book devoured him.
Words flooded his mind: "Soul bonds are not mere emotional tethers. They are metaphysical truths, threads of identity. When one is severed… the other is left incomplete."
His breath caught. Incomplete. That's what he was. That's what he'd always felt.
"Someone did this to me," he whispered.
"What?" Hermione knelt beside him, heart racing.
"They cut me away from my brother. From Harry." He turned to her, eyes dark with something new. Not his usual calm, calculated curiosity. This was rage. "I didn't just get forgotten. I was erased."
Hermione's mouth opened, then closed.
"I—I thought you were just separated at birth."
"No," Elias said, standing now, book clutched tightly to his chest. "This was intentional. Magical. Someone didn't just abandon me. They broke me off from him. Like a shard of soul too inconvenient to keep."
He looked up toward the ceiling, toward the higher levels of the castle.
"Someone here knows. Someone in this school was part of it."
Hermione grabbed his hand, grounding him. "We'll figure it out. Together."
But Elias didn't respond. Not immediately.
He stared at the book, and deeper into the void it revealed.
---
Later, back in the Gryffindor common room, they sat in silence. The fire crackled. Rain tapped the windows. Students slept upstairs, unaware that centuries of secrets had just been disturbed.
Hermione still held his hand.
"You think it's connected to your power," she said quietly.
Elias nodded. "My insight isn't normal. I've always known that. But what if it didn't come naturally? What if it came from that bond? From the backlash of having it ripped out of me?"
Hermione frowned. "You mean like… your power is a scar?"
"A scar that thinks," he whispered. "A wound that understands everything but itself."
He placed the book gently on the table. "Whoever did this… I'm going to find them."
Hermione didn't answer.
She didn't have to.
Instead, she moved closer, leaning her head on his shoulder again. Not just for comfort. But to remind him: He wasn't alone anymore.
Not forgotten.
Not broken.
Just waiting to be made whole.
---
Far above them, in the headmaster's office, an old wand cracked slightly in its holster. A painting of a former headmaster stirred uneasily. And behind a cabinet, hidden deep in magically sealed drawers, a second copy of the same book Elias now held vanished — burned away in silent blue fire.
Dumbledore woke from his chair with a start.
"Not yet," he muttered. "He wasn't supposed to find it yet."
But fate had other plans.
And Elias Granger was no longer just the forgotten twin.
He was becoming the reckoning.