Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows...continued

Chapter Sixteen

Godric’s Hollow



When Harry woke the following day it was several seconds before he
remembered what had happened. Then he hoped childishly, that it had been a dream, that
Ron was still there and had never left. Yet by turning his head on his pillow he could see
Ron's deserted bunk. It was like a dead body in the way it seems to draw his eyes. Harry
jumped down from his own bed, keeping his eyes averted from Ron's. Hermione, who
was already busy in the kitchen, did not wish Harry good morning, but turned

her face away quickly as he went by. He's gone, Harry told himself. He's gone. He had to
keep thinking it as he washed and dressed as though repetition would dull the shock of it.
He's gone and he's not coming back. And that was the simple truth of it, Harry knew,
because their protective enchantments meant that it would be impossible, once they
vacated this spot, for Ron to find them again. He and Hermione ate breakfast in silence.
Hermione's eyes were puffy and red; she looked as if she had not slept. They packed up
their things, Hermione dawdling. Harry knew why she wanted to spin out their time on
the riverbank; several times he saw her look up eagerly, and he was sure she had deluded
herself into thinking that she heard footsteps through the heavy rain, but no red-haired
figure appeared between the trees. Every time Harry imitated her, looked around ( for he
could not help hoping a little, himself) and saw nothing but rain-swept woods, another
little parcel of fury exploded inside him. He could hear Ron saying, "We thought you
knew what you were doing!", and he resumed packing with a hard knot in the pit of his
stomach.

The muddy river beside them was rising rapidly and would soon spill over onto their
bank. They had lingered a good hour after they would usually have departed their
campsite. Finally having entirely repacked the beaded bag three times, Hermione seemed
unable to find any more reasons to delay: She and Harry gasped hands and Disapparated,
reappearing on a windswept heather-covered hillside. The instant they arrived, Hermione
dropped Harry's hand and walked away from him, finally sitting down on a large rock,
her face on her knees, shaking with what he knew were sobs. He watched her, supposing
that he ought to go and comfort her, but something kept him rooted to the spot.
Everything inside him felt cold and tight: Again he saw the contemptuous expression on
Ron's face. Harry strode off through the heather, walking in a large circle with the
distraught Hermione at its center, casting the spell she usually performed to ensure their
protection.

They did not discuss Ron at all over the next few days. Harry was determined never to
mention his name again and Hermione seemed to know that it was no use forcing the
issue, although sometimes at night when she thought he was sleeping, he would hear her


crying. Meanwhile Harry had started bringing out the Marauder's map and examining it
by wandlight. He was waiting for the moment when Ron's labeled dot would reappear in
the corridors of Hogwarts, proving that he had returned to the comfortable castle,
protected by his status of pureblood. However, Ron did not appear on the map and after a
while Harry found himself taking it out simply to stare at Ginny's name in the girl's
dormitory, wondering whether the intensity with which he gazed at it might break into
her sleep, that she would somehow know he was thinking about her, hoping that she was
all right.

By day, hey devoted themselves to trying to determine the possible locations of
Gryffindor's sword, but the more they talked about the places in which Dumbledore
might have hidden it, the more desperate and far-fetched their speculation became.
Cudgel his brains though he might, Harry could not remember Dumbledore ever
mentioning a place in which he might hide something. There were moments when he did
not know whether he was angrier with Ron or with Dumbledore. We thought you knew
what you were doing ...We thought Dumbledore had told you what to do ... We thought
you had a real plan!

He could not hide it from himself: Ron had been right. Dumbledore had left him
with virtually nothing. They had discovered one Horcrux, but they had no means of
destroying it: The others were as unattainable as they had ever been. Hopelessness
threatened to engulf him. He was staggered now to think of his own presumption in
accepting his friends' offers to accompany him on this meandering, pointless journey. he
knew nothing, he had no ideas, and he was constantly, painfully on the alert for any
indications that Hermione too was about to tell him that she had had enough. That she
was leaving.

They were spending many evenings in near silence and Hermione took to bringing out
Phineas Nigellus's portrait and propping it up in a chair, as though he might fill part of
the gaping hole left by Ron's departure. Despite his previous assertion that he would
never visit them again, Phineas Nigellus did not seem able to resist the chance to find out
more about what Harry was up to and consented to reappear, blindfolded, every few days
of so. Harry was even glad to see him, because he was company, albeit of a snide and
taunting kind. They relished any news about what was happening at Hogwarts, though
Phineas Nigellus was not an ideal informer. He venerated Snape, the first Slytherin
headmaster since he himself had controlled the school, and they had to be careful not to
criticize or ask impertinent questions about Snape, or Phineas Nigellus would instantly
leave his painting.

However, he did let drop certain snippets. Snape seemed to be facing a constant,
low level of mutiny from a hard core of students. Ginny had been banned from going into
Hogsmeade. Snape had reinstated Umbridge's old decree forbidding gatherings of three
or more students or any unofficial student societies. From all of these things, Harry
deduced that Ginny, and probably Neville and Luna along with her, had been doing their
best to continue Dumbledore's Army. This scant news made Harry want to see Ginny so
badly it felt like a stomachache; but it also made him think of Ron again, and of
Dumbledore, and of Hogwarts itself, which he missed nearly as much as his ex-girlfriend.
Indeed, as Phineas Niggellus talked about Snape's crackdown, Harry experienced a split
second of madness when he imagined simply going back to school to join the
destabilization of Snape’s regime: Being fed and having a soft bad, and other people


being in charge, seemed the most wonderful prospect in the world at this moment. But
then he remembered that he was Undesirable Number One, that there was a ten-thousand
Galleon price on his head, and that to walk into Hogwarts these days was just as
dangerous as walking into the Ministry of Magic. Indeed, Phineas Nigellus inadvertently
emphasized this fact my slipping in leading questions about Harry and
Hermione's whereabouts. Hermione shoved him back inside the beaded bag every time
he did this, and Phineas Nigellus invariably refused to reappear for several days after
these unceremonious good-byes.

The weather grew colder and colder. They did not dare remain in any area too
long, so rather than staying in the south of England, where a hard ground frost was the
worst of their worries, they continued to meander up and down the country, braving a
mountainside, where sleet pounded the tent; a wide, flat marsh, where the tent was
flooded with chill water; and a tiny island in the middle of a Scottish loch, where snow
half buried the tent in the night. They had already spotted Christmas Trees twinkling
from several sitting room windows before there came an evening when Harry resolved to
suggest again, what seemed to him the only unexplored avenue left to them. They had
just eaten an unusually good meal: Hermione had been to a supermarket under the
Invisibility Cloak (scrupulously dropping the money into an open till as she left), and
Harry thought that she might be more persuadable than usual on a stomach full of
spaghetti Bolognese and tinned pears.

He had also had the foresight to suggest that they take a few hours’ break from
wearing the Horcrux, which was hanging over the end of the bunk beside him.

“Hermione?”

“Hmm?” She was curled up in one of the sagging armchairs with The Tales of
Beedle the Bard. He could not imagine how much more she could get out of the book,
which was not, after all, very long, but evidently she was still deciphering something in it,
because Spellman’s Syllabary lay open on the arm of the chair.

Harry cleared his throat. He felt exactly as he had done on the occasion, several
years previously, when he had asked Professor McGonagall whether he could go into
Hogsmeade, despite the fact that he had not persuaded the Dursleys to sign his
permission slip.

“Hermione, I’ve been thinking, and –“

“Harry, could you help me with something?”
Apparently she had not been listening to him. She leaned forward and held out
The Tales of Beedle the Bard.

“Look at that symbol,” she said, pointing to the top of a page. Above what Harry
assumed was the title of the story (being unable to read runes, he could not be sure), there
was a picture of what looked like a triangular eye, its pupil crossed with a vertical line.

“I never took Ancient Runes, Hermione.”

“I know that; but it isn’t a rune and it’s not in the syllabary, either. All along I
thought it was a picture of an eye, but I don’t think it is! It’s been inked in, look,
somebody’s drawn it there, it isn’t really part of the book. Think, have you ever seen it
before?”
“No . . . No, wait a moment.” Harry looked closer. “Isn’t it the same symbol
Luna’s dad was wearing round his neck?”


“Well, that’s what I thought too!”
“Then it’s Grindelwald’s mark.”

She stared at him, openmouthed.

“What?”

“Krum told me . . .”
He recounted the story that Viktor Krum had told him at the wedding. Hermione
looked astonished.

“Grindelwald’s mark?”

She looked from Harry to the weird symbol and back again. “I’ve never heard that
Grindelwald had a mark. There’s no mention of it in anything I’ve ever read about him.”

“Well, like I say, Krum reckoned that symbol was carved on a wall at Durmstrang,
and Grindelwald put it there.”
She fell back into the old armchair, frowning.

“That’s very odd. If it’s a symbol of Dark Magic, what’s it doing in a book of
children’s stories?”

“Yeah, it is weird,” said Harry. “And you’d think Scrimgeour would have
recognized it. He was Minister, he ought to have been expert on Dark stuff.”
“I know. . . . Perhaps he thought it was an eye, just like I did. All the other stories
have little pictures over the titles.”
She did not speak, but continued to pore over the strange mark. Harry tried again.

“Hermione?”

“Hmm?”

“I’ve been thinking. I – I want to go to Godric’s Hollow.”

She looked up at him, but her eyes were unfocused, and he was sure she was still
thinking about the mysterious mark on the book.

“Yes,” she said. “Yes, I’ve been wondering that too. I really think we’ll have to.”

“Did you hear me right?” he asked.

“Of course I did. You want to go to Godric’s Hollow. I agree. I think we should. I
mean, I can’t think of anywhere else it could be either. It’ll be dangerous, but the more I
think about it, the more likely it seems it’s there.”
“Er – what’s there?” asked Harry.

At that, she looked just as bewildered as he felt.

“Well, the sword, Harry! Dumbledore must have known you’d want to go back
there, and I mean, Godric’s Hollow is Godric Gryffindor’s birthplace –“

“Really? Gryffindor came from Godric’s Hollow?”
“Harry, did you ever even open A History of Magic?”

“Erm,” he said, smiling for what felt like the first time in months: The muscles in
his face felt oddly stiff. “I might’ve opened it, you know, when I bought it . . . just the
once. . . .”

“Well, as the village is named after him I’d have thought you might have made
the connection,” said Hermione. She sounded much more like her old self than she had
done of late; Harry half expected her to announce that she was off to the library. “There’s
a bit about the village in A History of Magic, wait . . .”

She opened the beaded bag and rummaged for a while, finally extracting her copy
of their old school textbook, A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot, which she thumbed
through until finding the page she wanted.


“’Upon the signature of the International Statute of Secrecy in 1689, wizards went
into hiding for good. It was natural, perhaps, that they formed their own small
communities within a community. Many small villages and hamlets attracted several
magical families, who banded together for mutual support and protection. The villages of
Tinworsh in Cornwall, Upper Flagley in Yorkshire, and Ottery St. Catchpole on the south
coast of England were notable homes to knots of Wizarding families who lived alongside
tolerant and sometimes Confunded Muggles. Most celebrated of these half-magical
dwelling places is, perhaps, Godric’s Hollow, the West Country village where the great
wizard Godric Gryffindor was born, and where Bowman Wright, Wizarding smith, forged
the first Golden Snitch. The graveyard is full of the names of ancient magical families,
and this accounts, no doubt, for the stories of hauntings that have dogged the little
church beside it for many centuries.’

“You and your parents aren’t mentioned.” Hermione said, closing the book,
“because Professor Bagshot doesn’t cover anything later than the end of the nineteenth
century. But you see? Godric’s Hollow, Godric Gryffindor, Gryffindor’s sword; don’t
you think Dumbledore would have expected you to make the connection?”

“Oh yeah . . .”

Harry did not want to admit that he had not been thinking about the sword at all
when he suggested they go to Godric’s Hollow. For him, the lore of the village lay in his
parents’ graves, the house where he had narrowly escaped death, and in the person of
Bathilda Bagshot.

“Remember what Muriel said?” he asked eventually.

“Who?”

“You know,” he hesitated. He did not want to say Ron’s name. “Ginny’s great-
aunt. At the wedding. The one who said you had skinny ankles.”

“Oh,” said Hermione. It was a sticky moment: Harry knew that she had sensed
Ron’s name in the offing. He rushed on:

“She said Bathilda Bagshot still lived in Godric’s Hollow.”

“Bathilda Bagshot,” murmured Hermione, running her index finger over
Bathilda’s embossed name on the front cover of A History of Magic. “Well, I suppose –“

She gasped so dramatically that Harry’s insides turned over; he drew his wand,
looking around at the entrance, half expecting to see a hand forcing its way through the
entrance flap, but there was nothing there.

“What?” he said, half angry, half relieved. “What did you do that for? I thought
you’d seen a Death Eater unzipping the tent, at least –“

“Harry, what if Bathilda’s got the sword? What if Dumbledore entrusted it to
her?”

Harry considered this possibility. Bathilda would be an extremely old woman by
now, and according to Muriel, she was “gaga.” Was it likely that Dumbledore would
have hidden the sword of Gryffindor with her? If so, Harry felt that Dumbledore had left
a great deal to chance: Dumbledore had never revealed that he had replaced the sword
with a fake, nor had he so much as mentioned a friendship with Bathilda. Now, however,
was not the moment to cast doubt on Hermione’s theory, not when she was so
surprisingly willing to fall in with Harry’s dearest wish.

“Yeah, he might have done! So, are we going to go to Godric’s Hollow?”


“Yes, but we’ll have to think it through carefully, Harry.” She was sitting up now,
and Harry could tell that the prospect of having a plan again had lifted her mood as much
as his. “We’ll need to practice Disapparating together under the Invisibility Cloak for a
start, and perhaps Disillusionment Charms would be sensible too, unless you think we
should go the whole hog and use Polyjuice Potion? In that case we’ll need to collect hair
from somebody. I actually think we’d better do that, Harry, the thicker our disguises the
better. . . .”

Harry let her talk, nodding and agreeing whenever there was a pause, but his mind
had left the conversation. For the first time since he had discovered that the sword in
Gringotts was a fake, he felt excited.

He was about to go home, about to return to the place where he had had a family.
It was in Godric’s Hollow that, but for Voldemort, he would have grown up and spent
every school holiday. He could have invited friends to his house. . . . He might even have
had brothers and sisters. . . . It would have been his mother who had made his
seventeenth birthday cake. The life he had lost had hardly ever seemed so real to him as
at this moment, when he knew he was about to see the place where it had been taken
from him. After Hermione had gone to bed that night, Harry quietly extracted his
rucksack from Hermione’s beaded bag, and from inside it, the photograph album Hagrid
had given him so long ago. For the first time in months, he perused the old pictures of his
parents, smiling and waving up at him from the images, which were all he had left of
them now.

Harry would gladly have set out for Godric’s Hollow the following day, but
Hermione had other ideas. Convinced as she was that Voldemort would expect Harry to
return to the scene of his parents’ deaths, she was determined that they would set off only
after they had ensured that they had the best disguises possible. It was therefore a full
week later – once they had surreptitiously obtained hairs from innocent Muggles who
were Christmas shopping, and had practiced Apparating and Disapparating while
underneath the Invisibility Cloak together – that Hermione agreed to make the journey.

They were to Apparate to the village under cover of darkness, so it was late
afternoon when they finally swallowed Polyjuice Potion, Harry transforming into a
balding, middle-aged Muggle man, Hermione into his small and rather mousy wife. The
beaded bag containing all of their possessions (apart from the Horcrux, which Harry was
wearing around his neck) was tucked into an inside pocket of Hermione’s buttoned-up
coat. Harry lowered the Invisibility Cloak over them, then they turned into the
suffocating darkness once again.

Heart beating in his throat, Harry opened his eyes. They were standing hand in
hand in a snowy lane under a dark blue sky, in which the night’s first stars were already
glimmering feebly. Cottages stood on either side of the narrow road, Christmas
decorations twinkling in their windows. A short way ahead of them, a glow of golden
streetlights indicated the center of the village.

“All this snow!” Hermione whispered beneath the cloak. “Why didn’t we think of
snow? After all our precautions, we’ll leave prints! We’ll just have to get rid of them –
you go in front, I’ll do it –“

Harry did not want to enter the village like a pantomime horse, trying to keep
themselves concealed while magically covering their traces.


“Let’s take off the Cloak,” said Harry, and when she looked frightened, “Oh,
come on, we don’t look like us and there’s no one around.”

He stowed the Cloak under his jacket and they made their way forward
unhampered, the icy air stinging their faces as they passed more cottages. Any one of
them might have been the one in which James and Lily had once lived or where Bathilda
lived now. Harry gazed at the front doors, their snow-burdened roofs, and their front
porches, wondering whether he remembered any of them, knowing deep inside that it was
impossible, that he had been little more than a year old when he had left this place forever.
He was not even sure whether he would be able to see the cottage at all; he did not know
what happened when the subjects of a Fidelius Charm died. Then the little lane along
which they were walking curved to the left and the heart of the village, a small square,
was revealed to them.

Strung all around with colored lights, there was what looked like a war memorial
in the middle, partly obscured by a windblown Christmas tree. There were several shops,
a post office, a pub, and a little church whose stained-glass windows were glowing jewel-
bright across the square.

The snow here had become impacted: It was hard and slippery where people had
trodden on it all day. Villagers were crisscrossing in front of them, their figures briefly
illuminated by streetlamps. They heard a snatch of laughter and pop music as the pub
door opened and closed; then they heard a carol start up inside the little church.

“Harry, I think it’s Christmas Eve!” said Hermione.

“Is it?”

He had lost track of the date; they had not seen a newspaper for weeks.

“I’m sure it is,” said Hermione, her eyes upon the church. “They . . . they’ll be in
there, won’t they? Your mum and dad? I can see the graveyard behind it.”

Harry felt a thrill of something that was beyond excitement, more like fear. Now
that he was so near, he wondered whether he wanted to see after all. Perhaps Hermione
knew how he was feeling, because she reached for his hand and took the lead for the first
time, pulling him forward. Halfway across the square, however, she stopped dead.

“Harry, look!”

She was pointing at the war memorial. As they had passed it, it had transformed.
Instead of an obelisk covered in names, there was a statue of three people: a man with
untidy hair and glasses, a woman with long hair and a kind, pretty face, and a baby boy
sitting in his mother’s arms. Snow lay upon all their heads, like fluffy white caps.

Harry drew closer, gazing up into his parents’ faces. He had never imagined that
there would be a statue. . . . How strange it was to see himself represented in stone, a
happy baby without a scar on his forehead. . . .

“C’mon,” said Harry, when he had looked his fill, and they turned again toward
the church. As they crossed the road, he glanced over his shoulder; the statue had turned
back into the war memorial.

The singing grew louder as they approached the church. It made Harry’s throat
constrict, it reminded him so forcefully of Hogwarts, of Peeves bellowing rude versions
of carols from inside suits of armor, of the Great Hall’s twelve Christmas trees, of
Dumbledore wearing a bonnet he had won in a cracker, of Ron in a hand-knitted
sweater. . . .


There was a kissing gate at the entrance to the graveyard. Hermione pushed it
open as quietly as possible and they edged through it. On either side of the slippery path
to the church doors, the snow lay deep and untouched. They moved off through the snow,
carving deep trenches behind them as they walked around the building, keeping to the
shadows beneath the brilliant windows.

Behind the church, row upon row of snowy tombstones protruded from a blanket
of pale blue that was flecked with dazzling red, gold, and green wherever the reflections
from the stained glass hit the snow. Keeping his hand closed tightly on the wand in his
jacket pocket, Harry moved toward the nearest grave.

“Look at this, it’s an Abbott, could be some long-lost relation of Hannah’s!”

“Keep your voice down,” Hermione begged him.

They waded deeper and deeper into the graveyard, gouging dark tracks into the
snow behind them, stooping to peer at the words on old headstones, every now and then
squinting into the surrounding darkness to make absolutely sure that they were
unaccompanied.

“Harry, here!”

Hermione was two rows of tombstones away; he had to wade back to her, his
heart positively banging in his chest.

“Is it – ?”

“No, but look!”

She pointed to the dark stone. Harry stooped down and saw , upon the frozen,
lichen-spotted granite, the words Kendra Dumbledore and, a short way down her dates of
birth and death, and Her Daughter Ariana. There was also a quotation:



Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.



So Rita Skeeter and Muriel had got some of their facts right. The Dumbledore
family had indeed lived here, and part of it had died here.

Seeing the grave was worse than hearing about it. Harry could not help thinking
that he and Dumbledore both had deep roots in this graveyard, and that Dumbledore
ought to have told him so, yet he had never thought to share the connection. They could
have visited the place together; for a moment Harry imagined coming here with
Dumbledore, of what a bond that would have been, of how much it would have meant to
him. But it seemed that to Dumbledore, the fact that their families lay side by side in the
same graveyard had been an unimportant coincidence, irrelevant, perhaps, to the job he
wanted Harry to do.

Hermione was looking at Harry, and he was glad that his face was hidden in
shadow. He read the words on the tombstone again. Where your treasure is, there will
your heart be also. He did not understand what these words meant. Surely Dumbledore
had chosen them, as the eldest member of the family once his mother had died.

“Are you sure he never mentioned – ?” Hermione began.

“No,” said Harry curtly, then, “let’s keep looking,” and he turned away, wishing
he had not seen the stone: He did not want his excited trepidation tainted with resentment.

“Here!” cried Hermione again a few moments later from out of the darkness. “Oh
no, sorry! I thought it said Potter.”


She was rubbing at a crumbling, mossy stone, gazing down at it, a little frown on
her face.

“Harry, come back a moment.”

He did not want to be sidetracked again, and only grudgingly made his way back
through the snow toward her.

“What?”

“Look at this!”
The grave was extremely old, weathered so that Harry could hardly make out the
name. Hermione showed him the symbol beneath it.

“Harry, that’s the mark in the book!”

He peered at the place she indicated: The stone was so worn that it was hard to
make out what was engraved there, though there did seem to be a triangular mark beneath
the nearly illegible name.

“Yeah . . . it could be. . . .”

Hermione lit her wand and pointed it at the name on the headstone.

“It says Ig – Ignotus, I think. . . .”
“I’m going to keep looking for my parents, all right?” Harry told her, a slight edge
to his voice, and he set off again, leaving her crouched beside the old grave.

Every now and then he recognized a surname that, like Abbott, he had met at
Hogwarts. Sometimes there were several generations of the same Wizarding family
represented in the graveyard: Harry could tell from the dates that it had either died out, or
the current members had moved away from Godric’s Hollow. Deeper and deeper
amongst the graves he went, and every time he reached a new headstone he felt a little
lurch of apprehension and anticipation.

The darkness and the silence seemed to become, all of a sudden, much deeper.
Harry looked around, worried, thinking of dementors, then realized that the carols had
finished, that the chatter and flurry of churchgoers were fading away as they made their
way back into the square. Somebody inside the church had just turned off the lights.

Then Hermione’s voice came out of the blackness for the third time, sharp and
clear from a few yards away.

“Harry, they’re here . . . right here.”

And he knew by her tone that it was his mother and father this time: He moved
toward her, feeling as if something heavy were pressing on his chest, the same sensation
he had had right after Dumbledore had died, a grief that had actually weighed on his heart
and lungs.

The headstone was only two rows behind Kendra and Ariana’s. It was made of
white marble, just like Dumbledore’s tomb, and this made it easy to read, as it seemed to
shine in the dark. Harry did not need to kneel or even approach very close to it to make
out the words engraved upon it.



JAMES POTTER LILY POTTER



BORN 27 MARCH 1960 BORN 30 JANUARY 1960

DIED 31 OCTOBER 1981 DIED 31 OCTOBER 1981



The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.




Harry read the words slowly, as though he would have only one chance to take in
their meaning, and he read the last of them aloud.

“’The last enemy that shall be defeated is death’ . . .” A horrible thought came to
him, and with a kind of panic. “Isn’t that a Death Eater idea? Why is that there?”

“It doesn’t mean defeating death in the way the Death Eaters mean it, Harry,” said
Hermione, her voice gentle. “It means . . . you know . . . living beyond death. Living after
death.”

But they were not living, thought Harry. They were gone. The empty words could
not disguise the fact that his parents’ moldering remains lay beneath snow and stone,
indifferent, unknowing. And tears came before he could stop them, boiling hot then
instantly freezing on his face, and what was the point in wiping them off or pretending?
He let them fall, his lips pressed hard together, looking down at the thick snow hiding
from his eyes the place where the last of Lily and James lay, bones now, surely, or dust,
not knowing or caring that their living son stood so near, his heart still beating, alive
because of their sacrifice and close to wishing, at this moment, that he was sleeping under
the snow with them.

Hermione had taken his hand again and was gripping it tightly. He could not look
at her, but returned the pressure, now taking deep, sharp gulps of the night air, trying to
steady himself, trying to regain control. He should have brought something o give them,
and he had not thought of it, and every plant in the graveyard was leafless and frozen. But
Hermione raised her wand, moved it in a circle through the air, and a wreath of Christmas
roses blossomed before them. Harry caught it and laid it on his parents’ grave.

As soon as he stood up he wanted to leave: He did not think he could stand
another moment there. He put his arm around Hermione’s shoulders, and she put hers
around his waist, and they turned in silence and walked away through the snow, past
Dumbledore’s mother and sister, back toward the dark church and the out-of-sight kissing
gate.



Chapter Seventeen

Bathilda’s Secret



"Harry, stop."
"What's wrong?"
They had only just reached the grave of the unknown Abbott.
"There's someone there. Someone watching us. I can tell. There, over by the bushes."
They stood quite still, holding on to each other, gazing at the dense black boundary of the
graveyard. Harry could not see anything.
"Are you sure?"



"I saw something move. I could have sworn I did..."
She broke from him to free her wand arm.
"We look like Muggles," Harry pointed out.
"Muggles who've just been laying flowers on your parents' grave? Harry, I'm sure there's
someone over there!"
Harry thought of A History of Magic; the graveyard was supposed to be haunted; what if
--? But then he heard a rustle and saw a little eddy of dislodged snow in the bush to
which Hermione had pointed. Ghosts could not move snow.
"It's a cat," said Harry, after a second or two, "or a bird. If it was a Death Eater we'd be
dead by now. But let's get out of here, and we can put the Cloak back on."
They glanced back repeatedly as they made their way out of the graveyard. Harry, who
did not feel as sanguine as he had pretended when reassuring Hermione, was glad to
reach the gate and the slippery pavement. They pulled the Invisibility Cloak back over
themselves. The pub was fuller than before. Many voices inside it were now singing the
carol that they had heard as they approached the church. For a moment, Harry considered
suggesting they take refuge inside it, but before he could say anything Hermione
murmured, "Let's go this way," and pulled him down the dark street leading out of the
village in the opposite direction from which they had entered. Harry could make out the
point where the cottages ended and the lane turned into open country again. They walked
as quickly as they dared, past more windows sparkling with multicolored lights, the
outlines of Christmas trees dark through the curtains.
"How are we going to find Bathilda's house?" asked Hermione, who was shivering a little
and kept glancing back over her shoulder. "Harry? What do you think? Harry?"
She tugged at this arm, but Harry was not paying attention. He was looking toward the
dark mass that stood at the very end of this row of houses. Next moment he sped up,
dragging Hermione along with him, she slipped a little on the ice.
"Harry --"
"Look ... Look at it, Hermione ..."
"I don't ... oh!"
He could see it; the Fidelius Charm must have died with James and Lily. The hedge had
grown wild in the sixteen years since Hagrid had taken Harry from the rubble that lay
scattered amongst the waist-high grass. Most of the cottage was still standing, though
entirely covered in the dark ivy and snow, but the right side of the top floor had been
blown apart; that, Harry was sure, was where the curse had backfired. He and Hermione


stood at the gate, gazing up at the wreck of what must once have been a cottage just like
those that flanked it.
"I wonder why nobody's ever rebuilt it?" whispered Hermione.
"Maybe you can't rebuild it?" Harry replied. "Maybe it's like the injuries from Dark
Magic and you can't repair the damage?"
He slipped a hand from beneath the Cloak and grasped the snowy and thickly rusted gate,
not wishing to open it, but simply so he'd some part of the house.
"You're not going to go inside? It looks unsafe, it might -- oh, Harry, look!"
His touch on the gate seemed to have done it. A sign had risen out of the ground in front
of them, up thorough the tangles of nettles and weeds, like some bizarre, fast-growing
flower, and in golden letters upon the wood it said:
On this spot, on this night of 31 October 1981,
Lily and James Potter lost their lives.
Their son, Harry, remains the only wizard
ever to have survived the Killing Curse.
This house, invisible to Muggles, has been left
in its ruined state as a monument to the Potters
and as a reminder of the violence
that tore apart their family.
And all around these neatly lettered words, scribbles had been added by other witches
and wizards who had come to see the place where the Boy Who Lived had escaped.
Some had merely signed their names in Everlasting Ink; others had carved their initials
into the wood, still others had left messages. The most recent of these, shining brightly
over sixteen years' worth of magical graffiti, all said similar things.
Good luck, Harry, wherever you are.
If you read this, Harry, we're all behind you!
Long live Harry Potter.
"They shouldn't have written on the sign!" said Hermione, indignant.
But Harry beamed at her.
"It's brilliant. I'm glad they did. I ..."
He broke off. A heavily muffled figure was hobbling up the lane toward them, silhouetted
by the bright lights in the distant square. Harry thought, though it was hard to judge, that
the figure was a woman. She was moving slowly, possibly frightened of slipping on the
snowy ground. Her stoop, her stoutness, her shuffling gait all gave an impression of


extreme age. They watched in silence as she drew nearer. Harry was waiting to see
whether she would turn into any of the cottages she was passing, but he knew
instinctively that she would not. At last she came to a halt a few yards from them and
simply stood there in the middle of the frozen road, facing them.
He did not need Hermione's pinch to his arm. There was next to no chance that this
woman was a Muggle: She was standing there gazing at a house that ought to have been
completely invisible to her, if she was not a witch. Even assuming that she was a witch,
however, it was odd behavior to come out on a night this cold, simply to look at an old
ruin. By all the rules of normal magic, meanwhile, she ought not to be able to see
Hermione and him at all. Nevertheless, Harry had the strangest feeling that she knew that
they were there, and also who they were. Just as he had reached this uneasy conclusion,
she raised a gloved hand and beckoned.
Hermione moved closer to him under the Cloak, her arm pressed against his.
"How does she know?"
He shook his head. The woman beckoned again, more vigorously. Harry could think of
many reasons not to obey the summons, and yet his suspicions about her identity were
growing stronger every moment that they stood facing each other in the deserted street.
Was it possible that she had been waiting for them all these long months? That
Dumbledore had told her to wait, and that Harry would come in the end? Was it not likely
that it was she who had moved in the shadows in the graveyard and had followed them to
this spot? Even her ability to sense them suggested some Dumbledore-ish power that he
had never encountered before.
Finally Harry spoke, causing Hermione to gasp and jump.
"Are you Bathilda?"
The muffled figure nodded and beckoned again.
Beneath the Cloak Harry and Hermione looked at each other. Harry raised his eyebrows;
Hermione gave a tiny, nervous nod.
They stepped toward the woman and , at once, she turned and hobbled off back the way
they had come. Leading them past several houses, she turned in at a gate. They followed
her up the front path through a garden nearly as overgrown as the one they had just left.
She fumbled for a moment with a key at the front door, then opened it and stepped back
to let them pass.
She smelled bad, or perhaps it was her house; Harry wrinkled his nose as they sidled past
her and pulled off the Cloak. Now that he was beside her, he realized how tiny she was;
bowed down with age, she came barely level with his chest. She closed the door behind


them, her knuckles blue and mottled against the peeling paint, then turned and peered into
Harry's face. Her eyes were thick with cataracts and sunken into folds of transparent skin,
and her whole face was dotted with broken veins and liver spots. He wondered whether
she could make him out at all; even if she could, it was the balding Muggle whose
identity he had stolen that she would see.
The odor of old age, of dust, of unwashed clothes and stale food intensified as the
unwound a moth-eaten black shawl, revealing a head of scant white hair through which
the scalp showed clearly.
"Bathilda?" Harry repeated.
She nodded again. Harry became aware of the locket against his skin; the thing inside it
that sometimes ticked or beat had woken; he could feel it pulsing through the cold gold.
Did it know, could it sense, that the thing that would destroy it was near?
Bathilda shuffled past them, pushing Hermione aside as though she had not seen her, and
vanished into what seemed to be a sitting room.
"Harry, I'm not sure about this," breathed Hermione.
"Look at the size of her, I think we could overpower her if we had to," said Harry. "Listen,
I should have told you, I knew she wasn't all there. Muriel called her 'gaga.'"
"Come!" called Bathilda from the next room.
Hermione jumped and clutched Harry's arm.
"It's okay," said Harry reassuringly, and he led the way into the sitting room.
Bathilda was tottering around the place lighting candles, but it was still very dark, not to
mention extremely dirty. Thick dust crunched beneath their feet, and Harry's nose
detected, underneath the dank and mildewed smell, something worse, like meat gone bad.
He wondered when was the last time anyone had been inside Bathilda's house to check
whether she was coping. She seemed to have forgotten that she could do magic, too, for
she lit the candles clumsily by hand, her trailing lace cuff in constant danger of catching
fire.
"Let me do that," offered Harry, and he took the matches from her. She stood watching
him as he finished lighting the candle stubs that stood on saucers around the room,
perched precariously on stacks of books and on side tables crammed with cracked and
moldy cups.
The last surface on which Harry spotted a candle was a bow-fronted chest of drawers on
which there stood a large number of photographs. When the flame danced into life, its
reflection wavered on their dusty glass and silver. He saw a few tiny movements from the


pictures. As Bathilda fumbled with logs for the fire, he muttered "Tergeo": The dust
vanished from the photographs, and he saw at once that half a dozen were missing from
the largest and most ornate frames. He wondered whether Bathilda or somebody else had
removed them. Then the sight of a photograph near the back of the collection caught his
eye, and he snatched it up.
It was the golden-haired, merry-faced thief, the young man who had perched on
Gregorovitch's windowsill, smiling lazily up at Harry out of the silver frame. And it came
to Harry instantly where he had seen the boy before: in The Life and Lies of Albus
Dumbledore, arm in arm with the teenage Dumbledore, and that must be where all the
missing photographs were: in Rita's book.
"Mrs. -- Miss -- Bagshot?" he said, and his voice shook slightly. "Who is this?"
Bathilda was standing in the middle of the room watching Hermione light the fire for her.
"Miss Bagshot?" Harry repeated, and he advanced with the picture in his hands as the
flames burst into life in the fireplace. Bathilda looked up at his voice, and the Horcrux
beat faster upon his chest.
"Who is this person?" Harry asked her, pushing the picture forward.
She peered at it solemnly, then up at Harry.
"Do you know who this is?" he repeated in a much slower and louder voice than usual.
"This man? Do you know him? What's he called?"
Bathilda merely looked vague. Harry felt an awful frustration. How had Rita Skeeter
unlocked Bathilda's memories?
"Who is this man?" he repeated loudly.
"Harry, what area you doing?" asked Hermione.
"This picture. Hermione, it's the thief, the thief who stole from Gregorovitch! Please!" he
said to Bathilda. "Who is this?"
But she only stared at him.
"Why did you ask us to come with you, Mrs. - Miss -- Bagshot?" asked Hermione,
raising her own voice. "Was there something you wanted to tell us?"
Giving no sign that she had heard Hermione, Bathilda now shuffled a few steps closer to
Harry. With a little jerk of her head she looked back into the hall.
"You want us to leave?" he asked.


She repeated the gesture, this time pointing firstly at him, then at herself, then at the
ceiling.
"Oh, right... Hermione, I think she wants me to go upstairs with her."
"All right," said Hermione, "let's go."
But when Hermione moved, Bathilda shook her head with surprising vigor, once more
pointing first at Harry, then to herself.
"She wants me to go with her, alone."
"Why?" asked Hermione, and her voice rang out sharp and clear in the candlelit room, the
old lady shook her head a little at the loud noise.
"Maybe Dumbledore told her to give the sword to me, and only to me?"
"Do you really think she knows who you are?"
"Yes," said Harry, looking down into the milky eyes fixed upon his own. "I think she
does."
"Well, okay then, but be quick, Harry."
"Lead the way," Harry told Bathilda.
She seemed to understand, because she shuffled around him toward the door. Harry
glanced back at Hermione with a reassuring smile, but he was not sure she had seen it;
she stood hugging herself in the midst of the candlelit squalor, looking toward the
bookcase. As Harry walked out of the room, unseen by both Hermione and Bathilda, he
slipped the silver-framed photograph of the unknown thief inside his jacket.
The stairs were steep and narrow; Harry was half tempted to place his hands on stout
Bathilda's backside to ensure that she did not topple over backward on top of him, which
seemed only too likely. Slowly, wheezing a little, she climbed to the upper landing,
turned immediately right, and led him into a low-ceilinged bedroom.
It was pitch-black and smelled horrible: Harry had just made out a chamber pot
protruding from under the bed before Bathilda closed the door and even that was
swallowed by the darkness.
"Lumos," said Harry, and his wand ignited. He gave a start: Bathilda had moved close to
him in those few seconds of darkness, and he had not heard her approach.
"You are Potter?" she whispered.


"Yes, I am."
She nodded slowly, solemnly. Harry felt the Horcrux beating fast, faster than his own
heart; It was an unpleasant, agitating sensation.
"Have you got anything for me?" Harry asked, but she seemed distracted by his lit wand-
tip.
"Have you got anything for me?" he repeated.
Then she closed her eyes and several things happened at once: Harry's scar prickled
painfully; the Horcrux twitched so that the front of his sweater actually moved; the dark,
fetid room dissolved momentarily. He felt a leap of joy and spoke in a high, cold voice:
Hold him!
Harry swayed where he stood: The dark, foul-smelling room seemed to close around him
again; he did not know what had just happened.
"Have you got anything for me?" he asked for a third time, much louder.
"Over here," she whispered, pointing to the corner. Harry raised his wand and saw the
outline of a cluttered dressing table beneath the curtained window.
This time she did not lead him. Harry edged between her and the unmade bed, his wand
raised. He did not want to look away from her.
"What is it?" he asked as he reached the dressing table, which was heaped high with what
looked and smelled like dirty laundry.
"There," she said, pointing at the shapeless mass.
And in the instant that he looked away, his eyes taking the tangled mess for a sword hilt,
a ruby, she moved weirdly: He saw it out of the corner of his eye; panic made him turn
and horror paralyzed him as he saw the old body collapsing and the great snake pouring
from the place where her neck had been.
The snake struck as he raised his wand: The force of the bite to his forearm sent the wand
spinning up toward the ceiling; its light swung dizzyingly around the room and was
extinguished; Then a powerful blow from the tail to his midriff knocked the breath out of
him: He fell backward onto the dressing table, into the mound of filthy clothing --
He rolled sideways, narrowly avoiding the snake's tail, which thrashed down upon the
table where he had been a second earlier. Fragments of the glass surface rained upon him
as he hit the floor. From below he heard Hermione call, "Harry?"



He could not get enough breath into his lungs to call back: Then a heavy smooth mass
smashed him to the floor and he felt it slide over him, powerful, muscular --
"No!" he gasped, pinned to the floor.
"Yes," whispered the voice. "Yesss... hold you ... hold you ..."
"Accio ... Accio Wand ..."
But nothing happened and he needed his hands to try to force the snake from him as it
coiled itself around his torso, squeezing the air from him, pressing the Horcrux hard into
his chest, a circle of ice that throbbed with life, inches from his own frantic heart, and his
brain was flooding with cold, white light, all thought obliterated, his own breath drowned,
distant footsteps, everything going...
A metal heart was banging outside his chest, and now he was flying, flying with triumph
in his heart, without need of broomstick or thestral...
He was abruptly awake in the sour-smelling darkness; Nagini had released him. He
scrambled up and saw the snake outlined against the landing light: It struck, and
Hermione dived aside with a shriek; her deflected curse hit the curtained window, which
shattered. Frozen air filled the room as Harry ducked to avoid another shower of broken
glass and his foot slipped on a pencil-like something -- his wand --
He bent and snatched it up, but now the room was full of the snake, its tail thrashing;
Hermione was nowhere to be seen and for a moment Harry thought the worst, but then
there was a loud bang and a flash of red light, and the snake flew into the air, smacking
Harry hard in the face as it went, coil after heavy coil rising up to the ceiling. Harry
raised his wand, but as he did so, his scar seared more painfully, more powerfully than it
had done in years.
"He's coming! Hermione, he's coming!"
As he yelled the snake fell, hissing wildly. Everything was chaos: It smashed shelves
from the wall, and splintered china flew everywhere as Harry jumped over the bed and
seized the dark shape he knew to be Hermione --
She shrieked with pain as he pulled her back across the bed: The snake reared again, but
Harry knew that worse than the snake was coming, was perhaps already at the gate, his
head was going to split open with the pain from his scar --
The snake lunged as he took a running leap, dragging Hermione with him; as it struck,
Hermione screamed, "Confringo!" and her spell flew around the room, exploding the
wardrobe mirror and ricocheting back at them, bouncing from floor to ceiling; Harry felt
the heat of it sear the back of his hand. Glass cut his cheek as, pulling Hermione with him,
he leapt from bed to broken dressing table and then straight out of the smashed window


into nothingness, her scream reverberating through the night as they twisted in midair ...
And then his scar burst open and he was Voldemort and he was running across the fetid
bedroom, his long white hands clutching at the windowsill as he glimpsed the bald man
and the little woman twist and vanish, and he screamed with rage, a scream that mingled
with the girl's, that echoed across the dark gardens over the church bells ringing in
Christmas Day...
And his scream was Harry's scream, his pain was Harry's pain... that it could happen here,
where it had happened before... here, within sight of that house where he had come so
close to knowing what it was to die ... to die ... the pain was so terrible ... ripped from his
body ... But if he had no body, why did his head hurt so badly; if he was dead, how cold
he feel so unbearably, didn't pain cease with death, didn't it go ...
The night wet and windy, two children dressed as pumpkins waddling across the square
and the shop windows covered in paper spiders, all the tawdry Muggle trappings of a
world in which they did not believe ... And he was gliding along, that sense of purpose
and power and rightness in him that he always knew on these occasions ... Not anger ...
that was for weaker souls than he ... but triumph, yes ... He had waited for this, he had
hoped for it ...
"Nice costume, mister!"
He saw the small boy's smile falter as he ran near enough to see beneath the hood of the
cloak, saw the fear cloud his pained face: Then the child turned and ran away ... Beneath
the robe he fingered the handle of his wand ... One simple movement and the child would
never reach his mother ... but unnecessary, quite unnecessary ...
And along a new and darker street he moved, and now his destination was in sight at last,
the Fidelius Charm broken, though they did not know it yet ... And he made less noise
than the dead leaves slithering along the pavement as he drew level with the dark hedge,
and steered over it ...
They had not drawn the curtains; he saw them quite clearly in their little sitting room, the
tall black-haired man in his glasses, making puffs of colored smoke erupt from his wand
for the amusement of the small black-haired boy in his blue pajamas. The child was
laughing and trying to catch the smoke, to grab it in his small fist ...
A door opened and the mother entered, saying words he cold not hear, her long dark-red
hair falling over her face. Now the father scooped up the son and handed him to the
mother. He threw his wand down upon the sofa and stretched, yawning...
The gate creaked a little as he pushed it open, but James Potter did not hear. His white
hand pulled out the wand beneath his cloak and pointed it at the door, which burst open...
He was over the threshold as James came sprinting into the hall. It was easy, too easy, he


had not even picked up his wand ...
"Lily, take Harry and go! It's him! Go! Run! I'll hold him off!"
Hold him off, without a wand in his hand! ... He laughed before casting the curse ...
"Avada Kedavra!"
The green light filled the cramped hallway, it lit the pram pushed against the wall, it
made the banisters glow like lighting rods, and James Potter fell like a marionette whose
strings were cut ...
He could hear her screaming from the upper floor, trapped, but as long as she was
sensible, she, at least, had nothing to fear ... He climbed the steps, listening with faint
amusement to her attempts to barricade herself in ... She had no wand upon her either ...
How stupid they were, and how trusting, thinking that their safety lay in friends, that
weapons could be discarded even for moments...
He forced the door open, cast aside the chair and boxes hastily piled against it with one
lazy wave of his wand ... and there she stood, the child in her arms. At the sight of him,
she dropped her son into the crib behind her and threw her arms wide, as if this would
help, as if in shielding him from sight she hoped to be chosen instead ...
"Not Harry, not Harry, please not Harry!"
"Stand aside, you silly girl... stand aside, now."
"Not Harry, please no, take me, kill me instead --"
"This is my last warning --"
"Not Harry! Please ... have mercy ... have mercy ... Not Harry! Not Harry! Please -- I'll
do anything ..."
"Stand aside. Stand aside, girl!"
He could have forced her away from the crib, but it seemed more prudent to finish them
all ...
The green light flashed around the room and she dropped like her husband. The child had
not cried all this time. He could stand, clutching the bars of his crib, and he looked up
into the intruder's face with a kind of bright interest, perhaps thinking that it was his
father who hid beneath the cloak, making more pretty lights, and his mother would pop
up any moment, laughing --
He pointed the wand very carefully into the boy's face: He wanted to see it happen, the


destruction of this one, inexplicable danger. The child began to cry: It had seen that he
was not James. He did not like it crying, he had never been able to stomach the small
ones whining in the orphanage --
"Avada Kedavra!"
And then he broke. He was nothing, nothing but pain and terror, and he must hide himself,
not here in the rubble of the ruined house, where the child was trapped screaming, but far
away ... far away ...
"No," he moaned.
The snake rustled on the filthy, cluttered floor, and he had killed the boy, and yet he was
the boy ...
"No..."
And now he stood at the broken window of Bathilda's house, immersed in memories of
his greatest loss, and at his feet the great snake slithered over broken china and glass... He
looked down and saw something... something incredible...
"No..."
"Harry, it's all right, you're all right!"
He stooped down and picked up the smashed photograph. There he was, the unknown
thief, the thief he was seeking...
"No... I dropped it... I dropped it ..."
"Harry, it's okay, wake up, wake up!"
He was Harry... Harry, not Voldemort ... and the thing that was rustling was not a snake ...
He opened his eyes.
"Harry," Hermione whispered. "Do you feel all -- all right?"
"Yes," he lied.
He was in the tent, lying on one of the lower bunks beneath a heap of blankets. He could
tell that it was almost dawn by the stillness and quality of the cold, flat light beyond the
canvas ceiling. He was drenched in sweat; he could feel it on the sheets and blankets.
"We got away."
"Yes," said Hermione. "I had to use a Hover Charm to get you into your bunk. I couldn't


lift you. You've been ... Well, you haven't been quite ..."
There were purple shadows under her brown eyes and he noticed a small sponge in her
hand: She had been wiping his face.
"You've been ill," she finished. "Quite ill."
"How long ago did we leave?"
"Hours ago. It's nearly morning."
"And I've been... what, unconscious?"
"Not exactly," said Hermione uncomfortably. "You've been shouting and moaning and ...
things," she added in a tone that made Harry feel uneasy. What had he done? Screamed
curses like Voldemort, cried like the baby in the crib?
"I couldn't get the Horcrux off you," Hermione said, and he knew she wanted to change
the subject. "It was stuck, stuck to your chest. You've got a mark; I'm sorry, I had to use a
Severing Charm to get it away. The snake hit you too, but I've cleaned the wound and put
some dittany on it ..."
He pulled the sweaty T-shirt he was wearing away from himself and looked down. There
was a scarlet oval over his heart where the locket had burned him. He could also see the
half healed puncture marks to his forearm.
"Where've you put the Horcrux?"
"In my bag. I think we should keep it off for a while."
He lay back on his pillows and looked into her pinched gray face.
"We shouldn't have gone to Godric's Hollow. It's my fault, it's all my fault. Hermione, I'm
sorry."
"It's not you fault. I wanted to go too; I really thought Dumbledore might have left the
sword there for you."
"Yeah, well ... we got that wrong, didn't we?"
"What happened, Harry? What happened when she took you upstairs? Was the snake
hiding somewhere? Did it just come out and kill her and attack you?"
"No." he said. "She was the snake ... or the snake was her ... all along."
"W-what?"


He closed his eyes. He could still smell Bathilda's house on him; it made the whole thing
horribly vivid.
"Bathilda must've been dead a while. The snake was ... was inside her. You-Know-Who
put it there in Godric's Hollow, to wait. You were right. He knew I'd go back."
"The snake was inside her?"
He opened his eyes again. Hermione looked revolted, nauseated.
"Lupin said there would be magic we'd never imagined." Harry said. "She didn't want to
talk in front of you, because it was Parseltongue, all Parseltongue, and I didn't realize,
but of course I could understand her. Once we were up in the room, the snake sent a
message to You-Know-Who, I heard it happen inside my head, I felt him get excited, he
said to keep me there ... and then ..."
He remembered the snake coming out of Bathilda's neck: Hermione did not need to know
the details.
"...she changed, changed into the snake, and attacked."
He looked down at the puncture marks.
"It wasn't supposed to kill me, just keep me there till You-Know-Who came."
If he had only managed to kill the snake, it would have been worth it, all of it ... Sick at
heart, he sat up and threw back the covers.
"Harry, no, I'm sure you ought to rest!"
"You're the one who needs sleep. No offense, but you look terrible. I'm fine. I'll keep
watch for a while. Where's my wand?"
She did not answer, she merely looked at him.
"Where's my wand, Hermione?"
She was biting her lip, and tears swam in her eyes.
"Harry ..."
"Where's my wand?"
She reached down beside the bed and held it out to him.



The holly and phoenix wand was nearly severed in two. One fragile strand of phoenix
feather kept both pieces hanging together. The wood had splintered apart completely.
Harry took it into his hands as though it was a living thing that had suffered a terrible
injury. He could not think properly: Everything was a blur of panic and fear. Then he
held out the want to Hermione.
"Mend it. Please."
"Harry, I don't think, when it's broken like this --"
"Please, Hermione, try!"
"R-Reparo."
The dangling half of the wand resealed itself. Harry held it up.
"Lumos!"
The wand sparked feebly, then went out. Harry pointed it at Hermione.
"Expelliarmus!"
Hermione's wand gave a little jerk, but did not leave her hand. The feeble attempt at
magic was too much for Harry's wand, which split into two again. He stared at it, aghast,
unable to take in what he was seeing ... the wand that had survived so much ...
"Harry." Hermione whispered so quietly he could hardly hear her. "I'm so, so sorry. I
think it was me. As we were leaving, you know, the snake was coming for us, and so I
cast a Blasting Curse, and it rebounded everywhere, and it must have -- must have hit --"
"It was an accident." said Harry mechanically. He felt empty, stunned. "We'll -- we'll find
a way to repair it."
"Harry, I don't think we're going to be able to," said Hermione, the ears trickling down
her face. "Remember ... remember Ron? When he broke his wand, crashing the car? It
was never the same again, he had to get a new one."
Harry thought of Ollivander, kidnapped and held hostage by Voldemort; of Gregorovitch,
who was dead. How was he supposed to find himself a new wand?
"Well," he said, in a falsely matter-of-fact voice, "well, I'll just borrow yours for now,
then. While I keep watch."
Her face glazed with tears, Hermione handed over her wand, and he left her sitting beside
his bed, desiring nothing more than to get away from her.




Chapter Eighteen

The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore

The sun was coming up: The pure, colorless vastness of the sky stretched over
him, indifferent to him and his suffering. Harry sat down in the tent entrance and took a
deep breath of clean air. Simply to be alive to watch the sun rise over the sparkling snowy
hillside ought to have been the greatest treasure on earth, yet he could not appreciate it:
His senses had been spiked by the calamity of losing his want. He looked out over a
valley blanketed in snow, distant church bells chiming through the glittering silence.

Without realizing it, he was digging his fingers into his arms as if he were trying
to resist physical pain. He had spilled his own blood more times than he could count; he
had lost all bones in his right arm once; this journey had already given him scars to his
chest and forearm to join those on his hand and forehead, but never, until this moment,
had he felt himself to be fatally weakened, vulnerable, and naked, as though the best part
of his magical power had been torn from him. He knew exactly what Hermione would
say if he expressed any of this: The wand is only as good as the wizard. But she was
wrong, his case was different. She had not felt the wand spin like the needle of a compass
and shoot golden flames at his enemy. He had lost the protection of the twin cores, and
only now that it was gone did he realize how much he had been counting on it.

He pulled the pieces of the broken wand out of his pocket and, without looking at
them, tucked them away in Hagrid’s pouch around his neck. The pouch was now too full
of broken and useless objects to take any more. Harry’s hand brushed the old Snitch
through the mokeskin and for a moment he had to fight the temptation to pull it out and
throw it away. Impenetrable, unhelpful, useless, like everything else Dumbledore had left
behind ---

And his fury at Dumbledore broke over him now like lava, scorching him inside,
wiping out every other feeling. Out of sheer desperation they had talked themselves into
believing that Godric’s Hollow held answers, convinced themselves that they were
supposed to go back, that it was all part of some secret path laid out for them by
Dumbledore: but there was no map, no plan. Dumbledore had left them to grope in the
darkness, to wrestle with unknown and undreamed-of terrors, alone and unaided: Nothing
was explained, nothing was given freely, they had no sword, and now, Harry had no
wand. And he had dropped the photograph of the thief, and it would surely be easy now
for Voldemort to find out who he was . . .

Voldemort had all the information now . . .

“Harry?”

Hermione looked frightened that he might curse her with her own wand. Her face
streaked with tears, she crouched down beside him, two cups of tea trembling in her
hands and something bulky under her arm.

“Thanks,” he said, taking one of the cups.

“Do you mind if I talk to you?”

“No,” he said because he did not want to hurt her feelings.

“Harry, you wanted to know who that man in the picture was. Well . . . I’ve got
the book.”

Timidly she pushed it onto his lap, a pristine copy of The Life and Lies of Albus
Dumbledore.


“Where --- how --- ?”

“It was in Bathilda’s sitting room, just lying there. . . . This note was sticking out
of the top of it.”

Hermione read the few lines of spiky, acid-green writing aloud.

“ ‘Dear Bally, Thanks for your help. Here’s a copy of the book, hope you like it.
You said everything, even if you don’t remember it. Rita.’ I think it must have arrived
while the real Bathilda was alive, but perhaps she wasn’t in any fit state to read it?”

“No, she probably wasn’t.”

Harry looked down upon Dumbledore’s face and experienced a surge of savage
pleasure: Now he would know if all the things that Dumbledore had never thought it
worth telling him, whether Dumbledore wanted him to or not.

“You’re still really angry at me, aren’t you?” said Hermione; he looked up to see
fresh tears leaking out of her eyes, and knew that his anger must have shown in his face.

“No,” he said quietly. “No, Hermione, I know it was an accident. You were trying
to get us out of there alive, and you were incredible. I’d be dead if you hadn’t been there
to help me.”

He tried to return her watery smile, then turned his attention to the book. Its spine
was stiff; it had clearly never been opened before. He riffled through the pages, looking
for photographs. He came across the one he sought almost at once, the young
Dumbledore and his handsome companion, roaring with laughter at some long-forgotten
joke. Harry dropped his eyes to the caption.



Albus Dumbledore, shortly after his mother’s death,

With his friend Gellert Grindelwald.



Harry gaped at the last word for several long moments. Grindelwald. His friend
Grindelwald. He looked sideways at Hermione, who was still contemplating the name as
though she could not believe her eyes. Slowly she looked up at Harry.

“Grindelwald!”

Ignoring the remainder of the photographs, Harry searched the pages around them
for a recurrence of that fatal name. He soon discovered it and read greedily, but became
lost: It was necessary to go farther back to make sense of it all, and eventually he found
himself at the start of a chapter entitled “The Greater Good.” Together, he and Hermione
started to read:



Now approaching his eighteenth birthday, Dumbledore left Hogwarts in a blaze
of glory --- Head Boy, Prefect, Winner of the Barnabus Finkley Prize for
Exceptional Spell-Casting, British Youth Representative to the Wizengamot,
Gold Medal-Winner for Ground-Breaking Contribution to the International
Alchemical Conference in Cairo. Dumbledore intended, next, to take a Grand
Tour with Elphias “Dogbreath” Doge, the dim-witted but devoted sidekick he
had picked up at school.

The two young men were staying at the Leaky Cauldron in London,
preparing to depart for Greece the following morning, when an owl arrived
bearing news of Dumbledore’s mother’s death. “Dogbreath” Doge, who refused
to be interviewed for this book, has given the public his own sentimental


version of what happened next. He represents Kendra’s death as a tragic blow,
and Dumbledore’s decision to give up his expedition as an act of noble self-
sacrifice.

Certainly Dumbledore returned to Godric’s Hollow at once, supposedly to
“care” for his younger brother and sister. But how much care did he actually
give them?

“He were a head case, that Aberforth,” said Enid Smeek, whose family lived
on the outskirts of Godric’s Hollow at that time. “Ran wild. ‘Course, with his
mum and dad gone you’d have felt sorry for him, only he kept chucking goat
dung at my head. I don’t think Albus was fussed about him. I never saw them
together, anyway.”

So what was Albus doing, if not comforting his wild young brother? The
answer, it seems, is ensuring the continued imprisonment of his sister. For
though her first jailer had died, there was no change in the pitiful condition of
Ariana Dumbledore. Her very existence continued to be known only to those
few outsiders who, like “Dogbreath” Doge, could be counted upon to believe in
the story of her “ill health.”

Another such easily satisfied friend of the family was Bathilda Bagshot, the
celebrated magical historian who has lived in Godric’s Hollow for many years.
Kendra, of course, had rebuffed Bathilda when she first attempted to welcome
the family to the village. Several years later, however, the author sent an owl to
Albus at Hogwarts, having been favorably impressed by his paper on trans-
species transformation in Transfiguration Today. This initial contract led to
acquaintance with the entire Dumbledore family. At the time of Kendra’s death,
Bathilda was the only person in Godric’s Hollow who was on speaking terms
with Dumbledore’s mother.

Unfortunately, the brilliance that Bathilda exhibited earlier in her life has
now dimmed. “The fire’s lit, but the cauldron’s empty,” as Ivor Dillonsby put it
to me, or, in Enid Smeek’s slightly earthier phrase, “She’s nutty as squirrel
poo.” Nevertheless, a combination of tried-and-tested reporting techniques
enabled me to extract enough nuggets of hard fact to string together the whole
scandalous story.

Like the rest of the Wizarding world, Bathilda puts Kendra’s premature death
down to a backfiring charm, a story repeated by Albus and Aberforth in later
years. Bathilda also parrots the family line on Ariana, calling her “frail” and
“delicate.” On one subject, however, Bathilda is well worth the effort I put into
procuring Veritaserum, for she, and she alone, knows the full story of the best-
kept secret of Albus Dumbledore’s life. Now revealed for the first time, it calls
into question everything that his admirers believed of Dumbledore: his
supposed hatred of the Dark Arts, his opposition into the oppression of Muggles,
even his devotion to his own family.

The very same summer that Dumbledore went home to Godric’s Hollow,
now an orphan and head of the family, Bathilda Bagshot agreed to accept into
her home her great-nephew, Gellert Grindelwald.

The name of Grindelwald is justly famous: In a list of Most Dangerous Dark
Wizards of All Time, he would miss out on the top spot only because You-


Know-Who arrived, a generation later, to steal his crown. As Grindelwald never
extended his campaign of terror to Britain, however, the details of his rise to
power are not widely known here.

Educated at Durmstrang, a school famous even then for its unfortunate
tolerance of the Dark Arts, Grindelwald showed himself quite as precociously
brilliant as Dumbledore. Rather than channel his abilities into the attainment of
awards and prizes, however, Gellert Grindelwald devoted himself no other
pursuits. At sixteen years old, even Durmstrang felt it could no longer turn a
blind eye to the twisted experiments of Gellert Grindelwald, and he was
expelled.

Hitherto, all that has been known of Grindelwald’s next movements is that he
“traveled around for some months.” It can now be revealed that Grindelwald
chose to visit his great-aunt in Godric’s Hollow, and that there, intensely
shocking though it will be for many to hear it, he struck up a close friendship
with none other than Albus Dumbledore.

“He seemed a charming boy to me,” babbles Bathilda, “whatever he became
later. Naturally I introduced him to poor Albus, who was missing the company
of lads his own age. The boys took to each other at once.”

They certainly did. Bathilda shows me a letter, kept by her that Albus
Dumbledore sent Gellert Grindelwald in the dead of night.

“Yes, even after they’d spent all day in discussion --- both such brilliant
young boys, they got on like a cauldron on fire --- I’d sometimes hear an owl
tapping at Gellert’s bedroom window, delivering a letter from Albus! An idea
would have struck him and he had to let Gellert know immediately!”

And what ideas they were. Profoundly shocking though Albus Dumbledore’s
fans will find it, here are the thoughts of their seventeen-year-old hero, as
relayed to his new best friend. (A copy of the original letter may be seen on
page 463.)



Gellert ---

Your point about Wizard dominance being FOR THE MUGGLES’
OWN GOOD --- this, I think, is the crucial point. Yes, we have been given
power and yes, that power gives us the right to rule, but it also gives us
responsibilities over the ruled. We must stress this point, it will be the
foundation stone upon which we build. Where we are opposed, as we
surely will be, this must be the basis of all our counterarguments. We seize
control FOR THE GREATER GOOD. And from this it follows that where
we meet resistance, we must use only the force that is necessary and no
more. (This was your mistake at Durmstrang! But I do not complain,
because if you had not been expelled, we would never have met.)

Albus



Astonished and appalled though his many admirers will be, this letter
constitutes the Statute of Secrecy and establishing Wizard rule over Muggles.
What a blow for those who have always portrayed Dumbledore as the Muggle-
borns’ greatest champion! How hollow those speeches promoting Muggle rights


seem in the light of this damning new evidence! How despicable does Albus
Dumbledore appear, busy plotting his rise to power when he should have been
mourning his mother and caring for his sister!

No doubt those determined to keep Dumbledore on his crumbling pedestal
will bleat that he did not, after all, put his plans into action, that he must have
suffered a change of heart, that he came to his senses. However, the truth seems
altogether more shocking.

Barely two months into their great new friendship, Dumbledore and
Grindelwald parted, never to see each other again until they met for their
legendary duel (for more, see chapter 22). What caused this abrupt rupture? Had
Dumbledore come to his senses? Had he told Grindelwald he wanted no more
part in his plans? Alas, no.

“It was poor little Ariana dying, I think, that did it,” says Bathilda. “It came
as an awful shock. Gellert was there in the house when it happened, and he
came back to my house all of a dither, told me he wanted to go home the next
day. Terribly distressed, you know. So I arranged a Portkey and that was the last
I saw of him.

“Albus was beside himself at Ariana’s death. It was so dreadful for those two
brothers. They had lost everybody except for each other. No wonder tempers
ran a little high. Aberforth blamed Albus, you know, as people will under these
dreadful circumstances. But Aberforth always talked a little madly, poor boy.
All the same, breaking Albus’s nose at the funeral was not decent. It would have
destroyed Kendra to see her sons fighting like that, across her daughter’s body.
A shame Gellert could not have stayed for the funeral. . . . He would have been
a comfort to Albus, at least. . . .

This dreadful coffin-side brawl, known only to those few who attended
Ariana Dumbledore’s funeral, raises several questions. Why exactly did
Aberforth Dumbledore blame Albus for his sister’s death? Was it, as “Batty”
pretends, a mere effusion of grief? Or could there have been some more
concrete reason for his fury? Grindelwald, expelled from Durmstrang for the
near-fatal attacks upon fellow students, fled the country hours after the girl’s
death, and Albus (out of shame or fear?) never saw him again, not until forced
to do so by the pleas of the Wizarding world.

Neither Dumbledore nor Grindelwald ever seems to have referred to this
brief boyhood friendship in later life. However, there can be no doubt that
Dumbledore delayed, for some five years of turmoil, fatalities, and
disappearances, his attack upon Gellert Grindelwald. Was it lingering affection
for the man or fear of exposure as his once best friend that caused Dumbledore
to hesitate? Was it only reluctantly that Dumbledore set out to capture the man
he was once so delighted he had met?

And how did the mysterious Ariana die? Was she the inadvertent victim of
some Dark rite? Did she stumble across something she ought not to have done,
as the two young men sat practicing for their attempt at glory and domination?
Is it possible that Ariana Dumbledore was the first person to die “for the greater
good”?




The chapter ended here and Harry looked up. Hermione had reached the bottom
of the page before him. She tugged the book out of Harry’s hands, looking a little
alarmed by his expression, and closed it without looking at it, as though hiding something
indecent.

“Harry ---”

But he shook his head. Some inner certainty had crashed down inside him; it was
exactly as he had felt after Ron left. He had trusted Dumbledore, believed him the
embodiment of goodness and wisdom. All was ashes: How much more could he lose?
Ron, Dumbledore, the phoenix wand . . .

“Harry.” She seemed to have heard his thoughts. "Listen to me. It --- it doesn't
make a very nice reading ---"

"Yeah, you could say that ---"

"--- but don't forget, Harry, this is Rita Skeeter writing."

"You did read that letter to Grindelwald, didn't you?"

"Yes, I --- I did." She hesitated, looking upset, cradling her tea in her cold hands.
"I think that's the worst bit. I know Bathilda thought it was all just talk, but 'For the
Greater Good' became Grindelwald's slogan, his justification for all the atrocities he
committed later. And . . . from that . . . it looks like Dumbledore gave him the idea. They
say 'For the Greater Good' was even carved over the entrance to Nurmengard."

"What's Nurmengard?"

"The prison Grindelwald had built to hold his opponents. He ended up in there
himself, once Dumbledore had caught him. Anyway, it's --- it’s an awful thought that
Dumbledore's ideas helped Grindelwald rise to power. But on the other hand, even Rita
can't pretend that they knew each other for more than a few months one summer when
they were both really young, and ---"

"I thought you'd say that," said Harry. He did not want to let his anger spill out at
her, but it was hard to keep his voice steady. "I thought you'd say 'They were young.'
They were the same age as we are now. And here we are, risking our lives to fight the
Dark Arts, and there he was, in a huddle with his new best friend, plotting their rise to
power over the Muggles."

His temper would not remain in check much longer: He stood up and walked
around, trying to work some of it off.

"I'm not trying to defend what Dumbledore wrote," said Hermione. "All that 'right
to rule' rubbish, it's 'Magic Is Might' all over again. But Harry, his mother had just died,
he was stuck alone in the house ---"

"Alone? He wasn't alone! He had his brother and sister for company, his Squib
sister he was keeping locked up ---"

"I don't believe it," said Hermione. She stood up too. "Whatever was wrong with that
girl, I don't think she was a Squib. The Dumbledore we knew would never, ever have
allowed---"

"The Dumbledore we thought we knew didn't want to conquer Muggles by force!"
Harry shouted, his voice echoing across the empty hilltop, and several blackbirds rose
into the air, squawking and spiraling against the pearly sky.

"He changed, Harry, he changed! It's as simple as that! Maybe he did believe
these things when he was seventeen, but the whole of the rest of his life was devoted to
fighting the Dark Arts! Dumbledore was the one who stopped Grindelwald, the one who


always voted for Muggle protection and Muggle born rights, who fought You-Know-
Who from the start, and who died trying to bring him down!"

Rita's book lay on the ground between them, so that the face of Albus
Dumbledore smiled dolefully at both.

"Harry, I'm sorry, but I think the real reason you're so angry is that Dumbledore
never told you any of this himself."

"Maybe I am!" Harry bellowed, and he flung his arms over his head, hardly
knowing whether he was trying to hold in his anger or protect himself from the weight of
his own disillusionment. "Look what he asked from me, Hermione! Risk your life, Harry!
And again! And again! And don't expect me to explain everything, just trust me blindly,
trust that I know what I'm doing, trust me even though I don't trust you! Never the whole
truth! Never!"

His voice cracked with the strain, and they stood looking at each other in the
whiteness and emptiness, and Harry felt they were as insignificant as insects beneath that
wide sky.

"He loved you," Hermione whispered. "I know he loved you."

Harry dropped his arms.

"I don't know who he loved, Hermione, but it was never me. This isn't love, the
mess he's left me in. He shared a damn sight more of what he was really thinking with
Gellert Grindelwald than he ever shared with me."

Harry picked up Hermione's wand, which he had dropped in the snow, and sat
back down in the entrance of the tent.

"Thanks for the tea. I'll finish the watch. You get back in the warm."

She hesitated, but recognized the dismissal. She picked up the book and then walked
back past him into the tent, but as she did so, she brushed the top of his head lightly with
her hand. He closed his eyes at her touch, and hated himself for wishing that what she
said was true: that Dumbledore had really cared.



Chapter Nineteen

The Silver Doe



It was snowing by the time Hermione took over the watch at midnight. Harry's
dreams were confused and disturbing: Nagini wove in and out of them, first through a
wreath of Christmas roses. He woke repeatedly, panicky, convinced that somebody had
called out to him in the distance, imagining that the wind whipping around the tent was
footsteps or voices.

Finally he got up in the darkness and joined Hermione, who was huddled in the
entrance to the tent reading A History of Magic by the light of her wand. The snow was
falling thickly, and she greeted with relief his suggestion of packing up early and moving
on.

"We'll somewhere more sheltered," she agreed, shivering as she pulled on a
sweatshirt over her pajamas. "I kept thinking I could hear people moving outside. I even
though I saw somebody one or twice."


Harry paused in the act of pulling on a jumper and glanced at the silent,
motionless Sneakoscope on the table.

"I'm sure I imagined it," said Hermione, looking nervous. "The snow the dark, it
plays tricks on your eyes.... But perhaps we ought to Disapparate under the Invisibility
Cloak, just in case?"

Half an hour later, with the tent packed, Harry wearing the Horcrux, and
Hermione clutching the beaded bag, they Disapparated. The usual tightness engulfed
them; Harry's feet parted company with the snowy ground, then slammed hard onto what
felt like frozen earth covered in leaves.

"Where are we?" he asked, peering around at the fresh mass of trees as Hermione
opened the beaded bag and began tugging out the tent poles.

"The Forest of Dean," she said, "I came camping here once with my mum and
dad."

Here too snow lay on the trees all around and it was bitterly cold, but they were at
least protected from the wind. They spent most of the day inside the tent, huddled for
warmth around the useful bright blue flames that Hermione was adept at producing, and
which could be scooped up and carried in a jar. Harry felt as though he was recuperating
from some brief but severe, an impression reinforced by Hermione's solicitousness. That
afternoon fresh flakes drifted down upon them, so that even their sheltered clearing had a
fresh dusting of powdery snow.

After two nights of little sleep, Harry's senses seemed more alert than usual.
Their escape from Godric's Hollow had been so narrow that Voldemort seemed somehow
closer than before, more threatening. As darkness drove in again Harry refused
Hermione's offer to keep watch and told her to go to bed.

Harry moved an old cushion into the tent mouth and sat down, wearing all the
sweaters he owned but even so, still shivery. The darkness deepened with the passing
hours until it was virtually impenetrable. He was on the point of taking out the
Marauder's Map, so as to watch Ginny's dot for a while, before he remembered that it was
the Christmas holidays and that she would be back at the Burrow.

Every tiny movement seemed magnified in the vastness of the forest. Harry knew
that it must be full of living creatures, but he wished they would all remain still and silent
so that he could separate their innocent scurryings and prowlings from noises that might
proclaim other, sinister movements. He remembered the sound of a cloak slithering over
dead leaves many years ago, and at once thought he heard it again before mentally
shaking himself. Their protective enchantments had worked for weeks; why should they
break now? And yet he could no throw off the feeling that something was different
tonight.

Several times he jerked upright, his neck aching because he had fallen asleep,
slumped at an awkward angle against the side of the tent. The night reached such a depth
of velvety blackness that he might have been suspended in limbo between Disapparation
and Apparation. He had just held a hand in front of his face to see whether he could
make out his fingers when it happened.

A bright silver light appeared right ahead of him, moving through the trees.
Whatever the source, it was moving soundlessly. The light seemed simply to drift toward
him.


He jumped to his feet, his voice frozen in his throat, and raised Hermione's wand.
He screwed up his eyes as the light became blinding, the trees in front of it pitch black in
silhouette, and still the thing came closer....

And then the source of the light stepped out from behind an oak. It was a silver
white doe, moon-bright and dazzling, picking her way over the ground, still silent, and
leaving no hoofprints in the fine powdering of snow. She stepped toward him, her
beautiful head with its wide, long-lashed eyes held high.

Harry stared at the creature, filled with wonder, not at her strangeness, but her
inexplicable familiarity. He felt that he had been waiting for her to come, but that he had
forgotten, until this moment, that they had arranged to meet. His impulse to shout for
Hermione, which had been so strong a moment ago, had gone. He knew, he would have
staked his life on it, that she had come for him, and him alone.

They gazed at each other for several long moments and then she turned and
walked away.

"No," he said, and his voice was cracked with lack of use. "Come back!"

She continued to step deliberately through the trees, and soon he brightness was
striped by their thick black trunks. For one trembling second he hesitated. Caution
murmured it could be a trick, a lure, a trap. But instinct, overwhelming instinct, told him
that this was not Dark Magic. He set off in pursuit.

Snow crunched beneath his feet, but the doe made no noise as she passed through
the trees, for she was nothing but light. Deeper and deeper into the forest she led him,
and Harry walked quickly, sure that when she stopped, she would allow him to approach
her properly. And then she would speak and the voice would tell him what he needed to
know.

At last she came to a halt. She turned her beautiful head toward him once more,
and he broke into a run, a question burning in him, but as he opened his lips to ask it, she
vanished.

Though the darkness had swallowed her whole, her burnished image was still
imprinted on his retinas; it obscured his vision, brightening when he lowered his eyelids,
disorienting him. Now fear came: Her presence had meant safety.

"Lumos!" he whispered, and the wand-tip ignited.

The imprint of the doe faded away with every blink of his eyes as he stood there,
listening to the sounds of the forest, to distant crackles of twigs, soft swishes of snow.
Was he about to be attacked? Had she enticed him into an ambush? Was he imagining
that somebody stood beyond the reach of the wandlight, watching him?

He held the wand higher. Nobody ran out at him, no flash of green light burst
from behind a tree. Why, then, had she led him to this spot?

Something gleamed in the light of the wand, and Harry spun about, but all that
was there was a small, frozen pool, its black, cracked surface glittering as he raised his
wand higher to examine it.

He moved forward rather cautiously and looked down. The ice reflected his
distorted shadow and the beam of wandlight, but deep below the thick, misty gray
carapace, something else glinted. A great silver cross...

His heart skipped into his mouth: He dropped to his knees at the pool's edge and
angled the wand so as to flood the bottom of the pool with as much light as possible. A


glint of deep red...It was a sword with glittering rubies in its hilt....The sword of
Gryffindor was lying at the bottom of the forest pool.

Barely breathing, he stared down at it. How was this possible? How could it
have come to be lying in a forest pool, this close to the place where they were camping?
Had some unknown magic drawn Hermione to this spot, or was the doe, which he had
taken to be a Patronus, some kind of guardian of the pool? Or had the sword been put
into the pool after they had arrived, precisely because they were here? In which case,
where was the person who wanted to pass it to Harry? Again he directed the wand at the
surrounding trees and bushes, searching for a human outline, for the glint of an eye, but
he could not see anyone there. All the same, a little more fear leavened his exhilaration
as he returned his attention to the sword reposing upon the bottom of the frozen pool.

He pointed the wand at the silvery shape and murmured, "Accio Sword."

It did not stir. He had not expected it to. If it had been that easy the sword would
have lain on the ground for him to pick up, not in the depths of a frozen pool. He set off
around the circle of ice, thinking hard about the last time the sword had delivered itself to
him. He had been in terrible danger then, and had asked for help.

"Help," he murmured, but the sword remained upon the pool bottom, indifferent,
motionless.

What was it, Harry asked himself (walking again), that Dumbledore had told him
the last time he had retrieved the sword? Only a true Gryffindor could have pulled that
out of the hat. And what were the qualities that defined a Gryffindor? A small voice
inside Harry's head answered him: Their daring nerve and chivalry set Gryffindor apart.

Harry stopped walking and let out a long sigh, his smoky breath dispersing
rapidly upon the frozen air. He knew what he had to do. If he was honest with himself,
he had thought it might come to this from the moment he had spotted the sword through
the ice.

He glanced around at the surrounding trees again, but was convinced now that
nobody was going to attack him. They had had their chance as he walked alone through
the forest, had had plenty of opportunity as he examined the pool. The only reason to
delay at this point was because the immediate prospect was so deeply uninviting.

With fumbling fingers Harry started to remove his many layers of clothing.
Where "chivalry" entered into this, he thought ruefully, he was not entirely sure, unless it
counted as chivalrous that he was not calling for Hermione to do it in his stead.

An owl hooted somewhere as he stripped off, and he thought with a pang of
Hedwig. He was shivering now, his teeth chattering horribly, and yet he continued to
strip off until at last he stood there in his underwear, barefooted in the snow. He placed
the pouch containing his wand, his mother's letter, the shard of Sirius's mirror, and the old
Snitch on top of his clothes, then he pointed Hermione's wand at the ice.

"Diffindo."

It cracked with a sound like a bullet in the silence. The surface of the pool broke
and chunks of dark ice rocked on the ruffled water. As far as Harry could judge, it was
not deep, but to retrieve the sword he would have to submerge himself completely.

Contemplating the task ahead would not make it easier or the water warmer. He
stepped to the pool's edge and placed Hermione's wand on the ground still lit. Then,
trying not to imagine how much colder he was about to become or how violently he
would soon be shivering, he jumped.


Every pore of his body screamed in protest. The very air in his lungs seemed to
freeze solid as he was submerged to his shoulders in the frozen water. He could hardly
breathe: trembling so violently the water lapped over the edges of the pool, he felt for the
blade with his numb feet. He only wanted to dive once.

Harry put off the moment of total submersion from second to second, gasping and
shaking, until he told himself that it must be done, gathered all his courage, and dived.

The cold was agony: It attacked him like fire. His brain itself seemed to have
frozen as he pushed through the dark water to the bottom and reached out, groping for the
sword. His fingers closed around the hilt; he pulled it upward.

Then something closed tight around his neck. He thought of water weeds, though
nothing had brushed him as he dived, and raised his hand to free himself. It was not
weed: The chain of the Horcrux had tightened and was slowly constricting his windpipe.

Harry kicked out wildly, trying to push himself back to the surface, but merely
propelled himself into the rocky side of the pool. Thrashing, suffocating, he scrabbled at
the strangling chain, his frozen fingers unable to loosen it, and now little lights were
popping inside his head, and he was going to drown, there was nothing left, nothing he
could do, and the arms that closed around his chest were surely Death's....

Choking and retching, soaking and colder than he had ever been in his life, he
came to facedown in the snow. Somewhere, close by, another person was panting and
coughing and staggering around, as she had come when the snake attacked....Yet it did
not sound like her, not with those deep coughs, no judging by the weight of the
footsteps....

Harry had no strength to lift his head and see his savior's identity. All he could do
was raise a shaking hand to his throat and feel the place where the locket had cut tightly
into his flesh. It was gone. Someone had cut him free. Then a panting voice spoke from
over his head.

"Are -- you -- mental?"

Nothing but the shock of hearing that voice could have given Harry the strength to
get up. Shivering violently, he staggered to his feet. There before him stood Ron, fully
dressed but drenched to the skin, his hair plastered to his face, the sword of Gryffindor in
one hand and the Horcrux dangling from its broken chain in the other.

"Why the hell," panted Ron, holding up the Horcrux, which swung backward and
forward on its shortened chain in some parody of hypnosis, "didn't you take the thing off
before you dived?"

Harry could not answer. The silver doe was nothing, nothing compared with
Ron's reappearance; he could not believe it. Shuddering with cold, he caught up the pile
of clothes still lying at the water's edge and began to pull them on. As he dragged
sweater after sweater over his head, Harry stared at Ron, half expecting him to have
disappeared every time he lost sight of him, and yet he had to be real: He had just dived
into the pool, he had saved Harry's life.

"It was y-you?" Harry said at last, his teeth chattering, his voice weaker than usual
due to his near-strangulation.

"Well, yeah," said Ron, looking slightly confused.

"Y-you cast that doe?"

"What? No, of course not! I thought it was you doing it!"

"My Patronus is a stag."


"Oh yeah. I thought it looked different. No antlers."

Harry put Hagrid's pouch back around his neck, pulled on a final sweater, stooped
to pick up Hermione's wand, and faced Ron again.

"How come you're here?"

Apparently Ron had hoped that this point would come up later, if at all.

"Well, I've -- you know -- I've come back. If --" He cleared his throat. "You
know. You still want me."

There was a pause, in which the subject of Ron's departure seemed to rise like a
wall between them. Yet he was here. He had returned. He had just saved Harry's life.

Ron looked down at his hands. He seemed momentarily surprised to see the
things he was holding.

"Oh yeah, I got it out," he said, rather unnecessarily, holding up the sword for
Harry's inspection. "That's why you jumped in, right?"

"Yeah," said Harry. "But I don't understand. How did you get here? How did
you find us?"

"Long story," said Ron. "I've been looking for you for hours, it's a big forest, isn't
it? And I was just thinking I'd have to go kip under a tree and wait for morning when I
saw that dear coming and you following."

"You didn't see anyone else?"

"No," said Ron. "I --"

But he hesitated, glancing at two trees growing close together some yards away.

"I did think I saw something move over there, but I was running to the pool at the
time, because you'd gone in and you hadn't come up, so I wasn't going to make a detour
to -- hey!"

Harry was already hurrying to the place that Ron had indicated. The two oaks
grew close together; there was a gap of only a few inches between the trunks at eye level,
an ideal place to see but not be seen. The ground around the roots, however, was free of
snow, and Harry could see no sign of footprints. He walked back to where Ron stood
waiting, still holding the sword and the Horcrux.

"Anything there?" Ron asked.

"No," said Harry.

"So how did the sword get in that pool?"

"Whoever cast the Patronus must have put it there."

They both looked at the ornate silver sword, its rubied hilt glinting a little in the
light from Hermione's wand.

"You reckon this is the real one?" asked Ron.

"One way to find out, isn't there?" said Harry.

The Horcrux was still swinging from Ron's hand. The locket was twitching
slightly. Harry knew that the thing inside it was agitated again. It had sensed the
presence of the sword and had tried to kill Harry rather than let him possess it. Now was
not the time for long discussions; now was the moment to destroy once and for all. Harry
looked around, holding Hermione's wand high, and saw the place: a flattish rock lying in
the shadow of a sycamore tree.

"Come here." he said and he led the way, brushed snow from the rock's surface,
and held out his hand for the Horcrux. When Ron offered the sword, however, Harry
shook his head.


"No you should do it."

"Me?" said Ron, looking shocked. "Why?"

"Because you got the sword out of the pool. I think it's supposed to be you."

He was not being kind or generous. As certainly as he had known that the doe
was benign, he knew that Ron had to be the one to wield the sword. Dumbledore had at
least taught Harry something about certain kinds of magic, of the incalculable power of
certain acts.

"I'm going to open it," said Harry, "and you will stab it. Straightaway okay?
Because whatever's in there will put up a fight. The bit of Riddle in the Diary tried to kill
me."

"How are you going to open it?" asked Ron. He looked terrified

"I'm going to ask it to open, using Parseltongue," said Harry. The answer came so
readily to his lips that thought that he had always known it deep down: Perhaps it had
taken his recent encounter with Nagini to make him realize it. He looked at the
serpentine S, inlaid with glittering green stones: It was easy to visualize it as a miniscule
snake, curled upon the cold rock.

"No!" said Ron. "Don't open it! I'm serious!"

"Why not?" asked Harry. "Let's get rid of the damn thing, it's been months --"

"I can't, Harry, I'm serious -- you do it --"

"But why?"

"Because that thing's bad for me!" said Ron, backing away from the locket on the
rock. "I can't handle it! I'm not making excuses, for what I was like, but it affects me
worse than it affects you and Hermione, it made me think stuff -- stuff that I was thinking
anyway, but it made everything worse. I can't explain it, and then I'd take it off and I'd
get my head straight again, and then I'd have to put the effing thing back on -- I can't do it
Harry!"

He had backed away, the sword dragging at his side, shaking his head.

"You can do it," said Harry, "you can! You've just got the sword, I know it's
supposed to be you who uses it. Please just get rid of it Ron."

The sound of his name seemed to act like a stimulant. Ron swallowed, then still
breathing hard through his long nose, moved back toward the rock.

"Tell me when," he croaked.

"On three," said Harry, looking back down at the locket and narrowing his eyes,
concentrating on the letter S, imagining a serpent, while the contents of the locket rattled
like a trapped cockroach. It would have been easy to pity it, except that the cut around
Harry's neck still burned.

"One . . . two . . . three . . .open."

The last word came as a hiss and a snarl and the golden doors of the locket swung
wide open with a little click.

Behind both of the glass windows within blinked a living eye, dark and handsome
as Tom Riddle's eyes had been before he turned them scarlet and slit-pupiled

"Stab," said Harry, holding the locket steady on the rock.

Ron raised the sword in his shaking hands: The point dangled over the frantically
swiveling eyes, and Harry gripped the locket tightly, bracing himself, already imagining
blood pouring from the empty windows.

Then a voice hissed from out the Horcrux.


"I have seen your heart, and it is mine."

"Don't listen to it!" Harry said harshly. "Stab it!"

"I have seen your dreams, Ronald Weasley, and I have seen your fears. All you
desire is possible, but all that you dread is also possible...."

"Stab!" shouted Harry, his voice echoed off the surrounding trees, the sword point
trembled, and Ron gazed down into Riddle's eyes.

"Least loved, always, by the mother who craved a daughter . . . Least loved, now,
by the girl who prefers your friend . . . Second best, always, eternally overshadowed . . ."

"Ron, stab it now!" Harry bellowed: He could feel the locket quivering in the grip and
was scared of what was coming. Ron raised the sword still higher, and as he did so,
Riddle's eyes gleamed scarlet.


Out of the locket's two windows, out of the eyes, there bloomed like two grotesque
bubbles, the heads of Harry and Hermione, weirdly distorted.



Ron yelled in shock and backed away as the figures blossomed out of the locket, first
chests, then waists, then legs, until they stood in the locket, side by side like trees with a
common root, swaying over Ron and the real Harry, who had snatched his fingers away
from the locket as it burned, suddenly, white-hot.



"Ron!" he shouted, but the Riddle-Harry was now speaking with Voldemort's voice and
Ron was gazing, mesmerized, into its face.



"Why return? We were better without you, happier without you, glad of your absence....
We laughed at your stupidity, your cowardice, your presumption--"



"Presumption!" echoed the Riddle-Hermione, who was more beautiful and yet more
terrible than the real Hermione: She swayed, cackling, before Ron, who looked horrified,
yet transfixed, the sword hanging pointlessly at his side. "Who could look at you, who
would ever look at you, beside Harry Potter? What have you ever done, compared with
the Chosen One? What are you, compared with the Boy Who Lived?"



"Ron, stab it, STAB IT!" Harry yelled, but Ron did not move. His eyes were wide, and
the Riddle-Harry and the Riddle-Hermione were reflected in them, their hair swirling like
flames, their eyes shining red, their voices lifted in an evil duet.



"Your mother confessed," sneered Riddle-Harry, while Riddle-Hermione jeered, "that she
would have preferred me as a son, would be glad to exchange..."



"Who wouldn't prefer him, what woman would take you, you are nothing, nothing,
nothing to him," crooned Riddle-Hermione, and she stretched like a snake and entwined
herself around Riddle-Harry, wrapping him in a close embrace: Their lips met.


On the ground in front of them, Ron's face filled with anguish. he raised the sword high,
his arms shaking.


"Do it, Ron!" Harry yelled.


Ron looked toward him, and Harry thought he saw a trace of scarlet in his eyes.


"Ron --?"



The sword flashed, plunged: Harry threw himself out of the way, there as a clang of metal
and a long, drawn-out scream. Harry whirled around, slipping in the snow, wand held
ready to defend himself, but there was nothing to fight.



The monstrous versions of himself and Hermione were gone: There was only Ron,
standing there with the sword held slackly in his hand, looking down at the shattered
remains of the locket on the flat rock.



Slowly, Harry walked back to him, hardly knowing what to say or do. Ron was breathing
heavily: His eyes were no longer red at all, but their normal blue: they were also wet.


Harry stooped, pretending he had not seen, and picked up the broken Horcrux. Ron had
pierced the glass in both windows: Riddle's eyes were gone, and the stained silk lining of
the locket was smoking slightly. The thing that had lived in the Horcrux had vanished;
torturing Ron had been its final act. The sword clanged as Ron dropped it. He had sunk to
his knees, his head in his arms. He was shaking, but not, Harry realized, from cold. Harry
crammed the broken locket into his pocket, knelt down beside Ron, and placed a hand
cautiously on his shoulder. He took it as a good sign that Ron did not throw it off.



"After you left," he said in a low voice, grateful for the fact that Ron's face was hidden,
"she cried for a week. Probably longer, only she didn't want me to see. There were loads
of nights when we never even spoke to each other. With you gone..."



He could not finish; it was now that Ron was here again that Harry fully realized how
much his absence had cost them.



"She's like my sister," he went on. "I love her like a sister and I reckon that she feels the
same way about me. It's always been like that. I thought you knew."



Ron did not respond, but turned his face away from Harry and wiped his nose noisily on
his sleeve. Harry got to his feet again and walked to where Ron's enormous rucksack lay
yards away, discarded as Ron had run toward the pool to save Harry from drowning. He
hoisted it onto his own back and walked back to Ron, who clambered to his feet as Harry
approached, eyes bloodshot but otherwise composed.



"I'm sorry," he said in a thick voice. "I'm sorry I left. I know I was a -- a --"



He looked around at the darkness, as if hoping a bad enough word would swoop down
upon him and claim him.




"You've sort of made up for it tonight," said Harry. "Getting the sword. Finishing off the
Horcrux. Saving my life."



"That makes me sound a lot cooler than I was," Ron mumbled.



"Stuff like that always sounds cooler than it really was" said Harry. "I've been trying to
tell you that for years."



Simultaneously they walked forward and hugged, Harry gripping the still-sopping back
of Ron's jacket.



"And now," said Harry as they broke apart, "all we've got to do is find that tent again."



But it was not difficult. Though the walk through the dark forest with the doe had seemed
lengthy, with Ron by his side, the journey back seemed to take a surprisingly short time.
Harry could not wait to wake Hermione, and it was with quickening excitement that he
entered the tent, Ron lagging a little behind him.



It was gloriously warm after the pool and the forest, the only illumination the bluebell
flames still shimmering in a bowl on the floor. Hermione was fast asleep, curled up under
her blankets, and did not move until Harry had said her name several times.



"Hermione!"



She stirred, then sat up quickly, pushing her hair out of her face.


"What's wrong? Harry? Are you all right?"



"It's okay, everything's fine. More than fine, I'm great. There's someone here."



"What do you mean? Who --?"



She saw Ron, who stood there holding the sword and dripping onto the threadbare carpet.
Harry backed into a shadowy corner, slipped off Ron's rucksack, and attempted to blend
in with the canvas.



Hermione slid out of her bunk and moved like a sleepwalker toward Ron, her eyes upon
his pale face. She stopped right in front of him, her lips slightly parted, her eyes wide.
Ron gave a weak hopeful smile and half raised his arms.



Hermione launched herself forward and started punching every inch of him that she could
reach.



"Ouch -- ow -- gerroff! What the --? Hermione -- OW!"




"You -- complete -- arse -- Ronald -- Weasley!"



She punctuated every word with a blow: Ron backed away, shielding his head as
Hermione advanced.



"You -- crawl -- back -- here -- after -- weeks -- and -- weeks -- oh, where's my wand?"



She looked as though ready to wrestle it out of Harry's hands and he reacted instinctively.



"Protego!"



The invisible shield erupted between Ron and Hermione. The force of it knocked her
backward onto the floor. Spitting hair out of her mouth, she lept up again.


"Hermione!" said Harry. "Calm --"



"I will not calm down!" she screamed. Never before had he seen her lose control like this;
she looked quite demented. "Give me back my wand! Give it back to me!"



"Hermione, will you please --"



"Don't you tell me what do, Harry Potter!" she screeched. "Don't you dare! Give it back
now! And YOU!"



She was pointing at Ron in dire accusation: It was like a malediction, and Harry could not
blame Ron for retreating several steps.



"I cam running after you! I called you! I begged you to come back"
"I know," Ron said, "Hermione, I'm sorry, I'm really --"



"Oh, you're sorry!"



She laughed a high-pitched, out-of-control sound; Ron looked at Harry for help, but
Harry merely grimaced his helplessness.



"You came back after weeks -- weeks -- and you think it's all going to be all right if you
just say sorry?"



"Well, what else can I say?" Ron shouted, and Harry was glad that Ron was fighting back.



"Oh, I don't know!" yelled Hermione with awful sarcasm. "Rack your brains, Ron, that
should only take a couple of seconds --"



"Hermione," interjected Harry, who considered this a low blow, "he just saved my --"




"I don't care!" she screamed. "I don't care what he's done! Weeks and weeks, we could
have been dead for all he knew --"



"I knew you weren't dead!" bellowed Ron, drowning her voice for the first time, and
approaching as close as he could with the Shield Charm between them. "Harry's all over
the Prophet, all over the radio, they're looking for you everywhere, all these rumors and
mental stories, I knew I'd hear straight off if you were dead, you don't know what it's
been like --"



"What it's been like for you??



Her voice was not so shrill only bats would be able to hear it soon, but she had reached a
level of indignation that rendered her temporarily speechless, and Ron seized his
opportunity.



"I wanted to come back the minute I'd Disapparated, but I walked straight into a gang of
Snatchers, Hermione, and I couldn't go anywhere!"
"A gang of what?" asked Harry, as Hermione threw herself down into a chair with her
arms and legs crossed so tightly it seemed unlikely that she would unravel them for
several years.



"Snatchers," said Ron. "They're everywhere -- gangs trying to earn gold by rounding up
Muggle-borns and blood traitors, there's a reward from the Ministry for everyone
captured. I was on my own and I look like I might be school age; they got really excited,
thought I was a Muggle-born in hiding. I had to talk fast to get out of being dragged to
the Ministry."



"What did you say to them?"
"Told them I was Stan Shunpike. First person I could think of."
"And they believed that?"
"They weren't the brightest. One of them was definitely part troll, the smell of him...."



Ron glanced at Hermione, clearly hopeful she might soften at this small instance of
humor, but her expression remained stony above her tightly knotted limbs.



"Anyway, they had a row about whether I was Stan or not. It was a bit pathetic to be
honest, but there were still five of them and only one of me, and they'd taken my wand.
Then two of them got into a fight and while the others were distracted I managed to hit
the one holding me in the stomach, grabbed his wand, Disarmed the bloke holding mine,
and Disapparated. I didn't do it so well. Splinched myself again" -- Ron held up his right
hand to show two missing fingernails: Hermione raised her eyebrows coldly -- "and I


came out miles from where you were. By the time I got back to that bit of riverbank
where we'd been ... you were gone."



"Gosh, what a gripping story," Hermione said in the lofty voice she adopted when
wishing to wound. "You must have been simply terrified. Meanwhile we went to Godric's
Hollow and, let's think, what happened there, Harry? Oh yes, You-Know-Who's snake
turned up, it nearly killed both of us, and then You-Know-Who himself arrived and
missed us by about a second."
"What?" Ron said, gaping from her to Harry, but Hermione ignored him.


"Imagine losing fingernails, Harry! That really puts our sufferings into perspective,
doesn't it?"
"Hermione," said Harry quietly, "Ron just saved my life."



She appeared not to have heard him.


"One thing I would like to know, though," she said, fixing her eyes on a spot a foot over
Ron's head. "How exactly did you find us tonight? That's important. Once we know, we'll
be able to make sure we're not visited by anyone else we don't want to see."



Ron glared at her, then pulled a small silver object from his jeans pocket.


"This."



She had to look at Ron to see what he was showing them.



"The Deluminator?" she asked, so surprised she forgot to look cold and fierce.



"It doesn't just turn the lights on and off," said Ron. "I don't know how it works or why it
happened then and not any other time, because I've been wanting to come back ever since
I left. But I was listening to the radio really early on Christmas morning and I heard ... I
heard you."



He was looking at Hermione.



"You heard me on the radio?" she asked incredulously.



"No, I heard you coming out of my pocket. Your voice," he held up the Deluminator
again, "came out of this."



"And what exactly did I say?" asked Hermione, her tone somewhere between skepticism
and curiosity.



"My name. 'Ron.' And you said ... something about a wand...."




Hermione turned a fiery shade of scarlet. Harry remembered: it had been the first time
Won's name had been said aloud by either of them since the day he had left; Hermione
had mentioned it when talking about repairing Harry's wand.



"So I took it out," Ron went on, looking at the Deluminator, "and it didn't seem different
or anything, but I was sure I'd heard you. So I clicked it. And the light went out in my
room, but another light appeared right outside the window."



Ron raised his empty hand and pointed in front of him, his eyes focused on something
neither Harry nor Hermione could see.



"It was a ball of light, kind of pulsing, and bluish, like that light you get around a Portkey,
you know?"



"Yeah," said Harry and Hermione together automatically.



"I knew this was it," said Ron. "I grabbed my stuff and packed it, then I put on my
rucksack and went out into the garden.



"The little ball of light was hovering there, waiting for me, and when I came out it
bobbed along a bit and I followed it behind the shed and then it ... well, it went inside
me."



"Sorry?" said Harry, sure he had not heard correctly.



"It sort of floated toward me," said Ron, illustrating the movement with his free index
finger, "right to my chest, and then -- it just went straight through. It was here," he
touched a point close to his heard, "I could feel it, it was hot. And once it was inside me, I
knew what I was supposed to do. I knew it would take me where I needed to go. So I
Disapparated and came out on the side of a hill. There was snow everywhere...."



"We were there," said Harry. "We spent two nights there, and the second night I kept
thinking I could hear someone moving around in the dark and calling out!"
"Yeah, well, that would've been me," said Ron. "Your protective spells work, anyway,
because I couldn't see you and I couldn't hear you. I was sure you were around, though,
so in the end I got in my sleeping bag and waited for one of you to appear. I thought
you'd have to show yourselves when you packed up the tent."



"No, actually," said Hermione. "We've been Disapparating under the Invisibility Cloak as
an extra precaution. And we left really early, because as Harry says, we'd heard
somebody blundering around."



"Well, I stayed on that hill all day," said Ron. "I kept hoping you'd appear. But when it
started to get dark I knew I must have missed you, so I clicked the Deluminator again, the


blue light came out and went inside me, and I Disapparated and arrived here in these
woods. I still couldn't see you, so I just had to hope one of you would show yourselves in
the end -- and Harry did. Well, I saw the doe first, obviously."



"You saw the what?" said Hermione sharply.



They explained what had happened and as the story of the silver doe and the sword in the
pool unfolded, Hermione frowned form one to the other of them, concentrating so hard
she forgot to keep her limbs locked together.


"But it must have been a Patronus!" she said. "Couldn't you see who was casting it?
Didn't you see anyone? And it led you to the sword! I can't believe this! Then what
happened?"



Ron explained how he had watched Harry jump into the pool, and had waited for him to
resurface; how he had realized that something was wrong, dived in, and saved Harry,
then returned for the sword. He got as far as the opening of the locket, then hesitated, and
Harry cut in.



"-- and Ron stabbed it with the sword."



"And ... and it went? Just like that?" she whispered.



"Well, it -- it screamed," said Harry with half a glance at Ron. "Here."



He threw the locket into her lap; gingerly she picked it up and examined its punctured
windows.



Deciding that it was at last safe to do so, Harry removed the Shield Charm with a wave of
Hermione's wand and turned to Ron.


"Did you just say now that you got away from the snatchers with a spare wand?"



"What?" said Ron, who had been watching Hermione examining the locket. "Oh -- oh
yeah."



He tugged open a buckle on his rucksack and pulled a short dark wand out of his pocket.
"Here, I figured it's always handy to have a backup."



"You were right," said Harry, holding out his hand. "Mine's broken."



"You're kidding?" Ron said, but at that moment Hermione got to her feet, and he looked
apprehensive again.



Hermione put the vanquished Horcrux into the beaded bag, then climbed back into her
bed and settled down without another word.




Ron passed Harry the new wand.



"About the best you could hope for, I think," murmured Harry.



"Yeah," said Ron. "Could've been worse. Remember those birds she set on me?"



"I still haven't ruled it out," came Hermione's muffled voice from beneath her blankets,
but Harry saw Ron smiling slightly as he pulled his maroon pajamas out of his rucksack.





Chapter Twenty

Xenophilius Lovegood



Harry had not expected Hermione's anger to abate over night and was
therefore unsurprised that she communicated mainly by dirty looks and
pointed silences the next morning. Ron responded by maintaining an
unnaturally somber demeanor in her presence as an outward sign of continuing
remorse. In fact, when all three of them were together Harry felt like the
only non-mourner at a poorly attended funeral. During those few moments he
spent alone with Harry, however (collecting water and searching the
undergrowth for mushrooms). Ron became shamelessly cheery.
"Someone helped us," he kept saying, "Someone sent that doe, Someone's on
our side, One Horcrux down, mate!"
Bolstered by the destruction of the locket they set to debating the possible
locations of the other Horcruxes and even though they had discussed the
matter so often before. Harry felt optimistic, certain that more
breakthroughs would succeed the first. Hermione's sulkiness could not mar
his buoyant spirits; The sudden upswing in their fortunes, the appearance of
the mysterious due, the recovery of Gryffindor’s sword, and above all, Ron's
return made Harry so happy that it was quite difficult to maintain a
straight face.
Late in the afternoon he and Ron escaped Hermione's baleful presence again
and under the pretense of scouring the bare hedges for nonexistent
blackberries, they continued their ongoing exchange of news. Harry had
finally managed to tell Ron the whole story of his and Hermione's various
wanderings, right up to the full story of what had happened at Godric's
Hollow; Ron was now filling Harry in on everything he had discovered about
the wider Wizarding world during his weeks away.



"... and how did you find out about the Taboo?" he asked Harry after
explaining the many desperate attempts of Muggle-borns to evade the
Ministry."
"The what?"
"You and Hermione have stopped saying You-Know-Who's name!"
"Oh, yeah, Well, it's just a bad habit we've slipped into," said Harry. "But
I haven't got a problem calling him V ---"
"NO!" roared Ron, causing Harry to jump into the hedge and Hermione (nose
buried in a book at the tent entrance) to scowl over at them. "Sorry," said
Ron, wrenching Harry back out of the brambles, "but the name's been jinxed,
Harry, that's how they track people! Using his name breaks protective
enchantments, it causes some kind of magical disturbance --- it's how they
found us in Tottenham Court Road!"
"Because we used his *name*?"
"Exactly! You've got to give them credit, it makes sense. It was only people
who were serious about standing up to him, like Dumbledore, who even dared
use it. Now they've put a Taboo on it, anyone who says it is trackable ---
quick-and-easy way to find Order members! They nearly got Kingsley ---"
"You're kidding?"
"Yeah, a bunch of Death Eaters cornered him, Bill said but he fought his way
out. He's on the run now just like us." Ron scratched his chin
thoughtfully with
the end of his wand. "You don't reckon Kingsley could have sent that doe?"
"His Patronus is a lynx, we saw it at the wedding, remember?"
"Oh yeah..."
They moved farther along the hedge, away from the tent and Hermione.
"Harry... you don't reckon it could've been Dumbledore?"
"Dumbledore what?"
Ron looked a little embarrassed, but said in a low voice, "Dumbledore ... the
doe? I mean," Ron was watching Harry out of the corners of his eyes, "he had
the real sword last, didn't he?



Harry did not laugh at Ron, because he understood too well the longing
behind the question. The idea that Dumbledore had managed to come back to
them, that he was watching over them, would have inexpressibly comforting.
He shook his head.
"Dumbledore’s dead," he said. "I saw it happen, I saw the body. He's
definitely gone. Anyway his Patronus was a phoenix, not a doe"
"Patronuses can change, though can't they?" said Ron, "Tonks’s changed
didn't it?"
Yeah, but if Dumbledore was alive, why wouldn't he show himself? Why
wouldn't he just hand us the sword?
"Search me," said Ron. "Same reason he didn't give it to you while he was
alive? Same reason he left you an old Snitch and Hermione a book of kid's
stories?"
"Which is what?" asked Harry, turning to look Ron full in the face desperate
for the answer.
"I dunno," said Ron. "Sometimes I've thought, when I've been a bit hacked
off, he was having a laugh or --- or he just wanted to make it more
difficult, But I don't think so, not anymore. He knew what he was doing when
he gave me the Deluminator, didn't he? He -- well," Ron's ears turned bright
red and he became engrossed in a tuft of grass at his feet, which he prodded
with his toe, "he must've known I'd run out on you."
"No," Harry corrected him. "He must've known you'd always want to come
back."
Ron looked grateful, but still awkward. Partly to change the subject, Harry
said, "Speaking of Dumbledore, have you heard what Skeeter wrote about him?"
"Oh yeah," said Ron at once, "people are talking about it quite a lot.
'Course, if things were different it'd be huge news, Dumbledore being pals
with Grindelwald, but now it's just something to laugh about for people who
didn't like Dumbledore, and a bit of a slap in the face for everyone who
thought he was such a good bloke. I don't know that it's such a big deal,
though. He was really young when they --"
"Our age," said Harry, just as he had retorted to Hermione, and something in
his face seemed to decide Ron against pursuing the subject.
A large spider sat in the middle of a frosted web in the brambles. Harry
took aim at it with the wand Ron had given him the previous night, which


Hermione had since condescended to examine, and had decided was made of
blackthorn.
"*Engorgio*"
"The spider gave a little shiver, bouncing slightly in the web. Harry tried
again. This time the spider grew slightly larger.
"Stop that," said Ron sharply, " I'm sorry I said Dumbledore was young,
okay?"
Harry had forgotten Ron's hatred of spiders.
"Sorry --- *Reducio*"
The spider did not shrink. Harry looked down at the blackthorn wand. Every
minor spell he had cast with it so far that day had seemed less powerful
than those he had produced with his phoenix wand. The new one felt
intrusively unfamiliar, like having somebody else's hand sewn to the end of
his arm.
"You just need to practice," said Hermione, who had approached them
noiselessly from behind and had stood watching anxiously as Harry tried to
enlarge and reduce the spider. "It’s all a matter of confidence Harry."
He knew why she wanted it to be all right; She still felt guilty about
breaking his wand. He bit back the retort that sprung to his lips, that she
could take the blackthorn wand if she thought it made no difference, and he
would have hers instead. Keen for them all to be friends again, however, he
agreed; but when Ron gave Hermione a tentative smile, she stalked off and
vanished behind her book once more.
All three of them returned to the tent when darkness fell, and Harry took
first watch. Sitting in the entrance, he tried to make the blackthorn wand
levitate small stones at his feet; but his magic still seemed clumsier and
less powerful than it had done before. Hermione was lying on her bunk
reading, while Ron, after many nervous glances up at her, had taken a small
wooden wireless out of his rucksack and started to try to tune it.
"There's this one program," he told Harry in a low voice, "that tells the
news like it really is. All the others are on You-Know-Who's side and are
following the Ministry line, but this one ... you wait till you hear it, it's
great. Only they can't do it every night, they have to keep changing
locations in case they're raided and you need a password to tune in ...
Trouble is, I missed the last one..."



He drummed lightly on the top of the radio with his wand muttering random
words under his breath. He threw Hermione many covert glances, plainly
fearing an angry outburst, but for all the notice she took of him he might
not have been there. For ten minutes or so Ron tapped and muttered, Hermione
turned the pages of her book, and Harry continued to practice with the
blackthorn wand.
Finally Hermione climbed down from her bunk. Ron ceased his tapping at once.
"If it's annoying you, I'll stop!" he told Hermione nervously.
Hermione did not deign to respond, but approached Harry.
"We need to talk," she said.
He looked at the book still clutched in her hand. It was * The Life and Lies
of Albus Dumbledore.*
"What?" he said apprehensively. It flew through his mind that there was a
chapter on him in there; he was not sure he felt up to hearing Rita's
version of his relationship with Dumbledore. Hermione's answer however, was
completely unexpected.
"I want to go and see Xenophilius Lovegood."
He stared at her.
"Sorry?"



“Xenophilius Lovegood, Luna’s father. I want to go and talk to him!”

“er – why?”

She took a deep breath, as though bracing herself, and said, “It’s that mark, the
mark in Beedle the Bard. Look at this!”

She thrust The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore under Harry’s unwilling eyes
and saw a photograph of the original letter that Dumbledore had written Grindelwald,
with Dumbledore’s familiar thin, slanting handwriting. He hated seeing absolute proof
that Dumbledore really had written those words, that they had not been Rita’s invention.

“The signature,” said Hermione. “Look at the signature, Harry!”

He obeyed. For a moment he had no idea what she was talking about, but, looking
more closely with the aid of his lit wand, he saw that Dumbledore had replaced the A of
Albus with a tiny version of the same triangular mark inscribed upon The Tales of Beedle
the Bard.

“Er – what are you -- ?” said Ron tentatively, but Hermione quelled him with a
look and turned back to Harry.

“It keeps cropping up, doesn’t it?” she said. “I know Viktor said it was
Grindelwald’s mark, but it was definitely on that old grave in Godric’s Hollow, and the


dates on the headstone were long before Grindelwald came along! And now this! Well,
we can’t ask Dumbledore or Grindelwald what it means – I don’t even know whether
Grindelwald’s still alive – but we can ask Mr. Lovegood. He was wearing the symbol at
the wedding. I’m sure this is important, Harry!”

Harry did not answer immediately. He looked into her intense, eager face and
then out into the surrounding darkness, thinking. After a long pause he said, “Hermione,
we don’t need another Godric’s Hollow. We talked ourselves into going there, and –”

“But it keeps appearing, Harry! Dumbledore left me The Tales of Beedle the Bard,
how do you know we’re not supposed to find out about the sign?”

“Here we go again!” Harry felt slightly exasperated. “We keep trying to convince
ourselves Dumbledore left us secret signs and clues –“

“The Deluminator turned out to be pretty useful,” piped up Ron. “I think
Hermione’s right, I think we ought to go and see Lovegood.”

Harry threw him a dark look. He was quite sure that Ron’s support of Hermione
had little to do with a desire to know the meaning of the triangular rune.

“It won’t be like Godric’s Hollow,” Ron added, “Lovegood’s on your side, Harry,
The Quibbler’s been for you all along, it keeps telling everyone they’ve got to help you!”

“I’m sure this is important!” said Hermione earnestly.

“But don’t you think if it was, Dumbledore would have told me about it before he
died?”

“Maybe . . . maybe it’s something you need to find out for yourself,” said
Hermione with a faint air of clutching at straws.

“Yeah,” said Ron sycophantically, “that makes sense.”

“No, it doesn’t,” snapped Hermione, “but I still think we ought to talk to Mr.
Lovegood. A symbol that links Dumbledore, Grindelwald, and Godric’s Hollow? Harry,
I’m sure we ought to know about this!”

“I think we should vote on it,” said Ron. “Those in favor of going to see Love
good –”

His hand flew into the air before Hermione’s. Her lips quivered suspiciously as
she raised her own.

“Outvoted, Harry, sorry,” said Ron, clapping him on the back.

“Fine,” said Harry, half amused, half irritated. “Only, once we’ve seen Lovegood,
let’s try and look for some more Horcruxes, shall we? Where do the Lovegood’s live,
anyway? Do either of you know?

“Yeah, they’re not far from my place,” said Ron. “I dunno exactly where, but
Mum and Dad always point toward the hills whenever they mention them. Shouldn’t be
hard to find.”

When Hermione had returned to her bunk, Harry lowered his voice.

“You only agreed to try and get back in her good books.”

“All’s fair in love and war,” said Ron brightly, “and this is a bit of both. Cheer up,
it’s the Christmas holidays, Luna’ll be home!”

They had an excellent view of the village of Ottery St. Catchopole from the
breezy hillside to which they Disapparated next morning. From their high vantage point
the village looked like a collection of toy houses in the great slanting shafts of sunlight
stretching to earth in the breaks between clouds. They stood for a minute or two looking
toward the Burrow, their hands shadowing their eyes, but all they could make out were


the high hedges and trees of the orchard, which afforded the crooked little house
protection from Muggle eyes.

“It’s weird, being this near, but not going to visit,” said Ron.

“Well, it’s not like you haven’t just seen them. You were there for Christmas,”
said Hermione coldly.

“I wasn’t at the Burrow!” said Ron with an incredulous laugh. “Do you think I
was going to go back there and tell them all I’d walked out on you? Yeah, Fred and
George would’ve been great about it. And Ginny, she’d have been really understanding.”

“But where have you been, then?” asked Hermione, surprised.

“Bill and Fleur’s new place. Shell cottage. Bill’s always been decent to me. He –
he wasn’t impressed when he heard what I’d done, but he didn’t go on about it. He knew
I was really sorry. None of the rest of the family know I was there. Bill told Mum he and
Fleur weren’t going home for Christmas because they wanted to spend it alone. You
know, first holiday after they were married. I don’t think Fleur minded. You know how
much she hates Celestina Warbeck.”

Ron turned his back on the Burrow.

“Let’s try up here,” he said, leading the way over the top of the hill.

They walked for a few hours, Harry, at Hermione’s insistence, hidden beneath the
Invisibility Cloak. The cluster of low hills appeared to be uninhabited apart from one
small cottage, which seemed deserted.

“Do you think it’s theirs, and they’ve gone away for Christmas?” said Hermione,
peering through the window at a neat little kitchen with geraniums on the windowsill.
Ron snorted.

“Listen, I’ve got a feeling you’d be able to tell who lived there if you looked
through the Lovegoods’ window. Let’s try the next lot of hills.”

So they Disapparated a few miles farther north.

“Aha!” shouted Ron, as the wind whipped their hair and clothes. Ron was
pointing upward, toward the top of the hill on which they had appeared, where a most
strange-looking house rose vertically against the sky, a great black cylinder with a
ghostly moon hanging behind it in the afternoon sky. “That’s got to be Luna’s house,
who else would live in a place like that? It looks like a giant rook!”

“It’s nothing like a bird,” said Hermione, frowning at the tower.

“I was talking about a chess rook,” said Ron. “A castle to you.”

Ron’s legs were the longest and he reached the top of the hill first. When Harry
and Hermione caught up with him, panting and clutching stitches in their sides, they
found him grinning broadly.

“It’s theirs,” said Ron. “Look.”

Three hand-painted signs had been tacked to a broke-down gate. The first read,

THE QUIBBLER. EDITOR, X. LOVEGOOD



the second,

PICK YOUR OWN MISTLETOE



the third,

KEEP OFF THE DIRIGIBLE PLUMS




The gate creaked as they opened it. The zigzagging path leading to the front door
was overgrown with a variety of odd plants, including a bush covered in orange
radishlike fruit Luna sometimes wore as earrings. Harry thought he recognized a
Snargaluff and gave the wizened stump a wide berth. Two aged crab apple trees, bent
with the wind, stripped of leaves but still heavy with berry-sized red fruits and bushy
crowns of white beaded mistletoe, stood sentinel on either side of the front door. A little
owl with a slightly flattened hawklike head peered down at them from one of the
branches.

“You’d better take off the Invisibility Cloak, Harry,” said Hermione. “It’s you Mr.
Lovegood wants to help, not us.”

He did as she suggested, handing her the Cloak to stow in the beaded bag. She
then rapped three times on the thick black door, which was studded with iron nails and
bore a knocker shaped like an eagle.

Barely ten seconds passed, then the door was flung open and there stood
Xenophilius Lovegood, barefoot and wearing what appeared to be a stained
nightshirt. His long white candyfloss hair was dirty and unkempt. Xenophilius
had been positively dapper at Bill and Fleur's wedding by comparison.
"What? What is it? Who are you? What do you want?" he cried in a
high-pitched, querulous voice, looking first at Hermione, then at Ron, and
finally at Harry, upon which his mouth fell open in a perfect, comical O.
"Hello, Mr. Lovegood," said Harry, holding out his hand, "I'm Harry,
Harry Potter."
Xenophilius did not take Harry's hand, although the eye that was not
pointing inward at his nose slid straight to the scar on Harry's forehead.
"Would it be okay if we came in?" asked Harry. "There's something we'd
like to ask you."
"I . . . I'm not sure that's advisable," whispered Xenophilius, He
swallowed and cast a quick look around the garden. "Rather a shock . . . My
word . . . I . . . I'm afraid I don't really think I ought to ---"
"It wont take long" said Harry, slightly disappointed by this
less-than-warm welcome.
"I --- oh, all right then. Come in, quickly, Quickly!"
They were barely over the threshold when Xenophilius slammed the door
shut behind them, They were standing in the most peculiar kitchen Harry had
ever seen. The room was perfectly circular, so that he felt like being
inside a giant pepper pot. Everything was curved to fit the walls - the
stove, the sink, and the cupboards - and all of it had been painted with
flowers, insects, and birds in bright primary colors. Harry thought he
recognized Luna's styles. The effect in such and enclosed space, was
slightly overwhelming.
In the middle of the floor, a wrought-iron spiral staircase ld to the
upper levels. There was a great deal of clattering and banging coming from
overhead: Harry wondered what Luna could be doing.
"You'd better come up." said Xenophilius, still looking extremely
uncomfortable, and he led the way.
The room above seemed to be a combination of living room and workplace,


and as such, was even more cluttered than the kitchen. Though much smaller
and entirely round, the room somewhat resembled the Room of Requirement on
the unforgettable occasion that it had transformed itself into a gigantic
labyrinth comprised of centuries of hidden objects. There were piles upon
piles of books and papers on every surface. Delicately made models of
creatures Harry did not recognize, all flapping wings or snapping jaws, hung
from the ceiling.
Luna was not there: The thing that was making such a racket was a wooden
object covered in magically turning cogs and wheels, It looked like the
bizarre offspring of a workbench and a set of shelves, but after a moment
Harry deduced that it was an old-fashioned printing press, due to the fact
that it was churning out Quibblers.
"Excuse me," said Xenophilius, and he strode over to the machine, seized
grubbily tablecloth from beneath an immense number of books and papers,
which all tumbled onto the floor, and threw it over the press, somewhat
muffling the loud bangs and clatters. He then faced Harry.
"Why have you come here?"
Before Harry could speak, however, Hermione let out a small cry of shock.
"Mr. Lovegood - what's that?"
See was pointing at an enormous, gray spiral horn, not unlike that of a
unicorn, which had been mounted on the wall, protruding several feet into
the room.
"It is the horn of a Crumple-Horned Snorkack," said Xenophilius.
"No it isn't!" said Hermione.
"Hermione," muttered Harry, embarrassed, "now's not the moment -"
"But Harry, it's an Erumpent horn! It's a Class B Tradeable Material and
it's an extraordinary dangerous thing to have in a house!"
"How'd you know it's an Erumpent horn?" asked Ron, edging away from the
horn as fast as he could, given the extreme clutter of the room.
"There's a description in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them! Mr.
Lovegood, you need to get rid of it straightaway, don't you know it can
explode at the slightest touch?"
"The Crumple Horned Snorkack" said Xenophilius very clearly, a mulish
look upon his face, “is a shy and highly magical creature, and it's horn -"
"Mr. Lovegood. I recognize the grooved markings around the base, that's
an Erumpent horn and it's incredibly dangerous - I don't know where you got
it-"
"I bought it," said Xenophilius dogmatically. "Two weeks ago, from a
delightful young wizard who knew my interest in the exquisite Snorkack. A
Christmas surprise for my Luna. Now," he said, turning to Harry, "why
exactly have you come here, Mr. Potter?"
"We need some help," said Harry, before Hermione could start again.
"Ah," said Xenophilius, "Help, Hmm."
His good eye moved again to Harry's scar. He seemed simultaneously
terrified and mesmerized.
"Yes. The thing is ... helping Harry Potter ... rather dangerous..."


"Aren't you the one who keeps telling everyone it's their first duty to
help Harry?" said Ron. "In that magazine of yours?"
Xenophilius glanced behind him at the concealed printing press, still
banging and clattering beneath the tablecloth.
"Er - yes, I have expressed that view. however -"
"That's for everyone else to do, not you personally?" said Ron.
Xenophilius did not answer. He kept swallowing, his eyes darting between
the three of them. Harry had the impression that he was undergoing some
painful internal struggle.
"Where's Luna?" asked Hermione. "Let's see what she thinks."
Xenophilius gulped. He seemed to be steeling himself. Finally he said in
a shaky voice difficult to hear over the noise of the printing press, "Luna
is down at the stream, fishing for Freshwater Plimpies. She...she will like
to see you. I'll go and call her and then - yes, very well. I shall try to
help you."
He disappeared down the spiral staircase and they heard the front open
and close. They looked at each other.
"Cowardly old wart," said Ron. "Luna's got ten times his guts."
"He's probably worried about what'll happen to them if the Death Eaters
find out I was here" said Harry.
"Well, I agree with Ron, " said Hermione, "Awful old hypocrite, telling
everyone else to help you and trying to worm our of it himself. And for
heaven's sake keep away from that horn."
Harry crossed to the window on the far side of the room. He could see a
stream, a thin, glittering ribbon lying far below them at the base of the
hill. They were very high up; a bird fluttered past the window as he stared
in the direction of the Burrow, now invisible beyond another line of hills.
Ginny was over there somewhere. They were closer to each other today than
they had been since Bill and Fleur's wedding, but she could have no idea he
was gazing toward her now, thinking of her. He suppose he ought to be glad
of it; anyone he came into contact with was in danger, Xenophilius's attitude
proved that.
he turned away from the windows and his gaze fell upon another peculiar
object standing upon the cluttered, curved slide board; a stone but of a
beautiful but austere-looking witch wearing a most bizarre-looking
headdress. Two objects that resembled golden ear trumpets curved out from
the sides. A tiny pair of glittering blue wing was stuck to a leather strap
that ran over the top of her head, while one of the orange radishes had been
stuck to a second strap around her forehead.
"Look at this," said Harry.
"Fetching," said Ron. "Surprised he didn't hear that to the wedding."
They heard the front door close, and a moment later Xenophilius climbed
back up the spiral staircase into the room, his thin legs now encase in
Wellington boots, bearing a tray of ill-assorted teacups and a steaming
teapot.
"Ah, you have spotted my pet invention," he said, shoving the tray into


Hermione's arms and joining Harry at the statue's side.
"Modeled, fittingly enough, upon the head of the beautiful Rowens Ravenclaw,
'Wit beyond measure is a man's greatest treasure!'"
He indicated the objects like ear trumpets.
"These are the Wrackpurt siphons - to remove all sources of distraction
from the thinker's immediate area. Here, "he pointed out the tiny wings, "a
billywig propeller, to induce an elevated frame of mind. Finally, "he
pointed to the orange radish, "the dirigible Plum, so as to enhance the
ability to accept the extraordinary."
Xenophilius strode back to the tea tray, which Hermione had managed to
balance precariously on one of the cluttered side tables.
"May I offer you all an infusion of Gurdyroots?" said Xenophilius. "We
make it ourselves." As he started to pour out the drink, which was as deeply
purple as beetroot juice, he added, "Luna is down beyond Bottom Bridge, she
is most excited that you are here She ought not to be too long, she has
caught nearly enough Plumpies to make soup for all of us. Do sit down and
help yourselves to sugar.
"Now," he remove a tottering pile of papers from an armchair and sat
down, his Wellingtoned legs crossed, "how may I help you, Mr. Potter?"
"Well," said Harry, glancing at Hermione, who nodded encouragingly,
"it's about that symbol you were wearing around your neck at Bill and
Fleur's wedding, Mr. Lovegood. We wondered what it meant."
Xenophilius raised his eyebrows.
"Are you referring to the sign of the Deathly Hallows?"







Chapter Twenty-One

The Tale of the Three Brothers



Harry turned to look at Ron and Hermione. Neither of them seemed to have
understood what Xenophilius had said either.

"The Deathly Hallows?"

"That's right," said Xenophilius. "You haven't heard of them? I'm not surprised.
Very, very few wizards believe. Witness that knuckle-headed young man at your
brother's wedding," he nodded at Ron, "who attacked me for sporting the symbol of a
well-known Dark wizard! Such ignorance. There is nothing Dark about the Hallows – at
least not in that crude sense. One simply uses the symbol to reveal oneself to other
believers, in the hope that they might help one with the Quest."

He stirred several lumps of sugar into his Gurdyroot infusion and drank some.

"I'm sorry," said Harry, "I still don't really understand."

To be polite, he took a sip from his cup too, and almost gagged: The stuff was
quite disgusting, as though someone had liquidized bogey-flavored Every Flavor Beans.


"Well, you see, believers seek the Deathly Hallows," said Xenophilius, smacking
his lips in apparent appreciation of the Gurdyroot infusion.

"But what are the Deathly Hallows?" asked Hermione.

Xenophilius set aside his empty teacup.

"I assume that you are familiar with 'The Tale of the Three Brothers'?"

Harry said, "No," but Ron and Hermione both said, "Yes." Xenophilius nodded
gravely.

"Well, well, Mr. Potter, the whole thing starts with 'The Tale of the Three
Brothers' . . . I have a copy somewhere . . ."

He glanced vaguely around the room, at the piles of parchment and books, but
Hermione said, "I've got a copy, Mr. Lovegood, I've got it right here."

And she pulled out The Tales of Beedle the Bard from the small, beaded bag.

"The original?" inquired Xenophilius sharply, and when she nodded, he said,
"Well then, why don't you read it out aloud? Much the best way to make sure we all
understand."

"Er. . . all right," said Hermione nervously. She opened the book, and Harry saw
that the symbol they were investigating headed the top of the page as she gave a little
cough, and began to read.

"'There were once three brothers who were traveling along a lonely, winding road
at twilight –'"

"Midnight, our mum always told us," said Ron, who had stretched out, arms
behind his head, to listen. Hermione shot him a look of annoyance.

"Sorry, I just think it's a bit spookier if it's midnight!" said Ron.

"Yeah, because we really need a bit more fear in our lives," said Harry before he
could stop himself. Xenophilius did not seem to be paying much attention, but was
staring out of the window at the sky. "Go on, Hermione."

"In time, the brothers reached a river too deep to wade through and too
dangerous to swim across. However, these brothers were learned in the magical arts, and
so they simply waved their wands and made a bridge appear across the treacherous
water. They were halfway across it when they found their path blocked by a hooded
figure.

"'And Death spoke to them –'"

"Sorry," interjected Harry, "but Death spoke to them?"

"It's a fairy tale, Harry!"

"Right, sorry. Go on."

"'And Death spoke to them. He was angry that he had been cheated out of the
three new victims, for travelers usually drowned in the river. But Death was cunning. He
pretended to congratulate the three brothers upon their magic, and said that each had
earned a prize for having been clever enough to evade him.

"'So the oldest brother, who was a combative man, asked for a wand more
powerful than any in existence: a wand that must always win duels for its owner, a wand
worthy of a wizard who had conquered Death! So Death crossed to an elder tree on the
banks of the river, fashioned a wand from a branch that hung there, and gave it to the
oldest brother.

"'Then the second brother, who was an arrogant man, decided that he wanted to
humiliate Death still further, and asked for the power to recall others from Death. So


Death picked up a stone from the riverbank and gave it to the second brother, and told
him that the stone would have the power to bring back the dead.

"'And then Death asked the third and youngest brother what he would like. The
youngest brother was the humblest and also the wisest of the brothers, and he did not
trust Death. So he asked for something that would enable him to go forth from that place
without being followed by Death. And Death, most unwillingly, handed over his own
Cloak of Invisibility.'"

"Death's got an Invisibility Cloak?" Harry interrupted again.

"So he can sneak up on people," said Ron. "Sometimes he gets bored of running at
them, flapping his arms and shrieking . . . sorry, Hermione."

"'Then Death stood aside and allowed the three brothers to continue on their way,
and they did so talking with wonder of the adventure they had had and admiring Death's
gifts.

"'In due course the brothers separated, each for his own destination.

"'The first brother traveled on for a week more, and reaching a distant village,
sought out a fellow wizard with whom he had a quarrel. Naturally, with the Elder Wand
as his weapon, he could not fail to win the duel that followed. Leaving his enemy dead
upon the floor the oldest brother proceeded to an inn, where he boasted loudly of the
powerful wand he had snatched from Death himself, and of how it made him invincible.

"'That very night, another wizard crept upon the oldest brother as he lay, wine-
sodden upon his bed. The thief took the wand and for good measure, slit the oldest
brother's throat.

"'And so Death took the first brother for his own.

"'Meanwhile, the second brother journeyed to his own home, where he lived alone.
Here he took out the stone that had the power to recall the dead, and turned it thrice in
his hand. To his amazement and his delight, the figure of the girl he had once hoped to
marry, before her untimely death, appeared at once before him.

"'Yet she was sad and cold, separated from him as by a veil. Though she had
returned to the mortal world, she did not truly belong there and suffered. Finally the
second brother, driven mad with hopeless longing, killed himself so as to truly join her.

"'And so Death took the second brother from his own.

"'But though Death searched for the third brother for many years, he was never
able to find him. It was only when he had attained a great age that the youngest brother
finally took off the Cloak of Invisibility and gave it to his son. And the he greeted Death
as an old friend, and went with him gladly, and, equals, they departed this life.'"

Hermione closed the book. It was a moment or two before Xenophilius seemed to
realize that she had stopped reading; then he withdrew his gaze from the window and
said: "Well, there you are."

"Sorry?" said Hermione, sounding confused.

"Those are the Deathly Hallows," said Xenophilius.

He picked up a quill from a packed table at his elbow, and pulled a torn piece of
parchment from between more books.

"The Elder Wand," he said, and drew a straight vertical line upon the parchment.
"The Resurrection Stone," he said, and added a circle on top of the line. "The Cloak of
Invisibility," he finished, enclosing both line and circle in a triangle, to make the symbols
that so intrigued Hermione. "Together," he said, "the Deathly Hallows."


"But there's no mention of the words 'Deathly Hallows' in the story," said
Hermione.

"Well, of course not," said Xenophilius, maddeningly smug. "That is a children's
tale, told to amuse rather than to instruct. Those of us who understand these matters,
however, recognize that the ancient story refers to three objects, or Hallows, which, if
united, will make the possessor master of Death."

There was a short silence in which Xenophilius glanced out of the window.
Already the sun was low in the sky.

"Luna ought to have enough Plimpies soon," he said quietly.

"When you say 'master of Death' –"said Ron.

"Master," said Xenophilius, waving an airy hand. "Conqueror. Vanquisher.
Whichever term you prefer."

"But then . . . do you mean . . ." said Hermione slowly, and Harry could tell that
she was trying to keep any trace of skepticism out of her voice, "that you believe these
objects – these Hallows – really exist?"

Xenophilius raised his eyebrows again.

"Well, of course."

"But," said Hermione, and Harry could hear her restraint starting to crack, "Mr.
Lovegood, how can you possibly believe – ?"

"Luna has told me all about you, young lady," said Xenophilius. "You are, I
gather, not unintelligent, but painfully limited. Narrow. Close-minded."

"Perhaps you ought to try on the hat, Hermione," said Ron, nodding toward the
ludicrous headdress. His voice shook with the strain of not laughing.

"Mr. Lovegood," Hermione began again, "We all know that there are such things
as Invisibility Cloaks. They are rare, but they exist. But –"

"Ah, but the Third Hallow is a true Cloak of Invisibility, Miss Granger! I mean to
say, it is not a traveling cloak imbued with a Disillusionment Charm, or carrying a
Bedazzling Hex, or else woven from Demiguise hair, which will hide one initially but
fade with the years until it turns opaque. We are talking about a cloak that really and truly
renders the wearer completely invisible, and endures eternally, giving constant and
impenetrable concealment, no matter what spells are cast at it. How many cloaks have
you ever seen like that, Miss Granger?"

Hermione opened her mouth to answer, then closed it again, looking more
confused than ever. She, Harry and Ron glanced at one another, and Harry knew that they
were all thinking the same thing. It so happened that a cloak exactly like the one
Xenophilius had just described was in the room with them at that very moment.

"Exactly," said Xenophilius, as if he had defeated them all in reasoned argument.
"None of you have ever seen such a thing. The possessor would be immeasurably rich,
would he not?"

He glanced out of the window again. The sky was now tinged with the faintest
trace of pink.

"All right," said Hermione, disconcerted. "Say the Cloak existed. . . what about
that stone, Mr. Lovegood? The thing you call the Resurrection Stone?"

"What of it?"

"Well, how can that be real?"

"Prove that is not," said Xenophilius.


Hermione looked outraged.

"But that's – I'm sorry, but that's completely ridiculous! How can I possibly prove
it doesn't exist? Do you expect me to get hold of – of all the pebbles in the world and test
them? I mean, you could claim that anything's real if the only basis for believing in it is
that nobody's proved it doesn't exist!"

"Yes, you could," said Xenophilius. "I am glad to see that you are opening your
mind a little."

"So the Elder Wand," said Harry quickly, before Hermione could retort, "you
think that exists too?"

"Oh, well, in that case there is endless evidence," said Xenophilius. "The Elder
Wand is the Hallow that is most easily traced, because of the way in which it passes from
hand to hand."

"Which is what?" asked Harry.

"Which is that the possessor of the wand must capture it from its previous owner,
if he is to be truly master of it," said Xenophilius. "Surely you have heard of the way the
wand came to Egbert the Egregious, after his slaughter of Emeric the Evil? Of how
Godelot died in his own cellar after his son, Hereward, took the wand from him? Of the
dreadful Loxias, who took the wand from Baraabas Deverill, whom he had killed? The
bloody trail of the Elder Wand is splattered across the pages of Wizarding history."

Harry glanced at Hermione. She was frowning at Xenophilius, but she did not
contradict him.

"So where do you think the Elder Wand is now?" asked Ron.

"Alas, who knows?" said Xenophilius, as he gazed out of the window. "Who
knows where the Elder Wand lies hidden? The trail goes cold with Arcus and Livius.
Who can say which of them really defeated Loxias, and which took the wand? And who
can say who may have defeated them? History, alas, does not tell us."

There was a pause. Finally Hermione asked stiffly, "Mr. Lovegood, does the
Peverell family have anything to do with the Deathly Hallows?"

Xenophilius looked taken aback as something shifted in Harry's memory, but he
could not locate it. Peverell. . . he had heard that name before. . .

"But you have been misleading me, young woman!" said Xenophilius, now sitting
up much straighter in his chair and goggling at Hermione. "I thought you were new to the
Hallows Quest! Many of us Questers believe that the Peverells have everything –
everything! – to do with the Hallows!"

"Who are the Peverells?" asked Ron.

"That was the name on the grave with the mark on it, in Godric's Hollow," said
Hermione, still watching Xenophilius. "Ignotus Peverell."

"Exactly!" said Xenophilius, his forefinger raised pedantically. "The sign of the
Death Hallows on Ignotus's grave is conclusive proof!"

"Of what?" asked Ron.

"Why, that the three brothers in the story were actually the three Peverell brothers,
Antioch, Cadmus and Ignotus! That they were the original owners of the Hallows!"

With another glance at the window he got to his feet, picked up the tray, and
headed for the spiral staircase.

"You will stay for dinner?" he called, as he vanished downstairs again.
"Everybody always requests our recipe for Freshwater Plimply soup."


"Probably to show the Poisoning Department at St. Mungo's," said Ron under his
breath.

Harry waited until they could hear Xenophilius moving about in the kitchen
downstairs before speaking.

"What do you think?" he asked Hermione.

"Oh, Harry," she said wearily, "it's a pile of utter rubbish. This can't be what the
sign really means. This must just be his weird take on it. What a waste of time."

"I s'pose this is the man who brought us Crumple-Horned Snorkacks," said Ron.

"You didn't believe it either?" Harry asked him.

"Nah, that story's just one of those things you tell kids to teach them lessons, isn't
it? 'Don't go looking for trouble, don't go pick fights, don't go messing around with stuff
that's best left alone! Just keep your head down, mind your own business, and you'll be
okay. Come to think of it," Ron added, "maybe that story's why elder wands are supposed
to be unlucky."

"What are you talking about?"

"One of those superstitions, isn't it? 'May-born witches will marry Muggles.' 'Jinx
by twilight, undone by midnight.' 'Wand of cider, never prosper.' You must have heard
them. My mum's full of them."

"Harry and I were raised by Muggles," Hermione reminded him. "We were taught
different superstitions." She sighed deeply as a rather pungent smell drifted up from the
kitchen. The one good thing about her exasperation with Xenophilius was that it seemed
to have made her forget that she was annoyed at Ron. "I think you're right," she told him.
"It's just a morality tale, it's obvious which gift is best, which one you'd choose –"

The three of them spoke at the same time: Hermione said, "the Cloak," Ron said,
"the wand," and Harry said, "the stone."

They looked at each other, half surprised, half amused.

"You're supposed to say the Cloak," Ron told Hermione, "but you wouldn't need
to be invisible if you had the wand. An unbeatable wand, Hermione, come on!"


"We've already got an Invisibility Cloak," said Harry, "And it's helped us rather a lot, in
case you hadn't noticed!" said Hermione. "Whereas the wand would be bound to attract
trouble--"
"Only if you shouted about it," argued Ron. "Only if you were prat enough to go dancing
around waving it over your head, and singing, 'I've got an unbeatable want, come and
have a go if you think you're hard enough.' As long as you kept your trap shut --"
-Yes, but could you keep your trap shut?" said Hermione, looking skeptical. "You know
the only true thing he said to us was that there have been stories about extra-powerful
wands for hundreds of years."
"There have?" asked Harry.
Hermione looked exasperated: The expression was so endearingly familiar that Harry and
Ron grinned at each other.
"The Deathstick, the Wand of Destiny, they crop up under different names through the
centuries, usually in the possession of some Dark wizard who’s boasting about them.
Professor Binns mentioned some of them, but -- oh it's all nonsense. Wands are only as
powerful as the wizards who use them. Some wizards just like to boast that theirs are
bigger and better than other people's"


"But how do you know," said Harry, "that those wants -- the Deathstick, and the Wand of
Destiny -- aren't the same want, surfacing over the centuries under different names?"
"What if they're all really the Elder Wand, made by Death?" said Ron.
Harry laughed: The strange idea that had occurred to him was after all, ridiculous. His
wand, he reminded himself, had been of holly, not elder, and it had been made by
Ollivander, whatever it had done that night Voldemort had pursued him across the skies
and if it had been unbeatable, how could it have been broken?
"So why would you take the stone?" Ron asked him.
"Well, if you could bring people back, we could have Sirius...Mad-
Eye...Dumbledore...my parents..."
Neither Ron nor Hermione smiled.
"But according to Beedle the Bard, they wouldn't want to come back, would they?" said
Harry, thinking about the tail they had just heard. "I don't suppose there have been loads
of other stories about a stone that can raise the dead, have there?: he asked Hermione.
"No," she replied sadly. "I don't think anyone except Mr. Lovegood could kid themselves
that's possible. Beedle probably took the idea from the Sorcerer's Stone; you know,
instead of a stone to make you immortal, a stone to reverse death."
The smell from the kitchen was getting stronger. It was something like burning
underpants. Harry wondered whether it would be possible to eat enough of whatever
Xenophilius was cooking to spare his feelings.
"What about the Cloak, though?" said Ron slowly. "Don't you realize, he's right? I've got
so used to Harry's Cloak and how good it is, I never stopped to think. I've never heard of
one like Harry's. It's infallible. We've never been spotted under it --"
"Of course not -- we're invisible when we're under it, Ron!"
"But all the stuff he said about other cloaks, and they're not exactly ten a Knut, you know,
is true! It's never occurred to me before but I've heard stuff about charms wearing off
cloaks when they get old, or them being ripped apart by spells so they've got holes,
Harry's was owned by his dad, so it's not exactly new, is it, but it's just ... perfect!"
"Yes, all right, but Ron, the stone..."
As they argued in whispers, Harry moved around the room, only half listening. Reaching
the spiral stair, he raised his eyes absently to the next level and was distracted at once.
His own face was looking back at him from the ceiling of the room above. After a
moment's bewilderment, he realized that it was not a mirror, but a painting. Curious, he
began to clime the stairs.
"Harry, what are you doing? I don't think you should look around when he's not here!"
But Harry had already reached the next level. Luna had decorated her bedroom ceiling
with five beautifully painted faces: Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and Neville. They
were not moving as the portraits at Hogwarts moved, but there was a certain magic about
them all the same. Harry thought they breathed. What appeared to be a fine golden chains
wove around the pictures linking them together, but after examining them for a minute or
so, Harry realized that the chains were actually one work repeated a thousand times in
golden ink: friends... friends... friends...
Harry felt a great rush of affection for Luna. He looked around the room. There was a
large photograph beside the bed, of a young Luna and a woman who looked very like her.
They were hugging. Luna looked rather better-groomed in this picture than Harry had
ever seen her in life. The picture was dusty. This struck Harry as slightly odd. He stared


around. Something was wrong. The pale blue carpet was also thick with dust. There were
no clothes in the wardrobe, whose doors stood ajar. The bed had a cold, unfriendly look,
as though it had not been slept in for weeks. A single cobweb stretched over the nearest
window across the blood red sky.
"What's wrong?" Hermione asked as Harry descended the staircase, but before he could
respond, Xenophilius reached the top of the stairs from the kitchen, now holding a tray
laden with bowls.
"Mr. Lovegood," said Harry. "Where's Luna?"
"Excuse me?"
"Where's Luna?"
Xenophilius halted on the top step.
"I -- I've already told you. She is down at the Botions Bridge fishing for Plimpies."
"So why have you only laid that tray for four?"
Xenophilius tried to speak, but no sound came out. The only noise was the continued
chugging of the printing press, and a slight rattle from the tray as Xenophilius's hands
shook.
"I don't think Luna's been here for weeks." said Harry. "Her clothes are gone, her bed
hasn't been slept in. Where is she? and why do you keep looking out of the window?"
Xenophilius dropped the tray. The bowls bounced and smashed Harry, Ron, and
Hermione drew their wands. Xenophilius froze his hand about to enter his pocket. At that
moment the printing press have a huge bank and numerous Quibblers came streaming
across the floor from underneath the tablecloth, the press fell silent at last. Hermione
stooped down and picked up one of the magazines, her wand still pointing at Mr.
Lovegood.
"Harry, look at this" He strode over to her as quickly as he could through all the clutter.
The front of the Quibbler carried his own picture, emblazoned with the words
"Undesirable Number One" and captioned with the reward money.
"The Quibbler's going for a new angle, then?: Harry asked coldly, his mind working very
fast. "Is that what you were doing when you went into the garden, Mr. Lovegood?
Sending an owl to the Ministry?
Xenophilius licked his lips
"They took my Luna," he whispered, "Because of what I've been writing. They took my
Luna and I don't know where she is, what they've done to her. But they might give her
back to me if I -- If I--"
"Hand over Harry?" Hermione finished for him.
"No deal." said Ron flatly. "Get out of the way, we're leaving."
Xenophilius looked ghastly, a century old, his lips drawn back into a dreadful leer.
"They will be here any moment. I must save Luna. I cannot lose Luna. You must not
leave."
He spread his arms in front of the staircase, and Harry had a sudden vision of his mother
doing the same thing in front of his crib.
"Don't make us hurt you," Harry said. "Get out of the way, Mr. Lovegood."
"HARRY!" Hermione screamed.
Figures on broomsticks were flying past the windows. As the three of them looked away
from him. Xenophilius drew his wand. Harry realized their mistake just in time. He
launched himself sideways, shoving Ron and Hermione out of harm's way as


Xenophilius's Stunning Spell soared across the room and hit the Erumpent horn.
There was a colossal explosion. The sound of it seemed to blow the room apart.
Fragments of wood and paper and rubble flew in all directions, along with an
impenetrable cloud of thick white dust. Harry flew through the air, then crashed to the
floor, unable to see as debris rained upon him, his arms over his head. He heard
Hermione's scream, Ron's yell, and a series of sickening metallic thuds which told him
that Xenophilius had been blasted off his feet and fallen backward down the spiral stairs.
Half buried in rubble, Harry tried to raise himself. He could barely breathe or see for dust.
Half of the ceiling had fall in and the end of Luna's bead was hanging through the hole.
The bust of Rowena Ravenclaw lay beside him with half its face missing fragments of
torn parchment were floating through the air, and most of the printing press lay on its side,
blocking the top of the staircase to the kitchen. Then another white shape moved close by,
and Hermione, coated in dust like a second statue, pressed his finger to her lips.
The door downstairs crashed open.
"Didn't I tell you there was no need to hurry, Travers?" said a rough voice. "Didn't I tell
you this nutter was just raving as usual?" There was a bang and a scream of pain from
Xenophilius.
"No...no...upstairs...Potter!"
"I told you last week Lovegood, we weren't coming back for anything less than some
solid information! Remember last week? When you wanted to swap your daughter for
that stupid bleeding headdress? And the week before" -- Another bang, another squeal --
"When you thought we'd give her back if you offered us proof there are Cumple" -- Bang
-- "Headed"--bang--"Snorkacks?"
"No -- no -- I beg of you!" sobbed Xenophilius. "It really is Potter, Really!"
"And now it turns out you only called us here to try and blow us up!" roared the Death
Eater, and there was a volley of bangs interspersed with squeals of agony from
Xenophilius.
"The place looks like it's about to fall in, Selwyn," said a cool second voice, echoing up
the mangled staircase. "The stairs are completely blocked. Could try clearing it? Might
bring the place down."
"You lying piece of filth." shouted the wizard named Selwyn.
"You have never seen Potter in your life, have you? Thought you'd lure us here to kill us,
did you? And you think you'll get your girl back like this?"
"I swear...I swear...Potter's upstairs!"
"Homenum revelio." said the voice at the foot of the stairs. Harry heard Hermione gasp,
and he had the odd sensation something was swooping low over him, immersing his body
in its shadow.
"There's someone up there all right, Selwyn," said the second man sharply.
"It's Potter, I tell you, it's Potter!" sobbed Xenophilius. "Please...please...give me Luna,
just let me have Luna..."
"You can have your little girl, Lovegood," said Selwyn, "if you get up those stairs and
bring me down Harry Potter. But if this is a plot, if it's a trick, if you've got an accomplice
waiting up there to ambush us, we'll see if we can spare a bit of your daughter for you to
bury."
Xenophilius gave a wail of fear and despair. There were scurryings and scrapings.
Xenophilius was trying to get through the debris on the stairs.


"Come on," Harry whispered, "we've got to get out of here."
He started to dig himself out under cover of all the noise Xenophilius was making on the
staircase. Ron was buried the deepest. Harry and Hermione climbed, as quietly as they
could, over all the wreckage to where he lay, trying to prise a heavy chest of drawers off
his legs. While Xenophilius banging and scraping drew nearer and nearer, Hermione
managed to free Ron with the use of a Hover Charm.
"All right." breathed Hermione, as the broken printing press blocking the top of the stairs
begin to tremble. Xenophilius was feet away from them. She was still white with dust.
"Do you trust me Harry?"
Harry nodded.
"Okay then." Hermione whispered. "give me the invisibility Cloak. Ron, you're going to
put it on."
"Me? But Harry --"
"Please, Ron! Harry, hold on tight to my hand, Ron grab my shoulder."
Harry held out his left hand. Ron vanished beneath the Cloak. The printing press blocking
the stairs was vibrating. Xenophilius was trying to shift it using a Hover Charm. Harry
did not know what Hermione was waiting for.
"Hold tight" she whispered. "Hold tight...any second..."
Xenophilius's paper-white face appeared over the top of the sideboard.
"Obliviate!" cried Hermione, pointing her want first into his face then at the floor beneath
them. "Deprimo!"
She had blasted a hole in the sitting room floor. They fell like boulders. Harry still
holding onto her hand for dear life, there was a scream from below, and he glimpsed two
men trying to get out of the way as vast quantities of rubble and broken furniture rained
all around them from the shattered ceiling. Hermione twisted in midair and thundering of
the collapsing house rang in Harry's ears as she dragged him once more into darkness.



Chapter Twenty-Two

The Deathly Hallows



Harry fell, panting, onto grass and scrambled up at once. They seemed to have
landed in the corner of a field at dusk; Hermione was already running in a circle around
them, waving her wand.

“Protego Totalum…Salvio Hexia…”

“That treacherous old bleeder.” Ron panted, emerging from beneath the
Invisibility Cloak and throwing it to Harry. “Hermione you’re a genius, a total genius. I
can’t believe we got out of that.”

“Cave Inimicum…Didn’t I say it was an Frumpent horn, didn’t I tell him? And
now his house has been blown apart!”

“Serves him right,” said Ron, examining his torn jeans and the cuts to his legs,
“What’d you reckon they’ll do to him?”

“Oh I hope they don’t kill him!” groaned Hermione, “That’s why I wanted the
Death Eaters to get a glimpse of Harry before we left, so they knew Xenophilius hadn’t
been lying!”


“Why hide me though?” asked Ron.

“You’re supposed to be in bed with spattergrolt, Ron! They’ve kidnapped Luna
because her father supported Harry! What would happen to your family if they knew
you’re with him?”

“But what about your mum and dad?”

“They’re in Australia,” said Hermione, “They should be all right. They don’t
know anything.”

“You’re a genius,” Ron repeated, looking awed.

Yeah, you are, Hermione,” agreed Harry fervently. “I don’t know what we’d do
without you.”

She beamed, but became solemn at once.

“What about Luna?”

“Well, if they’re telling the truth and she’s still Alive ---“ began Ron.

“Don’t say that, don’t say it!” squealed Hermione. “She must be alive, she must!”

“Then she’ll be in Azkaban, I expect,” said Ron. “Whether she survives the place,
though…Loads don’t…”

“She will,” said Harry. He could not bear to contemplate the alternative. “She’s
tough, Luna, much tougher than you’d think. She’s probably teaching all the inmates
about Wrackspurts and Nargles.”

“I hope you’re right,” said Hermione. She passed a hand over her eyes. “I’d feel
so sorry for Xenophilius if ---“

“---if he hadn’t just tried to sell us to the Death Eaters, yeah,” said Ron.

They put up the tent and retreated inside it, where Ron made them tea. After their
narrow escape, the chilly, musty old place felt like home: safe, familiar, and friendly.

“Oh, why did we go there?” groaned Hermione after a few minutes’ silence.
“Harry, you were right, it was Godric’s Hollow all over again, a complete waste of time!
The Deathly Hallows…such rubbish…although actually,” a sudden thought seemed to
have struck her, “he might have made it all up, mightn’t he? He probably doesn’t believe
in the Deathly Hallows at all, he just wanted to keep us talking until the Death Eaters
arrived!”

“I don’t think so,” said Ron. “It’s a damn sight harder making stuff up when
you’re under stress than you’d think. I found that out when the Snatchers caught me. It
was much easier pretending to be Stan, because I knew a bit about him, than inventing a
whole new person. Old Lovegood was under loads of pressure, trying to make sure we
stayed put. I reckon he told us the truth, or what he thinks is the truth, just to keep us
talking.”

“Well, I don’t suppose it matters,” sighed Hermione. “Even if he was being
honest, I never heard such a lot of nonsense in all my life.”

“Hang on, though,” said Ron. “The Chamber of Secrets was supposed to be a
myth, wasn’t it?”

“But the Deathly Hallows can’t exist, Ron!”

“You keep saying that, but one of them can,” said Ron. “Harry’s Invisibility
Cloak ---“

“The Tale of the Three Brothers’ is a story,” said Hermione firmly. “A story about
how humans are frightened of death. If surviving was as simple as hiding under the
Invisibility Cloak, we’d have everything we need already!”


“I don’t know. We could do with an unbeatable wand,” said Harry, turning the
blackthorn wand he so disliked over in his fingers.

“There’s no such thing, Harry!”

“You said there have been loads of wands --- the Deathstick and whatever they
were called ---“

“All right, even if you want to kid yourself the Elder Wand’s real, what about the
Resurrection Stone?” Her fingers sketched quotation marks around the name, and her
tone dripped sarcasm. “No magic can raise the dead, and that’s that!”

“When my wand connected with You-Know-Who’s, it made my mum and dad
appear…and Cedric…”

“But they weren’t really back from the dead, were they?” said Hermione. “Those
kind of ---of pale imitations aren’t the same as truly bringing someone back to life.”

“But she, the girl in the tale, didn’t really come back, did she? The story says that
once people are dead, they belong with the dead. But the second brother still got to see
her and talk to her, didn’t he? He even lived with her for a while…”

He saw concern and something less easily definable in Hermione’s expression.
Then, as she glanced at Ron, Harry realized that it was fear: He had scared her with his
talk of living with dead people.

“So that Peverell bloke who’s buried in Godric’s Hollow,” he said hastily, trying
to sound robustly sane, “you don’t know anything about him, then?”

“No,” she replied, looking relieved at the change of subject. “I looked him up
after I saw the mark on his grave; if he’d been anyone famous or done anything important,
I’m sure he’d be in one of our books. The only place I’ve managed to find the name
‘Peverell’ Is Nature’s Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy. I borrowed it from Kreacher,”
she explained as Ron raised his eyebrows. “It lists the pure-blood families that are now
extinct in the male line. Apparently the Peverells were one of the earliest families to
vanish.”

“Extinct in the male line?” repeated Ron.

“It means the name died out,” said Hermione, “centuries ago, in the case of the
Peverells. They could still have descendents, though, they’d just be called something
different.”

And then it came to Harry in one shining piece, the memory that had stirred at the
sound of the name “Peverell”: a filthy old man brandishing an ugly ring in the face of a
Ministry official, and he cried aloud, “Marvolo Gaunt!”

“Sorry said Ron and Hermione together.

“Marvolo Gaunt! You-Know-Who’s grandfather! In the Pensieve! With
Dumbledore! Marvolo Gaunt said he was descended from the Peverells!”

Ron and Hermione looked bewildered.

“The ring, the ring that became the Horcrux, Marvolo Gaunt said it had the
Peverell coat of arms on it! I saw him waving it in the bloke from the Ministry’s face, he
nearly shoved it up his nose!”

“The Peverell coat of arms?” said Hermione sharply. “Could you see what it
looked like?”

“Not really,” said Harry, trying to remember. “There was nothing fancy on there,
as far as I could see; maybe a few scratches. I only ever saw it really close up after it had
been cracked open.”


Harry saw Hermione’s comprehension in the sudden widening of her eyes. Ron
was looking from one to the other, astonished.

“Blimey…You reckon it was this sign again? The sign of the Hallows?

“Why not said Harry excitedly, “Marvolo Gaunt was an ignorant old git who lived
like a pig, all he cared about was his ancestry. If that ring had been passed down through
the centuries, he might not have known what it really was. There were no books in that
house, and trust me, he wasn’t the type to read fairy tales to his kids. He’d have loved to
think the scratches on the stone were a coat of arms, because as far as he was concerned,
having pure blood made you practically royal.”

“Yes…and that’s all very interesting,” said Hermione cautiously, “but Harry, if
you’re thinking what I think you’re think ---“

“Well, why not? Why not? said Harry, abandoning caution. “It was a stone,
wasn’t it?” He looked at Ron for support. “What if it was the Resurrection Stone?”

Ron’s mouth fell open.

“Blimey --- but would it still work if Dumbledore broke --- ?”

“Work? Work? Ron, it never worked! There’s no such thing as a Resurrection
Stone!”

Hermione leapt to her feet, looking exasperated and angry. Harry you’re trying to
fit everything into the Hallows story ---“

“Fit everything in?” he repeated. “Hermione, it fits of its own accord! I know the
sign of the Deathly Hallows was on that stone! Gaunt said he was descended from the
Peverells!”

“A minute ago you told us you never saw the mark on the stone properly!”

“Where’d you reckon the ring is now?” Ron asked Harry. “What did Dumbledore
do with it after he broke it open?”

“But Harry’s imagination was racing ahead, far beyond Ron and Hermione’s…

Three objects, or Hallows, which, if united, will make the possessor master of
Death…Master…Conqueror…Vanquisher…The last enemy that shall be destroyed is
death…

And he saw himself, possessor of the Hallows, facing Voldemort, whose
Horcruxes were no match…Neither can live while the other survives…Was this the
answer? Hallows versus Horcruxes? Was there a way after all, to ensure that he was the
one who triumphed? If he were the master of the Deathly Hallows, would he be safe?

“Harry?”

But he scarcely heard Hermione: He had pulled out his Invisibility Cloak and was
running it through his fingers, the cloth supple as water, light as air. He had never seen
anything to equal it in his nearly seven years in the Wizarding world. The Cloak was
exactly what Xenophilius had described: A cloak that really and truly renders the wearer
completely invisible, and endures eternally, giving constant and impenetrable
concealment, no matter what spells are cast at it…

And then, with a gasp, he remembered—

“Dumbledore had my Cloak the night my parents died!”

His voice shook and he could feel the color in his face, but he did not care.

“My mum told Sirius that Dumbledore borrowed the Cloak! This is why! He
wanted to examine it, because he thought it was the third Hallow! Ignotus Peverell is
buried in Godric’s Hollow…” Harry was walking blindly around the tent, feeling as


though great new vistas of truth were opening all around him. “He’s my ancestor. I’m
descended from the third brother! It all makes sense!”

“He felt armed in certainty, in his belief in the Hallows, as if the mere idea of
possessing them was giving him protection, and he felt joyous as he turned back to the
other two.

“Harry,” said Hermione again, but he was busy undoing the pouch around his
neck, his fingers shaking hard.

“Read it,” he told her, pushing his mother’s letter into her hand. “Read it!
Dumbledore had the Cloak, Hermione! Why else would he want it? He didn’t need a
Cloak, he could perform a Disillusionment Charm so powerful that he made himself
completely invisible without one!”

Something fell to the floor and rolled, glittering, under a chair: He had dislodged
the Snitch when he pulled out the letter. He stooped to pick it up, and then the newly
tapped spring of fabulous discoveries threw him another gift, and shock and wonder
erupted inside him so that he shouted out.

“IT’S IN HERE! He left me the ring – it’s in the Snitch!”

“You --- you reckon?”

He could not understand why Ron looked taken aback. It was so obvious, so clear
to Harry. Everything fit, everything…His Cloak was the third Hallow, and when he
discovered how to open the Snitch he would have the second, and then all he needed to
do was find the first Hallow, the Elder Wand, and then ---

But it was as though a curtain fell on a lit stage: All his excitement, all his hope
and happiness were extinguished at a stroke, and he stood alone in the darkness, and the
glorious spell was broken.

“That’s what he’s after.”

The change in his voice made Ron and Hermione look even more scared.

“You-Know-Who’s after the Elder Wand.”

He turned his back on their strained, incredulous faces. He knew it was the truth.
It all made sense, Voldemort was not seeking a new wand; he was seeking an old wand, a
very old wand indeed. Harry walked to the entrance of the tent, forgetting about Ron and
Hermione as he looked out into the night, thinking…

Voldemort had been raised in a Muggle orphanage. Nobody could have told him
The Tales of Beedle the Bard when he was a child, any more than Harry had heard them.
Hardly any wizards believed in the Deathly Hallows. Was it likely that Voldemort knew
about them?

Harry gazed into the darkness…If Voldemort had known about the Deathly
Hallows, surely he would have sought them, done anything to possess them: three objects
that made the possessor master of Death? If he had known about the Deathly Hallows, he
might not have needed Horcruxes in the first place. Didn’t the simple fact that he had
taken a Hallow, and turned it into a Horcrux, demonstrate that he did not know this last
great Wizarding secret?

Which meant that Voldemort sought the Elder Wand without realizing its full
power, without understanding that it was one of three…for the wand was the Hallow that
could not be hidden, whose existence was best known…The bloody trail of the Elder
Wand is splattered across the pages of Wizarding history…


Harry watched the cloudy sky, curves of smoke-gray and silver sliding over the
face of the white moon. He felt lightheaded with amazement at his discoveries.

He turned back into the tent. It was a shock to see Ron and Hermione standing
exactly where he had left them, Hermione still holding Lily’s letter, Ron at her side
looking slightly anxious. Didn’t they realize how far they had traveled in the last few
minutes?

“This is it?” Harry said, trying to bring them inside the glow of his own
astonished certainty, “This explains everything. The Deathly Hallows are real and I’ve
got one --- maybe two ---“

He held up the Snitch.

“--- and You-Know-Who’s chasing the third, but he doesn’t realize…he just
thinks it’s a powerful wand ---“

“Harry,” said Hermione, moving across to him and handing him back Lily’s letter,
“I’m sorry, but I think you’ve got this wrong, all wrong.”

“But don’t you see? It all fits ---“

“Not, it doesn’t,” she said. “It doesn’t. Harry, you’re just getting carried away.
Please,” she said as she started to speak, “please just answer me this: If the Deathly
Hallows really existed, and Dumbledore knew about them, knew that the person who
possessed all of them would be master of Death --- Harry, why wouldn’t he have told
you? Why?”

He had his answer ready.

“But you said it, Hermione! You’ve got to find out about them for yourself! It’s a
Quest!”

“But I only said that to try and persuade you to come to the Lovegoods’!” cried
Hermione in exasperation. “I didn’t really believe it!”

Harry took no notice.

“Dumbledore usually let me find out stuff for myself. He let me try my strength,
take risks. This feels like the kind of thing he’d do.”

“Harry, this isn’t a game, this isn’t practice! This is the real thing, and
Dumbledore left you very clear instructions: Find and destroy the Horcruxes! That
symbol doesn’t mean anything, forget the Deathly Hallows, we can’t afford to get
sidetracked ---“

Harry was barely listening to her. He was turning the Snitch over and over in his
hands, half expecting it to break open, to reveal the Resurrection Stone, to prove to
Hermione that he was right, that the Deathly Hallows were real.

She appealed to Ron.

“You don’t believe in this, do you?”

Harry looked up, Ron hesitated.

“I dunno…I mean…bits of it sort of fit together,” said Ron awkwardly, “But
when you look at the whole thing…” He took a deep breath. “I think we’re supposed to
get rid of Horcruxes, Harry. That’s what Dumbledore told us to do. Maybe…maybe we
should forget about this Hallows business.”

“Thank you, Ron,” said Hermione. “I’ll take first watch.”

And she strode past Harry and sat down in the tent entrance bringing the action to
a fierce full stop.


But Harry hardly slept that night. The idea of the Deathly Hallows had taken
possession of him, and he could not rest while agitating thoughts whirled through his
mind: the wand, the stone, and the Cloak, if he could just possess them all…

I open at the close…But what was the close? Why couldn’t he have the stone
now? If only he had the stone, he could ask Dumbledore these questions in person…and
Harry murmured words to the Snitch in the darkness, trying everything, even
Parseltongue, but the golden ball would not open…

And the wand, the Elder Wand, where was that hidden? Where was Voldemort
searching now? Harry wished his scar would burn and show him Voldemort’s thoughts,
because for the first time ever, he and Voldemort were united in wanting the very same
thing…Hermione would not like that idea, of course…But then, she did not
believe….Xenophilius had been right, in a way…Limited, Narrow, Close-minded. The
truth was that she was scared of the idea of the Deathly Hallows, especially of the
Resurrection Stone…and Harry pressed his mouth again to the Snitch, kissing it, nearly
swallowing it, but the cold medal did not yield…

It was nearly dawn when he remembered Luna, alone in a cell in Azkaban,
surrounded by dementors, and he suddenly felt ashamed of himself. He had forgotten all
about her in his feverish contemplation of the Hallows. If only they could rescue her, but
dementors in those numbers would be virtually unassailable. Now he came to think about
it, he had not tried casting a Patronus with the blackthorn wand…He must try that in the
morning…

If only there was a way of getting a better wand…

And desire for the Elder Wand, the Deathstick, unbeatable, invincible, swallowed
him once more…

They packed up the tent next morning and moved on through a dreary shower of
rain. The downpour pursued them to the coast, where they pitched the tent that night, and
persisted through the whole week, through sodden landscapes that Harry found bleak and
depressing. He could think only of the Deathly Hallows. It was as though a flame had
been lit inside him that nothing, not Hermione’s flat disbelief nor Ron’s persistent doubts,
could extinguish. And yet the fiercer the longing for the Hallows burned inside him, the
less joyful it made him. He blamed Ron and Hermione: Their determined indifference
was as bad as the relentless rain for dampening his spirits, but neither could erode his
certainty, which remained absolute. Harry’s belief in and longing for the Hallows
consumed him so much that he felt isolated from the other two and their obsession with
the Horcruxes.

“Obsession?” said Hermione in a low fierce voice, when Harry was careless
enough to use the word one evening, after Hermione had told him off for his lack of
interest in locating more Horcruxes. “We’re not the one with an obsession, Harry! We’re
the ones trying to do what Dumbledore wanted us to do!”

But he was impervious to the veiled criticism. Dumbledore had left the sign of the
Hallows for Hermione to decipher, and he had also, Harry remained convinced of it, left
the Resurrection Stone hidden in the golden Snitch. Neither can live while the other
survives…master of Death…Why didn’t Ron and Hermione understand?

“’The last enemy shall be destroyed is death,’” Harry quoted calmly.

“I thought it was You-Know-Who we were supposed to be fighting?” Hermione
retorted, and Harry gave up on her.


Even the mystery of the silver doe, which the other two insisted on discussing,
seemed less important to Harry now, a vaguely interesting sideshow. The only other thing
that mattered to him was that his scar had begun to prickle again, although he did all he
could to hide this fact from the other two. He sought solitude whenever it happened, but
was disappointed by what he saw. The visions he and Voldemort were sharing had
changed in quality; they had become blurred, shifting as though they were moving in and
out of focus. Harry was just able to make out the indistinct features of an object that
looked like a skull, and something like a mountain that was more shadow than substance.
Used to images sharp as reality, Harry was disconcerted by the change. He was worried
that the connection between himself and Voldemort had been damaged, a connection that
he both feared and, whatever he had told Hermione, prized. Somehow Harry connected
these unsatisfying, vague images with the destruction of his wand, as if it was the
blackthorn wand’s fault that he could no longer see into Voldemort’s mind as well as
before.

As the weeks crept on, Harry could not help but notice, even through his new self-
absorption, that Ron seemed to be taking charge. Perhaps because he was determined to
make up for having walked out on them, perhaps because Harry’s descent into
listlessness galvanized his dormant leadership qualities, Ron was the one now
encouraging and exhorting the other two into action.

“Three Horcruxes left,” he kept saying. “We need a plan of action, come on!
Where haven’t we looked? Let’s go through it again. The orphanage…”

Diagon Alley, Hogwarts, the Riddle House, Borgin and Burkes, Albania, every
place that they knew Tom Riddle had ever lived or worked, visited or murdered, Ron and
Hermione raked over them again, Harry joining in only to stop Hermione pestering him.
He would have been happy to sit alone in silence, trying to read Voldemort’s thoughts, to
find out more about the Elder Wand, but Ron insisted on journeying to ever more
unlikely places simply, Harry was aware, to keep them moving.

“You never know,” was Ron’s constant refrain. “Upper Flagley is a Wizarding
village, he might’ve wanted to live there. Let’s go and have a poke around.”

These frequent forays into Wizarding territory brought them within occasional
sight of Snatchers.

“Some of them are supposed to be as bad as Death Eaters,” said Ron. “The lot that
got me were a bit pathetic, but Bill recons some of them are really dangerous. They said
on Potterwatch ---“

“On what?” said Harry.

“Potterwatch, didn’t I tell you that’s what it was called? The program I keep
trying to get on the radio, the only one that tells the truth about what’s going on! Nearly
all of the programs are following You-Know-Who’s line, all except Potterwatch, I really
want you to hear it, but it’s tricky tuning in…”

Ron spent evening after evening using his wand to beat out various rhythms on
top of the wireless while the dials whirled. Occasionally they would catch snatches of
advice on how to treat dragonpox, and once a few bars of “A Cauldron Full of Hot,
Strong Love.” While he taped, Ron continued to try to hit on the correct password,
muttering strings of random words under his breath.

“They’re normally something to do with the Order,” he told them. “Bill had a real
knack for guessing them. I’m bound to get one in the end…”


“But not until March did luck favor Ron at last. Harry was sitting in the tent
entrance, on guard duty, staring idly at a clump of grape hyacinths that had forced their
way through the chilly ground, when Ron shouted excitedly from inside the tent.

“I’ve got it, I’ve got it! Password was ‘Albus’! Get in here, Harry.”

Roused for the first time in days from his contemplation of the Deathly Hallows,
Harry hurried back inside the tent to find Ron and Hermione kneeling on the floor beside
the little radio. Hermione, who had been polishing the sword of Gryffindor just for
something to do, was sitting open-mouthed, staring at the tiny speaker, from which a
most familiar voice was issuing.

“…apologize for our temporary absence from the airwaves, which was due to a
number of house calls in our area by those charming Death Eaters.”

“But that’s Lee Jordan!” said Hermione.

“I know!” beamed Ron. “Cool, eh?”

“…now found ourselves another secure location,” Lee was saying, and I’m
pleased to tell you that two of our regular contributors have joined me here this evening.
Evening, boys!”

“Hi.”

“Evening, River.”

“’River’” that’s Lee,” Ron explained. “They’ve all got code names, but you can
usually tell ---“

“Shh!” said Hermione.

“But before we hear from Royal and Romulus,” Lee went on, “let’s take a
moment to report those deaths that the Wizarding Wireless Network News and Daily
Prophet don’t think important enough to mention. It is with great regret that we inform
our listeners of the murders of Ted Tonks and Dirk Cresswell.”

Harry felt a sick, swooping in his belly. He, Ron, and Hermione gazed at one
another in horror.

“A goblin by the name of Gornuk was also killed. It is believed that Muggle-born
Dean Thomas and a second goblin, both believed to have been traveling with Tonks,
Cresswell, and Gornuk, may have escaped. If Dean is listening, or if anyone has any
knowledge of his whereabouts, his parents and sisters are desperate for news.

“Meanwhile, in Gaddley, a Muggle family of five has been found dead in their
home. Muggle authorities are attributing their deaths to a gas leak, but members of the
Order of the Phoenix inform me that it was the Killing Curse --- more evidence, as if it
were needed, of the fact that Muggle slaughter is becoming little more than a recreational
sport under the new regime.

“Finally, we regret to inform our listeners that the remains of Bathilda Bagshot
have been discovered in Godric’s Hollow. The evidence is that she died several months
ago. The Order of the Phoenix informs us that her body showed unmistakable signs of
injuries inflicted by Dark Magic.

“Listeners, I’d like to invite you now to join us in a minute’s silence in memory of
Ted Tonks, Dirk Cresswell, Bathilda Bagshot, Gornuk, and the unnamed, but no less
regretted, Muggles murdered by the Death Eaters.”

Silence fell, and Harry, Ron, and Hermione did not speak. Half of Harry yearned
to hear more, half of him was afraid of what might come next. It was the first time he had
felt fully connected to the outside world for a long time.


“Thank you,” said Lee’s voice. “And now we can return to regular contributor
Royal, for an update on how the new Wizarding order is affecting the Muggle world.”

“Thanks, River,” said an unmistakable voice, deep, measured, reassuring.

“Kingsley!” burst out Ron.

“We know!” said Hermione, hushing him.

“Muggles remain ignorant of the source of their suffering as they continue to
sustain heavy casualties,” said Kingsley. “However, we continue to hear truly
inspirational stories of wizards and witches risking their own safety to protect Muggle
friends and neighbors, often without the Muggles’ knowledge. I’d like to appeal to all our
listeners to emulate their example, perhaps by casting a protective charm over any
Muggle dwellings in your street. Many lives could be saved if such simple measures are
taken.”

“And what would you say, Royal, to those listeners who reply that in these
dangerous times, it should be ‘Wizards first’? asked Lee.

“I’d say that it’s one short step from ‘Wizards first’ to ‘Purebloods first,’ and then
to ‘Death Eaters,’” replied Kingsley. “We’re all human, aren’t we? Every human life is
worth the same, and worth saving.”

“Excellently put, Royal, and you’ve got my vote for Minister of Magic if we ever
get out of this mess,” said Lee. “And now, over to Romulus for our popular feature ‘Pals
of Potter.’”

“Thanks, River,” said another very familiar voice. Ron started to speak, but
Hermione forestalled him in a whisper.

“We know it’s Lupin!”

“Romulus, do you maintain, as you have every time you’ve appeared on our
program, that Harry Potter is still alive?”

“I do,” said Lupin firmly. “There is no doubt at all in my mind that his death
would be proclaimed as widely as possible by the Death Eaters if it had happened,
because it would strike a deadly blow at the morale of those resisting the new regime.
‘The Boy Who Lived’ remains a symbol of everything for which we are fighting: the
triumph of good, the power of innocence, the need to keep resisting.”

A mixture of gratitude and shame welled up in Harry. Had Lupin forgiven him,
then, for the terrible things he had said when they had last met?

“And what would you say to Harry if you knew he was listening, Romulus?”

“I’d tell him we’re all with him in spirit,” said Lupin, then hesitated slightly,
“And I’d tell him to follow his instincts, which are good and nearly always right.”

Harry looked at Hermione, whose eyes were full of tears.

“Nearly always right,” she repeated.

“Oh, didn’t I tell you?” said Ron in surprise. “Bill told me Lupin’s living with
Tonks again! And apparently she’s getting pretty big too…”

“…and our usual update on those friends of Harry Potter’s who are suffering for
their allegiance?” Lee was saying.

“Well, as regular listeners will know, several of the more outspoken supporters of
Harry Potter have now been imprisoned, including Xenophilius Lovegood, erstwhile
editor of The Quibbler,” said Lupin.

“At least he’s still alive!” muttered Ron.


“We have also heard within the last few hours that Rubeus Hagrid” – all three of
them gasped, and so nearly missed the rest of the sentence -- “well-known gamekeeper at
Hogwarts School, has narrowly escaped arrest within the grounds of Hogwarts, where he
is rumored to have hosted a ‘Support Harry Potter’ party in his house. However, Hagrid
was not taken into custody, and is, we believe, on the run.”

“I suppose it helps, when escaping from Death Eaters, if you’ve got a sixteen-
foot-high half brother?” asked Lee.

“It would tend to give you an edge,” agreed Lupin gravely. “May I just add that
while we here at Potterwatch applaud Hagrid’s spirit, we would urge even the most
devoted of Harry’s supporters against following Hagrid’s lead. ‘Support Harry Potter’
parties are unwise in the present climate.”

“Indeed they are, Romulus,” said Lee, “so we suggest that you continue to show
your devotion to the man with the lightning scar by listening to Potterwatch! And now
let’s move to news concerning the wizard who is proving just as elusive as Harry Potter.
We like to refer to him as the Chief Death Eater, and here to give his views on some of
the more insane rumors circulating about him, I’d like to introduce a new correspondent.
Rodent?”

“’Rodent’?” said yet another familiar voice, and Harry, Ron, and Hermione cried
out together:

“Fred!”

“No – is it George?”

“It’s Fred, I think,” said Ron, leaning in closer, as whichever twin it was said,

“I’m not being ‘Rodent,’ no way, I told you I wanted to be ‘Rapier’!”

“Oh, all right then, ‘Rapier,’ could you please give us your take on the various
stories we’ve been hearing about the Chief Death Eater?”

“Yes, River, I can,” said Fred. “As our listeners will know, unless they’ve taken
refuge at the bottom of a garden pond or somewhere similar, You-Know-Who’s strategy
of remaining in the shadows is creating a nice little climate of panic. Mind you, if all the
alleged sightings of him are genuine, we must have a good nineteen You-Know-Whos
running around the place.”

“Which suits him, of course,” said Kingsley. “The air of mystery is creating more
terror than actually showing himself.”

“Agreed,” said Fred. “So, people, let’s try and calm down a bit. Things are bad
enough without inventing stuff as well. For instance, this new idea that You-Know-Who
can kill people with a single glance from his eyes. That’s a basilisk, listeners. One simple
test: Check whether the thing that’s glaring at you has got legs. If it has, it’s safe to look
into its eyes, although if it really is You-Know-Who, that’s still likely to be the last thing
you ever do.”

For the first time in weeks and weeks, Harry was laughing: He could feel the
weight of tension leaving him.

“And the rumors that he keeps being sighted abroad?” asked Lee.

“Well, who wouldn’t want a nice little holiday after all the hard work he’s been
putting in?” asked Fred. “Point is, people, don’t get lulled into a false sense of security,
thinking he’s out of the country. Maybe he is, maybe he isn’t, but the fact remains he can
move faster than Severus Snape confronted with shampoo when he wants to, so don’t


count on him being a long way away if you’re planning to take any risks. I never thought
I’d hear myself say it, but safety first!”

“Thank you very much for those wise words, Rapier,” said Lee. ”Listeners, that
brings us to the end of another Potterwatch. We don’t know when it will be possible to
broadcast again, but you can be sure we shall be back. Keep twiddling those dials: The
next password will be ‘Mad-Eye.’ Keep each other safe: Keep faith. Good night.”

The radio’s dial twirled and the lights behind the tuning panel went out. Harry,
Ron, and Hermione were still beaming. Hearing familiar, friendly voices was an
extraordinary tonic; Harry had become so used to their isolation he had nearly forgotten
that other people were resisting Voldemort. It was like waking from a long sleep.

“Good, eh?” said Ron happily.

“Brilliant,” said Harry.

“It’s so brave of them,” sighed Hermione admiringly. “If they were found …”

“Well, they keep on the move, don’t they?” said Ron. “Like us.”

“But did you hear what Fred said?” asked Harry excitedly; now the broadcast was
over, his thoughts turned around toward his all consuming obsession. “He’s abroad! He’s
still looking for the Wand, I knew it!”

“Harry—“

“Come on, Hermione, why are you so determined not to admit it? Vol –“

“HARRY, NO!”

“—demort’s after the Elder Wand!”

“The name’s Taboo!” Ron bellowed, leaping to his feet as a loud crack sounded
outside the tent. “I told you, Harry, I told you, we can’t say it anymore – we’ve got to put
the protection back around us – quickly – it’s how they find –“

But Ron stopped talking, and Harry knew why. The Sneakoscope on the table had
lit up and begun to spin; they could hear voices coming nearer and nearer: rough, excited
voices. Ron pulled the Deluminator out of his pocket and clicked it: Their lamps went out.

“Come out of there with your hands up!” came a rasping voice through the
darkness. “We know you’re in there! You’ve got half a dozen wands pointing at you and
we don’t care who we curse!”





Chapter Twenty-Three

Malfoy Manor



Harry looked around at the other two, now mere outlines in the darkness. He saw
Hermione point her wand, set toward the outside, but into his face; there was a bang, a
burst of white light, and he buckled in agony, unable to see. He could feel his face
swelling rapidly under his hands as heavy footfalls surrounded him.

"Get up, vermin."

Unknown hands dragged Harry roughly off the ground, before he could stop them,
someone had rummaged through his pockets and removed the blackthorn wand. Harry
clutched at his excruciatingly painful face, which felt unrecognizable beneath his fingers,
tight, swollen, and puffy as though he had suffered some violent allergic reaction. His


eyes had been reduced to slits through which he could barely see; his glasses fell off as he
was bundled out of the tent: all he could make out were the blurred shapes of four or five
people wrestling Ron and Hermione outside too.

"Get -- off - her!" Ron shouted. There was the unmistakable sound of knuckles
hitting flesh: Ron grunted in pain and Hermione screamed, "No! Leave him alone, leave
him alone!"

"Your boyfriend's going to have worse than that done to him if he's on my list,"
said the horribly familiar, rasping voice. "Delicious girl... what a treat . . . I do enjoy the
softness of the skin. . . ."

Harry's stomach turned over. He knew who this was, Fenrit Greyback, the
werewolf who was permitted to wear Death Eater robes in return for his hired savagery.

"Search the tent!" said another voice.

Harry was thrown face down onto the ground. A thud told him that Ron had been
cast down beside him. They could hear footsteps and crashes; the men were pushing over
chairs inside the tent as they searched.

"Now, let's see who we've got," said Greyback's gloating voice from overhead,
and Harry was rolled over onto his back. A beam of wand light fell onto his face and
Greyback laughed.

"I'll be needing butterbeer to wash this one down. What happened to you, ugly?"

Harry did not answer immediately.

"I said," repeated Greyback, and Harry received a blow to the diaphragm that
made him double over in pain. "what happened to you?"

"Stung." Harry muttered. "Been Stung."

"Yeah, looks like it." said a second voice.

"What’s your name?" snarled Greyback.

"Dudley." said Harry.

"And your first name?"

"I -- Vernon. Vernon Dudley."

"Check the list, Scabior." said Greyback, and Harry head him move sideways to
look down at Ron, instead. "And what about you, ginger?"

"Stan Shunpike." said Ron.

"Like 'ell you are." said the man called Scabior. "We know Stan Shunpike, 'e's put
a bit of work our way."

There was another thud.

"I'b Bardy," said Ron, and Harry could tell that his mouth was full of blood.
"Bardy Weasley."

"A Weasley?" rasped Greyback. "So you're related to blood traitors even if you're
not a Mudblood. And lastly, your pretty little friend . . ." The relish in his voice made
Harry's flesh crawl.

"Easy, Greyback." said Scabior over the jeering of the others.

"Oh, I'm not going to bite just yet. We'll see if she’s a bit quicker at remembering
her name than Barny. Who are you, girly?

"Penelope Clearwater." said Hermione. She sounded terrified, but convincing.

"What's your blood status?"

"Half-Blood." said Hermione.


"Easy enough to check," said Scabior. "But the 'ole lot of 'em look like they could
still be 'ogwarts age -"

"We'b lebt," said Ron.

"Left, 'ave you, ginger?" said Scabior. "And you decided to go camping? And you
thought, just for a laugh, you'd use the Dark Lords name?"

"Nod a laugh," said Ron. "Aggiden."

"Accident?" There was more jeering laughter.

"You know who used to like using the Dark Lord's name, Weasley?" growled
Greyback, "The Order of the Phoenix. Mean anything to you?"

"Doh."

"Well, they don't show the Dark Lord proper respect, so the name's been Tabooed.
A few Order members have been tracked that way. We'll see. Bind them up with the
other two prisoners!"

Someone yanked Harry up by the hair, dragged him a short way, pushed him
down into a sitting position, then started binding him back-to-back with other people.
Harry was still half blind, barely able to see anything through his puffed-up eyes. When
at last the man tying then had walked away, Harry whispered to the other prisoners.

"Anyone still got a wand?"

"No." Said Ron and Hermione from either side of him.

"This is all my fault. I said the name. I'm sorry -"

"Harry?"

It was a new, but familiar voice. and it came from directly behind Harry, from the
person tied to Hermione's left.

"Dean?"

"It is you! If they find out who they've got -! They're Snatchers, they're only
looking for truants to sell for gold -"

"Not a bad little haul for one night." Greyback was saying, as a pair of hobnailed
boots marched close by Harry and they heard more crashes from inside the tent. "A
Mudblood, a runaway goblin, and these truants. You checked their names on the list yet,
Scabior?" he roared.

"Yeah. There's no Vernon Dudley un 'ere, Greyback."

"Interesting," said Greyback. "That's interesting."

He crouched down beside Harry, who saw, through the infinitesimal gap left
between his swollen eyelids, a face covered in matted gray hair and whiskers, with
pointed brown teeth and sores in the corners of his mouth. Greyback smelled as he had
done at the top of the tower where Dumbledore had died: of dirt, sweat, and blood.

"So you aren't wanted, then, Vernon? Or are you on that list under a different
name? What house were you in at Hogwarts?"

"Slytherin," said Harry automatically.

"Funny 'ow they all thinks we wants to 'ear that." leered Scabior out of the
shadows. "But none of 'em can tell us where the common room is."

"It's in the dungeons." said Harry clearly. "You enter through the wall. It's full of
skulls and stuff and its under the lake, so the light's all green,"

There was a short pause.


"Well, well, looks like we really 'ave caught a little Slytherin." said Scabior.
"Good for you, Vernon, 'cause there ain't a lot of Mudblood Slytherins. Who's your
father?"

"He works at the Ministry," Harry lied. He knew that his whole story would
collapse with the smallest investigation, but on the other hand, he only had until his face
regained its usual appearance before the game was up in any case. "Department of
Magical Accidents and Catastrophes."

"You know what, Greyback," said Scabior. "I think there is a Dudley in there."

Harry could barely breathe: Could luck, sheer luck, get them safely out of this?

"Well, well." said Greyback, and Harry could hear the tiniest note of trepidation
in that callous voice, and knew that Greyback was wondering whether he had just indeed
just attacked and bound the son of a Ministry Official. Harry's heart was pounding against
the ropes around his ribs; he would not have been surprised to know that Greyback could
see it. "If you're telling the truth, ugly, you've got nothing to fear from a trip to the
Ministry. I expect your father'll reward us just for picking you up."

"But," said Harry, his mouth bone dry, "if you just let us -"

"Hey!" came a shout from inside the tent. "Look at this. Greyback!"

A dark figure came bustling toward them, and Harry saw a glint of silver to the
light of their wands. They had found Gryffindor's sword.

"Ve-e-ery nice," said Greyback appreciatively, taking it from his companion. "Oh,
very nice indeed. Looks goblin-made, that. Where did you get something like this?"

"It's my father's," Harry lied, hoping against hope that it was too dark for
Greyback to see the name etched just below the hilt. "We borrowed it to cut firewood -"

"'ang on a minute, Greyback! Look at this, in the Prophet!"

As Scabior said it, Harry's scar, which was stretched tight across his distended
forehead, burned savagely. More clearly than he could make out anything around him, he
saw a towering building, a grim fortress, jet-black and forbidding: Voldemort's thoughts
had suddenly become Razor-Sharp again; he was gliding toward the gigantic building
with a sense of calmly euphoric purpose . . .

So close . . . So close . . .

With a huge effort of will Harry closed his mind to Voldemort's thoughts, pulling himself
back to where he sat, tied to Ron, Hermione, Dean, and Griphook in the darkness,
listening to Greyback and Scabior.

"'Hermione Granger," Scabior was saying, "the Mudblood who is known to be traveling
with 'arry Potter."

Harry's scar burned in the silence, but he made a supreme effort to keep himself
present, nor to slip into Voldemort's mind. He heard the creak of Greyback's boots as he
crouched down, in front of Hermione.

"you know what, little girly? This picture looks a hell of a lot like you."

"It isn't! It isn't me!"

Hermione's terrified squeak was as good as a confession.

"... known to be traveling with Harry Potter," repeated Greyback quietly.

A stillness had settled over the scene. Harry's scar was Exquisitely painful, but he
struggled with all his strength against the pull of Voldemort's thoughts. It had never been
so important to remain in his own right mind.


"Well, this changed things, doesn't it?" whispered Greyback. Nobody spoke:
Harry sensed the gang of Snatchers watching, frozen, and felt Hermione's arm trembling
against his. Greyback got up and took a couple of steps to where Harry sat, crouching
down again to stare closely at his misshapen features.

"What's that on your forehead, Vernon?" he asked softly, his breath foul in
Harry's nostrils as he pressed a filthy finger to the taught scar.

"Don't touch it! Harry yelled; he could not stop himself, he thought he might be
sick from the pain of it.

"I thought you wore glasses, Potter?" breathed Greyback.

"I found glasses!" yelped one of the Snatchers skulking in the background. "There
was glasses in the tent, Greyback, wait -"

And seconds later Harry's glasses had been rammed back onto his face. The
Snatchers were closing in now, peering at him.

"It Is!" rasped Greyback. "We've caught Potter!"

They all took several steps backward, stunned by what they had done. Harry, still
fighting to remain present in his own splitting head, could think of nothing to say.
Fragmented visions were breaking across the surface of his mind -

--He was hiding around the high walls of the black fortress--

No, he was Harry, tied up and wandless, in grave danger--

--looking up, up to the topmost window, the highest tower--

He was Harry, and they were discussing his fate in low voices--

--Time to fly . . .

". . . To the Ministry?"

"To hell with the Ministry." growled Greyback. "They'll take the credit, and we
won't get a look in. I say we take him straight to You-Know-Who."

"Will you summon 'im? 'ere?" said Scabior, sounding awed, terrified.

"No," snarled Greyback, "I haven't got -- they say he's using the Malfoy's place as
a base. We'll take the boy there."

Harry thought he knew why Greyback was not calling Voldemort. The werewolf
might be allowed to wear Death Eater robes when they wanted to use him, but only
Voldemort's inner circle were branded with the Dark Mark: Greyback had not been
granted this highest honor.

Harry’s scar seared again –

– and he rose into the night, flying straight up to the windows at the very top of
the tower –

“. . . completely sure it’s him? ‘Cause if it ain’t, Greyback, we’re dead.”

“Who’s in charge here?” roared Greyback, covering his moment of inadequacy. “I
say that’s Potter, and him plus his wand, that’s two hundred thousand Galleons right
there! But if you’re too gutless to come along, any of you, it’s all for me, and with any
luck, I’ll get the girl thrown in!”

– The window was the merest slit in the black rock, not big enough for a man to
enter. . . . A skeletal figure was just visible through it, curled beneath a blanket. . . . Dead,
or sleeping . . . ?

“All right!” said Scabior. “All right, we’re in! And what about the rest of ‘em,
Greyback, what’ll we do with ‘em?”


“Might as well take the lot. We’ve got two Mudbloods, that’s another ten
Galleons. Give me the sword as well. If they’re rubies, that’s another small fortune right
there.”

The prisoners were dragged to their feet. Harry could hear Hermione’s breathing,
fast and terrified.

“Grab hold and make it tight. I’ll do Potter!” said Greyback, seizing a fistful of
Harry’s hair; Harry could feel his long yellow nails scratching his scalp. “On three! One –
two – three –“

They Disapparated, pulling the prisoners with them. Harry struggled, trying to
throw off Greyback’s hand, but it was hopeless: Ron and Hermione were squeezed tightly
against him on either side; he could not separate from the group, and as the breath was
squeezed out of him his scar seared more painfully still –

– as he forced himself through the slit of a window like a snake and landed,
lightly as vapor inside the cell-like room –

The prisoners lurched into one another as they landed in a country lane. Harry’s
eyes, still puffy, took a moment to acclimatize, then he saw a pair of wrought-iron gates
at the foot of what looked like a long drive. He experienced the tiniest trickle of relief.
The worst had not happened yet: Voldemort was not here. He was, Harry knew, for he
was fighting to resist the vision, in some strange, fortresslike place, at the top of a tower.
How long it would take Voldemort to get to this place, once he knew that Harry was here,
was another matter. . . .

One of the Snatchers strode to the gates and shook them.

“How do we get in? They’re locked, Greyback, I can’t – blimey!”

He whipped his hands away in fright. The iron was contorting, twisting itself out
of the abstract furls and coils into a frightening face, which spoke in a clanging, echoing
voice. “State your purpose!”

“We’ve got Potter!” Greyback roared triumphantly. “We’ve captured Harry
Potter!”

The gates swung open.

“Come on!” said Greyback to his men, and the prisoners were shunted through the
gates and up the drive, between high hedges that muffled their footsteps. Harry saw a
ghostly white shape above him, and realized it was an albino peacock. He stumbled and
was dragged onto his feet by Greyback; now he was staggering along sideways, tied
back-to-back to the four other prisoner. Closing his puffy eyes, he allowed the pain in his
scar to overcome him for a moment, wanting to know what Voldemort was doing,
whether he knew yet that Harry was caught. . . .

The emaciated figure stirred beneath its thin blanket and rolled over toward him,
eyes opening in a skull of a face. . . . The frail man sat up, great sunken eyes fixed upon
him, upon Voldemort, and then he smiled. Most of his teeth were gone. . . .

“So, you have come. I thought you would . . . one day. But your journey was
pointless. I never had it.”

“You lie!”

As Voldemort’s anger throbbed inside him, Harry’s scar threatened to burst with
pain, and he wrenched his mind back to his own body, fighting to remain present as the
prisoners were pushed over gravel.


Light spilled out over all of them.

“What is this?” said a woman’s cold voice.

“We’re here to see He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named!” rasped Greyback.

“Who are you?”

“You know me!” There was resentment in the werewolf’s voice. “Fenrit
Greyback! We’ve caught Harry Potter!”

Greyback seized Harry and dragged him around to face the light, forcing the other
prisoners to shuffle around too.

“I know ‘es swollen, ma’am, but it’s ‘im!” piped up Scabior. “If you look a bit
closer, you’ll see ‘is scar. And this ‘ere, see the girl? The Mudblood who’s been traveling
around with ‘im, ma’am. There’s no doubt it’s ‘im, and we’ve got ‘is wand as well! ‘Ere,
ma’am –“

Through his puffy eyelids Harry saw Narcissa Malfoy scrutinizing his swollen
face. Scabior thrust the blackthorn wand at her. She raised her eyebrows.

“Bring them in,” she said.

Harry and the others were shoved and kicked up broad stone steps into a hallway
lined with portraits.

“Follow me,” said Narcissa, leading the way across the hall. “My son, Draco, is
home for his Easter holidays. If that is Harry Potter, he will know.”

The drawing room dazzled after the darkness outside; even with his eyes almost
closed Harry could make out the wide proportions of the room. A crystal chandelier hung
from the ceiling, more portraits against the dark purple walls. Two figures rose from
chairs in front of an ornate marble fireplace as the prisoners were forced into the room by
the Snatchers.

“What is this?”

The dreadfully familiar, drawling voice of Lucius Malfoy fell on Harry’s ears. He
was panicking now. He could see no way out, and it was easier, as his fear mounted, to
block out Voldemort’s thoughts, though his scar was still burning.

“They say they’ve got Potter,” said Narcissa’s cold voice. “Draco, come here.”
Harry did not dare look directly at Draco, but saw him obliquely; a figure slightly
taller than he was, rising from an armchair, his face a pale and pointed blur beneath
white-blond hair.

Greyback forced the prisoners to turn again so as to place Harry directly beneath
the chandelier.

“Well, boy?” rasped the werewolf.

Harry was facing a mirror over the fireplace, a great gilded thing in an intricately
scrolled frame. Through the slits of his eyes he saw his own reflection for the first time
since leaving Grimmauld Place.

His face was huge, shiny, and pink, every feature distorted by Hermione’s jinx.
His black hair reached his shoulders and there was a dark shadow around his jaw. Had he
not known that it was he who stood there, he would have wondered who was wearing his
glasses. He resolved not to speak, for his voice was sure to give him away; yet he still
avoided eye contact with Draco as the latter approached.

“Well, Draco?” said Lucius Malfoy. He sounded avid. “Is it? Is it Harry Potter?”
“I can’t – I can’t be sure,” said Draco. He was keeping his distance from
Greyback, and seemed as scared of looking at Harry as Harry was of looking at him.


“But look at him carefully, look! Come closer!”

Harry had never heard Lucius Malfoy so excited.

“Draco, if we are the ones who hand Potter over to the Dark Lord, everything will
be forgiv –“

“Now, we won’t be forgetting who actually caught him, I hope Mr. Malfoy?” said
Greyback menacingly.

“Of course not, of course not!” said Lucius impatiently. He approached Harry
himself, came so close that Harry could see the usually languid, pale face in sharp detail
even through his swollen eyes. With his face a puffy mask, Harry felt as though he was
peering out from between the bars of a cage.

“What did you do to him?” Lucius asked Greyback. “How did he get into this
state?”

“That wasn’t us.”
“Looks more like a Stinging Jinx to me,” said Lucius.

His gray eyes raked Harry’s forehead.

“There’s something there,” he whispered. “it could be the scar, stretched
tight. . . .” Draco, come here, look properly! What do you think?”

Harry saw Draco’s face up close now, right beside his father’s. They were
extraordinarily alike, except that while his father looked beside himself with excitement,
Draco’s expression was full of reluctance, even fear.

“I don’t know,” he said, and he walked away toward the fireplace where his
mother stood watching.

“We had better be certain, Lucius,” Narcissa called to her husband in her cold,
clear voice. “Completely sure that it is Potter, before we summon the Dark Lord . . . They
say this is his” – she was looking closely at the blackthorn wand – “but it does not
resemble Ollivander’s description. . . . If we are mistaken, if we call the Dark Lord here
for nothing . . . Remember what he did to Rowle and Dolohov?”

“What about the Mudblood, then?” growled Greyback. Harry was nearly thrown
off his feet as the Snatchers forced the prisoners to swivel around again, so that the light
fell on Hermione instead.

“Wait,” said Narcissa sharply. “Yes – yes, she was in Madam Malkin’s with
Potter! I saw her picture in the Prophet! Look, Draco, isn’t it the Granger girl?”

“I . . . maybe . . . yeah.”

“But then, that’s the Weasley boy!” shouted Lucius, striding around the bound
prisoners to face Ron. “It’s them, Potter’s friends – Draco, look at him, isn’t it Arthur
Weasley’s son, what’s his name – ?”

“Yeah,” said Draco again, his back to the prisoners. “It could be.”

The drawing room door opened behind Harry. A woman spoke, and the sound of
the voice wound Harry’s fear to an even higher pitch.

“What is this? What’s happened, Cissy?”

Bellatrix Lestrange walked slowly around the prisoners, and stopped on Harry’s
right, staring at Hermione through her heavily lidded eyes,

“But surely,” she said quietly, “this is the Mudblood girl? This is Grander?”

“Yes, yes, it’s Granger!” cried Lucius, “And beside her, we think, Potter! Potter
and his friends, caught at last!”
“Potter?” shrieked Bellatrix, and she backed away, the better to take in Harry.


“Are you sure? Well then, the Dark Lord must be informed at once!”
She dragged back her left sleeve: Harry saw the Dark Mark burned into the flesh
of her arm, and knew that she was about to touch it, to summon her beloved master–

“I was about to call him!” said Lucius, and his hand actually closed upon
Bellatrix’s wrist, preventing her from touching the Mark. “I shall summon him, Bella.
Potter has been brought to my house, and it is therefore upon my authority –“

“Your authority!” she sneered, attempting to wrench her hand from his grasp.
“You lost your authority when you lost your wand, Lucius! How dare you! Take your
hands off me!”

“This is nothing to do with you, you did not capture the boy –“

“Begging your pardon, Mr. Malfoy,” interjected Greyback, “but it’s us that caught
Potter, and it’s us that’ll be claiming the gold –“

“Gold!” laughed Bellatrix, still attempting to throw off her brother-in-law, her
free hand groping in her pocket for her wand. “Take your gold, filthy scavenger, what do
I want with gold? I seek only the honor of his – of –“

She stopped struggling, her dark eyes fixed upon something Harry could not see.
Jubilant at her capitulation, Lucius threw her hand from him and ripped up his own sleeve
–

“STOP!” shrieked Bellatrix, “Do not touch it, we shall all perish if the Dark Lord
comes now!”

Lucius froze, his index finger hovering over his own Mark. Bellatrix strode out of
Harry’s limited line of vision.

“What is that?” he heard her say.

“Sword,” grunted an out-of-sight Snatcher.

“Give it to me.”

“It’s not yours, missus, it’s mine, I reckon I found it.”

There was a bang and a flash of red light; Harry knew that the Snatcher had been
Stunned. There was a roar of anger from his fellows: Scabior drew his wand.

“What d’you think you’re playing at, woman?”

“Stupefy!” she screamed, ”Stupefy!”

They were no match for her, even thought there were four of them against one of
her: She was a witch, as Harry knew, with prodigious skill and no conscience. They fell
where they stood, all except Greyback, who had been forced into a kneeling position, his
arms outstretched. Out of the corners of his eyes Harry saw Bellatrix bearing down upon
the werewolf, the sword of Gryffindor gripped tightly in her hand, her face waxen.

“Where did you get this sword?” she whispered to Greyback as she pulled his
wand out of his unresisting grip.

“How dare you?” he snarled, his mouth the only thing that could move as he was
forced to gaze up at her. He bared his pointed teeth. “Release me, woman!”
“Where did you find this sword?” she repeated, brandishing it in his face, “Snape
sent it to my vault in Gringotts!”

“It was in their tent,” rasped Greyback. “Release me, I say!”

She waved her wand, and the werewolf sprang to his feet, but appeared too wary
to approach her. He prowled behind an armchair, his filthy curved nails clutching its back.

“Draco, move this scum outside,” said Bellatrix, indicating the unconscious men.
“If you haven’t got the guts to finish them, then leave them in the courtyard for me.”


“Don’t you dare speak to Draco like –“ said Narcissa furiously, but Bellatrix
screamed.

“Be quiet! The situation is graver than you can possibly imagine, Cissy! We have
a very serious problem!”

She stood, panting slightly, looking down at the sword, examining its hilt. Then
she turned to look at the silent prisoners.

“If it is indeed Potter, he must not be harmed,” she muttered, more to herself than
to the others. “The Dark Lord wishes to dispose of Potter himself. . . . But if he finds
out . . . I must . . . I must know. . . .”

She turned back to her sister again.

“The prisoners must be placed in the cellar, while I think what to do!”
“This is my house, Bella, you don’t give orders in my –“

“Do it! You have no idea of the danger we’re in!” shrieked Bellatrix. She looked
frightening, mad; a thin stream of fire issued from her wand and burned a hole in the
carpet.

Narcissa hesitated for a moment, then addressed the werewolf.

“Take these prisoners down to the cellar, Greyback.”

“Wait,” said Bellatrix sharply. “All except. . . . except for the Mudblood.”
Greyback gave a grunt of pleasure.

“No!” shouted Ron. “You can have me, keep me!”
Bellatrix hit him across the face: the blow echoed around the room.

“If she dies under questioning, I’ll take you next,” she said. “Blood traitor is next
to Mudblood in my book. Take them downstairs, Greyback, and make sure they are
secure, but do nothing more to them – yet.”

She threw Greyback’s wand back to him, then took a short silver knife from under
her robes. She cut Hermione free from the other prisoners, then dragged her by the hair
into the middle of the room, while Greyback forced the rest of them to shuffle across to
another door, into a dark passageway, his wand held out in front of him, projecting an
invisible and irresistible force.

“Reckon she’ll let me have a bit of the girl when she’s finished with her?”
Greyback crooned as he forced them along the corridor. “I’d say I’ll get a bite or two,
wouldn’t you, ginger?”

Harry could feel Ron shaking. They were forced down a steep flight of stairs, still
tied back-to-back and in danger of slipping and breaking their necks at any moment. At
the bottom was a heavy door. Greyback unlocked it with a tap of his wand, then forced
them into a dank and musty room and left them in total darkness. The echoing bang of the
slammed cellar door had not died away before there was a terrible, drawn out scream
from directly above them.

“HERMIONE!” Ron bellowed, and he started to writhe and struggle against the
ropes tying them together, so that Harry staggered. “HERMIONE!”

“Be quiet!” Harry said. “Shut up. Ron, we need to work out a way –“

“HERMIONE! HERMIONE!”

“We need a plan, stop yelling – we need to get these ropes off –“

“Harry?” came a whisper through the darkness. “Ron? Is that you?”

Ron stopped shouting. There was a sound of movement close by them, then Harry
saw a shadow moving closer.


“Harry? Ron?”

“Luna?”

“Yes, it’s me! Oh no, I didn’t want you to be caught!”

“Luna, can you help us get these ropes off?” said Harry.

“Oh yes, I expect so. . . . There’s an old nail we use if we need to break
anything. . . . Just a moment . . .”

Hermione screamed again from overhead, and they could hear Bellatrix
screaming too, but her words were inaudible, for Ron shouted again, “HERMIONE!
HERMIONE!”

“Mr. Ollivander?” Harry could hear Luna saying. “Mr. Ollivander, have you got
the nail? If you just move over a little bit . . . I think it was beside the water jug.”

She was back within seconds.

“You’ll need to stay still,” she said.

Harry could feel her digging at the rope’s tough fibers to work the knots free.
From upstairs they heard Bellatrix’s voice.

“I’m going to ask you again! Where did you get this sword? Where?”

“We found it – we found it – PLEASE!” Hermione screamed again; Ron
struggled harder than ever, and the rusty nail slipped onto Harry’s wrist.

“Ron, please stay still!” Luna whispered. “I can’t see what I’m doing –“

“My pocket!” said Ron, “In my pocket, there’s a Deluminator, and it’s full of
light!”

A few seconds later, there was a click, and the luminescent spheres the
Deluminator had sucked from the lamps in the tent flew into the cellar: Unable to rejoin
their sources, they simply hung there, like tiny suns, flooding the underground room with
light. Harry saw Luna, all eyes in her white face, and the motionless figure of Ollivander
the wandmaker, curled up on the floor in the corner. Craning around, he caught sight of
their fellow prisoners: Dean and Griphook the goblin, who seemed barely conscious, kept
standing by the ropes that bound him to the humans.

“Oh, that’s much easier, thanks, Ron,” said Luna, and she began hacking at their
bindings again. “Hello, Dean!”

From above came Bellatrix’s voice.

“You’re lying, filthy Mudblood, and I know it! You have been inside my vault at
Gringotts! Tell the truth, tell the truth!”

Another terrible scream–

“HERMIONE!”

“What else did you take? What else have you got? Tel me the truth or, I swear, I
shall run you through with this knife!”

“There!”

Harry felt the ropes fall away and turned, rubbing his wrists, to see Ron running
around the cellar, looking up at the low ceiling, searching for a trapdoor. Dean, his face
bruised and bloody, said “Thanks” to Luna and stood there, shivering, but Griphook sank
onto the cellar floor, looking groggy and disoriented, many welts across his swarthy face.

Ron was now trying to Disapparate without a wand.

“There’s no way out, Ron,” said Luna, watching his fruitless efforts. “The cellar
is completely escape-proof. I tried, at first. Mr. Ollivander has been here for a long time,
he’s tried everything.”


Hermione was screaming again: The sound went through Harry like physical pain.
Barely conscious of the fierce prickling of his scar, he too started to run around the cellar,
feeling the walls for he hardly knew what, knowing in his heart that it was useless.

“What else did you take, what else? ANSWER ME! CRUCIO!”

Hermione’s screams echoed off the walls upstairs, Ron was half sobbing as he
pounded the walls with his fists, and Harry in utter desperation seized Hagrid’s pouch
from around his neck and groped inside it: He pulled out Dumbledore’s Snitch and shook
it, hoping for he did not know what – nothing happened – he waved the broken halves of
the phoenix wand, but they were lifeless – the mirror fragment fell sparkling to the floor,
and he saw a gleam of brightest blue –

Dumbledore’s eye was gazing at him out of the mirror.

“Help us!” he yelled at it in mad desperation. “We’re in the cellar of Malfoy
Manor, help us!”

The eye blinked and was gone.

Harry was not even sure that it had really been there. He tilted the shard of mirror
this way and that, and saw nothing reflected there but the walls and ceiling of their prison,
and upstairs Hermione was screaming worse than ever, and next to him Ron was
bellowing, “HERMIONE! HERMIONE!”

“How did you get into my vault?” they heard Bellatrix scream. “Did that dirty
little goblin in the cellar help you?”

“We only met him tonight!” Hermione sobbed. “We’ve never been inside your
vault. . . . It isn’t the real sword! It’s a copy, just a copy!”

“A copy?” screeched Bellatrix. “Oh, a likely story!”

“But we can find out easily!” came Lucius’s voice. “Draco, fetch the goblin, he
can tell us whether the sword is real or not!”

Harry dashed across the cellar to where Griphook was huddled on the floor.

“Griphook,” he whispered into the goblin’s pointed ear, “you must tell them that
sword’s a fake, they mustn’t know it’s the real one, Griphook, please –“

He could hear someone scuttling own the cellar steps; next moment, Draco’s
shaking voice spoke from behind the door.

“Stand back. Line up against the back wall. Don’t try anything, or I’ll kill you!”

They did as they were bidden; as the lock turned, Ron clicked the Deluminator
and the lights whisked back into his pocket, restoring the cellar’s darkness. The door flew
open; Malfoy marched inside, wand held out in front of him, pale and determined. He
seized the little goblin by the arm and backed out again, dragging Griphook with him.
The door slammed shut and at the same moment a loud crack echoed inside the cellar.

Ron clicked the Deluminator. Three balls of light flew back into the air from his
pocket, revealing Dobby the house-elf, who had just Apparated into their midst.

“DOB – !”

Harry hit Ron on the arm to stop him shouting, and Ron looked terrified at his
mistake. Footsteps crossed the ceiling overhead: Draco marching Griphook to Bellatrix.

Dobby’s enormous, tennis-ball shaped eyes were wide; he was trembling from his
feet to the tips of his ears. He was back in the home of his old masters, and it was clear
that he was petrified.

“Harry Potter,” he squeaked in the tiniest quiver of a voice, “Dobby has come to
rescue you.”


“But how did you – ?”

An awful scream drowned Harry’s words: Hermione was being tortured again. He
cut to the essentials.

“You can Disapparate out of this cellar?” he asked Dobby, who nodded, his ears
flapping.

“And you can take humans with you?”

Dobby nodded again.

“Right. Dobby, I want you to grab Luna, Dean, and Mr. Ollivander, and take them
– take them to –“

“Bill and Fleur’s,” said Ron. “Shell Cottage on the outskirts of Tinworth!”

The elf nodded for a third time.

“And then come back,” said Harry. “Can you do that, Dobby?”

“Of course, Harry Potter,” whispered the little elf. He hurried over to Mr.
Ollivander, who appeared to be barely conscious. He took one of the wandmaker’s hands
in his own, then held out the other to Luna and Dean, neither of whom moved.

“Harry, we want to help you!” Luna whispered.

“We can’t leave you here,” said Dean.

“Go, both of you! We’ll see you at Bill and Fleur’s.”

As Harry spoke, his scar burned worse than ever, and for a few seconds he looked
down, not upon the wandmaker, but on another man who was just as old, just as thin, but
laughing scornfully.

“Kill me, then. Voldemort, I welcome death! But my death will not bring you what
you seek. . . . There is so much you do not understand. . .”

He felt Voldemort’s fury, but as Hermione screamed again he shut it out,
returning to the cellar and the horror of his own present.

“Go!” Harry beseeched to Luna and Dean. “Go! We’ll follow, just go!”

They caught hold of the elf’s outstretched fingers. There was another loud crack,
and Dobby, Luna, Dean, and Ollivander vanished.

“What was that?” shouted Lucius Malfoy from over their heads. “Did you hear
that? What was that noise in the cellar?”

Harry and Ron stared at each other.

“Draco – no, call Wormtail! Make him go and check!”

Footsteps crossed the room overhead, then there was silence. Harry knew that the
people in the drawing room were listening for more noises from the cellar.

“We’re going to have to try and tackle him,” he whispered to Ron. They had no
choice: The moment anyone entered the room and saw the absence of three prisoners,
they were lost. “Leave the lights on,” Harry added, and as they heard someone
descending the steps outside the door, they backed against the wall on either side of it.

“Stand back,” came Wormtail’s voice. “Stand away from the door. I’m coming
in.”
The door flew open. For a split second Wormtail gazed into the apparently empty cellar,
ablaze with light from the three miniature suns floating in midair. Then Harry and Ron
launched themselves upon him. Ron seized Wormtail’s wand arm and forced it upwards.
Harry slapped a hand to his mouth, muffling his voice. Silently they struggled:
Wormtail’s wand emitted sparks; his silver hand closed around Harry’s throat.

“What is it, Wormtail?” called Lucius Malfoy from above.


“Nothing!” Ron called back, in a passable imitation of Wormtail’s wheezy voice.
“All fine!”

Harry could barely breathe.

“You’re going to kill me?” Harry choked, attempting to prise off the metal fingers.
“After I saved your life? You owe me, Wormtail!”

The silver fingers slackened. Harry had not expected it: He wrenched himself free,
astonished, keeping his hand over Wormtail’s mouth. He saw the ratlike man’s small
watery eyes widen with fear and surprise: He seemed just as shocked as Harry at what his
hand had done, at the tiny, merciful impulse it had betrayed, and he continued to struggle
more powerfully, as though to undo that moment of weakness.

“And we’ll have that,” whispered Ron, tugging Wormtail’s wand from his other
hand.

Wandless, helpless, Pettigrew’s pupils dilated in terror. His eyes had slid from
Harry’s face to something else. His own silver fingers were moving inexorably toward
his own throat.

“No –“

Without pausing to think, Harry tried to drag back the hand, but there was no
stopping it. The silver tool that Voldemort had given his most cowardly servant had
turned upon its disarmed and useless owner; Pettigrew was reaping his reward for his
hesitation, his moment of pity; he was being strangled before their eyes.

“No!”

Ron had released Wormtail too, and together he and Harry tried to pull the
crushing metal fingers from around Wormtail’s throat, but it was no use. Pettigrew was
turning blue.

“Relashio!” said Ron, pointing the wand at the silver hand, but nothing happened;
Pettigrew dropped to his knees, and at the same moment, Hermione gave a dreadful
scream from overhead. Wormtail’s eyes rolled upward in his purple face; he gave a last
twitch, and was still.

Harry and Ron looked at each other, then leaving Wormtail’s body on the floor
behind them, ran up the stairs and back into the shadowy passageway leading to the
drawing room. Cautiously they crept along it until they reached the drawing room door,
which was ajar. Now they had a clear view of Bellatrix looking down at Griphook, who
was holding Gryffindor’s sword in his long-fingered hands. Hermione was lying at
Bellatrix’s feet. She was barely stirring.

“Well?” Bellatrix said to Griphook. “Is it the true sword?”

Harry waited, holding his breath, fighting against the prickling of his scar.

“No,” said Griphook. “It is a fake.”

“Are you sure?” panted Bellatrix. “Quite sure?”

“Yes,” said the goblin.

Relief broke across her face, all tension drained from it.

“Good,” she said, and with a casual flick of her wand she slashed another deep cut
into the goblin’s face, and he dropped with a yell at her feet. She kicked him aside. “And
now,” she said in a voice that burst with triumph, “we call the Dark Lord!”

And she pushed back her sleeve and touched her forefinger to the Dark Mark.

At once, Harry’s scar felt as though it had split open again. His true surroundings
vanished: He was Voldemort, and the skeletal wizard before him was laughing


toothlessly at him; he was enraged at the summons he felt – he had warned them, he had
told them to summon him for nothing less than Potter. If they were mistaken . . .

“Kill me, then!” demanded the old man. “You will not win, you cannot win! That
wand will never, ever be yours –“

And Voldemort’s fury broke: A burst of green light filled the prison room and the
frail old body was lifted from its hard bed and then fell back, lifeless, and Voldemort
returned to the window, his wrath barely controllable. . . . They would suffer his
retribution if they had no good reason for calling him back. . . .

“And I think,” said Bellatrix’s voice, “we can dispose of the Mudblood. Greyback,
take her if you want her.”

“NOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Ron had burst into the drawing room; Bellatrix looked around, shocked; she
turned her wand to face Ron instead –

“Expelliarmus!” he roared, pointing Wormtail’s wand at Bellatrix, and hers flew
into the air and was caught by Harry, who had sprinted after Ron. Lucius, Narcissa,
Draco and Greyback wheeled about; Harry yelled, “Stupefy!” and Lucius Malfoy
collapsed onto the hearth. Jets of light flew from Draco’s, Narcissa’s, and Greyback’s
wands; Harry threw himself to the floor, rolling behind a sofa to avoid them.

“STOP OR SHE DIES!

Panting, Harry peered around the edge of the sofa. Bellatrix was supporting
Hermione, who seemed to be unconscious, and was holding her short silver knife to
Hermione’s throat.

“Drop your wands,” she whispered. “Drop them, or we’ll see exactly how filthy
her blood is!”

Ron stood rigid, clutching Wormtail’s wand. Harry straightened up, still holding
Bellatrix’s.

“I said, drop them!” she screeched, pressing the blade into Hermione’s throat:
Harry saw beads of blood appear there.

“All right!” he shouted, and he dropped Bellatrix’s wand onto the floor at his feet,
Ron did the same with Wormtail’s. Both raised their hands to shoulder height.

“Good!” she leered. “Draco, pick them up! The Dark Lord is coming, Harry
Potter! Your death approaches!”

Harry knew it; his scar was bursting with the pain of it, and he could feel
Voldemort flying through the sky from far away, over a dark and stormy sea, and soon he
would be close enough to Apparate to them, and Harry could see no way out.

“Now,” said Bellatrix softly, as Draco hurried back to her with the wands. “Cissy,
I think we ought to tie these little heroes up again, while Greyback takes care of Miss
Mudblood. I am sure the Dark Lord will not begrudge you the girl, Greyback, after what
you have done tonight.”

At the last word there was a peculiar grinding noise from above. All of them
looked upward in time to see the crystal chandelier tremble; then, with a creak and an
ominous jingling, it began to fall. Bellatrix was directly beneath it; dropping Hermione,
she threw herself aside with a scream. The chandelier crashed to the floor in an explosion
of crystal and chains, falling on top of Hermione and the goblin, who still clutched the
sword of Gryffindor. Glittering shards of crystal flew in all directions; Draco doubled
over, his hands covering his bloody face.


As Ron ran to pull Hermione out of the wreckage, Harry took the chance: He
leapt over an armchair and wrested the three wands from Draco’s grip, pointed all of
them at Greyback, and yelled, “Stupefy!” The werewolf was lifted off his feet by the
triple spell, flew up to the ceiling and then smashed to the ground.

As Narcissa dragged Draco out of the way of further harm, Bellatrix sprang to her
feet, her hair flying as she brandished the silver knife; but Narcissa had directed her wand
at the doorway.

“Dobby!” she screamed and even Bellatrix froze. “You! You dropped the
chandelier – ?”

The tiny elf trotted into the room, his shaking finger pointing at his old mistress.

“You must not hurt Harry Potter,” he squeaked.

“Kill him, Cissy!” shrieked Bellatrix, but there was another loud crack, and
Narcissa’s wand too flew into the air and landed on the other side of the room.

“You dirty little monkey!” bawled Bellatrix. “How dare you take a witch’s wand,
how dare you defy your masters?”

“Dobby has no master!” squealed the elf. “Dobby is a free elf, and Dobby has
come to save Harry Potter and his friends!”

Harry’s scar was blinding him with pain. Dimly he knew that they had moments,
seconds before Voldemort was with them.

“Ron, catch – and GO!” he yelled, throwing one of the wands to him; then he bent
down to tug Griphook out from under the chandelier. Hoisting the groaning goblin, who
still clung to the sword, over one shoulder, Harry seized Dobby’s hand and spun on the
spot to Disapparate.

As he turned into darkness he caught one last view of the drawing room of the
pale, frozen figures of Narcissa and Draco, of the streak of red that was Ron’s hair, and a
blue of flying silver, as Bellatrix’s knife flew across the room at the place where he was
vanishing –

Bill and Fleur’s . . . Shell Cottage . . . Bill and Fleur’s . . .

He had disappeared into the unknown; all he could do was repeat the name of the
destination and hope that it would suffice to take him there. The pain in his forehead
pierced him, and the weight of the goblin bore down upon him; he could feel the blade of
Gryffindor’s sword bumping against his back: Dobby’s hand jerked in his; he wondered
whether the elf was trying to take charge, to pull them in the right direction, and tried, by
squeezing the fingers, to indicate that that was fine with them. . . .

And then they hit solid earth and smelled salty air. Harry fell to his knees,
relinquished Dobby’s hand, and attempted to lower Griphook gently to the ground.

“Are you all right?” he said as the goblin stirred, but Griphook merely whimpered.

Harry squinted around through the darkness. There seemed to be a cottage a short
way away under the wide starry sky, and he thought he saw movement outside it.

“Dobby, is this Shell Cottage?” he whispered, clutching the two wands he had
brought from the Malfoys’, ready to fight if he needed to. “Have we come to the right
place? Dobby?”

He looked around. The little elf stood feet from him.

“DOBBY!”

The elf swayed slightly, stars reflected in his wide, shining eyes. Together, he and
Harry looked down at the silver hilt of the knife protruding from the elf’s heaving chest.


“Dobby – no – HELP!” Harry bellowed toward the cottage, toward the people
moving there. “HELP!”

He did not know or care whether they were wizards or Muggles, friends or foes;
all he cared about was that a dark stain was spreading across Dobby’s front, and that he
had stretched out his own arms to Harry with a look of supplication. Harry caught him
and laid him sideways on the cool grass.

“Dobby, no, don’t die, don’t die –“

The elf’s eyes found him, and his lips trembled with the effort to form words.

“Harry . . . Potter . . .”

And then with a little shudder the elf became quite still, and his eyes were nothing
more than great glassy orbs, sprinkled with light from the stars they could not see.”
















Chapter Twenty-Four

The Wandmaker



It was like sinking into an old nightmare; for an instant Harry knelt again beside
Dumbledore’s body at the foot of the tallest tower at Hogwarts, but in reality he was
staring at a tiny body curled upon the grass, pierced by Bellatrix’s silver knife. Harry’s
voice was still saying, “Dobby…Dobby…” even though he knew that the elf had gone
where he could not call him back.

After a minute or so he realized that they had, after all, come to the right place, for
here were Bill and Fleur, Dean and Luna, gathering around him as he knelt over the elf.
“Hermione,” he said suddenly. “Where is she?”

“Ron’s taken her inside,” said Bill. “She’ll be all right.” Harry looked back down at
Dobby. He stretched out a hand and pulled the sharp blade from the elf’s body, then
dragged off his own jacket and covered Dobby in it like a blanket.

The sea was rushing against the rock somewhere nearby; Harry listened to it
while the others talked, discussing matters in which he could take no interest, making
decisions, Dean carried the injured Griphook into the house, Fleur hurrying with them;
now Bill was really knowing what he was saying. As he did so, he gazed down at the
tiny body, and his scar prickled and burned, and in one part of his mind, viewed as if
from the wrong end of a long telescope, he saw Voldemort punishing those they had left
behind at the Malfoy Manor. His rage was dreadful and yet Harry’s grief for Dobby
seemed to diminish it, so that it became a distant storm that reached Harry from across a
vast, silent ocean.


“I want to do it properly,” were the first words of which Harry was fully
conscious of speaking. “Not by magic. Have you got a spade?” And shortly afterward he
had set to work, alone, digging the grave in the place that Bill had shown him at the end
of the garden, between bushes. He dug with a kind of fury, relishing the manual work,
glorying in the non-magic of it, for every drop of his sweat and every blister felt like a
gift to the elf who had saved their lives.

His scar burned, but he was master of the pain, he felt it, yet was apart from it.
He had learned control at last, learned to shut his mind to Voldemort, the very thing
Dumbledore had wanted him to learn from Snape. Just as Voldemort had not been able
to possess Harry while Harry was consumed with grief for Sirius, so his thoughts could
not penetrate Harry now while he mourned Dobby. Grief, it seemed, drove Voldemort
out…though Dumbledore, of course, would have said that it was love.

On Harry dug, deeper and deeper into the hard, cold earth, subsuming his grief in
sweat, denying the pain in his scar. In the darkness, with nothing but the sound of his
own breath and the rushing sea to keep him company, the things that had happened at the
Malfoys’ returned to him, the things he had heard came back to him, and understanding
blossomed in the darkness…

The steady rhythm of his arms beat time with his thoughts.
Hallows…Horcruxes…Hallows…Horcruxes…yet no longer burned with that weird,
obsessive longing. Loss and fear had snuffed it out. He felt as though he had been
slapped awake again.

Deeper and deeper Harry sank into the grave, and he knew where Voldemort had
been tonight, and whom he had killed in the topmost cell of Nurmengard, and why…

And he thought of Wormtail, dead because of one small unconscious impulse of
mercy…Dumbledore had foreseen that…How much more had he known?

Harry lost track of time. He knew only that the darkness had lightened a few
degrees when he was rejoined by Ron and Dean. “How’s Hermione?” “Better,” said
Ron. “Fleur’s looking after her.” Harry had his retort ready for when they asked him
why he had not simply created a perfect grave with his wand, but he did not need it.
They jumped down into the hole he had made with spades of their own and together they
worked in silence until the hole seemed deep enough.

Harry wrapped the elf more snuggly in his jacket. Ron sat on the edge of the
grave and stripped off his shoes and socks, which he placed on the elf’s bare feet. Dean
produced a woolen hat, which Harry placed carefully upon Dobby’s head, muffling his
batlike ears. “We should close his eyes.”

Harry had not heard the others coming through the darkness. Bill was wearing a
traveling cloak, Fleur a large white apron, from the pocket of which protruded a bottle of
what Harry recognized to be Skele-Gro. Hermione was wrapped in a borrowed dressing
gown, pale and unsteady on her feet; Ron put an arm around her when she reached him.
Luna, who was huddled in one of Fleur’s coats, crouched down and placed her fingers
tenderly upon each of the elf’s eyelids, sliding them over his glassy stare. “There,” she
said softly. “Now he could be sleeping.”

Harry placed the elf into the grave, arranged his tiny limbs so that he might have
been resting, then climbed out and gazed for the last time upon the little body. He forced
himself not to break down as he remembered Dumbledore’s funeral, and the rows and
rows of golden chairs, and the Minister of Magic in the front row, the recitation of


Dumbledore’s achievements, the stateliness of the white marble tomb. He felt that
Dobby deserved just as grand a funeral, and yet here the elf lay between bushes in a
roughly dug hole. “I think we ought to say something,” piped up Luna. “I’ll go first,
shall I?”

And as everybody looked at her, she addressed the dead elf at the bottom of the
grave. “Thank you so much Dobby for rescuing me from that cellar. It’s so unfair that
you had to die when you were so good and brave. I’ll always remember what you did for
us. I hope you’re happy now.”

She turned and looked expectingly at Ron, who cleared his throat and said in a
thick voice, “yeah…thanks Dobby.” “Thanks,” muttered Dean. Harry swallowed.
“Good bye Dobby,” he said It was all he could manage, but Luna had said it all for him.
Bill raised his wand, and the pile of earth beside the grave rose up into the air and fell
neatly upon it, a small, reddish mound. “D’ya mind if I stay here a moment?” He asked
the others.

They murmured words he did not catch; he felt gentle pats upon his back, and
then they all traipsed back toward the cottage, leaving Harry alone beside the elf.

He looked around: There were a number of large white stones, smoothed by the
sea, marking the edge of the flower beds. He picked up one of the largest and laid it,
pillowlike, over the place where Dobby’s head now rested. He then felt in his pocket for
a wand. There were two in there. He had forgotten, lost track; he could not now
remember whose wands these were; he seemed to remember wrenching them out of
someone’s hand. He selected the shorter of the two, which felt friendlier in his hand, and
pointed it at the rock.

Slowly, under his murmured instruction, deep cuts appeared upon the rock’s
surface. He knew that Hermione could have done it more neatly, and probably more
quickly, but he wanted to mark the spot as he had wanted to dig the grave. When Harry
stood up again, the stone read: HERE LIES DOBBY, A FREE ELF.

He looked at his handiwork for a few more seconds, then walked away, his scar
still prickling a little, and his mind full of those things that had come to him in the grave,
ideas that had taken shape in the darkness, ideas both fascinating and terrible.

They were all sitting in the living room when he entered the little hall, their
attention focused upon Bill, who was talking. The room was light-colored, pretty, with a
small fire of driftwood burning brightly in the fireplace. Harry did not want to drop mud
upon the carpet, so he stood in the doorway, listening.

“…lucky that Ginny’s on holiday. If she’d been at Hogwarts they could have
taken her before we reached her. Now we know she’s safe too.” He looked around and
saw Harry standing there. “I’ve been getting them all out of the Burrow,” he explained.
“Moved them to Muriel’s. The Death Eaters know Ron’s with you now, they’re bound to
target the family –don’t apologize,” he added at the sight of Harry’s expression. “It was
always a matter of time, Dad’s been saying so for months. We’re the biggest blood
traitor family there is.”

“How are they protected?” asked Harry. “Fidelius Charm. Dad’s Secret-Keeper.
And we’ve done it on this cottage too; I’m Secret-Keeper here. None of us can go to
work, but that’s hardly the most important thing now. Once Ollivander and Griphook are
well enough, we’ll move them to Muriel’s too. There isn’t much room here, but she’s got


plenty. Griphook’s legs are on the mend. Fleur’s given him Skele-Gro-we could
probably move them in an hour or—“

“No,” Harry said and Bill looked startled. “I need both of them here. I need to
talk to them. It’s important.” He heard the authority of his own voice, the conviction, the
voice of purpose that had come to him as he dug Dobby’s grave. All of their faces were
turned toward him looking puzzled.

“I’m going to wash,” Harry told Bill looking down at his hands still covered with
mud and Dobby’s blood. “Then I’ll need to see them, straight away.” He walked into the
little kitchen, to the basin beneath a window overlooking the sea. Dawn was breaking
over the horizon, shell pink and faintly gold, as he washed, again following the train of
thought that had come to him in the dark garden…

Dobby would never be able to tell them who had sent him to the cellar, but Harry
knew what he had seen. A piercing blue eye had looked out of the mirror fragment, and
then help had come. Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it.

Harry dried his hands, impervious to the beauty of the scene outside the window
and to the murmuring of the others in the sitting room. He looked out over the ocean and
felt closer, this dawn, than ever before, closer to the heart of it all.

And still his scar prickled, and he knew that Voldemort was getting there too.
Harry understood and yet did not understand. His instinct was telling him one thing, his
brain quite another. The Dumbledore in Harry’s head smiled, surveying Harry over the
tips of his fingers, pressed together as if in prayer.

You gave Ron the Deluminator…You understood him…You gave him a way
back…

And you understood Wormtail too…You knew there was a bit of regret there,
somewhere…

And if you knew them…What did you know about me, Dumbledore?

Am I meant to know but not to seek? Did you know how hard I’d feel that? Is
that why you made it this difficult? So I’d have time to work that out?

Harry stood quite still, eyes glazed, watching the place where a bright gold ray of
dazzling sun was rising over the horizon. Then he looked down at his clean hands and
was momentarily surprised to see the cloth he was holding in them. He set it down and
returned to the hall, and as he did so, he felt his scar pulse angrily, and then flashed
across his mind, swift as the reflection of a dragonfly over water, the outline of a building
he knew extremely well.

Bill and Fleur were standing at the foot of the stairs.

“I need to speak to Griphook and Ollivander,” Harry said.

“No,” said Fleur. “You will ‘ave to wait, ‘Arry. Zey are both too tired –”

“I’m sorry,” he said without heat, “but it can’t wait. I need to talk to them now.
Privately – and separately. It’s urgent.”

“Harry, what the hell’s going on?” asked Bill. “You turn up here with a dead
house-elf and a half-conscious goblin, Hermione looks as though she’s been tortured, and
Ron’s just refused to tell me anything –”

“We can’t tell you what we’re doing,” said Harry flatly. “You’re in the Order, Bill,
you know Dumbledore left us a mission. We’re not supposed to talk about it to anyone
else.”


Fleur made an impatient noise, but Bill did not look at her; he was staring at
Harry. His deeply scarred face was hard to read. Finally, Bill said, “All right. Who do
you want to talk to first?”

Harry hesitated. He knew what hung on his decision. There was hardly any time
left; now was the moment to decide: Horcruxes or Hallows?

“Griphook,” Harry said. “I’ll speak to Griphook first.”

His heart was racing as if he had been sprinting and had just cleared an enormous
obstacle.

“Up here, then,” said Bill, leading the way.

Harry had walked up several steps before stopping and looking back.

“I need you two as well!” he called to Ron and Hermione, who had been skulking,
half concealed, in the doorway of the sitting room.

They both moved into the light, looking oddly relieved.

“How are you?” Harry asked Hermione. “You were amazing – coming up with
that story when she was hurting you like that –”

Hermione gave a weak smile as Ron gave her a one-armed squeeze.

“What are we doing now, Harry?” he asked.

“You’ll see. Come on.”

Harry, Ron, and Hermione followed Bill up the steep stairs onto a small landing.
Three doors led off it.

“In here,” said Bill, opening the door into his and Fleur’s room, it too had a view
of the sea, now flecked with gold in the sunrise. Harry moved to the window, turned his
back on the spectacular view, and waited, his arms folded, his scar prickling. Hermione
took the chair beside the dressing table; Ron sat on the arm.

Bill reappeared, carrying the little goblin, whom he set down carefully upon the
bed. Griphook grunted thanks, and Bill left, closing the door upon them all.

“I’m sorry to take you out of bed,” said Harry. “How are your legs?”

“Painful,” replied the goblin. “But mending.”

He was still clutching the sword of Gryffindor, and wore a strange look: half
truculent, half intrigued. Harry noted the goblin’s sallow skin, his long thin fingers, his
black eyes. Fleur had removed his shoes: His long feet were dirty. He was larger than a
house-elf, but not by much. His domed head was much bigger than a human’s.

“You probably don’t remember –” Harry began.

“—that I was the goblin who showed you to your vault, the first time you ever
visited Gringotts?” said Griphook. “I remember, Harry Potter. Even amongst goblins, you
are very famous.”

Harry and the goblin looked at each other, sizing each other up. Harry’s scar was
still prickling. He wanted to get through this interview with Griphook quickly, and at the
same time was afraid of making a false move. While he tried to decide on the best way to
approach his request, the goblin broke the silence.

“You buried the elf,” he said, sounding unexpectedly rancorous. “I watched you
from the window of the bedroom next door.”

“Yes,” said Harry.

Griphook looked at him out of the corners of his slanting black eyes.

“You are an unusual wizard, Harry Potter.”

“In what way?” asked Harry, rubbing his scar absently.


“You dug the grave.”

“So?”

Griphook did not answer. Harry rather thought he was being sneered at for acting
like a Muggle, but it did not matter to him whether Griphook approved of Dobby’s grave
or not. He gathered himself for the attack.

“Griphook, I need to ask –”

“You also rescued a goblin.”

“What?”

“You brought me here. Saved me.”

“Well, I take it you’re not sorry?” said Harry a little impatiently.

“No, Harry Potter,” said Griphook, and with one finger he twisted the thin black
beard upon his chin, “but you are a very odd wizard.”

“Right,” said Harry. “Well, I need some help, Griphook, and you can give it to
me.”

The goblin made no sign of encouragement, but continued to frown at Harry as
though he had never seen anything like him.

“I need to break into a Gringotts vault.”

Harry had not meant to say it so badly: the words were forced from him as pain
shot through his lightning scar and he saw, again, the outline of Hogwarts. He closed his
mind firmly. He needed to deal with Griphook first. Ron and Hermione were staring at
Harry as though he had gone mad.

“Harry –” said Hermione, but she was cut off by Griphook.

“Break into a Gringotts vault?” repeated the goblin, wincing a little as he shifted
his position upon the bed. “It is impossible.”

“No, it isn’t,” Ron contradicted him. “It’s been done.”

“Yeah,” said Harry. “The same day I first met you, Griphook. My birthday, seven
years ago.”

“The vault in question was empty at the time,” snapped the goblin, and Harry
understood that even though Griphook had let Gringotts, he was offended at the idea of
its defenses being breached. “Its protection was minimal.”

“Well, the vault we need to get into isn’t empty, and I’m guessing its protection
will be pretty powerful,” said Harry. “It belongs to the Lestranges.”

He saw Hermione and Ron look at each other, astonished, but there would be time
enough to explain after Griphook had given his answer.

“You have no chance,” said Griphook flatly. “No chance at all. If you seek
beneath our floors, a treasure that was never yours –”

“Thief, you have been warned, beware – yeah, I know, I remember,” said Harry.
“But I’m not trying to get myself any treasure, I’m not trying to take anything for
personal gain. Can you believe that?”

The goblin looked slantwise at Harry, and the lightning scar on Harry’s forehead
prickled, but he ignored it, refusing to acknowledge its pain or its invitation.

“If there was a wizard of whom I would believe that they did not seek personal
gain,” said Griphook finally, “it would be you, Harry Potter. Goblins and elves are not
used to the protection or the respect that you have shown this night. Not from wand-
carriers.”


“Wand-carriers,” repeated Harry: The phrase fell oddly upon his ears as his scar
prickled, as Voldemort turned his thoughts northward, and as Harry burned to question
Ollivander next door.

“The right to carry a wand,” said the goblin quietly, “has long been contested
between wizards and goblins.”

“Well, goblins can do magic without wands,” said Ron.

“That is immaterial! Wizards refuse to share the secrets of wand-lore with other
magical beings, they deny us the possibility of extending our powers!”

“Well, goblins won’t share any of their magic either,” said Ron. “You won’t tell
us how to make swords and armor the way you do. Goblins know how to work metal in a
way wizards have never –”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Harry, noting Griphook’s rising color. “This isn’t about
wizards versus goblins or any other sort of magical creature –”

Griphook gave a nasty laugh.

“But it is, it is precisely that! As the Dark Lord becomes ever more powerful,
your race is set still more firmly above mine! Gringotts falls under Wizarding rule,
house-elves are slaughtered, and who amongst the wand-carriers protests?”

“We do!” said Hermione. She had sat up straight, her eyes bright. “We protest!
And I’m hunted quite as much as any goblin or elf, Griphook! I’m a Mudblood!”

“Don’t call yourself –” Ron muttered.

“Why shouldn’t I?” said Hermione. “Mudblood, and proud of it! I’ve got no
higher position under this new order than you have, Griphook! It was me they chose to
torture, back at the Malfoys!”

As she spoke, she pulled aside the neck of the dressing gown to reveal the thin cut
Bellatrix had made, scarlet against her throat.

“Did you know that it was Harry who set Dobby free?” she asked. “Did you know
that we’ve wanted elves to be freed for years?” (Ron fidgeted uncomfortably on the arm
of Hermione’s chair.) “You can’t want You-Know-Who defeated more than we do,
Griphook!”

The goblin gazed at Hermione with the same curiousity he had shown Harry.

“What do you seek within the Lestranges’ vault?” he asked abruptly. “The sword
that lies inside it is a fake. This is the real one.” He looked from one to the other of them.
“I think that you already know this. You asked me to lie for you back there.”

“But the fake sword isn’t the only thing in that vault, is it?” asked Harry. “Perhaps
you’ve seen other things in there?”

His heart was pounding harder than ever. He redoubled his efforts to ignore the
pulsing of his scar.

The goblin twisted his beard around his finger again.

“It is against our code to speak of the secrets of Gringotts. We are the guardians
of fabulous treasures. We have a duty to the objects placed in our care, which were, so
often, wrought by our fingers.”

The goblin stroked the sword, and his black eyes roved from Harry to Hermione
to Ron and then back again.

“So young,” he said finally, “to be fighting so many.”

“Will you help us?” said Harry. “We haven’t got a hope of breaking in without a
goblin’s help. You’re our one chance.”


“I shall . . . think about it,” said Griphook maddeningly.

“But –” Ron started angrily; Hermione nudged him in the ribs.

“Thank you,” said Harry.

The goblin bowed his great domed head in acknowledgement, then flexed his
short legs.

“I think,” he said, settling himself ostentatiously upon Bill and Fleur’s bed, “that
the Skele-Gro has finished its work. I may be able to sleep at last. Forgive me. . . .”

“Yeah, of course,” said Harry, but before leaving the room he leaned forward and
took the sword of Gryffindor from beside the goblin. Griphook did not protest, but Harry
thought he saw resentment in the goblin’s eyes as he closed the door upon him.

“Little git,” whispered Ron. “He’s enjoying keeping us hanging.”

“Harry,” whispered Hermione, pulling them both away from the door, into the
middle of the still-dark landing, “are you saying what I think you’re saying? Are you
saying there’s a Horcrux in the Lestranges vault?”

“Yes,” said Harry. “Bellatrix was terrified when she thought we’d been in there,
she was beside herself. Why? What did she think we’d seen, what else did she think we
might have taken? Something she was petrified You-Know-Who would find out about.”

“But I thought we were looking for places You-Know-Who’s been, places he’s
done something important?” said Ron, looking baffled. “Was he ever inside the
Lestranges’ vault?”

“I don’t know whether he was ever inside Gringotts,” said Harry. “He never had
gold there when he was younger, because nobody left him anything. He would have seen
the bank from the outside, though, the first time he ever went to Diagon Alley.”

Harry’s scar throbbed, but he ignored it; he wanted Ron and Hermione to
understand about Gringotts before they spoke to Ollivander.

“I think he would have envied anyone who had a key to a Gringotts vault. I think
he’d have seen it as a real symbol of belonging to the Wizarding world. And don’t forget,
he trusted Bellatrix and her husband. They were his most devoted servants before he fell,
and they went looking for him after he vanished. He said it night he came back, I heard
him.”

Harry rubbed his scar.

“I don’t think he’d have told Bellatrix it was a Horcrux, though. He never told
Lucius Malfoy the truth about the diary. He probably told her it was a treasured
possession and asked her to place it in her vault. The safest place in the world for
anything you want to hide, Hagrid told me. . . except for Hogwarts.”

When Harry had finished speaking, Ron shook his head.

“You really understand him.”

“Bits of him,” said Harry. “Bits . . . I just wish I’d understood Dumbledore as
much. But we’ll see. Come on – Ollivander now.”

Ron and Hermione looked bewildered but very impressed as they followed him
across the little landing and knocked upon the door opposite Bill and Fleur’s. A weak
“Come in!” answered them.

The wandmaker was lying on the twin bed farthest from the window. He had been
held in the cellar for more than a year, and tortured, Harry knew, on at least one occasion.
He was emaciated, the bones of his face sticking out sharply against the yellowish skin.
His great silver eyes seemed vast in their sunken sockets. The hands that lay upon the


blanket could have belonged to a skeleton. Harry sat down on the empty bed, beside Ron
and Hermione. The rising sun was not visible here. The room faced the cliff-top garden
and the freshly dug grave.

“Mr. Ollivander, I’m sorry to disturb you,” Harry said.

“My dear boy,” Ollivander’s voice was feeble. “You rescued us, I thought we
would die in that place, I can never thank you . . . never thank you . . . enough.”

“We were glad to do it.”

Harry’s scar throbbed. He knew, he was certain, that there was hardly any time
left in which to beat Voldemort to his goal, or else to attempt to thwart him. He felt a
flutter of panic . . . yet he had made his decision when he chose to speak to Griphook first.
Feigning a calm he did not feel, he groped in the pouch around his neck and took out the
two halves of his broken wand.

“Mr. Ollivander, I need some help.”

“Anything. Anything.” Said the wandmaker weakly.

“Can you mend this? Is it possible?”

Ollivander held out a trembling hand, and Harry placed the two barely connected
halves in his palm.

“Holly and phoenix feather,” said Ollivander in a tremulous voice. “Eleven inches.
Nice and supple.”

“Yes,” said Harry. “Can you -- ?”

“No,” whispered Ollivander. “I am sorry, very sorry, but a wand that has suffered
this degree of damage cannot be repaired by any means that I know of.”

Harry had been braced to hear it, but it was a blow nevertheless. He took the wand
halves back and replaced them in the pouch around his neck. Ollivander stared at the
place where the shattered wand had vanished, and did not look away until Harry had
taken from his pocket the two wands he had brought from the Malfoys’.

“Can you identify these?” Harry asked.

The wandmaker took the first of the wands and held it close to his faded eyes,
rolling it between his knobble-knuckled fingers, flexing it slightly.

“Walnut and dragon heartstring,” he said. “Twelve-and-three-quarter inches.
Unyielding. This wand belonged to Bellatrix Lestrange.”

“And this one?”

Ollivander performed the same examination.

“Hawthorn and unicorn hair. Ten inches precisely. Reasonably springy. This was
the wand of Draco Malfoy.”

“Was?” repeated Harry. “Isn’t it still his?”

“Perhaps not. If you took it –”

“—I did – ”

“—then it may be yours. Of course, the manner of taking matters. Much also
depends upon the wand itself. In general, however, where a wand has been won, its
allegiance will change.”

There was a silence in the room, except for the distant rushing of the sea.

“You talk about wands like they’ve got feelings,” said Harry, “like they can think
for themselves.”

“The wand chooses the wizard,” said Ollivander. “That much has always been
clear to those of us who have studied wandlore.”


“A person can still use a wand that hasn’t chosen them, though?” asked Harry.

“Oh yes, if you are any wizard at all you will be able to channel your magic
through almost any instrument. The best results, however, must always come where there
is the strongest affinity between wizard and wand. These connections are complex. An
initial attraction, and then a mutual quest for experience, the wand learning from the
wizard, the wizard from the wand.”

The sea gushed forward and backward; it was a mournful sound.
“I took this wand from Draco Malfoy by force,” said Harry. “Can I use it safely?”

“I think so. Subtle laws govern wand ownership, but the conquered wand will
usually bend its will to its new master.”

“So I should use this one?” said Ron, pulling Wormtail’s wand out of his pocket
and handing it to Ollivander.

“Chestnut and dragon heartstring. Nine-and-a-quarter inches. Brittle. I was forced
to make this shortly after my kidnapping, for Peter Pettigrew. Yes, if you won it, it is
more likely to do your bidding, and do it well, than another wand.”

“And this holds true for all wands, does it?” asked Harry.

“I think so,” replied Ollivander, his protuberant eyes upon Harry’s face. “You ask
deep questions, Mr. Potter. Wandlore is a complex and mysterious branch of magic.”

“So, it isn’t necessary to kill the previous owner to take the possession of a
wand?” asked Harry.

Ollivander swallowed.

“Necessary? No, I should not say that it is necessary to kill.”

“There are legends, though,” said Harry, and as his heart rate quickened, the pain
in his scar became more intense; he was sure that Voldemort has decided to put his idea
into action. “Legends about a wand – or wands – that have been passed from hand to
hand by murder.”

Ollivander turned pale. Against the snowy pillow he was light gray, and his eyes
were enormous, bloodshot, and bulging with what looked like fear.

“Only one wand, I think,” he whispered.

“And You-Know-Who is interested in it, isn’t he?” asked Harry.

“I – how?” croaked Ollivander, and he looked appealingly at Ron and Hermione
for help. “How do you know this?”

“He wanted you to tell him how to overcome the connection between our wands,”
said Harry.

Ollivander looked terrified.

“He tortured me, you must understand that! The Cruciatus Curse, I – I had no
choice but to tell him what I knew, what I guessed!”

“I understand,” said Harry. “You told him about the twin cores? You said he just
had to borrow another wizard’s wand?”

Ollivander looked horrified, transfixed, by the amount that Harry knew. He
nodded slowly.

“But it didn’t work,” Harry went on. “Mine still beat the borrowed wand. Do you
know why that is?”

Ollivander shook his head slowly as he had just nodded.


“I had . . . never heard of such a thing. Your wand performed something unique
that night. The connection of the twin cores is incredibly rare, yet why your wand would
have snapped the borrowed wand, I do not know. . . .

“We were talking about the other wand, the wand that changes hands by murder.
When You-Know-Who realized my wand had done something strange, he came back and
asked about that other wand, didn’t he?”

“How do you know this?”

Harry did not answer.

“Yes, he asked,” whispered Ollivander. “He wanted to know everything I could
tell him about the wand variously known as the Deathstick, the Wand of Destiny, or the
Elder Wand.”

Harry glanced sideways at Hermione. She looked flaggergasted.

“The Dark Lord,” said Ollivander in hushed and frightened tones, “had always
been happy with the wand I made him – yes and phoenix feather, thirteen-and-a-half
inches. – until he discovered the connection of the twin cores. Now he seeks another,
more powerful wand, as the only way to conquer yours.”

“But he’ll know soon, if he doesn’t already, that mine’s broken beyond repair,”
said Harry quietly.

“No!” said Hermione, sounding frightened. “He can’t know that, Harry, how
could he --?”

“Priori Incantatem,” said Harry. “We left your wand and the blackthorn wand at
the Malfoys’, Hermione. If they examine them properly, make them re-create the spells
they’ve cast lately, they’d see that yours broke mine, they’ll see that you tried and failed
to mend it, and they’ll realize that I’ve been using the blackthorn one ever since.”

The little color she had regained since their arrival had drained from her face. Ron
gave Harry a reproachful look, and said, “Let’s not worry about that now ---”

But Mr. Ollivander intervened.

“The Dark Lord no longer seeks the Elder Wand only for your destruction, Mr.
Potter. He is determined to possess it because he believes it will make him truly
invulnerable.”

“And will it?”

“The owner of the Elder Wand must always fear attack,” said Ollivander, “but the
idea of the Dark Lord in possession of the Deathstick is, I must admit . . . formidable.”

Harry was suddenly reminded of how unsure, when they first met, of how much
he like Ollivander. Even now, having been tortured and imprisoned by Voldemort, the
idea of the Dark Wizard in possession of this wand seemed to enthrall him as much as it
repulsed him.

“You – you really think this wand exists, then, Mr. Ollivander?” asked Hermione.

“Oh yes,” said Ollivander. “Yes, it is perfectly possible to trace the wand’s course
through history. There are gaps, of, course, and long ones, where it vanishes from view,
temporarily lost or hidden; but always it resurfaces. It has certain identifying
characteristics that those who are learned in wandlore recognize. There are written
accounts, some of them obscure, that I and other wandmakers have made it our business
to study. They have the ring of authenticity.”

“So you – you don’t think it can be a fairy tale or a myth?” Hermione asked
hopefully.


“No,” said Ollivander. “Whether it needs to pass by murder, I do not know. Its
history is bloody, but that may be simply due to the fact that it is such a desirable object,
and arouses such passions in wizards. Immensely powerful, dangerous in the wrong
hands, and an object of incredible fascination to all of us who study the power of wands.”

“Mr. Ollivander,” said Harry, “you told You-Know-Who that Gregorovitch had
the Elder Wand, didn’t you?”

Ollivander turned, if possible, even paler. He looked ghostly as he gulped.

“But how – how do you -- ?”

“Never mind how I know it,” said Harry, closing his eyes momentarily as his scar
burned and he saw, for mere seconds, a vision of the main street in Hogsmeade, still dark,
because it was so much farther north. “You told You-Know-Who that Gregorovitch had
the wand?”

“It was a rumor,” whispered Ollivander. “A rumor, years and years ago, long
before you were born I believe Gregorovitch himself started it. You can see how good it
would be for business; that he was studying and duplicating the qualities of the Elder
Wand!”

“Yes, I can see that,” said Harry. He stood up. “Mr. Ollivander, one last thing, and
then we’ll let you get some rest. What do you know about the Deathly Hallows?”

“The – the what?” asked the wandmaker, looking utterly bewildered.

“The Deathly Hallows.”

“I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about. Is this still something to do
with wands?”

Harry looked into the sunken face and believed that Ollivander was not acting. He
did not know about the Hallows.

“Thank you,” said Harry. “Thank you very much. We’ll leave you to get some
rest now.”

Ollivander looked stricken.

“He was torturing me!” he gasped. “The Cruciatus Curse . . . you have no
idea. . . .”

“I do,” said Harry, “I really do. Please get some rest. Thank you for telling me all
of this.”

He led Ron and Hermione down the staircase. Harry caught glimpses of Bill,
Fleur, Luna, and Dean sitting at the table in the kitchen, cups of tea in front of them. They
all looked up at Harry as he appeared in the doorway, but he merely nodded to them and
continued into the garden, Ron and Hermione behind him. The reddish mound of earth
that covered Dobby lay ahead, and Harry walked back to it, as the pain in his head built
more and more powerfully. It was a huge effort now to close down the visions that were
forcing themselves upon him, but he knew that he would have to resist only a little longer.
He would yield very soon, because he needed to know that his theory was right. He must
make only one more short effort, so that he could explain to Ron and Hermione.

“Gregorovitch had the Elder Wand a long time ago,” he said, “I saw You-Know-
Who trying to find him. When he tracked him down, he found that Gregorovitch didn’t
have it anymore: It was stolen from him by Grindelwald. How Grindelwald found out
that Gregorovitch had it, I don’t know – but if Gregorovitch was stupid enough to spread
the rumor, it can’t have been that difficult.”


Voldemort was at the gates of Hogwarts; Harry could see him standing there, and
see too the lamp bobbing in the pre-dawn, coming closer and closer.

“And Grindelwald used the Elder Wand to become powerful. And at the height of
his power, when Dumbledore knew he was the only one who could stop him, he dueled
Grindelwald and beat him, and he took the Elder Wand.”

“Dumbledore had the Elder Wand?” said Ron. “But then – where is it now?”

“At Hogwarts,” said Harry, fighting to remain with them in the cliff-top garden.

“But then, let’s go!” said Ron urgently. “Harry, let’s go and get it before he
does!”

“It’s too late for that,” said Harry. He could not help himself, but clutched his
head, trying to help it resist. “He knows where it is. He’s there now.”

“Harry!” Ron said furiously. “How long have you known this – why have we
been wasting time? Why did you talk to Griphook first? We could have gone – we could
still go –”

“No,” said Harry, and he sank to his knees in the grass. “Hermione’s right.
Dumbledore didn’t want me to have it. He didn’t want me to take it. He wanted me to get
the Horcruxes.”

“The unbeatable wand, Harry!” moaned Ron.

“I’m not supposed to . . . I’m supposed to get the Horcruxes. . . .”

And now everything was cool and dark: The sun was barely visible over the
horizon as he glided alongside Snape, up through the grounds toward the lake.

“I shall join you in the castle shortly,” he said in his high, cold voice. “Leave me
now.”

Snape bowed and set off back up the path, his black cloak billowing behind him.
Harry walked slowly, waiting for Snape’s figure to disappear. It would not do for Snape,
or indeed anyone else, to see where he was going. But there were no lights in the castle
windows, and he could conceal himself . . . and in a second he had cast upon himself a
Disillusionment Charm that hid him even from his own eyes.

And he walked on, around the edge of the lake, taking in the outlines of the
beloved castle, his first kingdom, his birthright. . . .

And here it was, beside the lake, reflected in the dark waters. The white marble
tomb, an unnecessary blot on the familiar landscape. He felt again that rush of controlled
euphoria, that heady sense of purpose in destruction. He raised the old yew wand: How
fitting that this would be its last great act.

The tomb split open from head to foot. The shrouded figure was as long as thin as
it had been in life. He raised the wand again.

The wrappings fell open. The face was translucent, pale, sunken, yet almost
perfectly preserved. They had left his spectacles on the crooked nose: He felt amused
derision. Dumbledore’s hands were folded upon his chest, and there it lay, clutched
beneath them, buried with him.

Had the old fool imagined that marble or death would protect the wand? Had he
thought that the Dark Lord would be scared to violate his tomb? The spiderlike hand
swooped and pulled the wand from Dumbledore’s grasp, and as he took it, a shower of
sparks flew from its tip, sparkling over the corpse of its last owner, ready to serve a new
master at last.








Chapter Twenty-Five

Shell Cottage



Bill and Fleur's cottage stood alone on a cliff overlooking the sea, its walls embedded
with shells and whitewashed. It was a lonely and beautiful place. Wherever Harry went
inside the tiny cottage or its garden, he could hear the constant ebb and flow of the sea,
like the breathing of some great, slumbering creature. He spent much of the next few
days making excuses to escape the crowded cottage, craving the cliff-top view of open
sky and wide, empty sea, and the feel of cold, salty wind on his face.

The enormity of his decision not to race Voldemort to the wand still scared Harry. He
could not remember, ever before, choosing /not/ to act. He was full of doubts, doubts that
Ron could not help voicing whenever they were together.

"What if Dumbledore wanted us to work out the symbol in time to get the wand?" "What
if working out what the symbol meant made you 'worthy' to get the Hallows?" "Harry, if
that really is the Elder Wand, how the hell are we supposed to finish off You-Know-
Who?"

Harry had no answers: There were moments when he wondered whether it had been
outright madness not to try to prevent Voldemort breaking open the tomb. He could not
even explain satisfactorily why he had decided against it: Every time he tried to
reconstruct the internal arguments that had led to his decision, they sounded feebler to
him.

The odd thing was that Hermione's support made him feel just as confused as Ron's
doubts. Now forced to accept that the Elder Wand was real, she maintained that it was an
evil object, and that the way Voldemort had taken possession of it was repellent, not to be
considered.

"You could never have done that, Harry," she said again and again. "You couldn't have
broken into Dumbledore's grave."

But the idea of Dumbledore's corpse frightened Harry much less than the possibility that
he might have misunderstood the living Dumbledore's intentions. He felt that he was still
groping in the dark; he had chosen his path but kept looking back, wondering whether he
had misread the signs, whether he should not have taken the other way. From time to time,
anger at Dumbledore crashed over him again, powerful as the waves slamming
themselves against the cliff beneath the cottage, anger that Dumbledore had not explained
before he died.

"But /is/ he dead?" said Ron, three days after they had arrived at the cottage. Harry had
been staring out over the wall that separated the cottage garden from the cliff when Ron
and Hermione had found him; he wished they had not, having no wish to join in with
their argument.

"Yes, he is. Ron, /please" don't start that again!"

"Look at the facts, Hermione," said Ron, speaking across Harry, who continued to gaze at
the horizon. "The solve doe. The sword. The eye Harry saw in the mirror --"


"Harry admits he could have imagined the eye! Don't you, Harry?"

"I could have," said Harry without looking at her.

"But you don't thing you did, do you?" asked Ron.

"No, I don't," said Harry.

"There you go!" said Ron quickly, before Hermione could carry on. "If it wasn't
Dumbledore, explain how Dobby knew we were in the cellar, Hermione?"

"I can't -- but can you explain how Dumbledore sent him to us if he's lying in a tomb at
Hogwarts?"

"I dunno, it could've been his ghost!"

"Dumbledore wouldn't come back as a ghost," said Harry. There was little about
Dumbledore he was sure of now, but he knew that much. "He would have gone on."

"What d'you mean, 'gone on'?" asked Ron, but before Harry could say any more, a voice
behind them said, "'Arry?"

Fleur had come out of the cottage, her long silver hair flying in the breeze.

"'Arry, Grip'ook would like to speak to you. 'E eez in ze smallest bedroom, 'e says 'e does
not want to be over'eard."

Her dislike of the goblin sending her to deliver messages was clear; she looked irritable
as she walked back around the house.

Griphook was waiting for them, as Fleur had said, in the tiniest of the cottage's three
bedrooms, in which Hermione and Luna slept by night. He had drawn the red cotton
curtains against the bright, cloudy sky, which gave the room a fiery glow at odds with the
rest of the airy, light cottage.

"I have reached my decision, Harry Potter," said the goblin, who was sitting cross-legged
in a low chair, drumming its arms with his spindly fingers. "Though the goblins of
Gringotts will consider it base treachery, I have decided to help you --"

"That's great!" said Harry, relief surging through him. "Griphook, thank you, we're really
--"

"-- in return," said the goblin firmly, "for payment."

Slightly taken aback, Harry hesitated.

"How much do you want? I've got gold."

"Not gold," said Griphook. "I have gold."

His black eyes glittered; there were no whites to his eyes.

"I want the sword. The sword of Godric Gryffindor."

Harry's spirits plummeted.

"You can't have that," he said. "I'm sorry."

"Then," said the goblin softly, "we have a problem."

"We can give you something else," said Ron eagerly. "I'll bet the Lestranges have got
loads of stuff, you can take your pick once we get into the vault."

He had said the wrong thing. Griphook flushed angrily.

"I am not a thief, boy! I am not trying to procure treasures to which I have no right!"

"The sword's ours --"

"it is not," said the goblin.

"We're Gryffindors, and it was Godric Gryffindor's --"

"And before it was Gryffindor's, whose was it?" demanded the goblin, sitting up straight.

"No one's," said Ron. "It was made for him, wasn't it?"


"No!" cried the goblin, bristling with anger as he pointed a long finger at Ron.
"Wizarding arrogance again! That sword was Ragnuk the First's, taken from him by
Godric Gryffindor! It is a _____ _________, a masterpiece of goblinwork! It belongs
with the gobl___. The sword is the price of my hire, take it or leave it!"

Griphook glared at them. Harry glanced at the other ____, then said, "We need to discuss
this, Griphook, if that's all right. Could you give us a few minutes?"

The goblin nodded, looking sour.

Downstairs in the empty sitting room, Harry walked to the fireplace, brow furrowed,
trying to think what to do. Behind him, Ron said, "He's having a laugh. We can't let him
have that sword."

"It is true?" Harry asked Hermione. "Was the sword stolen by Gryffindor?"

"I don't know," she said hopelessly. "Wizarding history often skates over what the
wizards have done to other magical races, but there's no account that I know of that says
Gryffindor stole the sword."

"It'll be one of those goblin stories," said Ron, "about how the wizards are always trying
to get one over on them. I suppose we should think ourselves lucky he hasn't asked for
one of our wands."

"Goblins have got good reason to dislike wizards, Ron." said Hermione. "They've been
treated brutally in the past."

"Goblins aren't exactly fluffy little bunnies, though, are they?" said Ron. "They've killed
plenty of us. They've fought dirty too."

"But arguing with Griphook about whose race is most underhanded and violent isn't
going to make him more likely to help us, is it?"

There was a pause while they tried to think of a way around the problem. Harry looked
out of the window at Dobby's grave. Luna was arranging sea lavender in a jam jar beside
the headstone.

"Okay," said Ron, and Harry turned back to face him, "how's this? We tell Griphook we
need the sword until we get inside the _____ and then he can have it. There's a fake in
these, isn't there? We switch them, and give him the fake."

"Ron, he'd know the difference better than we would!" said Hermione. "He's the only one
who realized there had been a swap!"

"Yeah, but we could _ca_per before he realizes --"

He quailed beneath the look Hermione was giving him.

"That," she said quietly, "is despicable. Ask for his help, then double-cross him? And you
wonder why goblins don't like wizards, Ron?"

Ron's ears had turned red.

"All right, all right! It was the only thing I could think of! What's your solution, then?"

"We need to offer him something else, something just as valuable."

"Brilliant, I'll go and get one of our ancient goblin-made swords and you can gift wrap
it."

Silence fell between them again. Harry was sure that the goblin would accept nothing but
the sword, even if they had something as valuable to offer him. Yet the sword was their
one, indispensable weapon against the Horcruxes.

He closed his eyes for a moment or two and listened to the rush of the sea. The idea that
Gryffindor might have stolen the sword was unpleasant to him: He had always been


proud to be a Gryffindor; Gryffindor had been the champion of Muggle-borns, the wizard
who had clashed with the pureblood-loving Slytherin....

"Maybe he's lying," Harry said, opening his eyes again. "Griphook. Maybe Gryffindor
didn't take the sword. How do we know the goblin version of history's right?"

"Does it make a difference?" asked Hermione.

"Changes how I feel about it," said Harry.

He took a deep breath.

"We'll tell him he can have the sword after he's helped us get into that vault -- but we'll be
careful to avoid telling him exactly /when/ he can have it."

A grin spread slowly across Ron's face. Hermione, however, looked alarmed.

"Harry, we can't --"

"He can have it," Harry went on, "after we've used it on all of the Horcruxes. I'll make
sure he gets it then. I'll keep my word."

"But that could be years!" said Hermione.

"I know that, but /he/ needn't. I won't be lying... really."

Harry met her eyes with a mixture of defiance and shame. He remembered the words that
had been engraved over the gateway to Nurmengard: FOR THE GREATER GOOD. He
pushed the idea away. What choice did they have?

"I don't like it," said Hermione.

"Nor do I, much," Harry admitted.

"Well, I think it's genius," said Ron, standing up again. "Let's go and tell him."

Back in the smallest bedroom, Harry made the offer, careful to phrase it so as not to give
any definite time for the handover of the sword. Hermione frowned at the floor while he
was speaking; he felt irritated at her, afraid that she might give the game away. However,
Griphook had eyes for nobody but Harry.

"I have your word, Harry Potter, that you will give me the sword of Gryffindor if I help
you?"

"Yes," said Harry.

"Then shake," said the goblin, holding out his hand.

Harry took it and shook. He wondered whether those black eyes saw any misgivings in
his own. Then Griphook relinquished him, clapped his hands together, and said, "So. We
begin!"

It was like planning to break into the Ministry all over again. They settled to work in the
smallest bedroom, which was kept, according to Griphook's preference, in semidarkness.

"I have visited the Lestranges' vault only once," Griphook told them, "on the occasion I
was told to place inside it the false sword. It is one of the most ancient chambers. The
oldest Wizarding families store their treasures at the deepest level, where the vaults are
largest and best protected...."

They remained shut in the cupboardlike room for hours at a time. Slowly the days
stretched into weeks. There was problem after problem to overcome, not least of which
was that their store of Polyjuice Potion was greatly depleted.

"There's really only enough left for one of us," said Hermione, tilting the thick mudlike
potion against the lamplight.

"That'll be enough," said Harry, who was examining Griphook's hand-drawn map of the
deepest passageways.


The other inhabitants of Shell Cottage could hardly fail to notice that something was
going on now that Harry, Ron and Hermione only emerged for mealtimes. Nobody asked
questions, although Harry often felt Bill's eyes on the three of them at the table,
thoughtful, concerned.

The longer they spent together, the more Harry realized that he did not much like the
goblin. Griphook was unexpectedly bloodthirsty, laughed at the idea of pain in lesser
creatures and seemed to relish the possibility that they might have to hurt other wizards to
reach the Lestranges' vault. Harry could tell that his distaste was shared by the other two,
but they did not discuss it. They needed Griphook.

The goblin ate only grudgingly with the rest of them. Even after his legs had mended, he
continued to request trays of food in his room, like the still-frail Ollivander, until Bill
(following an angry outburst from Fleur) went upstairs to tell him that the arrangement
could not continue. Thereafter Griphook joined them at the overcrowded table, although
he refused to eat the same food, insisting, instead, on lumps of raw meat, roots, and
various fungi.

Harry felt responsible: It was, after all, he who had insisted that the goblin remain at Shell
Cottage so that he could question him; his fault that the whole Weasley family had been
driven into hiding, that Bill, Fred, George, and Mr. Weasley could no longer work.

"I'm sorry," he told Fleur, one blustery April evening as he helped her prepare dinner. "I
never meant you to have to deal with all of this."

She had just set some knives to work, chipping up steaks for Griphook and Bill, who had
preferred his meat bloody ever since he had been attacked by Greyback. While the knives
sliced behind her, her somewhat irritable expression softened.

"'Arry, you saved my sister's life, I do not forget."

This was not, strictly speaking, true, but Harry decided against reminding her that
Gabrielle had never been in real danger.

"Anyway," Fleur went on, pointing her want at a pot of sauce on the stove, which began
to bubble at once, "Mr. Ollivander leaves for Muriel's zis evening. Zat will make zings
easier. Ze goblin," she scowled a little at the mention of him, "can move downstairs, and
you, Ron, and Dean can take zat room."

"We don't mind sleeping in the living room," said Harry, who knew that Griphook would
thing poorly of having to sleep on the sofa; keeping Griphook happy was essential to
their plans. "Don't worry about us." And when she tried to protest he went on, "We'll be
off your hands soon too, Ron, Hermione, and I. We won't need to be here much longer."

"But, what do you mean?" she said, frowning at him, her wand pointing at the casserole
dish now suspended in midair. "Of course you must not leave, you are safe 'ere!"

She looked rather like Mrs. Weasley as she said it, and he was glad that the back door
opened at that moment. Luna and Dean entered, their hair damp from the rain outside and
their arms full of driftwood.

"... and tiny little ears," Luna was saying, "a bit like hippo's, Daddy says, only purple and
hairy. And if you want to call them, you have to hum; they prefer a waltz, nothing too
fast...."

Looking uncomfortable, Dean shrugged at Harry as he passed, following Luna into the
combined dining and sitting room where Ron and Hermione were laying the dinner table.
Seizing the chance to escape Fleur's questions, Harry grabbed two jugs of pumpkin juice
and followed them.


"... and if you ever come to our house I'll be able to show you the horn, Daddy wrote to
me about it but I haven't seen it yet, because the Death Eaters took me from the Hogwarts
Express and I never got home for Christmas," Luna was saying, as she and Dean relit the
fire.

"Luna, we told you," Hermione called over to her. "That horn exploded. It came from an
Erumpent, not a Crumple-Horned Snorkack --"

"No, it was definitely a Snorkack horn," said Luna serenely, "Daddy told me. It will
probably have re-formed by now, they mend themselves, you know."

Hermione shook her head and continued laying down forks as Bill appeared, leading Mr.
Ollivander down the stairs. The wandmaker still looked exceptionally frail, and he clung
to Bill's arm as the latter supported him, carrying a large suitcase.

"I'm going to miss you, Mr. Ollivander," said Luna, approaching the old man.

"And I you, my dear," said Ollivander, patting her on the shoulder.

"You were an inexpressible comfort to me in that terrible place."

"So, au revoir, Mr. Ollivander," said Fleur, kissing him on both cheeks. "And I wonder
whezzer you could oblige me by delivering a package to Bill's Auntie Murie!? I never
returned 'er tiara."

"It will be an honor," said Ollivander with a little bow, "the very least I can do in return
for your generous hospitality."

Fleur drew out a worn velvet case, which she opened to show the wandmaker. The tiara
sat glittering and twinkling in the light from the low-hanging lamp.

"Moonstones and diamonds," said Griphook, who had sidled into the room without Harry
noticing. "Made by goblins, I think?"

"And paid for by wizards," said Bill quietly, and the goblin shot him a look that was both
furtive and challenging.

A strong wind gusted against the cottage windows as Bill and Ollivander set off into the
night. The rest of them squeezed in around the table; elbow to elbow and with barely
enough room to move, they started to eat. The fire crackled and popped in the grate
beside them. Fleur, Harry noticed, was merely playing with her food; she glanced at the
window every few minutes; however, Bill returned before they had finished their first
course, his long hair tangled by the wind.

"Everything's fine," he told Fleur. "Ollivander settled in, Mum and Dad say hello. Ginny
sends you all her love, Fred and George are driving Muriel up the wall, they're still
operating an Owl-Order business out of her back room. It cheered her up to have her tiara
back, though. She said she thought we'd stolen it."

"Ah, she eez charmant, your aunt," said Fleur crossly, waving her wand and causing the
dirty plates to rise and form a stack in midair. She caught them and marched out of the
room.

"Daddy's made a tiara," piped up Luna, "Well, more of a crown, really."

Ron caught Harry's eye and grinned; Harry knew that he was remembering the ludicrous
headdress they had seen on their visit to Xenophilius.

"Yes, he's trying to re-create the lost diadem of Ravenclaw. He thinks he's identified most
of the main elements now. Adding the billywig wings really made a difference --"

There was a bang on the front door. Everyone's head turned toward it. Fleur came
running out of the kitchen, looking frightened; Bill jumped to his feed, his wand pointing


at the door; Harry, Ron, and Hermione did the same. Silently Griphook slipped beneath
the table, out of sight.

"Who is it?" Bill called.

"It is I, Remus John Lupin!" called a voice over the howling wind. Harry experienced a
thrill of fear; what had happened? "I am a werewolf, married to Nymphadora Tonks, and
you, the Secret-Keeper of Shell Cottage, told me the address and bade me come in an
emergency!"

"Lupin," muttered Bill, and he ran to the door and wrenched it open.

Lupin fell over the threshold. He was white-faced, wrapped in a traveling cloak, his
graying hair windswept. He straightened up, looked around the room, making sure of
who was there, then cried aloud, "It's a boy! We've named him Ted, after Dora's father!"

Hermione shrieked.

"Wha --? Tonks -- Tonks has had the baby?"

"Yes, yes, she's had the baby!" shouted Lupin. All around the table came cries of delight,
sighs of relief: Hermione and Fleur both squealed, "Congratulations!" and Ron said,
"Blimey, a baby!" as if he had never heard of such a thing before.

"Yes -- yes -- a boy," said Lupin again, who seemed dazed by his own happiness. He
strode around the table and hugged Harry; the scene in the basement of Grimmauld Place
might never have happened.

"You'll be godfather?" he said as he released Harry.

"M-me?" stammered Harry.

"You, yes, of course -- Dora quite agrees, no one better --"

"I -- yeah -- blimey --"

Harry felt overwhelmed, astonished, delighted; now Bill was hurrying to fetch wine, and
Fleur was persuading Lupin to join them for a drink.

"I can't stay long, I must get back," said Lupin, beaming around at them all: He looked
years younger than Harry had ever seen him. "Thank you, thank you, Bill"

Bill had soon filled all of their goblets, they stood and raised them high in a toast.

"To Teddy Remus Lupin," said Lupin, "a great wizard in the making!"

"'Oo does 'e look like?" Fleur inquired.

"I think he looks like Dora, but she thinks he is like me. Not much hair. It looked black
when he was born, but I swear it's turned ginger in the hour since. Probably blond by the
time I get back. Andromeda says Tonks's hair started changing color the day that she was
born." He drained his goblet. "Oh, go on then, just one more," he added, beaming, as Bill
made to fill it again.

The wind buffeted the little cottage and the fire leapt and crackled, and Bill was soon
opening another bottle of wine. Lupin's news seemed to have taken them out of
themselves, removed them for a while from their state of siege: Tidings of new life were
exhilarating. Only the goblin seemed untouched by the suddenly festive atmosphere, and
after a while he slunk back to the bedroom he now occupied alone. Harry thought he was
the only one who had noticed this, until he saw Bill's eyes following the goblin up the
stairs.

"No... no... I really must get back," said Lupin at last, declining yet another goblet of
wine. He got to his feet and pulled his traveling cloak back around himself.

"Good-bye, good-bye -- I'll try and bring some pictures in a few day's time -- they'll all be
so glad to know that I've seen you --"


He fastened his cloak and made his farewells, hugging the women and grasping hands
with the men, then, still beaming, returned into the wild night.

"Godfather, Harry!" said Bill as they walked into the kitchen together, helping clear the
table. "A real honor! Congratulations!"

As Harry set down the empty goblets he was carrying, Bill pulled the door behind him
closed, shutting out the still-voluble voices of the others, who were continuing to
celebrate even in Lupin's absence.

"I wanted a private word, actually, Harry. It hasn't been easy to get an opportunity with
the cottage this full of people."

Bill hesitated.

"Harry, you're planning something with Griphook."

It was a statement, not a question, and Harry did not bother to deny it. He merely looked
at Bill, waiting.

"I know goblins," said Bill. "I've worked for Gringotts ever since I left Hogwarts. As far
as there can be friendship between wizards and goblins, I have goblin friends -- or, at
least, goblins I know well, and like." Again, Bill hesitated.

"Harry, what do you want from Griphook, and what have you promised him in return?"

"I can't tell you that," said Harry. "Sorry, Bill."

The kitchen door opened behind them; Fleur was trying to bring through more empty
goblets.

"Wait," Bill told her, "Just a moment."

She backed out and he closed the door again.

"Then I have to say this," Bill went on. "If you have struck any kind of bargain with
Griphook, and most particularly if that bargain involves treasure, you must be
exceptionally careful. Goblin notions of ownership, payment, and repayment are not the
same as human ones."

Harry felt a slight squirm of discomfort, as though a small snake had stirred inside him.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"We are talking about a different breed of being," said Bill. "Dealings between wizards
and goblins have been fraught for centuries -- but you'll know all that from History of
Magic. There has been fault on both sides, I would never claim that wizards have been
innocent. However, there is a belief among some goblins, and those at Gringotts are
perhaps most prone to it, that wizards cannot be trusted in matters of gold and treasure,
that they have no respect for goblin ownership."

"I respect --" Harry began, but Bill shook his head.

"You don't understand, Harry, nobody could understand unless they have lived with
goblins. To a goblin, the rightful and true master of any object is the maker, not the
purchaser. All goblin made objects are, in goblin eyes, rightfully theirs."

"But it was bought --"

"-- then they would consider it rented by the one who had paid the money. They have,
however, great difficulty with the idea of goblin-made objects passing from wizard to
wizard. You saw Griphook's face when the tiara passed under his eyes. He disapproves. I
believe he thinks, as do the fiercest of his kind, that it ought to have been returned to the
goblins once the original purchaser died. They consider our habit of keeping goblin-made
objects, passing them from wizard to wizard without further payment, little more than
theft."


Harry had an ominous feeling now; he wondered whether Bill guessed more than he was
letting on.

"All I am saying," said Bill, setting his hand on the door back into the sitting room, "is to
be very careful what you promise goblins, Harry. It would be less dangerous to break into
Gringotts than to renege on a promise to a goblin."

"Right," said Harry as Bill opened the door, "yeah. Thanks. I'll bear that in mind."

As he followed Bill back to the others a wry thought came to him, born no doubt of the
wine he had drunk. He seemed set on ______ to become just as reckless a godfather to
Teddy Lupin as Sirius Black had been to him.



Chapter Twenty-Six

Gringotts

Their plans were made, their preparations complete; in the smallest bedroom a
single long, coarse black hair (plucked from the sweater Hermione had been wearing at
Malfoy Manor) lay curled in a small glass phial on the mantelpiece.

"And you'll be using her actual wand," said Harry, nodding toward the walnut
wand, "so I reckon you'll be pretty convincing."

Hermione looked frightened that the wand might sting or bit her as she picked it
up.

"I hate that thing," she said in a low voice. "I really hate it. It feels all wrong, it
doesn't work properly for me . . . It's like a bit of her."

Harry could not help but remember how Hermione has dismissed his loathing of
the blackthorn wand, insisting that he was imagining things when it did not work as well
as his own, telling him to simply practice. He chose not to repeat her own advice back to
her, however, the eve of their attempted assault on Gringotts felt like the wrong moment
to antagonize her.

"It'll probably help you get in character, though," said Ron. "think what that
wand's done!"

"But that's my point!" said Hermione. "This is the wand that tortured Neville's
mum and dad, and who knows how many other people? This is the wand that killed
Sirius!"

Harry had not thought of that: He looked down at the wand and was visited by a
brutal urge to snap it, to slice it in half with Gryffindor's sword, which was propped
against the wall beside him.

"I miss my wand," Hermione said miserably. "I wish Mr. Ollivander could have
made me another one too."

Mr. Ollivander had sent Luna a new wand that morning. She was out on the back
lawn at that moment, testing its capabilities in the late afternoon sun. Dean, who had lost
his wand to the Snatchers, was watching rather gloomily.

Harry looked down at the hawthorn wand that had once belonged to Draco
Malfoy. He had been surprised, but pleased to discover that it worked for him at least as
well as Hermione's had done. Remembering what Ollivander had told them of the secret


workings of wands, Harry thought he knew what Hermione's problem was: She had not
won the walnut wand's allegiance by taking it personally from Bellatrix.

The door of the bedroom opened and Griphook entered. Harry reached
instinctively for the hilt of the sword and drew it close to him, but regretted his action at
once. He could tell that the goblin had noticed. Seeking to gloss over the sticky moment,
he said, "We've just been checking the last-minute stuff, Griphook. We've told Bill and
Fleur we're leaving tomorrow, and we've told them not to get up to see us off."

They had been firm on this point, because Hermione would need to transform in
Bellatrix before they left, and the less that Bill and Fleur knew or suspected about what
they were about to do, the better. They had also explained that they would not be
returning. As they had lost Perkin's old tent on the night that the Snatcher's caught them,
Bill had lent them another one. It was now packed inside the beaded bag, which, Harry
was impressed to learn, Hermione had protected from the Snatchers by the simple
expedient of stuffing it down her sock.

Though he would miss Bill, Fleur, Luna, and Dean, not to mention the home
comforts they had enjoyed over the last few weeks, Harry was looking forward to
escaping the confinement of Shell Cottage. He was tired of trying to make sure that they
were not overheard, tired of being shut in the tiny, dark bedroom. Most of all, he longed
to be rid of Griphook. However, precisely how and when they were to part from the
goblin without handing over Gryffindor's sword remained a question to which Harry had
no answer. It had been impossible to decide how they were going to do it, because the
goblin rarely left Harry, Ron, and Hermione alone together for more than five minutes at
a time: "He could give my mother lessons," growled Ron, as the goblin's long fingers
kept appearing around the edges of doors. With Bill's warning in mind, Harry could not
help suspecting that Griphook was on the watch for possible skullduggery. Hermione
disapproved so heartily of the planned double-cross that Harry had given up attempting to
pick her brains on how best to do it: Ron, on the rare occasions that they had been able to
snatch a few Griphook-free moments, had come up with nothing better than "We'll just
have to wing it, mate."

Harry slept badly that night. Lying away in the early hours, he thought back to the
way he had felt the night before they had infiltrated the Ministry of Magic and
remembered a determination, almost an excitement. Now he was experiencing jolts of
anxiety nagging doubts: He could not shake off the fear that it was all going to go wrong.
He kept telling himself that their plan was good, that Griphook knew what they were
facing, that they were well-prepared for all the difficulties they were likely to encounter,
yet still he felt uneasy. Once or twice he heard Ron stir and was sure that he too was
awake, but they were sharing the sitting room with Dean, so Harry did not speak.

It was a relief when six o-clock arrived and they could slip out of their sleeping
bags, dress in the semidarkness, then creep out into the garden, where they were to meet
Hermione and Griphook. The dawn was chilly, but there was little wind now that it was
May. Harry looked up at the stars still glimmering palely in the dark sky and listened to
the sea washing backward and forward against the cliff: He was going to miss the sound.

Small green shoots were forcing their way up through the red earth of Dobby's
grave now, in a year's time the mound would be covered in flowers. The white stone that
bore the elf's name had already acquired a weathered look. He realized now that they
could hardly have laid Dobby to rest in a more beautiful place, but Harry ached with


sadness to think of leaving him behind. Looking down on the grave, he wondered yet
again how the elf had known where to come to rescue them. His fingers moved
absentmindedly to the little pouch still strung around his neck, thorough which he could
feel the jagged mirror fragment in which he had been sure he had seen Dumbledore's eye.
Then the sound of a door opening made him look around.

Bellatrix Lestrange was striding across the lawn toward them, accompanied by
Griphook. As she walked, she was tucking the small, beaded bag into the inside pocket of
another set of the old robes they had taken from Grimmauld Place. Though Harry knew
perfectly well that it was really Hermione, he could not suppress a shiver of loathing. She
was taller than he was, her long black hair rippling down her back, her heavily lidded
eyes disdainful as they rested upon him; but then she spoke, and he heard Hermione
through Bellatrix's low voice.

"She tasted disgusting, worse than Gurdyroots! Okay, Ron, come here so I can do
you . . ."

"right, but remember, I don't like the beard too long"

"Oh, for heaven's sake, this isn't about looking handsome"

"It's not that, it gets in the way! But I liked my nose a bit shorter, try and do it the
way you did last time."

Hermione sighed and set to work, muttering under her breath as she transformed
various aspects of Ron's appearance. He was to be given a completely fake identity, and
they were trusting to the malevolent aura cast by Bellatrix to protect him. Meanwhile
Harry and Griphook were to be concealed under the Invisibility Cloak.

"There," said Hermione, "how does he look, Harry?"

It was just not possible to discern Ron under his disguise, but only, Harry thought
because he knew him so well. Ron's hair was now long and wavy; he had a thick brown
beard and mustache, no freckles, a short, broad nose, and heavy eyebrows.

"Well, he's not my type, but he'll do," said Harry. "Shall we go, then?"

All three of them glanced back at Shell Cottage, lying dark and silent under the
fading stars, then turned and began to walk toward the point, just beyond the boundary
wall, where the Fidelius Chard stopped working and they would be able to Disapparate.
Once past the gate, Griphook spoke.

"I should climb up now, Harry Potter, I think?"

Harry bent down and the goblin clambered onto his back, his hands linked on
front of Harry's throat. He was not heavy, but Harry disliked the feeling of the goblin and
the surprising strength with which he clung on. Hermione pulled the Invisibility Cloak
out of the beaded bag and threw it over them both.

"Perfect," she said, bending down to check Harry's feet. "I can't see a thing. Let's
go."

Harry turned on the spot, with Griphook on his shoulders, concentrating with all
his might on the Leaky Cauldron, the inn that was the entrance to Diagon Alley. The
goblin clung even tighter as they moved into the compressing darkness, and seconds later
Harry's feet found pavement and he opened his eyes on Charing Cross Road. Muggles
bustled past wearing the hangdog expressions of early morning, quite unconscious of the
little inn's existence.

The bar of the Leaky Cauldron was nearly deserted. Ton, the stooped and
toothless landlord, was polishing glasses behind the bar counter; a couple of warlocks


having a muttered conversation in the far corner glanced at Hermione and drew back into
the shadows.

"Madam Lestrange," murmured Tom, and as Hermione paused he inclined his
head subserviently.

"Good morning," said Hermione, and as Harry crept past, still carrying Griphook
piggyback under the Cloak, he saw Tom look surprised.

"Too polite," Harry whispered in Hermione's ear as they passed out of the Inn into
the tiny backyard. "You need to treat people like they're scum!"

"Okay, okay!"

Hermione drew out Bellatrix's wand and rapped a brick in the nondescript wall in
front of them. At once the bricks began to whirl and spin: A hole appeared in the middle
of them, which grew wider and wider, finally forming an archway onto the narrow
cobbled street that was Diagon Alley.

It was quiet, barely time for the shops to open, and there were hardly and
shoppers abroad. The crooked, cobbled street was much altered now from the bustling
place Harry had visited before his first team at Hogwarts so many years before. More
shops than ever were boarded up, though several new establishments dedicated to the
Dark Arts had been created since his last visit. Harry's own face glared down at him from
posters plastered over many windows, always captioned with the words UNDESIRABLE
NUMBER ONE.

A number of ragged people sat huddled in doorways. He heard them moaning to
the few passersby, pleading for gold, insisting that they were really wizards. One man
had a bloody bandage over his eye.

As they set off along the street, the beggars glimpsed Hermione. they seemed to
melt away before her, drawing hoods over their faces and fleeing as fast as they could.
Hermione looked after them curiously, until the man with the bloodied bandage came
staggering right across her path.

"My children," he bellowed, pointing at her. His voice was cracked, high-pitched,
he sounded distraught. "Where are my children? What has he done with them? You know,
you know!"

"I--I really--" stammered Hermione.

The man lunged at her, reaching for her throat. Then, with a bang and a burst of
red light he was thrown backward onto the ground, unconscious. Ron stood there, his
wand still outstretched and a look of shock visible behind his beard. Faces appeared at the
windows on either side of the street, while a little knot of prosperous-looking passerby
gathered their robes about them and broke into gentle trots, keen to vacate the scene.

their entrance into Diagon Alley could hardly have been more conspicuous; for a
moment Harry wondered whether it might not be better to leave now and try to think of a
different plan. Before they could move or consult one another, however, they heard a cry
from behind them.

"Why, Madam Lestrange!"

Harry whirled around and Griphook tightened his hold around Harry's neck: A tall,
think wizard with a crown of bushy gray hair and a long, sharp nose was striding toward
them.


"It's Travers," hissed the goblin into Harry's ear, but at that moment Harry could
not think who Travers was. Hermione had drawn herself up to full height and said with as
much contempt as she could muster:

"And what do you want?"

Travers stopped in his tracks, clearly affronted.

"He's another Death Eater!" breathed Griphook, and Harry sidled sideways to
repeat the information into Hermione's ear.

"I merely sought to greet you," said Travers coolly, "but if my presence is not
welcome . . ."

Harry recognized his voice now: Travers was one of the Death Eaters who had
been summoned to Xenophilius’s house.

"No, no, not at all, Travers," said Hermione quickly, trying to cover up her
mistake. "How are you?"

"Well, I confess I am surprised to see you out and about, Bellatrix."

"Really? Why?" asked Hermione.

"Well," Travers coughed, "I heard that the Inhabitants of Malfoy Manor were
confined to the house, after the . . . ah . . . escape."

Harry willed Hermione to keep her head. If this was true, and Bellatrix was not
supposed to be out in public--

"The Dark Lord forgives those who have served him most faithfully in the past,"
said Hermione in a magnificent imitation of Bellatrix's most contemptuous manner.
"Perhaps your credit is not as good with him as mine is, Travers."

Though the Death Eater looked offended, he also seemed less suspicious. He
glanced down at the man Ron had just Stunned.

"How did it offend you?"

"It does not matter, it will not do so again," said Hermione coolly.

"Some of these wandless can be troublesome," said Travers. "While they do
nothing but beg I have no objection, but one of them actually asked me to plead her case
in the Ministry last week. 'I'm a witch, sir, I'm a witch, let me prove it to you!" he said in
a squeaky impersonation. "As if I was going to give her my wand--but whose wand," said
Travers curiously, "are you using at the moment, Bellatrix? I heard that your own was--"

"I have my wand here," said Hermione coldly, holding up Bellatrix's wand. "I
don't know what rumors you have been listening to, Travers, but you seem sadly
misinformed."

Travers seemed a little taken aback at that, and he turned instead to Ron.

"Who is your friend? I do not recognize him."

"This is Dragomir Despard," said Hermione; they had decided that a fictional
foreigner was the safest cover for Ron to assume. "He speaks very little English, but he is
in sympathy with the Dark Lord's aims. He has traveled here from Transylvania to see
our new regime."

"Indeed? How do you do, Dragomir?"

"'Ow you?" said Ron, holding out his hand.

Travers extended two fingers and shook Ron's hand as though frightened of
dirtying himself.

So what brings you and your--ah--sympathetic friend to Diagon Alley this early?"
asked Travers.


"I need to visit Gringotts," said Hermione.

"Alas, I also," said Travers. "Gold, filthy gold! We cannot live without it, yet I
confess I deplore the necessity of consorting with our long-fingered friends."

Harry felt Griphook's clasped hands tighten momentarily around his neck.

"Shall we?" said Travers, gesturing Hermione forward.

Hermione had no choice but to fall into step beside him and head along the
crooked, cobbled street toward the place where the snowy-white Gringotts stood towering
over the other little shops. Ron sloped along beside them, and Harry and Griphook
followed.

A watchful Death Eater was the very last thing they needed, and the worst of it
was, with Travers matching at what he believed to be Bellatrix's side, there was no means
for Harry to communicate with Hermione or Ron. All too soon they arrived at the foot of
the marble steps leading up to the great bronze doors. As Griphook had already warned
them, the liveried goblins who usually flanked the entrance had been replaced by two
wizards, both of whom were clutching long thin golden rods.

"Ah, Probity Probes," signed Travers theatrically, "so crude--but so effective!"

And he set off up the steps, nodding left and right to the wizards, who raised the
golden rods and passed them up and down his body. The Probes, Harry knew, detected
spells of concealment and hidden magical objects. Knowing that he had only seconds,
Harry pointed Draco's wand at each of the guards in turn and murmured, "Confundo"
twice. Unnoticed by Travers, who was looking through the bronze doors at the inner hall,
each of the guards gave a little start as the spells hit them.

Hermione's long black hair rippled behind her as she climbed the steps.

"One moment, madam," said the guard, raising his Probe.

"But you've just done that!" said Hermione in Bellatrix's commanding, arrogant
voice. Travers looked around, eyebrows raised. The guard was confused. He stared down
at the thin golden Probe and then at his companion, who said in a slightly dazed voice,

"Yeah, you've just checked them, Marius."

Hermione swept forward. Ron by her side, Harry and Griphook trotting invisibly
behind them. Harry glanced back as they crossed the threshold. The wizards were both
scratching their heads.

Two goblins stood before the inner doors, which were made of silver and which
carried the poem warning of dire retribution to potential thieves. Harry looked up at it,
and all of a sudden a knife-sharp memory came to him: standing on this very spot on the
day that he had turned eleven, the most wonderful birthday of his life, and Hagrid
standing beside him saying, "Like I said, yeh'd be mad ter try an' rob it." Gringotts had
seemed a place of wonder that day, the enchanted repository of a trove of gold he had
never known he possessed, and never for an instant could he have dreamed that he would
return to steal . . . But within seconds they were standing in the vast marble hall of the
bank.

The long counter was manned by goblins sitting on high stools serving the first
customers of the day. Hermione, Ron, and Travers headed toward an old goblin who was
examining a thick gold coin through an eyeglass. Hermione allowed Travers to step
ahead of her on the pretext of explaining features of the hall to Ron.


The goblin tossed the coin he was holding aside, said to nobody in particular,
"Leprechaun," and then greeted Travers, who passed over a tiny golden key, which was
examined and given back to him.

Hermione stepped forward.

"Madam Lestrange!" said the goblin, evidently startled. "Dear me!" How--how
may I help you today?"

"I wish to enter my vault," said Hermione.

The old goblin seemed to recoil a little. Harry glanced around. Not only was
Travers hanging back, watching, but several other goblins had looked up from their work
to stare at Hermione.

"You have . . . identification?" asked the goblin.

"Identification? I--I have never been asked for identification before!" said
Hermione.

"They know!" whispered Griphook in Harry's ear, "They must have been warned
there might be an imposter!"

"Your wand will do, madam," said the goblin. He held out a slightly trembling
hand, and in a dreadful blast of realization Harry knew that the goblins of Gringotts were
aware that Bellatrix's wand had been stolen.

"Act now, act now," whispered Griphook in Harry's ear, "the Imperious Curse!"

Harry raised the hawthorn wand beneath the cloak, pointed it at the old goblin,
and whispered, for the first time in his life, "Imperio!"

A curious sensation shot down Harry's arm, a feeling of tingling, warmth that
seemed to flow from his mind, down the sinews and veins connecting him to the wand
and the curse it had just cast. The goblin took Bellatrix's wand, examined it closely, and
then said, "Ah, you have had a new wand made, Madam Lestrange!"

"What?" said Hermione, "No, no, that's mine--"

"A new wand?" said Travers, approaching the counter again; still the goblins all
around were watching. "But how could you have done, which wandmaker did you use?"

Harry acted without thinking. Pointing his wand at Travers, he muttered,
"Imperio!" once more.

"Oh yes, I see," said Travers, looking down at Bellatrix's wand, "yes, very
handsome. and is it working well? I always think wands require a little breaking in, don't
you?"

Hermione looked utterly bewildered, but to Harry's enormous relief she accepted
the bizarre turn of events without comment.

The old goblin behind the counter clapped his hands and a younger goblin
approached.

"I shall need the Clankers," he told the goblin, who dashed away and returned a
moment later with a leather bag that seemed to be full of jangling metal, which he handed
to his senior. "Good, good! S, if you will follow me, Madam Lestrange," said the old
goblin, hopping down off his stool and vanishing from sight. "I shall take you to your
vault."

He appeared around the end of the counter, jogging happily toward them, the
contents of the leather bag still jingling. Travers was now standing quite still with his
mouth hanging wide open. Ron was drawing attention to this odd phenomenon by
regarding Travers with confusion.


“Wait – Bogrod!”

Another goblin came scurrying around the counter.

“We have instructions,” he said with a bow to Hermione. “Forgive me, Madam,
but there have been special orders regarding the vault of Lestrange.”

He whispered urgently in Bogrod’s ear, but the Imperiused goblin shook him off.

“I am aware of the instructions, Madam Lestrange wishes to visit her vault …
Very old family … old clients … This way, please … “

And, still clanking, he hurried toward one of the many doors leading off the hall.
Harry looked back at Travers , who was still rooted to the spot looking abnormally vacant,
and made his decision. With a flick of his wand he made Travers come with them,
walking meekly in their wake as they reached the door and passed into the rough stone
passageway beyond, which was lit with flaming torches.

“We’re in trouble; they suspect,” said Harry as the door slammed behind them
and he pulled off the Invisibility Cloak. Griphook jumped down from his shoulders:
neither Travers nor Bogrod showed the slightest surprise at the sudden appearance of
Harry Potter in their midst. “They’re Imperiused,” he added, in response to Hermione and
Ron’s confused queries about Travers and Bogrod, who were both now standing there
looking blank. “I don’t think I did it strongly enough, I don’t know …”

And another memory darted through his mind, of the real Bellatrix Lestrange
shrieking at him when he had first tried to use an Unforgivable Curse: “You need to mean
them, Potter!”

“What do we do?” asked Ron. “Shall we get out now, while we can?”

“If we can,” said Hermione, looking back toward the door into the main hall,
beyond which who knew what was happening.

“We’ve got this far, I say we go on,” said Harry.

“Good!” said Griphook. “So, we need Bogrod to control the cart; I no long have
the authority. But there will not be room for the wizard.”

Harry pointed his wand at Travers.

“Imperio!”

The wizard turned and set off along the dark track at a smart pace.

“What are you making him do?”

“Hide,” said Harry as he pointed his wand at Bogrod, who whistled to summon a
little cart that came trundling along the tracks toward them out of the darkness. Harry was
sure he could hear shouting behind them in the main hall as they all clambered into it,
Bogrod in front of Griphook, Harry, Ron, and Hermione crammed together in the back.

With a jerk the cart moved off, gathering speed: They hurried past Travers, who
was wriggling into a crack in the wall, then the cart began twisting and turning through
the labyrinthine passages, sloping downward all the time. Harry could not hear anything
over the rattling of the cart on the tracks: His hair flew behind him as they swerved
between stalactites, flying ever deeper into the earth, but he kept glancing back. They
might as well have left enormous footprints behind them; the more he thought about it,
the more foolish it seemed to have disguised Hermione as Bellatrix, to have brought
along Bellatrix’s wand, when the Death Eaters knew who had stolen it –

There were a deeper than Harry had ever penetrated within Gringotts; they took a
hairpin bend at speed and saw ahead of them, with seconds to spare, a waterfall pounding
over the track. Harry heard Griphook shout, “No!” but there was no braking. They


zoomed through it. Water filled Harry’s eyes and mouth: He could not see or breathe:
Then, with an awful lurch, the cart flipped over and they were all thrown out of it. Harry
heard the cart smash into pieces against the passage wall, heard Hermione shriek
something, and felt himself glide back toward the ground as though weightless, landing
painlessly on the rocky passage floor.

“C-Cushioning Charm,” Hermione spluttered, as Ron pulled her to her feet, but to
Harry’s horror he saw that she was no longer Bellatrix; instead she stood there in
overlarge robes, sopping wet and completely herself; Ron was red-haired and beardless
again. They were realizing it as they looked at each other, feeling their own faces.

“The Thief’s Downfall!” said Griphook, clambering to his feet and looking back
the deluge onto the tracks, which, Harry knew now, had been more than water. “It washes
away all enchantment, all magical concealment! They know there are imposers in
Gringotts, they have set off defenses against us!”

Harry saw Hermione checking that she still had the beaded bag, and hurriedly
thrust his own hand under his jacket to make sure he had not lost the Invisibility Cloak.
Then he turned to see Bogrod shaking his head in bewilderment: The Thief’s Downfall
seemed to have lifted his Imperius Curse.

“We need him,” said Griphook, “we cannot enter the vault without a Gringott’s
goblin. And we need the clankers!”

“Imperio!” Harry said again; his voice echoed through the stone passage as he felt
again the sense of heady control that flowed from brain to wand. Bogrod submitted once
more to his will, his befuddled expression changing to one of polite indifference, as Ron
hurried to pick up the leather bag of metal tools.

“Harry, I think I can hear people coming!” said Hermione, and she pointed
Bellatrix’s wand at the waterfall and cried, “Protego!” They saw the Shield Charm break
the flow of enchanted water as it flew up the passageway.

“Good thinking,” said Harry. “Lead the way, Griphook!”

“How are we going to get out again?” Ron asked as they hurried on foot into the
darkness after the goblin, Bogrod panting in their wake like an old dog.

“Let’s worry about that when we have to,” said Harry. He was trying to listen: He
thought he could hear something clanking and moving around nearby. “Griphook, how
much farther?”

“Not far, Harry Potter, not far … “

And they turned a corner and saw the thing for which Harry had been prepared,
but which still brought all of them to a halt.

A gigantic dragon was tethered to the ground in front of them, barring access to
four or five of the deepest vaults in the place. The beast’s scales had turned pale and flaky
during its long incarceration under the ground, its eyes were milkily pink; both rear legs
bore heavy cuffs from which chains led to enormous pegs driven deep into the rocky
floor. Its great spiked wings, folded close to its body, would have filled the chamber if it
spread them, and when it turned its ugly head toward them, it roared with a noise that
made the rock tremble, opened its mouth, and spat a jet of fire that sent them running
back up the passageway.

“It is partially blind,” panted Griphook, “but even more savage for that. However,
we have the means to control it. It has learned what to expect when the Clankers come.
Give them to me.”


Ron passed the bag to Griphook, and the goblin pulled out a number of small
metal instruments that when shaken made a long ringing noise like miniature hammers on
anvils. Griphook handed them out: Bogrod accepted his meekly.

“You know what to do,” Griphook told Harry, Ron, and Hermione. “It will expect
pain when it hears the noise. It will retreat, and Bogrod must place his palm upon the
door of the vault.”

They advanced around the corner again, shaking the Clankers, and the noise
echoed off the rocky walls, grossly magnified, so that the inside of Harry’s skull seemed
to vibrate with the den. The dragon let out another hoarse roar, then retreated. Harry
could see it trembling, and as they drew nearer he saw the scars made by vicious slashes
across its face, and guess that it had been taught to fear hot swords when it heard the
sound of the Clankers.

“Make him press his hand to the door!” Griphook urged Harry, who turned his
wand again upon Bogrod. The old goblin obeyed, pressing his palm to the wood, and the
door of the vault melted away to reveal a cavelike opening crammed from floor to ceiling
with golden coins and goblets, silver armor, the skins of strange creatures – some with
long spines, other with drooping wings – potions in jeweled flasks, and a skull still
wearing a crown. “Search, fast!” said Harry as they all hurried inside the vault. He had
described Hufflepuff’s cap to Ron and Hermione, but if it was the other, unknown
Horcrux that resided in this vault, he did not know what it looked like. He barely had
time to glance around, however, before there was a muffled clunk from behind them: The
door had reappeared, sealing them inside the vault, and they were plunged into total
darkness.

“No matter, Bogrod will be able to release us!” said Griphook as Ron gave a
shout of surprise. “Light your wands, can’t you? And hurry, we have little time!”

“Lumos!”

Harry shone his lit wand around the vault: Its beam fell upon glittering jewels; he
saw the fake sword of Gryffindor lying on a high shelf amongst a jumble of chains. Ron
and Hermione had lit their wands too, and were now examining the piles of objects
surrounding them.

“Harry, could this be -- ? Aargh!”

Hermione screamed in pain, and Harry turned his wand on her in time to see a
jeweled goblet tumbling from her grip. But as it fell, it split, became a shower of goblets,
so that a second later, with a great clatter, the floor was covered in identical cups rolling
in every direction, the original impossible to discern amongst them.

“It burned me!” moaned Hermione, sucking her blistered fingers.

“They have added Germino and Flagrante Curses!” said Griphook.

“Everything you touch will burn and multiply, but the copies are worthless – and
if you continue to handle the treasure, you will eventually be crushed to death by the
weight of expanding gold!”

“Okay, don’t touch anything!” said Harry desperately, but even as he said it, Ron
accidentally nudged one of the fallen goblets with his foot, and twenty more exploded
into being while Ron hopped on the spot, part of his shoe burned away by contact with
the hot metal.

“Stand still, don’t move!” said Hermione, clutching at Ron.


“Just look around!” said Harry. “Remember, the cup’s small and gold, it’s got a
badger engraved on it, two handles – otherwise see if you can spot Ravenclaw’s symbol
anywhere, the eagle –”

They directed their wands into every nook and crevice, turning cautiously on the
spot. It was impossible not to brush up against anything; Harry sent a great cascade of
fake Galleons onto the ground where they joined the goblets, and now there was scarcely
room to place their feet, and the glowing gold blazed with heat, so that the vault felt like a
furnace. Harry’s wandlight passed over shields and goblin-made helmets set on shelves
rising to the ceiling; higher and higher he raised the beam, until suddenly it found an
object that made his heart skip and his hand tremble.

“It’s there, it’s up there!”

Ron and Hermione pointed there wands at it too, so that the little golden cup
sparkled in a three-way spotlight: the cup that had belonged to Helga Hufflepuff, which
had passed into the possession of Hepzibah Smith, from whom it had been stolen by Tom
Riddle.

“And how the hell are we going to get up there without touching anything?” asked
Ron.

“Accio Cup!” cried Hermione, who had evidently forgotten in her desperation
what Griphook had told them during their planning sessions.

“No use, no use!” snarled the goblin.

“Then what do we do?” said Harry, glaring at the goblin. “If you want the sword,
Griphook, then you’ll have to help us more than – wait! Can I touch stuff with the sword?
Hermione, give it here!”

Hermione fumbled insider her robes, drew out a beaded bag, rummaged for a few
seconds, then removed the shining sword. Harry seized it by its rubied hilt and touched
the tip of the blade to a silver flagon nearby, which did not multiply.

“If I can just poke the sword through a handle – but how am I going to get up
there?”

The shelf on which the cup reposed was out of reach for any of them, even Ron,
who was tallest. The heat from the enchanted treasure rose in waves, and sweat ran down
Harry’s face and back as he struggled to think of a way up to the cup; and then he heard
the dragon roar on the other side of the vault door, and the sound of clanking growing
louder and louder.

They were truly trapped now: There was no way out except through the door, and
a horde of goblins seemed to be approaching on the other side. Harry looked at Ron and
Hermione and saw terror in their faces.

“Hermione,” said Harry, as the clanking grew louder, “I’ve got to get up there,
we’ve got to get rid of it –”

She raised her wand, pointed it at Harry, and whispered, “Levicorpus.”

Hoisted into the air by his ankle, Harry hit a suit of armor and replicas burst out of
it like white-hot bodies, filling the cramped space. With screams of pain, Ron, Hermione,
and the two goblins were knocked aside into other objects, which also began to replicate.
Half buried in a rising tide of red-hot treasure, they struggled and yelled has Harry thrust
the sword through the handle of Hufflepuff’s cup, hooking it onto the blade.

“Impervius!” screeched Hermione in an attempt to protect herself, Ron, and the
goblins from the burning metal.


Then the worst scream yet made Harry look down: Ron and Hermione were waist
deep in treasure, struggling to keep Bogrod from slipping beneath the rising tide, but
Griphook had sunk out of sight; and nothing but the tips of a few long fingers were left in
view.

Harry seized Griphook’s fingers and pulled. The blistered goblin emerged by
degrees, howling.

“Liberatocorpus!” yelled Harry, and with a crash he and Griphook landed on the
surface of the swelling treasure, and the sword flew out of Harry’s hand.

“Get it!” Harry yelled, fighting the pain of the hot metal on his skin, as Griphook
clambered onto his shoulders again, determined to avoid the swelling mass of red-hot
objects. “Where’s the sword? It had the cup on it!”

The clanking on the other side of the door was growing deafening – it was too late
–

“There!”

It was Griphook who had seen it and Griphook who lunged, and in that instant
Harry knew that the goblin had never expected them to keep their word. One hand
holding tightly to a fistful of Harry’s hair, to make sure he did not fall into the heaving
sea of burning gold, Griphook seized the hilt of the sword and swung it high out of
Harry’s reach. The tiny golden cup, skewered by the handle on the sword’s blade was
flung into the air. The goblin astride him, Harry dived and caught it, and although he
could feel it scalding his flesh he did not relinquish it, even while countless Hufflepuff
cups burst from his fist, raining down upon him as the entrance of the vault opened up
again and he found himself sliding uncontrollably on an expanding avalanche of fiery
gold and silver that bore him, Ron, Hermione into the outer chamber.

Hardly aware of the pain from the burns covering his body, and still borne along
the swell of replicating treasure, Harry shoved the cup into his pocket and reached up to
retrieve the sword, but Griphook was gone. Sliding from Harry’s shoulders the moment
he could, he had sprinted for cover amongst the surrounding goblins, brandishing the
sword and crying, “Thieves! Thieves! Help! Thieves!” He vanished into the midst of the
advancing crowd, all of whom were holding daggers and who accepted him without
question.

Slipping on the hot metal, Harry struggled to his feet and knew that the only way
out was through.

“Stupefy!” he bellowed, and Ron and Hermione joined in: Jets of red light flew
into the crowd of goblins, and some toppled over, but others advanced, and Harry saw
several wizard guards running around the corner.

The tethered dragon let out a roar, and a gush of flame flew over the goblins; The
wizards fled, doubled-up, back the way they had come, and inspiration, or madness, came
to Harry. Pointing his wand at the thick cuffs chaining the beast to the floor, he yelled,
“Relashio!”

The cuffs broken open with loud bangs.

“This way!” Harry yelled, and still shooting Stunning Spells at the advancing
goblins, he sprinted toward the blind dragon.

“Harry – Harry – what are you doing?” cried Hermione.

“Get up, climb up, come on –”


The dragon had not realized that it was free: Harry’s foot found the crook of its
hind leg and he pulled himself up onto its back. The scales were hard as steel; it did not
even seem to feel him. He stretched out an arm; Hermione hoisted herself up; Ron
climbed on behind them, and a second later the dragon became aware that it was
untethered.

With a roar it reared: Harry dug in his knees, clutching as tightly as he could to
the jagged scales as the wings opened, knocking the shrieking goblins aside like skittles,
and it soared into the air. Harry, Ron, and Hermione, flat on its back, scraped against the
ceiling as it dived toward the passage opening, while the pursuing goblins hurled daggers
that glanced off its flanks.

“We’ll never get out, it’s too big!” Hermione screamed, but the dragon opened its
mouth and belched flame again, blasting the tunnel, whose floors and ceiling cracked and
crumbled. By sheer force, the dragon clawed and fought its way through. Harry’s eyes
were shut tight against the heat and dust: Deafened by the crash of rock and the dragon’s
roars, he could only cling to its back, expecting to be shaken off at any moment; then he
heard Hermione yelling, “Defodio!”

She was helping the dragon enlarge the passageway, carving out the ceiling as it
struggled upward toward the fresher air, away from the shrieking and clanking goblins:
Harry and Ron copied her, blasting the ceiling apart with more gouging spells. They
passed the underground lake, and the great crawling, snarling beast seemed to sense
freedom and space ahead of it, and behind them the passage was full of the dragon’s
thrashing, spiked tail, of great lumps of rock, gigantic fractured stalactites, and the
clanking of the goblins seemed to be growing more muffled, while ahead, the dragon’s
fire kept their progress clear –

And then at last, by the combined force of their spells and the dragon’s brute
strength, they had blasted their way out of the passage into the marble hallway. Goblins
and wizards shrieked and ran for cover, and finally the dragon had room to stretch its
wings: Turning its horned head toward the cool outside air it could smell beyond the
entrance, it took off, and with Harry, Ron, and Hermione still clinging to its back, it
forced its way through the metal doors, leaving them buckled and hanging from their
hinges, as it staggered into Diagon Alley and launched itself into the sky.







Chapter Twenty-Seven

The Final Hiding Place



There was no means of steering; the dragon could not see where it was
going, and Harry knew that if it turned sharply or rolled in midair they
would find it impossible to cling onto its broad back. Nevertheless, as they
climbed higher and higher, London unfurling below them like a gray-and-green
map, Harry's overwhelming feeling was of gratitude for an escape that had
seemed impossible. Crouching low over the beast's neck, he clung tight to


the metallic scales, and the cool breeze was soothing on his burned and
blistered skin, the dragon's wings beating the air like the sails of a
windmill. Behind him, whether from delight or fear he could not tell. Ron
kept swearing at the top of his voice, and Hermione seemed to be sobbing.
After five minutes or so, Harry lost some of his immediate dread that
the dragon was going to throw them off, for it seemed intent on nothing but
getting as far away from its underground prison as possible; but the
question of how and when they were to dismount remained rather frightening.
He had no idea how long dragons could fly without landing, nor how this
particular dragon, which could barely see, would locate a good place to put
down. He glanced around constantly, imagining that he could feel his seat
prickling.
How long would it be before Voldemort knew that they had broken into the
Lestranges' vault? How soon would the goblins of Gringotts notify Bellatrix?
How quickly would they realize what had been taken? And then, when they
discovered that the golden cup was missing? Voldemort would know, at last,
that they were hunting Horcruxes.
The dragon seemed to crave cooler and fresher air. It climbed steadily
until they were flying through wisps of chilly cloud, and Harry could no
longer make out the little colored dots which were cars pouring in and out
of the capital. On and on they flew, over countryside parceled out in
patches of green and brown, over roads and rivers winding through the
landscape like strips of matte and glossy ribbon.
"What do you reckon it's looking for?" Ron yelled as they flew farther
and farther north.
"No idea," Harry bellow back. His hands were numb with cold but he did
not date attempt to shift his grip. He had been wondering for some time what
they would do if they saw the coast sail beneath them, if the dragon headed
for open seal he was cold and numb, not to mention desperately hungry and
thirsty. When, he wondered, had the beast itself last eaten? Surely it would
need sustenance before long? And what if, at that point, it realized it had
three highly edible humans sitting on its back?
The sun slipped lower in the sky, which was turning indigo; and still
the dragon flew, cities and towns gliding out of sight beneath them, its
enormous shadow sliding over the earth like a giant dark cloud. Every part
of Harry ached with the effort of holding on to the dragon's back.
"Is it my imagination," shouted Ron after a considerable stretch of
silence, "or are we losing height?"
Harry looked down and saw deep green mountains and lakes, coppery in the
sunset. the landscape seemed to grow larger and more detailed as he squinted
over the side of the dragon, and he wondered whether it had divined the
presence of fresh water by the flashes of reflected sunlight.
Lower and lower the dragon flew, in great spiraling circles, honing in,
it seemed, upon one of the smaller lakes.
"I say we jump when it gets low enough!" Harry called back to the
others. "Straight into the water before it realizes we're here!"


They agreed, Hermione a little faintly, and now Harry could see the
dragon's wide yellow underbelly rippling in the surface of the water.
"NOW!"
He slithered over the side of the dragon and plummeted feetfirst toward
the surface of the lake; the drop was greater than he had estimated and he
hit the water hard, plunging like a stone into a freezing, green,
reed-filled world. He kicked toward the surface and emerged, panting, to see
enormous ripples emanating in circles from the places where Ron and Hermione
had fallen. The dragon did not seem to have noticed anything; it was already
fifty feet away, swooping low over the lake to scoop up water in its scarred
snout. As Ron and Hermione emerged, spluttering and gasping, from the depths
of the lake, the dragon flew on, its wings beating hard, and landed at last
on a distant bank.
Harry, Ron and Hermione struck out for the opposite shore. The lake did
not seem to be deep. Soon it was more a question of fighting their way
through reeds and mud than swimming, and at last they flopped, sodden,
panting, and exhausted, onto slippery grass.
Hermione collapsed, coughing and shuddering. Though Harry could have
happily lain down and slept, he staggered to his feet, drew out his wand,
and started casting the usual protective spells around them.
When he had finished, he joined the others. It was the first time that
he had seen them properly since escaping from the vault. Both had angry red
burns all over their faces and arms, and their clothing was singed away in
places. They were wincing as they dabbed essence of dittany onto their many
injuries. Hermione handed Harry the bottle, then pulled out three bottles of
pumpkin juice she had brought from Shell Cottage and clean, dry robes for
all of them. They changes and then gulped down the juice.
"Well, on the upside," said Ron finally, who was sitting watching the
skin on his hands regrow, "we got the Horcrux. On the downside-"
"-- no sword," said Harry through gritted teeth, as he dripped dittany
through the singed hole in his jeans onto the angry burn beneath.
"No sword," repeated Ron. "That double-crossing little scab..."
Harry pulled the Horcrux from the pocket of the wet jacket he had just
taken off and set it down on the grass in front of them. Glinting in the
sun, it drew their eyes as they swigged their bottles of juice.
"At least we can't wear it this time, that'd look a bit weird hanging
around our necks," said Ron, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand.
Hermione looked across the lake to the far bank where the dragon was
still drinking.
"What'll happen to it, do you think?" she asked, "Will it be alright?"
"You sound like Hagrid," said Ron, "It's a dragon, Hermione, it can look
after itself. It's us we need to worry about."
"What do you mean?"
"Well I don't know how to break this to you," said Ron, "but I think
they might have noticed we broke into Gringotts."
All three of them started to laugh, and once started, it was difficult


to stop. Harry's ribs ached, he felt lightheaded with hunger, but he lay
back on the grass beneath the reddening sky and laughed until his throat was
raw.
"What are we going to do, though?" said Hermione finally, hiccuping
herself back to seriousness. "He'll know, won't he? You-Know-Who will know
we know about his Horcruxes!"
"Maybe they'll be too scared to tell him!" said Ron hopefully, "Maybe
they'll cover up --"
The sky, the smell of the lake water, the sound of Ron's voice were
extinguished. Pain cleaved Harry's head like a sword stroke. He was standing
in a dimly lit room, and a semicircle of wizards faced him, and on the floor
at his feet knelt a small, quaking figure.
"What did you say to me?" His voice was high and cold, but fury and fear
burned inside him. The one thing that he had dreaded - but it could not be
true, he could not see how...
The goblin was trembling, unable to meet the red eyes high above his.
"Say it again!" murmured Voldemort. "Say it again!"
"M-my Lord," stammered the goblin, its black eyes wide with terror,
"m-my Lord... we t-tried to st-stop them... Im-impostors, my Lord... broke -
broke into the - into the Lestranges' vault..."
"Impostors? What impostors? I thought Gringotts had ways of revealing
impostors? Who were they?
"It was... it was... the P-Potter b-boy and the t-two accomplices..."
"And they took?" he said, his voice rising, a terrible fear gripping
him, "Tell me! What did they take?"
"A... a s-small golden c-cup m-my Lord..."
The scream of rage, of denial left him as if it were a stranger's. He
was crazed, frenzied, it could not be true, it was impossible, nobody had
known. How was it possible that the boy could have discovered his secret?
The Elder Wand slashed through the air and green light erupted through
the room; the kneeling goblin rolled over dead; the watching wizards
scattered before him, terrified. Bellatrix and Lucius Malfoy threw others
behind them in their race for the door, and again and again his wand fell,
and those who were left were slain, all of them, for bringing him this news,
for hearing about the golden cup -
Alone amongst the dead he stomped up and down, and they passed before him
in vision: his treasures, his safeguards, his anchors to immortality - the
diary was destroyed and the cup was stolen. What if, what if, the boy knew
about the others? Could he know, had he already acted, had he traced more of
them? Was Dumbledore at the root of this? Dumbledore, who had always
suspected him; Dumbledore, dead on his orders; Dumbledore, whose wand was
his now, yet who reached out from the ignominy of death through the boy, the
boy -
But surely if the boy had destroyed any of his Horcruxes, he, Lord
Voldemort, would have known, would have felt it? He, the greatest wizard of
them all; he, the most powerful; he, the killer of Dumbledore and of how


many other worthless, nameless men. How could Lord Voldemort not have known,
if he, himself, most important and precious, had been attacked, mutilated?
True, he had not felt it when the diary had been destroyed, but he had
thought that was because he had no body to fell, being less than ghost...
No, surely, the rest were safe... The other Horcruxes must be intact...
But he must know, he must be sure... He paced the room, kicking aside
the goblin's corpse as he passed, and the pictures blurred and burned in his
boiling brain: the lake, the shack, and Hogwarts -
A modicum of calm cooled his rage now. How could the boy know that he
had hidden the ring in the Gaunt shack? No one had ever known him to be
related to the Gaunts, he had hidden the connection, the killings had never
been traced to him. The ring, surely, was safe.
And how could the boy, or anybody else, know about the cave or penetrate
its protection? The idea of the locket being stolen was absurd...
As for the school: He alone knew where in Hogwarts he had stowed the
Horcrux, because he alone had plumed the deepest secrets of that place...
And there was still Nagini, who must remain close now, no longer sent to
do his bidding, under his protection...
But to be sure, to be utterly sure, he must return to each of his hiding
places, he must redouble protection around each of his Horcruxes... A job,
like the quest for the Elder Wand, that he must undertake alone...
Which should he visit first, which was in most danger? An old unease
flickered inside him. Dumbledore had known his middle name... Dumbledore
might have made the connection with the Gaunts... Their abandoned home was,
perhaps, the least secure of his hiding places, it was there that he would
go first...
The lake, surely impossible... though was there a slight possibility
that Dumbledore might have known some of his past misdeeds, through the
orphanage.
And Hogwarts... but he knew the his Horcrux there was safe; it would be
impossible for Potter to enter Hogsmeade without detection, let alone the
school. Nevertheless, it would be prudent to alert Snape to the fact that
the boy might try to reenter the castle. ... To tell Snape why the boy might
return would be foolish, of course; it had been a grave mistake to trust
Bellatrix and Malfoy. Didn't their stupidity and carelessness prove how
unwise it was ever to trust?
He would visit the Gaunt shack first, then, and take Nagini with him. He
would not be parted from the snake anymore ... and he strode from the room,
through the hall, and out into the dark garden where the fountain played; he
called the snake in Parseltongue and it slithered out to join him like a
long shadow. ...
Harry's eyes flew open as he wrenched himself back to the present. He
was lying on the bank of the lake in the setting sun, and Ron and Hermione
were looking down at him. Judging by their worried looks, and by the
continued pounding of his scar, his sudden excursion into Voldemort's mind
had not passed unnoticed. He struggled up, shivering, vaguely surprised that


he was still wet to his skin, and saw the cup lying innocently in the grass
before him, and the lake, deep blue shot with gold in the falling sun.
"He knows." His own voice sounded strange and low after Voldemort's high
screams. "He knows and he's going to check where the others are, and the
last one," he was already on his feet," is at Hogwarts. I knew it. I knew
it."
"What?"
Ron was gaping at him; Hermione sat up, looking worried.
"But what did you see? How do you know?"
"I saw him find out about the cup, I - I was in his head, he's" - Harry
remembered the killings - "he's seriously angry, and scared too, he can't
understand how we knew, and now he's going to check the others are safe, the
ring first. He things the Hogwarts one is safest, because Snape's there,
because it'll be so hard not to be seen getting in. I think he'll check that
one last, but he could still be there within hours -"
"Did you see where in Hogwarts it is?" asked Ron, now scrambling to his
feet too.
"No, he was concentrating on warning Snape, he didn't think about
exactly where it is -"
"Wait, wait!" cried Hermione as Ron caught up to the Horcrux and Harry
pulled out the Invisibility Cloak again. "We can't just go, we haven't got a
plan, we need to -"
"We need to get going," said Harry firmly. He had been hoping to sleep,
looking forward to getting into the new tent, but that was impossible now,
"Can you imagine what he's going to do once he realizes the ring and the
locket are gone? What if he moves the Hogwarts Horcrux, decides it isn't
safe enough?
"But how are we going to get in?"
"We'll go to Hogsmeade," said Harry, "and try to work something out once
we see what the protection around the school's like. Get under the Cloak,
Hermione, I want to stick together this time."
"But we don't really fit -"
"It'll be dark, no one's going to notice our feet."
The flapping of enormous wings echoed across the black water. The dragon
had drunk its fill and risen into the air. They paused in their preparations
to watch it climb higher and higher, now black against the rapidly darkening
sky, until it vanished over a nearby mountain. Then Hermione walked forward
and took her place between the other two, Harry pulled the Cloak down as far
as it would go, and together they turned on the spot into the crushing
darkness.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

The Missing Mirror




Harry's feet touched the road. He saw the achingly familiar Hogsmeade High Street:
dark shop

fronts, and the mist line of black mountains beyond the village and the curve in the road
ahead that

led off toward Hogwarts, and light spilling from the windows of the Three Broomsticks,
and with a

lurch of the hear, he remembered with piercing accuracy, how he had landed here nearly
a year before,

supporting a desperately weak Dumbledore, all this in a second, upon landing -- and then,
even as he

relaxed his grip upon Ron's and Hermione's arms, it happened.

The air was rent by a scream that sounded like Voldemort's when he had realized
the cup had

been stolen: It tore at every nerve in Harry's body, and he knew that their appearance had
caused it.

Even as he looked at the other two beneath the Cloak, the door of the Three Broomsticks
burst open

and a dozen cloaked and hooded Death Eaters dashed into the streets, their wands aloft.

Harry seized Ron's wrist as he raised his wand; there were too many of them to
run. Even

attempting it would have give away their position. One of the Death Eaters raised his
wand, and the

scream stopped, still echoing around the distant mountains.

"Accio Cloak!" roared one of the Death Eaters

Harry seized his folds, but it made no attempt to escape. The Summoning Charm
had not

worked on it.

"Not under your wrapper, then, Potter?" yelled the Death Eater who had tried the
charm and

then to his fellows. "Spread now. He's here."

Six of the Death Eaters ran toward them: Harry, Ron and Hermione backed as
quickly as

possible down the nearest side street, and the Death Eaters missed them by inches. They
waited

in the darkness, listening to the footsteps running up and down, beams of light flying
along the street

from the Death Eaters' searching wands.

"Let's just leave!" Hermione whispered. "Disapparate now!"

"Great idea," said Ron, but before Harry could reply, a Death Eater shouted,

"We know you are here, Potter, and there's no getting away! We'll find you!"

"They were ready for us," whispered Harry. "They set up that spell to tell them
we'd come.

I reckon they’ve done something to keep us here, trap us - "

"What about dementors?" called another Death Eater. "Let'em have free rein,
they'd find him

quick enough!"


"The Dark Lord wants Potter dead by no hands but his - "

" 'an dementors won't kill him! The Dark Lord wants Potter's life, nor his soul.
He'll be easier to

kill if he's been Kissed first!"

There were noises of agreement. Dread filled Harry: To repel dementors they
would have to produce

Patronuses which would give them away immediately.

"We're going to have to try to Disapparate, Harry!" Hermione whispered.

Even as she said it, he felt the unnatural cold being spread over the street. Light
was sucked from

the environment right up to the stars, which vanished. In the pitch blackness, he felt
Hermione take hold

of his arm and together, they turned on the spot.

The air through which they needed to move, seemed to have become solid: They
could not

Disapparate; the Death Eaters had cast their charms well. The cold was biting deeper and
deeper

into Harry's flesh. He, Ron and Hermione retreated down the side street, groping their
way along the wall

trying not to make a sound. Then, around the corner, gliding noiselessly, came dementors,
ten or more

of them, visible because they were of a denser darkness than their surroundings, with
their black cloaks

and their scabbed and rotting hands. Could they sense fear in the vicinity? Harry was sure
of it: They

seemed to be coming more quickly now, taking those dragging, rattling breaths he
detested, tasting

despair in the air, closing in -

He raised his wand: He could not, would not suffer the Dementor's Kiss, whatever
happened afterward.

It was of Ron and Hermione that he thought as he whispered "Expecto Patronum!"

The silver stag burst from his wand and charged: The Dementors scattered and
there was a triumphant

yell from somewhere out of sight

"It's him, down there, down there, I saw his Patronus, it was a stag!"

The Dementors have retreated, the stars were popping out again and the footsteps
of the Death Eaters

were becoming louder; but before Harry in his panic could decide what to do, there was a
grinding of bolts

nearby, a door opened on the left-side of the narrow street, and a rough voice said:
"Potter, in here, quick!"

He obeyed without hesitation, the three of them hurried through the open doorway.

"Upstairs, keep the Cloak on, keep quiet!" muttered a tall figure, passing them on
his way into the street

and slammed the door behind him.


Harry had had no idea where they were, but now he saw, by the stuttering light of
a single candle,

the grubby, sawdust bar of the Hog's Head Inn. They ran behind the counter and through
a second doorway,

which led to a trickery wooden staircase, that they climbed as fast as they could. The
stairs opened into

a sitting room with a durable carpet and a small fireplace, above which hung a single
large oil painting of a blonde

girl who gazed out at the room with a kind of a vacant sweetness.

Shouts reached from the streets below. Still wearing the Invisibility Cloak on,
they hurried toward the

grimy window and looked down. Their savior, whom Harry now recognized as the Hog's
Head's barman, was

the only person not wearing a hood.

"So what?" he was bellowing into one of the hooded faces. "So what? You send
dementors down my street,

I'll send a Patronus back at'em! I'm not having'em near me, I've told you that. I'm not
having it!"

"That wasn't your Patronus," said a Death Eater. "That was a stag. It was
Potter's!"

"Stag!" roared the barman, and he pulled out a wand. "Stag! You idiot - Expecto
Patronum!"

Something huge and horned erupted from the wand. Head down, it charged
toward the High Street, and

out of sight.

"That's not what I saw" said the Death Eater, though was less certainly

"Curfew's been broken, you heard the noise," one of his companions told the
barman. "Someone was

out on the streets against regulations - "

"If I want to put my cat out, I will, and be damned to your curfew!"

"You set off the Caterwauling Charm?"

"What if I did? Going to cart me off to Azkaban? Kill me for sticking my nose out
my own front door? Do it,

then, if you want to! But I hope for your sakes you haven't pressed your little Dark Marks,
and summoned him. He's

not going to like being called here, for me and my old cat, is he, now?"

"Don't worry about us." said one of the Death Eaters, "worry about yourself,
breaking curfew!"

"And where will you lot traffic potions and poisons when my pub's closed down?
What will happen to your

little sidelines then?"

"Are you threatening - ?"

"I keep my mouth shut, it's why you come here, isn't it?"

"I still say I saw a stag Patronus!" shouted the first Death Eater.

"Stag?" roared the barman. "It's a goat, idiot!"


"He's dead," said Harry, "Bellatrix Lestrange killed him."

The barman face was impassive. After a few moments he said, "I'm sorry to hear
it, I liked that elf."

He turned away, lightning lamps with prods of his wand, not looking at any of
them.

"You're Aberforth," said Harry to the man's back.

He neither confirmed or denied it, but bent to light the fire.

"How did you get this?" Harry asked, walking across to Sirius's mirror, the twin
of the one he had broken

nearly two years before.

"Bought it from Dung 'bout a year ago," said Aberforth. "Albus told me what it
was. Been trying to keep

an eye out for you."

Ron gasped.

"The silver doe," he said excitedly, "Was that you too?"

"What are you talking about?" asked Aberforth.

"Someone sent a doe Patronus to us!"

"Brains like that, you could be a Death Eater, son. Haven't I just prove my
Patronus is a goat?"

"Oh," said Ron, "Yeah... well, I'm hungry!" he added defensively as his stomach
gave an enormous

rumble.

"I got food," said Aberforth, and he sloped out of the room, reappearing moments
later with a large

"All right, we made a mistake," said the second Death Eater. "Break curfew again
and we won't be so lenient!"

The Death Eaters strode back towards the High Street. Hermione moaned with
relief, wove out from under the Cloak,

and sat down on a wobble-legged chair. Harry drew the curtains then pulled the Cloak off
himself and Ron. They could hear the

barman down below, rebolting the door of the bar, then climbing the stairs.

Harry's attention was caught by something on the mantelpiece: a small,
rectangular mirror, propped on top of it,

right beneath the portrait of the girl.

The barman entered the room.

"You bloody fools," he said gruffly, looking from one to the other of them. "What
were you thinking, coming here?"

"Thank you," said Harry. "You can't thank you enough. You saved our lives!"

The barman grunted. Harry approached him looking up into the face: trying to see
past the long, stringy, wire-gray hair

beard. He wore spectacles. Behind the dirty lenses, the eyes were a piercing, brilliant blue.

"It's your eye I've been seeing in the mirror."

There was a silence in the room. Harry and the barman looked at each other.

"You sent Dobby."

The barman nodded and looked around for the elf.

"Thought he'd be with you. Where've you left him?


loaf of bread, some cheese, and a pewter jug of mead, which he set upon a small table in
front of the fire.

Ravenous, they ate and drank, and for a while there was sound of chewing.

"Right then," said Aberforth when the had eaten their fill and Harry and Ron sat
slumped dozily in

their chairs. "We need to think of the best way to get you out of here. Can't be done by
night, you heard what

happens if anyone moves outdoors during darkness: Caterwauling Charm's set off, they'll
be onto you like

bowtruckles on doxy eggs. I don't reckon I'll be able to pass of a stag as a goat a second
time. Wait for daybreak

when curfew lifts, then you can put your Cloak back on and set out on foot. Get right out
of Hogsmeade, up into

the mountains, and you'll be able to Disapparate there. Might see Hagrid. He's been
hiding in a cave up there with

Grawp ever since they tried to arrest him."

"We're not leaving," said Harry. "We need to get into Hogwarts."

"Don't be stupid, boy," said Aberforth.

"We've got to," said Harry.

"What you've got to do," said Aberforth, leaning forward, "is to get as far from
here as from here as you

can."

"You don't understand. There isn't much time. We've got to get into the castle.
Dumbledore - I mean,

your brother - wanted us - "

The firelight made the grimy lenses of Aberforth's glasses momentarily opaque, a
bright flat white, and

Harry remembered the blind eyes of the giant spider, Aragog.

"My brother Albus wanted a lot of things," said Aberforth, "and people had a
habit of getting hurt while he

was carrying out his grand plans. You get away from this school, Potter, and out of the
country if you can. Forget

my brother and his clever schemes. He's gone where none of this can hurt him, and you
don't owe him anything."

"You don't understand." said Harry again.

"Oh, don't I? said Aberforth quietly. "You don't think I understood my own
brother? Think you know Albus

better than I did?"

"I didn't mean that," said Harry, whose brain felt sluggish with exhaustion and
from the surfeit of food and wine.

"It's... he left me a job."

"Did he now?" said Aberforth. "Nice job, I hope? Pleasant? Easy? Sort of thing
you'd expect an unqualified

wizard kid to be able to do without overstretching themselves?"

Ron gave a rather grim laugh. Hermione was looking strained.

"I-it's not easy, no," said Harry. "But I've got to - "


"Got to? Why got to? He's dead, isn't he?" said Aberforth roughly. "Let it go, boy,
before you follow him!

Save yourself!"

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"I - " Harry felt overwhelmed; he could not explain, so he took the offensive
instead. "But you're fighting too,

you're in the Order of the Phoenix - "

"I was," said Aberforth. "The Order of the Phoenix is finished. You-Know-Who's
won, it's over, and anyone

who's pretending different's kidding themselves. It'll never be safe for you here, Potter, he
wants you too badly.

So go abroad, go into hiding, save yourself. Best take these two with you." He jerked a
thumb at Ron and Hermione.

"They'll be in danger long as they live now everyone knows they've been working with
you."

"I can't leave," said Harry. "I've got a job - "

"Give it to someone else!"

"I can't. It's got to be me, Dumbledore explained it all - "

"Oh, did he now? And did he tell you everything, was he honest with you?"

Harry wanted him with all his heart to say "Yes," but somehow the simple word
would not rise to his lips,

Aberforth seemed to know what he was thinking.

"I knew my brother, Potter. He learned secrecy at our mother's knee. Secrets and
lies, that's how we grew

up, and Albus... he was a natural."

The old man's eyes traveled to the painting of the girl over the mantelpiece. It was,
now Harry looked around

properly, the only picture in the room. There was no photograph of Albus Dumbledore,
nor of anyone else.

"Mr. Dumbledore" said Hermione rather timidly. "Is that your sister? Ariana?

"Yes." said Aberforth tersely. "Been reading Rita Skeeter, have you, missy?"

Even by the rosy light of the fire it was clear that Hermione had turned red.

"Elphias Doge mentioned her to us," said Harry, trying to spare Hermione.

"That old berk," muttered Aberforth, taking another swig of mead. "Thought the
sun shone out of my

brother's every office, he did. Well, so did plenty of people, you three included, by the
looks of it."

Harry kept quiet. He did not want to express the doubts and uncertainties about
Dumbledore that had

riddled him for months now. He had made his choice while he dug Dobby's grave, he had
decided to continue

along the winding, dangerous path indicated for him by Albus Dumbledore, to accept that
he had not been told

everything that he wanted to know, but simply to trust. He had no desire to doubt again;
he did not want o hear


anything that would deflect him from his purpose. He met Aberforth's gaze, which was so
strikingly like his

brothers': The bright blue eyes gave the same impression that they were X-raying the
object of their scrutiny,

and Harry thought that Aberforth knew what he was thinking and despised him for it.

"Professor Dumbledore cared about Harry, very much," said Hermione in a low
voice.

"Did he now?" said Aberforth. "Funny thing how many of the people my brother
cared about very much

ended up in a worse state than if he'd left 'em well alone."

"What do you mean?" asked Hermione breathlessly.

"Never you mind," said Aberforth.

"But that's a really serious thing to say!" said Hermione. "Are you - are you
talking about your sister?"

Aberforth glared at her: His lips moved as if he were chewing the words he was
holding back. Then he burst

into speech.

"When my sister was six years old, she was attacked, by three Muggle boys.
They'd seen her doing magic,

spying through the back garden hedge: She was a kid, she couldn't control it, no witch or
wizard can at that age.

What they saw, scared them, I expect. They forced their way through the hedge, and
when she couldn't show them

the trick, they got a bit carried away trying to stop the little freak doing it."

Hermione's eyes were huge in the firelight; Ron looked slightly sick. Aberforth
stood up, tall as Albus, and

suddenly terrible in his anger and the intensity of his pain.

"It destroyed her, what they did: She was never right again. She wouldn't use
magic, but she couldn't get rid

of it; it turned inward and drove her mad, it exploded out of her when she couldn't control
it, and at times she was

strange and dangerous. But mostly she was sweet and scared and harmless.

"And my father went after the bastards that did it," said Aberforth, "and attacked
them. And they locked him

up in Azkaban for it. He never said why he'd done it, because the Ministry had known
what Ariana had become,

she'd have been locked up in St. Mungo's for good. They'd have seen her as a serious
threat to the International

Statute of Secrecy, unbalanced like she was, with magic exploding out of her at moments
when she couldn't keep it

in any longer.

"We had to keep her safe and quiet. We moved house, put it about she was ill, and
my mother looked after

her, and tried to keep her calm and happy.

"I was her favourite," he said, and as he said it, a grubby schoolboy seemed to
look out through Aberforth's


wrinkles and wrangled beard. "Not Albus, he was always up in his bedroom when he was
home, reading his books

and counting his prizes, keeping up with his correspondence with "the most notable
magical names of the day,"

Aberforth succored. "He didn't want to be bothered with her. She liked me best. I could
get her to eat when she wouldn't

do it for my mother, I could calm her down, when she was in one of her rages, and when
she was quiet, she used to

help me feed the goats.

"Then, when she was fourteen... See, I wasn't there." said Aberforth. "If I'd been
there, I could have calmed

her down. She had one of her rages, and my mother wasn't as young as she was, and . . . it
was an accident. Ariana

couldn't control it. But my mother was killed."

Harry felt a horrible mixture of pity and repulsion; he did not want to hear any
more, but Aberforth kept talking,

and Harry wondered how long it had been since he had spoken about this; whether, in
fact, he had ever spoken about it.

"So that put paid to Albus's trip round the world with little Doge. The pair of 'em
came home for my mother's

funeral and then Doge went off on his own, and Albus settled down as head of the family.
Ha!"

Aberforth spat into the fire.

"I'd have looked after her, I told him so, I didn't care about school, I'd have stayed
home and done it.

He told me I had to finish my education and he'd take over from my mother. Bit of a
comedown for Mr. Brilliant,

there's no prizes for looking after your half-mad sister, stopping her blowing up the house
every other day. But he

did all right for a few weeks . . . till he came."

And now a positively dangerous look crept over Aberforth’s face.

"Grindelwald. And at last, my brother had an equal to talk to someone just as
bright and talented he was. And

looking after Ariana took a backseat then, while they were hatching all their plans for a
new Wizarding order and looking

for Hallows, and whatever else it was they were so interested in. Grand plans for the
benefit of all Wizardkind, and if one

young girl neglected, what did that matter, when Albus was working for the greater
good?

"But after a few weeks of it, I'd had enough, I had. It was nearly time for me to go
hack to Hogwarts, so I told 'em,

both of 'em, face-to-face, like I am to you, now," and Aberforth looked downward Harry,
and it took a little imagination to

see him as a teenager, wiry and angry, confronting his elder brother. "I told him, you'd
better give it up now. You can't move her,


she's in no fit state, you can't take her with you, wherever it is you're planning to go,
when you're making your clever speeches,

trying to whip yourselves up a following. He didn't like that." said Aberforth, and his
eyes were briefly occluded by the fireflight on

the lenses of his glasses: They turned white and blind again. "Grindelwald didn't like that
at all. He got angry. He told me what a

stupid little boy I was, trying to stand in the way of him and my brilliant brother . . .
Didn't I understand, my poor sister wouldn't

have to be hidden once they'd changed the world, and led the wizards out of hiding, and
taught the Muggles their place?

"And there was an argument . . . and I pulled my wand, and he pulled out his, and
I had the Cruciatus Curse used on

me by my brother's best friend - and Albus was trying to stop him, and then all three of us
were dueling, and the flashing lights

and the bangs set her off, she couldn't stand it - "

The color was draining from Aberforth's face as though he had suffered a mortal
wound.

" - and I think she wanted to help, but she didn't really know what she was doing,
and I don't know which of us did it,

it could have been any of us - and she was dead."

His voice broke on the last word and he dropped down into the nearest chair.
Hermione's face was wet with tears, and Ron

was almost as pale as Aberforth. Harry felt nothing but revulsion: He wished he had not
heard it, wished he could wash is mind clean of it.

"I'm so . . . I'm so sorry," Hermione whispered.

"Gone," croaked Aberforth. "Gone forever."

He wiped his nose on hiss cuff and cleared his throat.

" 'Course, Grindelwald scarpered. He had a bit of a track record already, back in
his own country, and he didn't want Ariana

set to his account too. And Albus was free, wasn't he? Free of the burden of his sister,
free to become the greatest wizard of the - "

"He was never free," said Harry.

"I beg your pardon?" said Aberforth.

"Never," said Harry. "The night that your brother died, he drank a potion that
drove him out of his mind. He started screaming,

pleading with someone who wasn't there. 'Don't hurt them, please . . . hurt me instead.' "

Ron and Hermione were staring at Harry. He had never gone into details about
what had happened on the island on the lake:

The events that had taken place after he and Dumbledore had returned to Hogwarts had
eclipsed it so thoroughly.

"He thought he was back there with you and Grindelwald, I know he did," said
Harry, remembering Dumbledore whispering, pleading.

"He thought he was watching Grindelwald hurting you and Ariana . . . It was torture to
him, if you'd seen him then, you wouldn't say he was free."

Aberforth seemed lost in contemplation of his own knotted and veined hands.
After a long pause he said. "How can you be sure, Potter,


that my brother wasn't more interested in the greater good than in you? How can you be
sure you aren't dispensable, just like my little sister?"

A shard of ice seemed to pierce Harry's heart.

"I don't believe it. Dumbledore loved Harry," said Hermione.

"Why didn't he tell him to hide, then? shot back Aberforth. "Why didn't he say to
him, 'Take care of yourself, here's how to survive' ?"

"Because," said Harry before Hermione could answer, "sometimes you've got to
think about more than your own safety! Sometimes

you've got to think about the greater good! This is war!"

"You're seventeen, boy!"

"I'm of age, and I'm going to keep fighting even if you've given up!"

"Who says I've given up?"

"The Order of the Phoenix is finished," Harry repeated, "You-Know-Who's won,
it's over, and anyone who's pretending different's kidding

themselves."

"I don't say I like it, but it's the truth!"

"No, it isn't." said Harry. "Your brother knew how to finish You-Know-Who and
he passed the knowledge on to me. I'm going to keep going

until I succeed - or I die. Don't think I don't know how this might end. I've known it for
years."

He waited for Aberforth to jeer or to argue, but he did not. He merely moved.

"We need to get into Hogwarts," said Harry again. "If you can't help us, we'll wait
till daybreak, leave you in peace, and try to find a way

in ourselves. If you can help us - well, now would be a great time to mention it."

Aberforth remained fixed in his chair, gazing at Harry with the eye, that were so
extraordinarily like his brother's. At last he cleared his

throat, got to his feet, walked around the little table, and approached the portrait of Ariana.

"You know what to do," he said.

She smiled, turned, and walked away, not as people in portraits usually did, one of
the sides of their frames, but along what seemed to

be a long tunnel painted behind her. They watched her slight figure retreating until finally
she was swallowed by the darkness.

"Er - what - ?" began Ron.

"There's only one way in now," said Aberforth. "You must know they've got all
the old secret passageways covered at both ends, dementors

all around the boundary walls, regular patrols inside the school from what my sources tell
me. The place has never been so heavily guarded.

How you expect to do anything once you get inside it, with Snape in charge and the
Carrows as his deputies. . . well, that's your lookout, isn't it?

You say you're prepared to die."

"But what . . . ?" said Hermione, frowning at Ariana's picture.

A tiny white dot reappeared at the end of the painted tunnel, and now Ariana was
walking back toward them, growing bigger and bigger

as she came. But there was somebody else with her now, someone taller than she was,
who was limping along, looking excited. His hair was


longer than Harry had ever seen. He appeared and torn. Larger and larger the two figures
grew, until only their heads and shoulders filled the portrait.

Then the whole thing swang forward on the wall like a little door, and the entrance to a
real tunnel was revealed. And our of it, his hair overgrown,

his face cut, his robes ripped, clambered the real Neville Longbottom, who gave a roar of
delight, leapt down from the mantelpiece and yelled.

"I knew you'd come! I knew it, Harry!"



Chapter Twenty-Nine

The Lost Diadem

“Neville -- what the -- how -- ?”

But Neville had spotted Ron and Hermione, and with yells of delight was hugging
them too. The longer Harry looked at Neville, the worse he appeared: One of his eyes
was swollen yellow and purple, there were gouge marks on his face, and his general air of
unkemptness suggested that he had been living enough. Nevertheless, his battered visage
shone with happiness as he let go of Hermione and said again, “I knew you’d come! Kept
telling Seamus it was a matter of time!”

“Neville, what’s happened to you?”

“What? This?” Neville dismissed his injuries with a shake of the head. “This is
nothing, Seamus is worse. You’ll see. Shall we get going then? Oh,” he turned to
Aberforth, “Ab, there might be a couple more people no the way.”

“Couple more?” repeated Aberforth ominously. “What d’you mean, a couple
more, Longbottom? There’s a curfew and a Camwaulding Charm on the whole village!”

“I know, that’s why they’ll be Apparating directly into the bar,” said Neville.
“Just send them down the passage when they get here, will you? Thanks a lot.”

Neville held out his hand to Hermione and helped her to climb up onto the
mantelpiece and into the tunnel; Ron followed, then Neville. Harry addressed Aberforth.

“I don’t know how to thank you. You’ve saved our lives twice.”

“Look after ‘em, then,” said Aberforth gruffly. “I might not be able to save ‘em a
third time.”

Harry chambered up onto the mantelpiece and through the hole behind Ariana’s
portrait. There were smooth stone steps on the other side: It looked as though the
passageway had been there for years. Brass lamps hung from the walls and the earthy
floor was worn and smooth; as they walked, their shadows rippled, fanlike, across the
wall.

“How long’s this been here?” Ron asked as they set off. “It isn’t on the
Marauder’s Map, is it Harry? I thought there were only seven passages in and out of
school?”

“They sealed off all of those before the start of the year,” said Neville. “There’s
no chance of getting through any of them now, not with the curses over the entrances and
Death Eaters and dementors waiting at the exits.” He started walking backward, beaming,
drinking them in. “Never mind that stuff … Is it true? Did you break into Gringotts? Did
you escape on a dragon? It’s everywhere, everyone’s talking about it, Terry Boot got
beaten up by Carrow for yelling about it in the Great Hall at dinner!”


“Yeah, it’s true,” said Harry.

Neville laughed gleefully.

“What did you do with the dragon?”

“Released it into the wild,” said Ron. “Hermione was all for keeping it as a pet“

“Don’t exaggerate, Ron –“

“But what have you been doing? People have been saying you’ve just been on the
run, Harry, but I don’t think so. I think you’ve been up to something.”

“You’re right,” said Harry, “but tell us about Hogwarts, Neville, we haven’t heard
anything.”

“It’s been …. Well, it’s not really like Hogwarts anymore,” said Neville, the smile
fading from his face as he spoke. “Do you know about the Carrows?”

“Those two Death Eaters who teach here?”

“They do more than teach,” said Neville. “They’re in charge of all discipline.
They like punishment, the Carrows.”

“Like Umbridge?”

“Nah, they make her look tame. The other teachers are all supposed to refer us to
the Carrows if we do anything wrong. They don’t, though, if they can avoid it. You can
tell they all hate them as much as we do.”

“Amycus, the bloke, he teaches what used to be Defense Against the Dark Arts,
except now it’s just the Dark Arts. We’re supposed to practice the Cruciatus Curse on
people who’ve earned detentions – “

“What?”

Harry, Ron, and Hermione’s united voices echoed up and down the passage.

“Yeah,” said Neville. “That’s how I got this one,” he pointed at a particularly
deep gash in his cheek, “I refused to do it. Some people are into it, though; Crabbe and
Goyle love it. First time they’ve ever been top in anything, I expect.”

“Alecto, Amycus’s sister, teaches Muggle Studies, which is compulsory for
everyone. We’ve all got to listen to her explain how Muggles are like animals, stupid and
dirty, and how they drive wizards into hiding by being vicious toward them, and how the
natural order is being reestablished. I got this one,” he indicated another slash to his face,
“for asking her how much Muggle blood she and her brother have got.”

“Blimey, Neville,” said Ron, “there’s a time and a place for getting a smart
mouth.”

“You didn’t see her,” said Neville. “You wouldn’t have stood it either. The thing
is, it helps when people stand up to them, it gives everyone hope. I used to notice that
when you did it, Harry.”

“But they’ve used you as a knife sharpener,” said Ron, winding slightly as they
passed a lamp and Neville’s injuries were thrown into even greater relief.

Neville shrugged.

“Doesn’t matter. They don’t want to spill too much pure blood, so they’ll torture
us a bit if we’re mouthy but they won’t actually kill us.”

Harry did not know what was worse, the things that Neville was saying or the
matter-of-fact tone in which he said them.

“The only people in real danger are the ones whose friends and relatives on the
outside are giving trouble. They get taken hostage. Old Xeno Lovegood was getting a bit


too outspoken in The Quibbler, so they dragged Luna off the train on the way back for
Christmas.”

“Neville, she’s all right, we’ve seen her –“

“Yeah, I know, she managed to get a message to me.”

From his pocket he pulled a golden coin, and Harry recognized it as one of the
fake Galleons that Dumbledore’s Army had used to send one another messages.

“These have been great,” said Neville, beaming at Hermione. “The Carrows never
rumbled how we were communicating, it drove them mad. We used to sneak out at night
and put graffiti on the walls: Dumbledore’s Army, Still Recruiting, stuff like that. Snape
hated it.”

“You used to?” said Harry, who had noticed the past tense.

“Well, it got more difficult as time went one,” said Neville. “We lost Luna at
Christmas, and Ginny never came back after Easter, and the three of us were sort of the
leaders. The Carrows seemed to know I was behind a lot of it, so they started coming
down on me hard, and then Michael Corner went and got caught releasing a first-year
they’d chained up, and they tortured him pretty badly. That scared people off.”

“No kidding,” muttered Ron, as the passage began to slope upward.

“Yeah, well, I couldn’t ask people to go through what Michael did, so we dropped
those kinds of stunts. But we were still fighting, doing underground stuff, right up until a
couple of weeks ago. That’s when they decided there was only one way to stop me, I
suppose, and they went for Gran.”

“They what?” said Harry, Ron, and Hermione together.

“Yeah,” said Neville, panting a little now, because the passage was climbing so
steeply, “well, you can see their thinking. It had worked really well, kidnapping kids to
force their relatives to behave. I s’pose it was only a matter of time before they did it the
other way around. Thing was,” he faced them, and Harry was astonished to see that he
was grinning, “they bit off a bit more than they could chew with Gran. Little old witch
living alone, they probably thought hey didn’t need to send anyone particularly powerful.
Anyway,” Neville laughed, “Dawlish is still in St. Mungo’s and Gran’s on the run. She
sent me a letter,” he clapped a hand to the breast pocket of his robes, “telling me she was
proud of me, that I’m my parent’s son, and to keep it up.”

“Cool,” said Ron.

“Yea,” said Neville happily. “Only thing was, once they realized they had no hold
over me, they decided Hogwarts could do without me after all. I don’t know whether they
were planning to kill me or send me to Azkaban, either way, I knew it was time to
disappear.”

“But,” said Ron, looking thoroughly confused, “aren’t – aren’t we heading
straight back for Hogwarts?”

“’Course,” said Neville. “You’ll see. We’re here.”

They turned a corner and there ahead of them was the end of the passage. Another
short flight of steps led to a door just like the one hidden behind Ariana’s portrait. Neville
pushed it open and climbed through. As Harry followed, he heard Neville call out for
unseen people:

“Look who it is! Didn’t I tell you?”

As Harry emerged into the room behind the passage, there were several screams
and yells: “HARRY!” “It’s Potter, it’s POTTER!” “Ron!” “Hermione!”


He had a confused impression of colored hangings, of lamps and many faces. The
next moment, he, Ron, and Hermione were engulfed, hugged, pounded on the back, their
hair ruffled, their hands shaken, by what seemed to be more than twenty people. They
might have just won a Quidditch final.

“Okay, okay, calm down!” Neville called, and as the crowd backed away, Harry
was able to take in their surroundings.

He did not recognize the dorm at all. It was enormous, and looked rather like the
interior of a particularly sumptuous tree house, or perhaps a gigantic ship’s cabin.
Multicolored hammocks were strung from the ceiling and from the balcony that ran
around the dark wood-paneled and windowless walls, which were covered in bright
tapestry hangings. Harry saw the gold Gryffindor lion, emblazoned on scarlet; the black
badger of Hufflepuff, set against yellow; and the bronze eagle of Ravenclaw, on blue.
The silver and green of Slytherin alone were absent. There were bulging bookcases, a few
broomsticks propped against the walls, and in the corner, a large wood-cased wireless.

“Where are we?”

“Room of Requirement, of course!” said Neville. “Surpassed itself, hasn’t it? The
Carrows were chasing me, and I knew I had just one chance for a hideout: I managed to
get through the door and this is what I found! Well, it wasn’t exactly like this when I
arrived, it was a load smaller, there was only one hammock and just Gryffindor hangings.
But it’s expanded as more and more of the D.A. have arrived.”

“And the Carrows can’t get in?” asked Harry, looking around for the door.

“No,” said Seamus Finnigan, whom Harry had not recognized until he spoke:
Seamus’s face was bruised and puffy. “It’s a proper hideout, as long as one of us stays in
here, they can’t get at us, the door won’t open. It’s all down to Neville. He really gets this
room. You’ve got to ask for exactly what you need – like, “I don’t want any Carrow
supporters to be able to get in’ – and it’ll do it for you! You’ve just got to make sure you
close the loopholes. Neville’s the man!”

“It’s quite straightforward, really,” said Neville modestly. “I’d been in here about
a day and a half, and getting really hungry, and wishing I could get something to eat, and
that’s when the passage to Hog’s Head opened up. I went through it and met Aberforth.
He’s been providing us with food, because for some reason, that’s the one thing the room
doesn’t really do.

“Yeah, well, food’s one of the five exceptions to Gamp’s Law of Elemental
Transfiguration,” said Ron to general astonishment.

“So we’ve been hiding out here for nearly two weeks,” said Seamus, “and it just
makes more hammocks every time we need room, and it even sprouted a pretty good
bathroom once girls started turning up – “

“—and thought they’d quite like to wash, yes,” supplied Lavender Brown, whom
Harry had not noticed until that point. Now that he looked around properly, he recognized
many familiar faces. Both Patil twins were there, as were Terry Boot, Ernie Macmillan,
Anthony Goldstein, and Michael Corner.

“Tell us what you’ve been up to, though,” said Ernie. “There’ve been so many
rumors, we’ve been trying to keep up with you on Potterwatch.” He pointed at the
wireless. “You didn’t break into Gringotts?”

“They did!” said Neville. “And the dragon’s true too!”

There was a smattering of applause and a few whoops; Ron took a bow.


“What were you after?” asked Seamus eagerly.

Before any of them could parry the question with one of their own, Harry felt a
terrible, scorching pain in the lightning scar. As he turned his back hastily on the curious
and delighted faces, the Room of Requirement vanished, and he was standing inside a
ruined stone shack, and the rotting floorboards were ripped apart at his feet, a disinterred
golden box lay open and empty beside the hole, and Voldemort’s scream of fury vibrated
inside his head.

With an enormous effort he pulled out of Voldemort’s mind again, back to where