The Heart of Gryffindor
by SJR0301
Part III - Chapter Thirty-One
The train-ride back to Hogwarts proved less eventful than our attempts to get to the station. The only real surprise was that Narcissus Malfoy had returned as though nothing had happened. When I confronted him about the bomb at Kings Cross, he looked at me as though I were quite mad. “What bomb?” he asked. “And why the devil would I ever use a stupid Muggle device when I could use magic?”
“It was the cab you got in that blew up,” I retorted. I tried to gauge whether he was lying, but with Narcissus, one could rarely tell, as he is so disturbed that I am convinced he doesn’t always know the truth from the reality he creates.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he answered. He turned his back on me and joined Paul Parkinson and his friend Avery in their compartment. I resolved to keep a closer eye on Narcissus than usual. The best thing about graduating, I thought, would be getting away from that nutter. I just hoped that the morning’s mess had been some weird fluke and that it would all go away as if it had never happened.
Dad was at the feast that evening, but when I went to speak to him afterwards, I was afraid to ask him what had gone on. He looked utterly tired, as though he were only awake by some supreme effort, and the bruises on his face looked worse than ever. He must have gone to Madam Pomfrey after, though, because when he came into class the next afternoon, the bruises on his face were gone and he looked perfectly healthy again. He was wearing old jeans and a plain black sweater, but even Narcissus kept his mouth shut about his Muggle clothing as he was also carrying an object that stirred everyone’s interest.
It appeared to be an old, cracked leather sheath, so old that it could have been made before Hogwarts was even built. Dad ran his hand over the sheath and the cracked leather suddenly changed and appeared to be brand new, crimson with silver tooling. He unbuckled the cover and drew out the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my life. The long silver blade glinted in the sunlight and the hilt was decorated with a lion made out of gold. Clasped in the lion’s paws was a huge, heart-shaped ruby, which glowed as though some magical fire burned continuously in its depths. The blade had Dad’s name on and the single word, Gryffindor.
“Right,” Dad said, as though he hadn’t just shown us a marvel, “This term we will be learning sword fighting.” Without any apparent effort on Dad’s part, the Sword lit up with a crimson-gold light, and with one small gesture he conjured a whole rack of swords.
“Each of you will take one,” Dad explained. “These are regular swords, for learning, and they’re blunted to minimize injury.”
Malfoy stared at Dad’s sword greedily, yet with an expression in his arctic eyes that might have been fear. “Why do we get stuck with Muggle swords, then?” he asked.
Dad stared at him and for an instant I thought he would do the sensible thing and throw Malfoy out. I wondered if he had forgotten that Malloy had been in the cab that blew up, because Dad simply replied, “You’re not ready for that yet. Before you can even try to summon magic in a sword, you’ve got to know how to use it as a sword. Otherwise even a Muggle can disarm you quite easily.”
Lionel raised his hand and asked, “Is that the Sword you used against - ?” He stopped in the middle as though he was terrified to finish. Dad gave the smallest of shrugs and said, “Lord Voldemort? Yes.” He did not elaborate about that, but what he did say made quite a lot of us frightened, even, it seemed, many of the Gryffindors. “Yes. Unfortunately, as a number of Voldemort’s Death Eaters recently escaped and have joined up with dark wizards descended from Grindelwald’s followers, we thought it best that you all learn to defend yourselves from all possible forms of attack. It seems likely that we may see the kind of battle once more that everyone thought would never happen again.”
After that, no one asked another question although Malfoy gave him a funny look. Perhaps he was surprised that Dad hadn’t directly mentioned his grandfather. Nobody got to cross swords that day, nor for the next several weeks after that. We spent a good deal of time practicing the proper form for holding a sword, the proper form for lunging, thrusting, parrying, and doing more gymnastics to avoid being stuck or whacked by a sword. I left each lesson exhausted, sweaty, and woke up after every one with all my muscles aching. It occurred to me that Dad must be an extraordinary athlete, as he never seemed to tire, and his every movement was accomplished with the ease and grace of a cat on the hunt.
***
Harry followed the Muggle papers religiously after what he came to think of as the Great Debacle. He was careful to avoid public appearances and, unfortunately, felt obliged to avoid even his own home in Ottery St. Catchpole. For the first few days after, Ginny had stayed away, too, and eventually, the frustrated reporters stopped coming, although every so often one or the other of the most persistent would show up and try to interview the neighbors. Harry was never more grateful for the fact that he had sent his children to the local Muggle School. Sirius' friends, in particular, had happily informed the reporters that Sirius and his family could not possibly be wizards and had roundly insulted the reporters. After a bit, Ginny had recovered her sense of humor, and they had laughed for a good half hour when the story had disappeared only to the inside pages of the worst scandal sheets, side by side with the centerfold of the latest half-naked woman and cheek-by-jowl with the latest story about Elvis' reincarnation as a Borstal boy and reports on the latest crop circles. The story now included no mention of MI-5. Instead, it speculated on whether Harry might be the illegitimate son of the Prince of Wales with an elf-maid for a mother. Harry wondered what the Muggles would think if they could see real elves, which were nothing like the ones now popularized in Muggle fiction.
He had a considerable shock, however, when he was asked to appear at the Queen's dinner for the French president. This was a highly publicized event and the Queen had sent a note requiring Harry to bring his wife along. They had spent a mad morning in Harrods trying to find suitable clothing to attend a Palace dinner and Harry had to take a tuxedo that still needed alteration as the sales clerk had recognized him and wanted to know if he really could do magic.
Before taking his place in the procession, Harry checked to make sure that all of his security measures were in place. He had assigned Johnny and Brittany to sweep the reception room for hidden weapons and he and Ginny had set unobtrusive magical protections in place in order to prevent any Death Eaters or Alliance wizards from attacking. This had been quite tricky, as they had to set up the magical shielding without interfering with the electricity.
The procession had gone smoothly enough as had the Queen's welcome of the French President. Harry relaxed a bit after that, but he made sure to stay within the Queen's general orbit in case anyone attempted to attack her or the President. He thought he had succeeded at remaining unnoticed until the President said to the Queen, "So, is it true that your man over there is really a wizard? We wouldn't mind if you shipped a wizard or two over to France to assist with our security." He paused, and added roguishly, "Of course, we French would not need to ask for any love potions, but I should think you British could do with a bit more romance."
The President raised his glass of wine and toasted Harry, who had a terrible time retaining his calm. Harry glanced briefly at the Queen and said calmly, "Romance has nothing to do with love potions, although I would say it is a kind of magic."
The Queen looked momentarily annoyed, because, Harry supposed, the president had brought up the gossip about wizards, and in a public place. Harry thought, however, that the fact that the President had brought it up there meant he believed it was a joke.
"We would be happy," the Queen answered, "to cooperate more with your people on security and particularly on the problems of keeping terrorists out of our countries."
"Very good," the French president said, in a tone that imitated the most polite tones of a news reporter. "We just want to be sure that our genuine investors and job seekers are not unnecessarily screened out by these enhanced protocols. It's just too bad," he continued, "that terrorists aren't so romantic as wizards."
"Terror is never romantic," Harry blurted out, "no matter what methods are used to produce it."
The President blinked at him and frowned at his wine glass and seemed to be mentally counting the number of drinks he had. "Are you saying what I think you are saying?" He looked at the Queen, who was busily drawing a small compact from her purse and then back to Harry.
"I meant," Harry said, "that just because the idea of magic is somehow romantic or appeals to the imagination, if it did exist, if terrorists did use it, it would make no difference to their victims, who would be just as dead, no matter how they were murdered."
"Ah," the President said, "a hypothetical discussion. A Pascalian would say, I think magic exists, therefore it does, a Cartesian would say, magic can't exist unless proved."
Another voice behind him replied, "And what if you haven't the instruments to detect its presence or the perception to see it for yourself?"
The speaker was a tall young man with taffy colored hair and blue eyes with quite long eyelashes. The Queen now looked both amused and displeased at once and the young man immediately apologized, "Sorry, butting in where I'm not wanted."
The French President snagged another goblet of wine and drank it in several gulps. Thus fortified, he smiled and bowed elegantly, "You are more than welcome, Your Highness. It is just a bit of philosophical whimsy."
The Queen, perhaps, had given a signal, for the Prime Minister arrived and led the French President away to a room off of the reception room. The Queen followed, pausing only for moment to say to the Prince, "You ought to know by now that a reception like this requires more discretion than genuine diplomatic negotiations."
Harry felt quite abashed himself, though the remark had not been directed at him. "Damn," the Prince said, "Grandmum is hell on wheels, isn't she?"
Harry opened his mouth and closed it again. "I like her," he answered. "I think she's very brave."
"That is a hell of a compliment," the Prince said, "coming from The Boy Who Lived."
Harry gawped at the younger man, wondering whether everyone in the world now not only believed he was a wizard, but somehow had his entire history as well. He was saved from making an utter idiot of himself by Ginny, who came up and said to the Prince, "You have grown, haven't you?"
"He doesn't recognize me," the Prince complained.
"Well, why would he?" Ginny said tartly, "You were only a first year when he was a seventh and he was just a bit preoccupied that year with fighting Lord Voldemort."
The Prince flinched at the mention of Voldemort's name and it hit Harry that he did know the young man. "You were that first year who was always getting into trouble, pulling the girls' pigtails and stuff! Henry something?"
The Prince grinned. "I was a bit of a holy terror, wasn't I? Your friend Hermione was always pulling her hair out trying to keep me in line. I think she was the only one who guessed who I was."
"But the Queen isn't?" Harry asked.
The Prince shook his head. "Some people call her a witch behind her back, but she's a Muggle like everyone else in the family. I'm the first wizard born in the family that I know of. And the only reason I got to go to Hogwarts was because Grandmum had met Dumbledore several times and thinks a lot of him."
"We all do," Harry replied. He considered the young man before him and had a peculiar feeling that the heavens were playing a vast joke. He only hoped that it was a good one.
"It's quite odd," Harry said more to himself than to the others, "that you are what Eric Hayden imagines himself to be."
The Prince raised his eyebrows and said, "Not quite. If I read the Daily Prophet correctly, he thinks he should be King. I, however, am not the oldest and have no ambition to be King. It's bad enough living your life in the public glare," he added vehemently, "but to have to completely live it for the duty and the show like Grandmum - no thanks."
"Sometimes you get stuck with the duty whether you want it or not," Harry replied.
The Prince stared at him and shook his head. "I was at the Battle for Hogwarts. I meant no insult, you know."
"I know you didn't," Harry answered, "and I meant no criticism either." A thought struck him as he considered the Prince, "Why'd the Queen bother appointing me anyway, when she's got you to protect her from the Death Eaters?"
"She didn't think of it until after MI-5 assigned you on Opening Day," the Prince responded. "I think she felt you deserved a reward for all you've done. And besides," he continued, "I don't exactly have experience fighting Death Eaters like you do."
In the days that followed, Harry retreated back to Hogwarts and emerged from the Headmaster’s office only to teach Defense classes and to meet with Ginny to follow the progress of the Order’s attempts to locate the Death Eaters. Unfortunately, they had gone to ground somewhere and no one had information where. Lupin had scoured Knockturn Alley and Ron had visited the Malfoy’s manor in Wiltshire as well as the London townhouse. Neither had been occupied. Bones had even gone to the Riddle House, but it remained was entirely empty. Harry had even asked Johnny to check out the York hotel where the Death Eaters had attempted to bring back Voldemort, but it had changed hands several times and appeared to be a perfectly legitimate tourist attraction once more.
Cold snowy days were succeeded by even colder nights. Harry could not help noticing too that Dumbledore had grown frailer than ever, and despite all of Harry’s encouragement, the old wizard refused to take up residence in the Headmaster’s office once more. Where once Harry would have gone to Dumbledore with all of these problems, he now did his best to hide his worries.
The nights plagued Harry the most. Frequent nightmares troubled him, brought on, he supposed, by his abduction by the Alliance. Quite often, he dreamed he was tied to the gravestone at the Riddle House and Voldemort tormented him. At others, he woke dripping in sweat and shaking after re-living that moment when he had stabbed Voldemort with the Sword of Gryffindor, impaling himself on the other's own dark weapon. Worst of all, were the ones in which he was utterly paralyzed and unable to prevent his children's murder.
He stayed awake far into the night, reading every book and scroll he could find on Arthur's sword. Some said the sword was lost forever. Others gave fanciful descriptions of its powers and of the battles Arthur had won - defeating giants, slaying hundreds of men in a single battle, forcing the invading Angles and Saxons back from British land. Several even contained maps which gave the location of Arthur's castles. Only one, however, seemed likely to provide true guidance for his search. This one located the sword on the Isle the Muggles had taken to calling Avalon. In the scroll, it was named Apple Island for the sweet fragrance of the apple trees that thrived on its mild shores. The problem, of course, was that the isle was also known as the Vanishing Isle. Harry supposed that it had been made unplottable and that Muggle repelling spells had been laid on it. And there were other protections named, too. In order to cross to the island, the author (anonymous naturally) asserted one had to wait until low tide reduced the water in the channel between the mainland and the island, and then one had to cross a causeway brimming with dangerous enchantments.
The ancient castle loomed before him, obscured in mist, wavering in outline. He crept toward the castle ignoring the icy splash of the water, but before he was halfway there, sword upon sword flashed at him, and he dodged and dodged, until he found himself once more thrusting his sword into Voldemort’s evil heart.
Harry woke and he saw that he had slept less than half an hour. In desperation, he considered asking Madam Pomfrey for a draught of the potion for dreamless sleep. Such solace, he knew, could only be temporary though. He paced the office, his head so full of memories, terrors real and imaginary, that it felt as though it would explode. Abruptly, he stopped before the glass encased bookshelves and saw there the means for his relief: the Pensive. Eagerly, he opened the door and noted that the basin, just now, was quite empty. He drew his wand and drew out strand after strand of memories, and deposited each into the Pensive until he felt the pressure that weighed on his mind and his heart ease up. Exhaustion overcame him, and he found that it was simply too difficult to make the trek to his private chambers. He sank down on the couch beneath the window and slept.
The sun was well up when the sound of the griffin doorknocker being struck woke him. Harry sat up feeling quite grumpy, shoved his glasses back in place, and made his way over to the chair behind the Headmaster's desk. The knock sounded again, more demanding, and Harry had the urge to transform and escape. The sound of James' voice muttering, and hushing at some scolding by Snape was enough to bring him alert and make him annoyed at the same time.
At his word, Snape strode in, followed by James and Sirius, both of whom looked utterly furious.
"They've been fighting," Snape accused, in a tone Harry knew only too well and which immediately put his back up.
Harry clasped his hands and forced a cool expression on his face. "With whom?" he asked, thinking he knew the answer already.
"With each other," Snape replied. "Wand on wand with each other, after which they both went after Narcissus Malfoy."
Harry ignored the last part, as it was what Harry would have expected. "You were fighting each other, here, with wands?" he asked.
Neither contrived to look at all embarrassed. James was flushed red and Sirius was pale, his blue eyes cold and hard.
A rare anger possessed Harry, composed largely of fear, and with a tincture of self-reproach: he had ignored his children too much lately, shutting them out along with everyone else as he struggled to deal with the many crises brought on by the Death Eaters’ escape, his outing in the press, and the running of Hogwarts. Only peripherally aware of Snape’s presence now, he focused on the two boys. “You will not ever, never, fight each other with wands again,” he said icily. “I don’t care whose fault it was. I don’t care what provocation there was. Don’t ever raise a weapon against one another, or I will take your wands away and break them myself. Is that clear?”
“They didn’t work against each other anyway,” James mumbled. His face was still flushed with anger, but now also with shame.
“That’s right,” Harry replied. “They are brother wands and their wand cores come from the same phoenix. They won’t work because brothers should never raise weapons against each other. It’s unnatural.”
Snape gave him an odd look, shrewd and comprehending and yet derisive at once. “As ever, Potter, you see the world through the filter of your own noble illusions. As headmaster, it’s what they did together to Narcissus Malfoy that should concern you.”
“He murdered Matilda’s kitten,” Sirius cut in.
“You don’t know that,” Snape answered, “and you did him some serious damage. Perhaps you would have killed him, had I not stopped you?”
***
“I’m not a killer like him,” Sirius retorted vehemently. “If I’d wanted to kill him, I would have. It’s not like we all don’t know how.” He paused and added, “He helped try to kill Dad at Kings Cross at Christmas. He should have been expelled for taking part in that.”
“You have no proof of that either,” Professor Snape said. He looked at Dad and continued, “old grudges, bearing new fruit.”
Dad gave him an angry look, and would have spoken, but Professor Snape cut him off and said, “You’d better see Malfoy first before you make any judgments ... Headmaster.”
Dad looked suddenly weary and I felt sorry, for the first time, that I had not controlled my temper. There were shadows of exhaustion beneath his eyes and I could see that he had lost weight, so that his face seemed more chiseled, the flesh worn away to leave only the essentials.
"Stay here," he said to James and me, and he strode out of the office after Snape.
I looked at James and tried to put some order into my confused thoughts and emotions. He continued to look both angry and slightly ashamed, but his mouth and chin had that stubborn set that meant he was preparing to dig in for a good, hard battle.
"Look," he said, "I didn't mean to kiss Matilda. It just happened. I was the one who told Lily to go get you."
I just looked at him. I didn't have to say what I thought, that he had betrayed me, that he had no right to go poaching my girlfriend. He flushed deeper as though he read my thoughts; perhaps they were his already.
"I can't help it, being in love with her." He looked at his hands and then back at me. Perhaps he was preparing to fight me with them as Dad had ruled out wands. Instead, he shoved them in his pockets and glared at me as though all of it were my fault.
"It's not like you pay that much attention to her anyway. You're all preoccupied with your plans - Muggle University, the band; you don't really love her. She's got no place in your plans. She's your friend, a convenient date until you find the girl of your dreams. And you'll never find her because you're still stuck back in your childhood romance of playing knight to Lily's princess. You want to grow up, Sirius, and start living in reality."
At first, I was angrier than ever, because there was more truth to his words than I wanted to acknowledge. I liked Matilda, a lot, but did I love her? And what did she think? Did she actually like James? Did she love him? I had no doubts about James, though. James, I thought, was gone for good. James was the realist, the hard-headed practical one, and it seemed he had fallen head over heels for my girlfriend and how was I to deal with that? Was it just his need to compete with me, because I was older? I thought not.
I looked at his determined face and saw that he was willing to fight for Matilda in a way I was not. And because this made me feel small, and made me feel the sting of his accusations, I looked around the office, seeking anything other than that hard hazel-gaze, which just then looked more green than brown and made his resemblance to Dad more noticeable than usual. A glow in the glass bookcases attracted my attention, and more for a means of distraction and to stop the direction of our conversation, I moved to look at the round object from which the misty glow came. With a huff of annoyance more like Mum for my refusal to argue back, James followed me to look at the cracked stone basin in which a cloudy mist fill with images floated.
Ever curious and fearless, James gave the misty depths a poke with his wand and a face showed clearly in the clouds - Dad's. "What is it?" he asked.
"Dunno," I replied. I laid a hand on his shoulder, the better to see, and poked my head in the mist at the same time he did.
We were standing in a narrow pathway and beside us tall, dense shrubs grew above our heads. What little one could see of the sky was nearly fully dark and the place was incredibly eerie.
“Hey, Dad,” James called out.
The dark, untidy head turned to look over its shoulder, and I could see that this was Dad. He wore the same round glasses and on his forehead, the thin line of his lightning bolt scar stood out prominently – far more prominently than I had ever seen it before. The green eyes were the same as well, but the rest of him, that was truly strange. For the person in front of us, though clearly our Dad and he was so much smaller. He was shorter than James by a good half a foot and looked quite skinny, almost too thin. And he was wearing school robes, not the robes of an adult teacher or the casual wear he favored when he was at home. The other peculiar thing was that the boy in front of us did not reply. It was as if we did not exist.
James and I followed our boy father as he stuck out his wand and said, “Point Me.” His wand spun and then pointed and he walked on quickly in the direction the wand had pointed, but he had a nervous air, and his wand was held at the ready.
He rounded a corner and stopped dead. James and I stopped abruptly too, and I almost knocked right into Dad, but he still didn’t notice us. I was beginning to get some inkling of what had happened. We had, I thought, gone back in time somehow, but I didn’t quite understand when. James had his mouth open and he was quite pale. Before us was a monster I’d only seen in books. Its leonine form topped with a woman’s head, the Sphinx challenged Dad. James and I exchanged looks of surprise as he worked out the riddle the Sphinx had given, without any apparent sign of nervousness and then marched right on when the Sphinx stretched and moved aside for him. I followed Dad, though James tugged at me and said, “You can’t –“ But it was as I thought. The Sphinx paid us no mind and I was sure now that no one we would see would know of our presence.
We had to hurry along as Dad had started to jog and we saw from the other side of the pathway that someone else was also running quite fast. Dad stopped and shouted a warning to the other person as a huge, black thing with lots of legs appeared from another pathway. Dad aimed his wand and struck the thing, an enormous spider, with a spell, but the thing kept coming, apparently unharmed and unaffected by the spell. Instead of going for the other boy, a taller boy, the spider went for Dad and caught him by the leg with a pincer lifting him up high. Dad shouted another spell and the spider dropped him. We saw with horror that the spider was going to bite him, but Dad hit the spider under its belly with another spell just as the other boy did the same. This time, the spider tumbled over stunned.
The other boy, who looked as though he must be at least a sixth or seventh year, helped Dad up and they proceeded to argue over who would win. There on a plinth nearby stood a tall silver trophy on which was inscribed TRIWIZARD CONTEST. I tried to recall what I had read about Dad and the Triwizard contest, but I had passed over that portion of his biography in favor of the very last. “Both of us,” Dad said. I came to and saw the two of them seize either handle of the cup and then everything moved. In a whirlwind, in the space of seconds, we were no longer in that high sheltered maze, but in a graveyard somewhere else. I looked at James and heard him cursing dreadfully as he was given to do when he wanted to avoid admitting to himself that he was scared.
Even later, I did not care to dwell on the things I saw in Dad’s past: The green light striking the other boy and leaving him dead, his handsome face open and empty of thought forever, Dad’s cry of pain when the green light passed close by, so close it barely missed grazing him, and his struggles when the short man bound him to the gravestone. At that point, James and I both lost it and tried to shout spells at the ratty looking man, but nothing came and we understood that we were only captive viewers, helpless to do anything. Worst of all, I knew exactly how he felt, being tied up, being helpless.
But nothing prepared us for the rise of the man from the great stone cauldron, for his pitiless red eyes, or for the tortures he inflicted on that helpless young boy. And neither of us could have imagined the extraordinary way in which our boy father fought back when given a chance against a monster beyond comprehension. This man, You Know Who, Lord Voldemort, was so far greater in evil than even the man who had ordered me killed with such cold carelessness only weeks before. I know I shouted aloud at several moments, when the spells from their wands joined, when the ghosts appeared from the end of the monster’s wand, and most of all, when the monster prepared triumphantly to kill Dad just at the moment that Dad summoned the trophy and he and we all returned to Hogwarts in a howl of wind and light. I knew I was dazed and I am sure James was too. The fog began to swirl and we saw Dad’s face again, this time a year or two older than before, but before we could go any further, strong hands pulled us both away from the basin.
“What did you see?” Dad asked. His face was white, horrified, more scared than he had been inside the past.
“You,” James said shakily. “And You Know Who.”
“When?” Dad demanded. His hand shook as he drew his wand and we both backed away in alarm as he moved to the basin and hurriedly scooped up the white mists, strand after strand of it, and returned it to his head.
“Those were your memories,” I said in amazement. “That was real?”
Dad looked at me then, closely, penetratingly, but still with something like fear and horror, and said, “Oh, yes. The Pensive stores your memories. I put them there to forget them for the night last night. So I could sleep.” He breathed in a moment and visibly calmed himself, and I had the odd thought that he seemed to be girding himself for another battle when he asked, “How much did you see?”
“We saw Him,” I answered. “You Know Who. We saw what He did to you and how you escaped with the Triwizard Cup.”
“And that was all?”
“There’s more?” James asked. His tone echoed my own feelings. What more could be worse?
Strangely though, Dad seemed relieved that that was all we had seen. In fact, he was so relieved that he sent us off without any further lectures or punishments for our fighting and for what we had done to Malfoy.
As for me, I found myself dreaming about the monster and felt, from time to time, as if those pitiless eyes were watching me without mercy and with some vast and nameless evil intent.
We left as quickly as we could as neither one of us wanted to give Dad time to recover and get as angry with us as we probably deserved. We got down to the Great Hall, but it wasn’t time for lunch yet, and I had other things on my mind in any case. “Wait here,” I told James, “I want to get that biography of Dad from my trunk.”
“Why don’t you throw some clothes and pajamas in your bag while you’re at it,” James answered. “I don’t think you’re going to last the night in that wretched Slytherin dormitory without being attacked after what we did to Malfoy.”
I glared at him and said, “I can handle those gits. It’s not the first time I’ve had a fight with Malfoy.”
“You don’t belong there!” James retorted. “I can’t believe the Hat put you there. And I don’t see why you should have to stay when they’re always laying traps for you. It’ll be Athena that’s killed next.”
“They won’t touch her,” I replied. “Her whistle scares them all witless.”
“Well, you don’t scare them witless,” James countered.
“You’d be surprised how scary I can get when I want.” I left him and jogged on down to the Slytherin dormitory thinking I’d been a bit more certain of that than I really felt. But I knew quite well that I would never live it down if I let fear of the other Slytherins chase me out of my own dorm. I did draw my wand when I entered the common room and I kept it out in plain view as I descended the stairs and entered the seventh-year’s room. It was quite deserted and I realized that James and I had missed all of our morning classes by now. We were sure to get extra homework even if we didn’t get detentions. I checked my bed to see if the others had laid any traps. Parkinson was quite fond of a smothering spell whilst Avery enjoyed trying a pre-set body bind. That one was quite nasty as it gave the others a chance to torment me without any retaliation. They always stopped short of seriously marking me and they always ended up releasing me, as they didn’t want to actually be expelled – not yet at any rate. And they knew quite well I'd never tattle on them.
There were no traps set yet, and I could only suppose that they had not had time to return to the dormitory before classes started. I got out the copy of Dad’s biography, which I had still not returned to the Library, and quickly set a nearly invisible protective shielding over my four-poster bed and all of my possessions. If any of them tried to set any traps, they would get a nasty shock indeed.
I dashed back up to the Great Hall and found James already seated at the Gryffindor table and whispering everything that had happened to Lily. Matilda was nowhere to be seen and I realized that I had never actually said anything to her about her poor kitten being killed. James saw me and dragged me to the table to sit, overriding my protests that I couldn’t sit at their table during formal mealtimes.
“Don’t be a git, Sirius,” he said, “You’re my brother.” He grabbed at the book and started flipping through it, and sure enough, there was a whole section on the Triwizard Contest, on Dad’s disappearance in the maze and his return clutching the other Hogwarts champion’s body. There was a later article from, of all things, The Quibbler, which told the story in detail. Though this one was an interview with Dad supposedly, there were a quite few things left out, I noticed, especially the nastiest details of his tortures.
“So what more is there?” James asked.
“Well, he did kill You Know Who,” Lily reminded us.
“He was so young,” I said wonderingly. “As young as we are.” I turned the pages and found one of the photos and a story I had seen before but had always passed over, perhaps because it was not the final fight of all. This one told the story of how Dad had fought the monster right there in the Great Hall when the Death Eaters had attacked in his sixth year. According to the story, a desperate battle had been joined between the Death Eaters and the Hogwarts teachers and students. A Death Eater and student had been killed and You Know Who had attacked Professor Dumbledore, only Dad had suddenly appeared and had got in his way. There was the photograph of You Know Who with his sword extended and you could see that Dad must have gotten a shallow cut from it. But then there was the other photo, which showed Dad plunging his sword, the Sword of Gryffindor it said, into You Know Who’s heart, and impaling himself on You Know Who’s sword at the same time. This one made me feel sick, and I pushed the food platters away as I recalled quite vividly the scar I had seen on Dad’s body, heart high.
“That’s horrible,” Lily said shakily. “How’d he live, anyway?”
“Dad or You-Know-Who?” I asked. There were other articles there about You-Know-Who’s return and even more murders, but I didn’t look at them again. I closed the book up rather than look at the final story, the one in which Dad had survived the Killing Curse for a second time.
“No wonder,” I said abruptly, “Dad has nightmares. I bet it brought it all back, when they grabbed him at New Years and even teaching us sword fighting. No wonder he wanted to take out those memories, even for a night.” I wished I could forget what I had seen, in the Pensive and in the photographs. I wished I could forget that feeling of being helpless as someone aimed casually and coldly to kill me. I knew I never would.
“How can anyone be so evil?” I asked.
“I dunno,” James answered. He was quiet a moment and then he frowned and said slowly, “I wonder why Dad wanted us to have brother wands like that? Do you think it was just an accident?”
“Probably,” I replied, thinking back to when I had gone for mine. “Ollivander was having trouble finding one that suited me. Then Dad gave him three feathers and when we came back, one of the wands was the one that chose me.” I sat thinking and added doubtfully, “I don’t think Ollivander usually makes wands custom. I think it’s the usual thing that the wand chooses the wizard, isn’t it? So it must be just coincidence that we got the brother ones.”
“Do you really think so?” Lily asked quietly. “Then how come I have the third? I think Dad intended it that way.”
***
Harry sank down into the chair behind the desk and put his face in his hands. He could not conceive how he could have been so careless. The children had seen things they should never have seen. Worse, they had nearly seen the thing he had tried to keep from them forever. He thought again whether he had made the right decision in keeping the fact that Sirius had been adopted from them and from everyone. No matter how he looked at it, he could not imagine how it could benefit anyone, and especially Sirius, for them to know who Sirius’ true father might have been. He resolved he would be careful in the future and if he had to endure the occasional nightmare, so be it.
The morning ticked away, but he could not bring himself to do anything constructive. He stared out the window and watched the blue sky turn to a leaden grey-white. Heavy clouds, likely filled with snow, made the prospect oppressive, but no snow fell to lighten the load or refresh the earth below. A knock disturbed his reverie, this one just as firm as the one that had disturbed his sleep that morning, but softer sounding as the tapping came against the door rather than the metal door knocker. He saw with a leap of happiness unexpected that it was Ginny.
“What are you doing here?” he asked, though in truth he didn’t care about the reason at all.
“I’ve got a message for you from Bones,” Ginny replied. Her brown eyes gauged him with concern. “They want you at Thames Street in half an hour. There’s something going down, he says, and you’re needed.”
Harry frowned and considered sending Edgar a message that he couldn’t come. His reluctance must have been plain to Ginny: she shrugged off her cloak and came to kiss him and murmured, “You could say no, you know. Just this once.” She examined him thoroughly, knowingly. “You’d better tell me what’s wrong,” she added.
Harry told her the whole of it and the thing he had worried at and worried at spilled out. “Have I done wrong keeping it from them? ” he asked almost despairingly. “They came so close to seeing everything. I don’t think they can handle it. I don’t think Sirius could ever handle this. I know I never could.”
***
Harry showed up at the briefing session five minutes late and wearing black dragonhide jacket and boots over a sweater and jeans and not a proper business suit or regulation battle fatigues as the rest of the men did. Edgar could not help noting that he looked extremely tense and that there were faint shadows of fatigue about his eyes and mouth. Bentley made no comment on Harry's late arrival or dress, but continued with his instructions on what to do when they arrived at the chemical factory which they believed would be the subject of theft that afternoon.
One of their newer men, Aldridge, waited until they had boarded the helicopter that would fly them to the site and then muttered loudly enough for everyone to hear, "What's Potter doing here after he's been outed?"
When Harry turned to glare at him, Aldridge added, "So what are you planning on doing, Potter, waving your wand and turning all the terrorists into frogs?" He chortled at his own joke, but his chuckles trailed off when he realized that no one else was laughing with him. A couple of the other newer ones had also grinned though and Edgar cut in before Harry could answer and antagonize them all further.
"This is not an undercover operation, Aldridge, and Harry knows more about the Aryan Alliance than any other officer here."
"That I do," Harry cut in, "and I'm going to start wondering if you've had any contacts with them like Locherman did if you keep increasing dissension among our ranks."
Aldridge looked perfectly furious, and probably rightfully so. Harry, however, was watching Aldridge steadily, and though he appeared perfectly relaxed, Edgar knew he was quite capable of instant action if Aldridge were to make any move. Edgar laid a hand on Harry's shoulder and said quietly, "Steady on."
The atmosphere in the craft did not ease, though no other comments were made. It was uncertain how many men they would face, what kind of arms they would carry, or even whether they might be intent on simply blowing up the place. A total of fifty men had been scrambled together quickly for the counter-operation - twenty-five from MI-5 and twenty-five from Special Branch. The craft banked as it turned to land approach its planned landing site on the rooftop of the factory. Edgar noted with alarm that a fire was already glowing from the windows of the long concrete building.
They were still a good fifty feet up and Edgar found himself cursing as he scanned the site through binoculars. A man was on the roof carrying something and it looked as though he might get away before the helicopter could right itself for landing.
"What is it?" Harry asked. He tugged at the binoculars and glanced through them. Several others did the same.
"He'll get away," Harry exclaimed. "Can't you set this thing down faster?" he called out to the pilot.
"No I can't," the pilot called back. "Look at that fire!"
Edgar could see that the fire was spreading quickly from window to window. Glass shards flew out as many of the windows blew out from the heat. The man on the roof angled for a ladder that would take him down and he began climbing down the ladder always holding his prize as far away from the heat of the building as possible. The pilot banked again, seeking an alternate landing spot and Edgar could see they would be too late. Harry apparently thought the same, for he suddenly stood up and said, "This is no good. He's got to be stopped."
"Too bad you didn't bring your broomstick," Aldridge said nastily.
Harry paused only long enough to say, "Broomsticks do burn when they get too near fire," before silently disapparating from the vehicle.
Many of the others gawped and Aldridge most of all. Edgar felt a furious kind of annoyance that his own disapparition skills were too shaky for him to follow. He had to wait for the pilot to set down on the road in front of the burning building, but he was the first one off the helicopter and drawing his gun. The others followed, but there was no need to rush. The escaping thief was already neatly trussed with rope and looking positively terrified. Oddly, Harry was nearly as pale as the thief as he knelt on the ground and examined the seemingly innocuous suitcase in which the thief had stowed his loot.
"I wouldn't open it," the thief said. He sounded both terrified and triumphant at once.
"Is it armed?" Harry demanded.
The thief didn't reply at first. Edgar leveled his gun at the thief's head and repeated the question. He signaled the others to back off as he wanted to minimize injuries as much as possible if there really was an explosive device or explosive materials in there.
"Don't bother backing off," the thief said, "unless you want to back off half way across the ocean."
"How does it work?" Harry demanded.
The thief shrugged and smiled. "Well enough to make the people vote for a different government if it goes off. Especially when the foreigners take the blame for it."
Edgar touched the gun to the thief's head. "Disarm it, then, if you want to live."
The thief still smiled though he was sweating with fear - or excitement. He stopped smiling when Harry drew his wand.
"Be careful," Edgar exclaimed. "You don't know if magic could set it off!"
Harry froze and his green eyes closed and then opened and he seemed to be seeing nightmares so dark was his gaze and so terrible its focus when he looked at the thief again. "I suppose I'll have some explaining to do," he said dispassionately as he lifted his wand and said, "Imperio!"
Edgar gawped at the younger man astonished that he would even think of using an Unforgivable. Yet under the circumstances, he could not think of any better course himself.
"Disarm it," Harry commanded. He waved his wand and the ropes fell from the thief. The thief bent to touch the suitcase, his face vacant and his eyes like those of a sleepwalker.
"Wait!" Edgar cried, changing his mind. "What if opening it is a dangerous as setting it off? It should be done under contained conditions."
The thief, however, had already opened the case. Mechanically, he separated out the four containers, which looked like the size of large cans of canned peaches, and which appeared to be vacuum sealed. A timing device was indeed in the suitcase, but its wire were not attached to either the containers or the small bit of plastique that was meant to be the accelerant. Edgar felt his breath leak out in relief. Had they been only minutes later, the thief would have gotten away with his prize.
"How did you know it was safe to open?" Edgar asked Harry after.
Harry shrugged. "If he meant to set it off so soon, he would have set it off in the factory. And he would have resisted the order to disarm it if he knew it really might blew."
"He's a Muggle," Edgar said dryly. "What resistance could he put up against an Imperious curse?"
"Resisting an Imperious curse is pure will," Harry replied. "If the need to resist is that strong, even a Muggle will at least try."
When they returned to Thames Street for the debriefing, Aldridge kept staring at Harry like a dog scenting a ghost. "Broomsticks burn," he said with an attempt at a laugh. The laugh, however, had a slightly hysterical edge to it and he cut off instantly when Harry turned to him to respond. Some spark of mischief had worked its way into Harry's mood, though. The green eyes glinted with trouble and he grinned. "Yeah, but they don't cost anything to maintain - no petrol, you know."
He sobered again quickly, however, upon hearing what the extent of the damage would have been had the bomb inside the suitcase gone off. "I really don't understand Hayden," Edgar commented then. "He's obsessed with magic, with obtaining Arthur's sword, but he also doesn't mind using the worst kind of modern mechanical weapons of mass destruction."
"I don't think he cares what methods he uses so long as he get what he wants," Harry answered broodingly. "The Sword is truly a fixation of his. If he gets it, he thinks it proves he's the real king. The weapons are his insurance that he'll win no matter what. Even if it means having nothing left to rule over."
The most peculiar event of the day occurred just then. Marstan, one of the technical specialists, arrived wearing full protective gear and carrying a portable radiation detector. He made every officer who had been near the thief stop to be checked for exposure.
“Why is that necessary?” Edgar asked.
“One of those containers was leaking,” Marstan answered. He waved the machine’s attachment at Edgar, but the ticking on the counter remained quite steady. Marstand made Edgar remove his watch, and the counter’s ticking did pick up just a little. “Not much,” Marstan commented. “You next,” he said to Harry.
Harry looked as if he wanted to hiss at the machine. Thinking Harry hardly needed any more trouble, Edgar said hastily, “You were closest to it when the b*astard opened it.”
The dark brows drew down slightly, and Edgar thought for sure that Harry would balk. After a moment, however, he shrugged and said, “I’m perfectly fine.”
At first the counter continued to tick away quite steadily. Its ticking increased then, and Edgar felt a momentary stab of fear. Puzzlement took its place though as the ticking suddenly died away altogether and the needle on the counter’s face went flat to zero. Edgar glared at Harry thinking he had deliberately and foolishly interfered with it. Harry’s face expressed nothing but polite curiosity. “I think your machine needs charging or something,” he commented.
“It does not,” Marstan replied. “It doesn’t work like that at all.” He began playing with the knobs and tried waving the counter at Harry again, but still nothing happened. Harry tapped his long fingers on the table putting Edgar in mind of a cat tapping its tail as a prelude to biting. Edgar could not help noticing that Harry still wore his gloves – quite nice ones, dragonhide ones that covered him well past the wrists. “Nice gloves,” he said, seeking to distract Harry from behaving badly.
“Christmas present from my wife,” Harry said fondly. Edgar let out a sigh of relief. Then it occurred to him that Harry was well covered in dragonhide – from the three-quarter length jacket, to the gloves, to the boots, the only bit of him not covered was the small amount of jeans showing above his boots and his face. Edgar gave a slight cough of amusement and said as tactfully as possible, “You might want to, erm, take off your jacket and gloves, Harry, so Marstan can get a proper reading. And show him your watch and anything metal you’re carrying on you.”
The green eyes widened slightly. Again Edgar thought he would refuse. Instead, he calmly peeled off the gloves and removed his jacket. Edgar felt a small pang of jealousy and thought he wouldn’t mind one of those himself. Casually, Harry laid the jacket across the back of a chair and fiddled with his watch. Reluctantly, he removed the watch, and placed it near the counter, but the counter still remained at zero. The most minute grin tipped the corner of Harry’s mouth as he moved the watch casually to the bundle of glove. Edgar noticed that the watch was quite beautiful and unusual. Its dial had planets and moons and stars instead of numbers and inside its face appeared to be shifting grains of golden sand. He nearly exclaimed aloud at that, but he caught Harry’s warning glance and stayed quiet.
Marstan approached Harry with the counter again, but it still failed to register a single tick and the needle remained altogether flat. “You’ve broken my machine,” Marstan said disbelievingly. “What did you do, put a spell on it? You are the wizard, aren’t you?”
At his tone, Bentley came over to see what the trouble was. Edgar opened his mouth and closed it and looked at Harry not sure exactly what to say. The problem was that Marstan was probably right.
“He broke my machine,” Marstan said again.
Bentley looked at Harry for a response and Harry looked unusually embarrassed. “I didn’t do anything,” he insisted. But after a moment, he said unwillingly, “Well, it might have been my jacket.”
“Your jacket?” Marstan and Bentley asked at the same time.
Edgar coughed gently and said, “Dragonhide. Probably interferes with the operation of the machine.”
“Dragonhide?” Bentley asked faintly. Marstan said in an undertone, “Come on. We’ll be clapping our hands for the fairies next.”
Bentley looked fascinated though. “Dragonhide?” he asked again.
Harry shrugged again, in such a way that Edgar was reminded strongly of the rather difficult teenager he had been. “Dragons a hugely magical,” he answered, in the sort of tone that scholars adopt when they launch into a lecture. “Their hides are nearly impervious to everything, they are extremely warm in the winter even though they are quite lightweight and they are completely fire-proof.”
“Fire-proof?” Bentley inquired. “Really?”
“Radiation –proof maybe too,” Marstan said. He brought poked the counter back at the jacket on the chair, but no ticking came. His scientific instincts having overcome his apparent hostility, he moved to the other end of the room and pointed the machine at the telly screen, which showed a reporter standing in front of the burning factory they had recently left. The counter came to life and began to tick away as though it had never stopped. They all watched with fascination as Marstan returned and pointed the ticking counter back at Harry. The counter went dead again even though Harry was no longer wearing the jacket and gloves. Flushing slightly, Harry reached down and slid his wand out and laid it down on the table next to the gloves and watch. Marstan’s eyes widened nervously at that. Harry then slipped his sweater over his head – a very fine hand-knit one with a small golden lion on the front, a lion which Edgar could have sworn turned around on its tail and went to sleep. The sweater joined the pile as did the dragonhide boots.
“Is that everything?” Edgar asked. He wasn’t sure how long it would be before he started to howl with laughter. Harry started to nod and then flushed some more. This time he took off his socks. These were made of very fine wool and Edgar noticed that they didn’t quite match. One was dark green with tiny golden snitches on it and the other was gold with tiny green snitches on it. Harry faced them almost defiantly. His feet were bare and all he wore now were an old pair of jeans and a plain cotton t-shirt. He crossed his arms and nodded to Marstan. Looking like he’d rather approach a cobra than Harry, Marstan pointed the counter at him once more, but still the counter failed to tick and the needle stayed at zero. Harry looked at the piled of magical items on the table and sighed apologetically. “Sorry. I guess it’s just too much magic…” His voice trailed off as Bentley said, “What’s the sweater made off?”
“Wool,” Harry answered. “Just wool.” He paused as he picked it up and slipped it back over his head. “I expect my wife used magic to knit it.”
“And the socks?” Edgar couldn’t help asking.
“Dobby made those,” Harry replied, “for Christmas.”
“Dobby?” Bentley asked. “is she a witch, too?”
“He. He’s a house-elf,” Harry responded and Bentley said, “Ah,” as if Harry had said something quite normal and ordinary. It was a measure of how far Bentley had come that he did not express any astonishment. Instead, he asked, “Do you think we could order some of those jackets for the men? Maybe we should even have protective gear made out of them?”
Afterwards it occurred to Edgar to wonder why the machine had not worked even after Harry had removed all the magical items. Perhaps, he wondered, perhaps Harry Potter was that magical on his own, in the way that dragons were so magical. Perhaps the machine had not worked on him because he radiated a quite different energy than the one that the machine was made to detect.
