Previous chapter: https://theowlhouse.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000000190860
Chapter 1 if you want to get started at the beginning: https://theowlhouse.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000000189445
Lake Lacuna looked beautiful one early February morning. Luz was sitting at its banks with Eda and King at her flanks. The Golden Egg was still eluding her understanding, and the second task was coming up quickly.
“What if I don’t figure out the egg in time?” Luz asked her mentor.
“You will, don’t worry kid. You’re smart, you’ll get it eventually” She replied.
Luz opened it another time, praying that this time might be different. She was met with the same wailing noise that came from it every time she tried to open it. Luz closed it yet again, the noise was painful to her ears.
“Hey, kid!” Eda said loudly, “Maybe try leaving it open! Maybe the trick is just putting up with the noise until it tells you something useful!”
Luz thought that sounded stupid, but she was so out of ideas, she went with it. She opened the egg again, this time leaving it as such. The wailing just went on and on, remaining nothing more than an unintelligible shriek.
She put up with the pain for almost two minutes before she gave up. She felt like her ears were about to explode.
“Well, that didn’t work,” Eda said.
“I’ll say!” King interjected, “One more second of that, and I-”
“You aren’t breaking my egg, King. I need it.” Luz interrupted.
“Jeez! I was only going to say I would’ve thrown it in the lake!” King defended.
“How do you know it’s waterproof?” Luz asked. King had no response.
It seemed hopeless. Nothing they did made the egg understandable. Luz had listened for Morse code, she recorded it on her phone and reversed it, she had slowed down the recording, she had sped up the recording, she had done anything she could think of, but nothing worked.
Luz picked up the egg and started to walk back to the Owl House, but before she could get too far, a gust of wind blew, making the egg fly right out of her arm and into the lake!
“Oh come on!” Luz complained, “Now I have to go grab it!”
Luz dove into the lake, luckily it was one of the few non-boiling bodies of water in the Demon Realm. As soon as her head went under the surface, she heard what sounded like singing.
The egg had somehow opened when it landed on the lakebed (which luckily wasn’t very deep) Instead of the usual wailing, the egg was transmitting a beautiful melody.
“Come seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground,
And while you’re searching, ponder this:
We’ve taken what you’ll sorely miss,
An hour-long you’ll have to look,
And to recover what we took,
But past an hour; the prospect’s black,
Too late, it’s gone, it won't come back.”
Luz grabbed the egg and swam back to the surface. She gasped for breath as her head broke the surface.
“Eda!” Luz gasped, “Eda! The egg sang!” She swam to the surface as quickly as she could. She was drenched from head to toe and was very glad she had a change of clothes.
“It sang?” Eda said doubtfully, “Underwater? Are you sure you aren’t just hearing a Ness?”
“I’m sure, Eda. It was singing about having an hour to look for what I’ll sorely miss,” Luz said, “Or so I think, I only half caught it.”
“Well, let’s get you dried off, then maybe you can see if this works in the bathtub or something,” Eda said, drawing a spell circle with Owlbert.
The three of them all returned to the Owl House, Eda, and King rode on Owlbert, and Luz rode on Stringbean. Upon returning, they were met by the familiar house demon.
“Heeeyy!!” He said, “How are you? hoot, hoot,”
“Never better, Hooty!” Luz said enthusiastically, “I figured out the egg, for the most part anyway, and now I just need to get some details figured out!”
“Wanna hear how I’m doing?” He asked.
“No,” King, Eda, and Luz all said in unison.
Luz got inside and filled the bathtub with water. Once it was full, she listened to the song two, three, four more times. Eventually, she wrote it down so she couldn’t forget it. After doing that, she finally let KIng use it to, well, take a bath. Luz went downstairs to Eda.
“Hey Eda, could you help me make sure I’ve got this right?” Luz said.
“Yeah, sure kid, but make it quick, Mama Eda’s sleepy,” Eda replied.
“Aren’t you always?”
“Not the point.”
“Whatever, so the first two lines, ‘Come seek us where our voices sound, we cannot sing above the ground,’ I’m pretty sure that means I’m going to have to go underwater somewhere, do you agree?” Luz asked her mentor.
“Yeah, that makes sense,” the Owl Lady replied.
“Then the next two lines, ‘And while you’re searching, ponder this: we’ve taken what you’ll sorely miss,’ What do you think of that? Are they stealing something and I have to get it back?”
“Probably. Knowing merpeople, it won’t be a thing, but most likely it’ll be a person you’ll miss. Creatures of the sea love stealing people.” Eda told her.
“Well that’s great, so I might have to save Mamá, or you, or Amity, or-”
“I get it, move on,” Eda interrupted.
“Well the rest of it is ‘An hour long you’ll have to look, and to recover what we took, but past an hour; the prospect’s black, too late, it’s gone, it won't come back.’ which seems pretty clear, I have a one-hour time limit.” Luz finalized.
“Yeah, but how do you plan on breathing for an hour underwater? I’m pretty sure humans can’t do that if your struggled breathing earlier was any indication.” Eda told her.
“I don’t know, but I still have three weeks, I can figure this out,” Luz said.
“True, but I’m not gonna let you put this off to the last minute.”“Isn’t that what you’d do?” Luz told her.
“Hey!” Eda complained.
“You would though!”
Eda grabbed her staff and stood up. Luz, deciding she rather enjoyed having her head on her neck, stopped.
“That’s what I thought,” she said, “Now, I’m taking a nap, make sure King doesn’t drown himself in the bathtub.”
“Will do!” Luz said, going back upstairs as Eda lay down on the couch.
King was sitting in the tub, not drowning, but squeaking a rubber ducky.
“Rubber ducky!” He said, “Would you like to join my army of minions?”
He squeaked it, which was taken as a yes.
“Then it shall be so!” King bellowed, “We shall conquer the entire world! Mwahahaha-”
Luz bonked him on the skull.
“Weh?”
“Aren’t you supposed to be getting clean?” Luz said.
“Ugh, you’re sounding like Eda!” King complained.
“Maybe because Eda has a point!” Luz countered.
Luz almost had to sit there and bathe him herself with how much he didn’t want to do it. But he eventually got clean.
Harry didn’t know how long of a bath he would need to figure out the egg, so he decided to do it at night, when no one could bother him. Harry brought the egg with him, of course, but also his invisibility cloak and the Marauder’s Map, as they are Harry’s most essential tools in the art of rule-breaking.
He managed to make his way to the Prefect’s bathroom and muttered the password, “Pine Fresh” just as Cedric had said.
Harry’s first thought upon entering was that it would be worth it to become a Prefect just to be able to use this room. It was softly lit by a beautiful chandelier, and everything was made of white marble, including what looked like an empty swimming pool in the middle of the room. About a hundred faucets lined its perimeter, each with a different colored jewel in its handle. Long linen curtains hung at the windows; a large pile of white, fluffy towels sat in a corner; and there was a massive framed painting of a mermaid on the wall.
Harry grabbed one of the towels and set it and the rest of his things on the edge of the massive pool. As amazing as the room was, Harry had no idea how it was supposed to help him figure out the egg.
Harry very quickly discovered that the different faucets carried different sorts of bubble bath mixtures with water, though it was unlike any bubble bath Harry had ever seen. One tap had pink and blue bubbles the size of footballs; another poured ice-white foam so thick that Harry thought it probably could hold his weight; a third burst forth green bubbles shaped like music notes, which played a short melody when burst.
Harry amused himself with them for a while until the pool was full, which took little time considering its size. Harry pulled off his pajamas, slippers, and dressing gown, then slid into the water.
It was so deep that his feet barely touched the bottom, and he actually did a few laps around the pool before swimming back to his pile of stuff. Enjoyable as it was swimming through foamy water with clouds of any color Harry could imagine, no stroke of brilliance came to him.
Harry grabbed the egg and opened it. The familiar screech came forth from it and filled the bathroom, echoing off the marble walls, but it sounded just as incomprehensible as ever, if not more so due to the reverberation. Before he could get too far, a voice came from behind him, making Harry almost drop the egg.
“I’d try putting it in the water if I were you.”
Harry stood up and saw the ghost of a very glum-looking girl.
“Myrtle!” Harry said, “What are you doing here?”
“Well, you haven’t been to see me in ages,” Myrtle said, “And you’re in desperate need of help. So go on, put it underwater!”
Harry did as she said, and put it under the water. It didn’t wail this time, instead, a gurgling sound that he still couldn’t understand was emitted.
“You need to put your head under too!”
Harry took a deep breath and went under. Now, sitting on the bottom of the bath, he heard a chorus of eerie voices coming from the egg. He then spent an embarrassingly long time trying to figure out what the song meant.
Finally, he thought he had it. Harry told Myrtle to cover her eyes, then he got out of the bath.
“Will you come and visit me in my bathroom again sometime?” Myrtle asked after Harry made himself decent.
“Er, I’ll try,” Harry said.
Harry put on the invisibility cloak and examined the Marauder’s Map as he exited the bathroom. Filch and his cat were in his office. Nothing else was moving except for Peeves, who was bouncing around upstairs. Harry was about halfway to Gryffindor Tower when something else caught his eye, There was a dot in Snape’s office, but it wasn’t “Severus Snape” it was “Bartemius Crouch”.
Harry stared at the dot, perplexed. Mr Crouch is supposed to be too sick to come to work, what is he doing sneaking around Hogwarts at one in the morning? Harry wondered.
Harry’s curiosity got the better of him. He turned and set off to the dungeon, he had to know what Crouch was doing. He took a narrow staircase to go down two floors, but when he was halfway down, his foot got caught on the trick step that Neville always forgot to jump. The golden egg, still damp from the bath, slipped out from under his arm and fell down the long staircase with a bang as loud as a cymbal crash on every single step. The invisibility cloak tried to come off as well, Harry snatched it, and the map fluttered down six steps.
The egg burst open upon landing at the bottom of the staircase, letting forth its all-too-familiar wail. Pulling the cloak back over himself, Harry tried to get the map to at least clear itself, but it was too far away. Before Harry could free himself from the step, a loud yell echoed through the castle.
“PEEVES!!!”
It was Filch’s unmistakable voice, and he was pissed.
“What’s this racket? Wake up the whole castle, will you?” Filch yelled as he walked to the egg in order to close it. Harry stood very still, one leg still very stuck in the trick stair. Filch stared up the stairs, expecting to see Peeves, but he was met with a dark and (seemingly) empty staircase.
“Hiding, are you?” he said softly, “I’ll get you, Peeves. You’ve stolen a Triwizard clue. Dumbledore will finally have you out for this you filthy poltergeist!”
“Filch? What is going on?” Snape’s cold, heartless voice said.
“It’s Peeves, sir,” Filch said maliciously, “He threw this egg down the stairs.”
“Peeves?” Snape said, “But Peeves couldn’t get into my office…”
“This egg was in your office?”
“Of course not,” Snape snapped, “I heard banging and wailing-”
“Yes, that was the egg.”
“I was coming to investigate”
“Peeves threw it”
“And when I passed my office, I saw that the torches were lit and a cupboard door was ajar! Somebody was searching it! But that couldn’t have been Peeves, I seal it with a spell only a wizard can break!” Snape said, “I want you to help me search for this intruder.”
“The thing is, professor,” Filch said, “The headmaster will have to listen to me this time. Peeves has been stealing from a student, it might be my chance to get him thrown out of here for good!”“I don’t give a damn about that wretched poltergeist; it’s my office that’s-”
Snape stopped when he heard the clunking of Moody’s pegleg.
“Get back to bed, Snape” Moody growled at the potions professor.
“You don’t have the authority to send me anywhere!” Snape hissed, “I have as much right to prowl this school after dark as you do!”
“Then prowl away,” Moody said menacingly, “You dropped something, by the way.”
Harry saw Moody pointing at the Marauder’s Map. Snape turned around to look at it. Harry, hoping he was correct in his assumption that Moody could see through his cloak, waved his hands in the air, mouthing “It’s mine!”
“Accio parchment!”
The map flew into the air and soared into Moody’s hand.
“My mistake,” he said calmly, “It’s mine, I must have dropped it earlier.”
“I think I will go back to bed,” Snape said.
“Best idea you’ve had all night,” Moody replied, “Now, Filch, if you’ll just give me that egg.”
“No!” Filch cried, clutching the egg tightly, “This egg is evidence of Peeves’ treachery!”
“It’s property of the champion he stole it from,” Moody said, “Hand it over.”
Snape swept downstairs without another word. Filch begrudgingly handed Moody the egg, then sulked off to his office.
“Close shave, Potter,” Moody muttered after Filch and Snape left. “What is this thing?”
“A map of Hogwarts,” Harry said, hoping Moody would pull him out of the staircase.
“Merlin’s beard,” Moody whispered, staring at the map. “This is some map, Potter!”
“Yeah, it’s quite useful,” Harry said, “Er, Professor Moody, d’you think you could help me?”
“What? Oh, Yes, of course.”
Moody took hold of Harry's arms and pulled; he was finally free of the trick step.
“Potter,” he said, “You didn’t happen to see who broke into Snape’s office, did you?”
“Er, yeah,” Harry admitted, “It was Mister Crouch.”
“Crouch? Are you sure, Potter?”
“Positive.”
“Can I ask you something else, Potter?” Moody said, Harry’s mind jumped to the conclusion of him asking where he had gotten the map, an answer that would incriminate himself, Fred, George, his father, and Professor Lupin.
“Can I borrow this?”
“Oh!” Harry said. He was very fond of his map, but on the other hand, Moody had saved him from a lot of trouble. “Yeah, okay.”
“Potter? Have you ever thought about a career as an Auror?” Moody asked.
“No,” Harry admitted. He had never really thought about what he planned on doing after Hogwarts, he was typically too busy trying to survive to the end of the term to focus on his future.
“Might want to consider it,” Moody said.
Harry couldn’t believe it! Moody thought he, Harry Potter, ought to be an Auror! But maybe Harry should check to see how scarred the rest of the Aurors were before he made a decision.