Backup plan B...
"I'm lost," Harry said out loud. "Can, um, the spirit of the Hogwarts castle help me or something?"
"I don't think this castle has a spirit," observed a wizened old lady in one of the paintings on the walls. "Life, perhaps, but not spirit."
There was a brief pause.
"Are you -" Harry said, and then shut his mouth. On second thought, no he was NOT going to ask the painting whether it was fully conscious in the sense of being aware of its own awareness.
"I'm Harry Potter," said his mouth, more or less on autopilot. Also more or less automatically, Harry stuck out a hand towards the painting.
The woman in the painting looked down at Harry's hand and raised her eyebrows.
Slowly, the hand dropped back to Harry's side.
"Sorry," Harry said, "I'm sort of new here."
"So I perceive, young raven. Where are you trying to go?"
Harry hesitated. "I'm not really sure," he said.
"Then perhaps you are already there."
"Well, wherever I
The old lady in the painting was looking at him rather sceptically.
Harry sighed. "My life tends to get a bit peculiar."
"Would it be fair to say that you don't know where you're going or why you're trying to get there?"
"
The old lady nodded. "I'm not sure that being lost is your most important problem, young man."
"True, but unlike the more important problems, it's a problem I can understand how to solve and
The lady eyed Harry appraisingly. "You
That sounded strangely familiar but Harry couldn't recall where he'd heard it before. "Um... you seem like a very intelligent person. Or a picture of a very intelligent person... anyway, have you heard of a mysterious game where you can only play once, and they won't tell you the rules?"
"Life," said the lady at once. "That's one of the most obvious riddles I've ever heard."
Harry blinked. "No," he said slowly. "I mean I got an actual note and everything saying that I had to play the game but I wouldn't be told the rules, and someone is leaving me little slips of paper telling me how many points I've lost for violating the rules, like a minus two point penalty for wearing pyjamas. Do you know anyone here at Hogwarts who's crazy enough and powerful enough to do something like that? Besides Dumbledore, I mean?"
The picture of a lady sighed. "I'm only a picture, young man. I remember Hogwarts as it was - not Hogwarts as it is. All I can tell you is that if this were a riddle, the answer would be that the game is life, and that while we do not make all the rules ourselves, the one who awards or takes points is always you. If it is not riddle but reality - then I do not know."
Harry bowed very low to the picture. "Thank you, milady."
The lady curtseyed to him. "I wish I could say that I'll remember you with fondness," she said, "but I probably won't remember you at all. Farewell, Harry Potter."
He bowed again in reply, and started to climb down the nearest flight of stairs.
Four left turns later he found himself staring down a corridor that ended, abruptly, in a tumbled mound of large rocks - as if there had been a cave-in, only the surrounding walls and ceiling were intact and made of quite regular castle stones.
"All right," Harry said to the empty air, "I give up. I'm asking for another hint. How do I get to where I need to go?"
"A hint! A hint, you say?"
The excited voice came from a painting on the wall not far away, this one a portrait of a middle-aged man in the loudest pink robes that Harry had ever seen or even imagined. In the portrait he was wearing a droopy old pointed hat with a fish on it (not a drawing of a fish, mind, but a fish).
"Yes!" Harry said. "A hint! A hint, I say! Only not just
"Yes, yes! A hint for the game! You're Harry Potter, aren't you? I'm Cornelion Flubberwalt! I was told by Erin the Consort who was told by Lord Weaselnose who was told by, I forget really. But it was a message for
"Yes! I want it!" Harry was aware that he probably ought to keep his sarcasm under control but he just couldn't seem to help himself.