Harry Potter and the Fifth Element

Chapter 65 - Visitations

Hermione lapsed into silence, having finished her overly exhaustive description of the most significant of several ancient manuscripts that she and Luna had discovered in a secret room off of the Château's long-disused Muggle library.

Harry was also silent. Hermione's exegesis was largely beyond his rudimentary religious background. Years of magical experience meant he doubted that anything was truly supernatural. His scepticism was strongly reinforced by his relatives' abject failure to practice anything approaching the denatured Anglicanism that they preached - even putting aside the Dursleys' starving, beating, and heaping mental abuse on him.

So Harry was considerably more impressed with Hermione's other finds. "You really found books by Aristotle, Archimedes, and people like that ... books that are lost everywhere else?"

"Yes, Harry, but back to my main point, I think this 'Truth of the Cross,' or however it translates, might be the 'Gospel of Truth' mentioned in that strange letter you received." Hermione could be quite persistent.

And Harry was nothing if not obstinate. "Why should you, or anybody, care so much? It's all made up; that's what you just said."

"We used to think magic was made up," Hermione reminded him.

"Yeah," conceded Harry, "but that's exactly why we have the Statute of Secrecy. Use a bit of magic to wow the Muggles, and they'll believe anything. A little hocus pocus, a lot of hokum, and boom, in comes money and up go cathedrals."

"That's what you and I think, but six hundred years ago, saying that you could get burnt at the stake, or worse," Hermione declared.

"What could be worse than being burnt alive - for a Muggle that is?" Harry quickly added, not wanting a lecture about Wendelin the Weird at the moment.

He received a reminder of a different sort. "Not much ... I speak from personal experience...."

Harry shuddered at the thought.

"...Although some might say the Church's punishment of the Black family was more cruel."

"Umm ... sorry, but why care so much about that old book?" Harry returned to the heart of the matter. From hard experience he knew that, if Hermione thought something important, usually it was.

"Because that 'old book' purports to be - and, who knows, might just be - autobiographical ... written by Jesus Christ himself," Hermione whispered. "Complete with his handwritten corrections. Think what that might mean."

"That he wasn't born in a manger like on the telly?" Harry asked. "So they might have to cancel Christmas?"

"More like they might have to cancel Christianity," Hermione corrected, looking at Harry seriously. "Think about it. If this story's true, then Jesus wasn't divine; stayed a Jew; his miracles were staged by a mediocre wizard; the crucifixion was a hoax; the resurrection a botched elopement; and to top it all off, St. Peter wasn't his intended successor."

"Okay...."

"Well, after all that, what's left of both Christian dogma and the Church's legitimacy?" Hermione rattled on. "No wonder the Church did what it did - or that even now, after all these centuries, it still wants this book."

"To do what?" Harry asked bluntly.

"Either to discredit it, or failing that, to destroy it, I'm sure," Hermione predicted.

"Then I'm binning that letter," Harry declared. "I can't be a party to that...."

Her hand on his arm stopped Harry cold. "Don't do anything rash. For one thing, it's apparent that the Church, or some people in it, know more than we thought about you and the Blacks."

Hermione surprised him. "How so?" Harry asked.

Hermione reversed his question. "Well, when that letter arrived in Reims, your inheritance wasn't exactly public knowledge, was it?"

Harry thought about it. Hermione was right. The Reims speech in mid-August seemed so long ago; before his kidnapping. So much had been different. For one thing, his kidnapping precluded him from appearing at the Wizengamot hearing concerning the Black inheritance - where Hermione acknowledged her love for him in open court.

Hermione's question silenced Harry for quite some time. His expression revealed him thinking hard. Finally an odd little smile crossed his face. He turned, and without saying anything further, took her face in his hands and gave her a gentle, lingering kiss.

"You're right. They had to know," he whispered in her ear afterwards. "What do you think?"

Hermione's warm, fuzzy feeling from Harry's kiss vanished. "I-I don't know.... This is way, way over our heads. Did you tell Dumbledore about the letter?"

"Nope. Didn't get around to it with everything else going on," Harry admitted, a bit sheepishly. "But he has to know something. He was there when I received it."

"Well, now there's good reason to tell him - about all of this," Hermione proposed. "I know he's not totally trustworthy, but this is big, Harry. Too big for us. Nobody would really know how to deal with this...."

* * * *

Along with a parting kiss, Hermione told Harry, "See you when I get back. Besides, you'd rather have that kind of meeting without a notoriously radical Muggle-born - present."

Accompanied by Tonks and several goblins, Hermione was headed for London. She would meet with a D'Israeli, Braddock lawyer and sit through what promised to be rather pointless testimony before the inquest into her father's misdeeds. She was unconcerned because, as one short prep session at the Château made quite clear, Hermione knew nothing whatsoever about the topics of the inquest.

Hermione also planned last-minute Christmas shopping, sandwiched around a routine trip to the Ministry's Apparition Test Centre. She was now of age and could obtain an ordinary Apparition licence.

Harry stayed behind largely because Professor Shacklebolt wanted to meet and discuss politics - specifically, Harry presumed, Shak's upcoming electoral campaign for Minister of Magic.

Hermione was barely gone ten minutes when the Floo flared. Garbed in Hogwarts professor's robes, Kingsley Shacklebolt stepped from the fireplace at the kitchen end of the Château's formal dining hall.

One of the staff showed the visitor to the Map Room where, with the overblown trappings of proprietorship safely back in storage, Harry awaited his visitor in what was said to be the Château's most secure room.

"Mister Potter, the new Baron of Blackwalls," Kingsley boomed out as he set eyes on the wizard who, at Hogwarts, remained his ostensible (and actual) student. His tone, a little too hale and hearty for the occasion, betrayed a fair degree of ongoing tension.

"Professor," Harry acknowledged, likewise a bit stiffly. "You wanted a private meeting. Is something wrong?"

"Please, call me Shak," Kingsley tried breaking the ice. "I'd like to get us back on a first-name basis after that monumental cock-up about the ball.... And always when the Order is concerned, yes, there's something the matter. But first, is this room secure?"

"The Château's most sensitive business is transacted here," Harry told the man, passing over the recent investiture ceremony. "I'm told it's the best I have."

"Good enough that a staff mostly hired by Lucius Malfoy won't try listening in?" Shak cautioned.

"I ran Surveillius Revelato," Harry countered. "It was clean."

"Humour me, please," the once and (perhaps) future Auror requested. He performed a couple of sophisticated spells Harry did not know. From the gist of the incantations, these were plainly privacy charms.

"All right ... Shak," Harry said afterwards. "What's going on now?"

Shak began. "Politics, of course - developments I'd rather you learnt from me, given our previous discussions on the subject."

Harry remained sceptical. "Sensitive enough that you'd rather not involve Hermione?"

"Face it Harry," Shak responded without pretense, "in some circles, she's an issue. Let's avoid making her more of one, okay?"

"She's okay with it," Harry minced words, leaving out any details. "So what's the scoop?"

"I'm sure you remember what Dumbledore and I told you earlier," Shak took care to drop the Headmaster's name. "We were anticipating a political campaign for control of the Ministry this spring. We expected Scrimgeour to be the candidate of the pure-blood supremacy faction. Since he'd never been elected to anything, and was quite the blowhard, we thought we could take him in an election. Our best chance since the last war, we thought. Those Death Eater attacks - especially the one on London - repulsed a goodly portion of an electorate that's ordinarily swayed by pure-blood superiority arguments."

Harry scowled at the notion that any good could come from Death Eater attacks, but offered no direct comment. Instead, he tried speeding things along. "Yeah, I'm aware that you'll be our side's candidate, and Hermione's willing to lay low so she won't do more harm than good. So when's the election?"

"That's why I wanted to see you," Shak answered. "We won't have one. Things have changed."

"Why? Weren't there enough Death Eater attacks?" Harry let loose the pointed comment that had been swirling around his brain.

Shak either missed or ignored Harry's sarcasm. "Quite enough, actually. And the last one - well, that sealed things. Frankly, Scrimgeour's been better than we'd hoped for, and his vigorous response to the latest attacks causes us ... Dumbledore, really ... to reconsider demanding an election. Inevitably that would cause disunity in the face of the enemy and, equally bad, we're no longer as sure that we'd win."

Harry went from apathetic to animated in about five seconds.

"You're ... we're ... giving up? Without a fight?" he spluttered, as the jagged thought of surrender stuck in his craw.

"Not at all," Shak reassured. "It's politics. When we give something, we gain something."

"And that is?"

"Scrimgeour retaining direct control over the Auror Corps to ensure full cooperation and coordination with the Order against Voldemort, for starters," Shak explained. "He's agreed to formal Ministry ratification of the goblin treaty, with the backing of his faction in the Wizengamot.... We never thought we'd get that."

"His supporters will let that happen?" Harry inquired, his eyebrows rising. "But I thought they were the worst...."

"Some yes, some no," Shak hastened to clarify. "That will undoubtedly force a clean break between Scrimgeour and the ultra pure-blood faction. He knows that. But he's been losing their support anyway, which is why Scrimgeour was ready to bargain. We even obtained something specifically for you in the deal."

"I don't need anything," Harry declared, sounding affronted.

"They've agreed to a commission to re-examine marital property laws," Shak whispered in Harry's ear. "We expect it would recommend reforms not only involving the dowry question, but inheritance restrictions on Muggle-borns as well...."

Harry recoiled. "Muggle-borns? You mean...?"

"Quite," Shak confirmed before the question even escaped Harry's lips. "You really can't pretend that Miss Granger's presence here, and in general simply being with you, has gone unnoticed by the Minister. He has many faults, but he's always been politically attuned."

As Harry assimilated that information, another point evaded him. "What inheritance laws are you talking about?"

"Surely your Mister Howe has discussed this?" Shak responded in an incredulous, yet condescending, way that unfortunately only raised Harry's hackles. "I understand that a will of yours is floating about, although the goblins won't let a soul know what's in it."

"I wrote that bloody will myself," Harry replied curtly. "I used Blackie's form book, nothing more."

Shak paused, waiting to see if Harry would divulge any of the will's terms. When it became clear that he would not, Shak continued.

"Well, at present restrictions exist on what and how much property Muggle-borns can inherit directly from pure-bloods - or from close-to-pure-bloods like you," Shak told Harry pointedly. "I don't claim to know all the details, but the theory is to require more socialisation. All restricted property must be held in trust for the children.... That's why you have trusts, Harry. Your mother was a Muggle-born."

Harry's brow furrowed as he tried thinking back. "I don't think that's how Dumbledore explained it...."

They talked for quite some time about inheritance and other implications of the arrangement being reached between the Dumbledore/Order faction and Scrimgeour's faction. Finally, Shak arrived at the real reason for his call.

"...and that explains the seven votes against you in the Wizengamot. The Council's probably worse. They initially backed Scrimgeour as more competent than Fudge, but he hasn't disavowed the goblin treaty and has continued purging Death Eater sympathisers from the Ministry. They think that the purge is, if not aimed at them, at least affecting them disproportionately - and we both know that's true. They're on the verge of an open break anyway...."

"So the thought is to beat them to the punch?" Harry concluded.

"Pretty much," Shak confirmed. "They're coalescing behind the new DMLE Head, a wizard named Thicknesse ... apt name, that. Thicknesse has tried to interfere with the Auror Corps' relations with the Order. That's why Rufus' direct control is part of our little surprise."

"So what do you think about all this?" Harry asked Shak.

The dark-skinned wizard sighed. "Truthfully, I'm not particularly happy. Forgive me, it's not that I don't like teaching, but at heart I'll always be an Auror, not a professor." A wistful cast came to his face. "I resigned from the Corps and accepted this job thinking it was a temporary expedient because the Order needed me to stand for Minister. Now it looks like all that is for naught...."

"Dumbledore has a strange way of rewarding his supporters, doesn't he?" Harry remarked impassively.

"He does indeed," Shak agreed. "But it's all for the best, I think. I can't blame him for wanting to avoid a divisive election with all this Death Eater activity going on. So, are you in?"

Harry had almost felt sorry for Kinglsey Shacklebolt until that question. "What do you mean, 'in?'" he parried, trying to keep his expression neutral.

"We want you on board with this deal," Shak told him. "We can't have you - or Hermione - treating Minister Scrimgeour worse than, say, Fudge. You're a public figure, like it or not. Not only are you an Order of Merlin winner, but because it's Second Class, after your seventeenth birthday, that puts you in the Wizengamot. Particularly as to the goblin treaty, it may be necessary for you to speak out publicly. It is in all our interests...," Shak deliberately emphasised, "...to ensure that you're a party to all this."

Shak stopped speaking and eyed Harry keenly.

Harry deliberated. Now he wished he had not acceded so easily to Hermione's absence. She was much better attuned to all this political malarkey - because she cared more. He missed her sage advice.

But appreciating her own radical image, she had deliberately distanced herself. Obviously, her thoughts had coincided with the Order's. There would be rumours regardless - that she manipulated Harry politically - and she did not want to add weight to them.

Unstated, but nevertheless clear, was Hermione's willingness to hold her tongue, at least in public. That was a considerable sacrifice for her. A traitorous bit of his mind wondered what her price for acquiescence might be.

"I doubt it'll matter as much as you think, but I'll give it a go," Harry concurred.

"Excellent," Shak intoned. "I can't really blame you for being less than enthusiastic. I'm not either. Now, does that fireplace work?"

Harry flicked out his wand. "Incendio." Flames crackled merrily. "Yeah," Harry said.

"I meant as a Floo," Shak clarified.

Harry went a bit pink in the face. "Oh.... For security reasons, not unless I activate it with my wand," he said.

"Well then, if you please," Shak explicitly requested. "The Minister's waiting."

"Waiting? Where?" Harry yipped as realisation of what Shak meant sank in.

"In his office, of course," Shak answered, as calmly as if discussing the six variants of the Protego Charm.

"No," Harry said firmly. "I'm not going to do that. Even for the sake of.... I don't care enough about inheritance, anyway. Why should I? I'd be dead...."

"Harry, the Minister would very much like to make your acquaintance.... To work through details of what you're willing and unwilling do," Shak persisted, almost pleading.

"I'm sure he would," Harry stood firm, his eyes straying to the intricate battle scene filling the opposite wall - to the horsemen struggling over the pennant. "But you remember what happened the last time - you were there...."

"A much different situation, and a much different Minister," Shak pointed out.

"...We had a friendly enough conversation, and then without warning, he chucked me in front of a bunch of reporters. No thanks; I can't risk that again. If he wants to see me, he can come here," Harry finished on a decisive note.

"I'll see what I can do," Shak replied, briskly pocketing the concession. "Now, if you can activate the Floo, I'll talk to the Minister and see what we can work out...."

His face suddenly feeling very warm, Harry mechanically complied. No sooner had the older man vanished in a swirl of green flame than Harry muttered, "Oh, shite," to himself. "What am I getting into now?" In trying to fend off meeting Scrimgeour, he ended up agreeing to it - only with the meeting taking place at the Château instead of the Ministry.

If Scrimgeour were as anxious as Shak implied to seal a political deal, then Harry was fairly certain that the Minister would swallow his pride and visit the Château.

What had Dumbledore once said about a mountain and Mohammed?

More importantly, what could Harry do now?

Then it came to him. What, indeed....

The Château's grounds were too extensive, and its location too far in the back of beyond, for a Patronus to be worth much as a communication tool. But Harry had been told in this very room that he could summon his staff from just about anywhere with it. That also meant....

"Expecto patronum."

It took longer than Harry expected, but soon eventually the fireplace flames parted and Shak's face reappeared. "The Minister will see you momentarily," he related. "May we Floo in?"

Tempting though refusal of that request might be, that would be both impolitic and impolite. "Yeah," he agreed, making his disgruntlement clear.

The Floo flared - twice. First Shak and then Minister Scrimgeour, dressed in deep blue robes and carrying a walking stick, made their appearances.

The Minister was every inch the politician. "Mister Potter," he addressed Harry, his voice low but much more mellow than when giving a speech. "I was hoping to make your acquaintance.... I've wanted to meet you for quite some time. Did you....?"

Everyone heard a scraping noise behind Harry, chair legs dragged across the finely polished oak floor, and then a familiar thunk.

The Minister's mien and body both stiffened. "Alastor," he acknowledged warily.

"Rufus," Mad-Eye Moody replied in kind. "Always a pleasure. I see yeh're usin' the stick today."

Plainly, this meeting was anything but a pleasure for his guardian - or for the Minister.

"Neither of us is as young as we once were," the Minister warily addressed Moody. "Keeping up appearances can be exhausting. This was intended to be a private...."

"Quite," growled Moody.

The Minister quickly returned his attention to Harry. "I was surprised ... by the company," he began. "I have hoped to meet you since I gained office. But Dumbledore ... until we came to an arrangement.... He always had some excuse...."

"I'm a minor," Harry replied carefully, as Scrimgeour watched closely. "I'm not legally allowed to do much on my own. And Dumbledore, well he's...."

"Yes, I know," the Minister cut over. "I've heard ... you're Dumbledore's man through and through. Well, Albus and I...."

Harry returned the favour, since he was not party to any of the Headmaster's arrangements. "I think you'll find that I'm just my own man now. I certainly respect the Headmaster and what he's done for me, but we don't always see eye to eye. So please sit down and tell me what you have in mind...."

All four parked themselves in the map room's comfortable leather chairs and began discussing matters. Most words were the Minister's, as he provided a lengthy and - even Mad-Eye had to admit - accurate assessment of the current political situation. The primary complicating factor was Pius Thicknesse, successor to the late Amelia Bones as head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

"...Well, Thicknesse is a frightful conservative, a real last-ditcher," Scrimgeour went on (not mentioning that until recently he also fit that description). "He knows little about Muggles and doesn't like even that. His refusal to cooperate fully with the Muggle investigation of the London incident failed utterly to account for their political needs. That was, I believe, a major factor in the Muggles' demand to interview you, Harry."

"Are you implying that was by design?" Harry asked angrily.

"That, I can't say," the Minister equivocated. In the background, Mad-Eye snorted his disagreement. "But his obstructive behavior certainly aggravated matters. I had to remove him from the Muggleworthy Excuse Committee - good thing, too, given that latest incident...."

Knowing the truth, Harry kept his views to himself, as did the Minister, whose wandering eyes happened upon the painting. "Nice work," the Minister resorted to small talk. "Who's the artist?"

"A Muggle-born wizard," Harry responded. "Someone Thicknesse probably wouldn't deign to talk to. Da Vinci they tell me.... I'm glad I haven't met him...."

"Oh, I suspect that you, and even moreso your ladyfriend, would have gotten on famously with the wizard Leonardo," the Minister replied, continuing the chitchat. He had also made a point, signalling his awareness of Harry's and Hermione's relationship, with all the implications it held.

"I meant this Thicknesse chap." Harry was blunt; he had received the message loud and clear.

"Oh, you met him, briefly," Shak chimed in.

"Bloody bastard tried ta sabotage yeh, that's what they mean," Mad-Eye added more forcefully.

"Sorry, but could you explain, please," Harry turned to the ancient Auror.

"That day yeh blew out the window in the Situation Room," Mad-Eye specified. "Pius was one o' yer little audience. I'd heard he'd be there. One reason I kept my own score.... No friend o' yers, nor o' the Order...."

"Ah yes, the Order...," the Minister started and stopped. "And we're coordinating with the Order.... It's another point of agreement, an important one...."

The Minister glanced at Shak, as if seeking confirmation. Shak nodded his silent approval.

"Jes' what's goin' on here?" Mad-Eye demanded to know, his magical eye twitching. "I know that look o' yers, Rufus. There's somethin' yer not sayin'."

"True enough," the Minister answered immediately. "And I suppose you should know, though it's quite secret. I intend our working together to be mutually beneficial.... I know Harry's the principal investor in that company the Creevey brothers have started. And we're prepared to ensure its success."

"Who's we?" Harry asked.

"My Ministry," Scrimgeour responded frankly, "and the Order. We've tested their computaters, and they seem to work. I promised better communication and coordination ... and that's precisely what we'll do.... Both the Ministry and the Order have ordered Creevey computaters...."

"That's 'computers,'" Shak corrected. But the Minister was on a roll.

"...and we'll use them to improve, first, our communication, and then our coordination. We're starting with the Auror Corps, one major reason for my keeping control.... Damn, I wish Robards had more backbone...."

"Wait a minute," Mad-Eye interrupted. "Yeh mean yer going ta replace our existin' system, fer both the Aurors and the Order, with somethin' new based on these Creevey gadgets?"

"That's what I said, wasn't it?" the Minister retorted.

"That's creatin' a security risk, I think," Mad-Eye shook his head, as Harry sat back, content to let his guardian take the lead.

"Any change that shuts down and replaces our basic communication equipment and spellwork involves some risk," Scrimgeour replied stoutly. "We're aware of that, and so is Dumbledore. We're taking every step to minimise that risk."

Kingsley intervened. "Alastor, the Minister is right on this one. You've been complaining about the coordination between us and ... well, us, for years. We're finally getting it. This deal will do that. Let the man explain, for once, without jumping down his throat."

"All right. Go ahead and do it," Mad-Eye conceded with visible ill grace. His unnaturally blue eye ceased its wild gyrations and for once went still.

The Minister gratefully pursued the opening he was given. "As I said, progress always carries some risk, particularly with all the Death Eater activity we've seen since the London incident. What I'm about to tell is still under wraps and is not to leave this room. Understood?"

"Yessir," Harry answered immediately, pleased to be taken into such confidence - after all, Dumbledore had not told him a thing.

"Fine," Mad-Eye assented, less willingly. "I assume Albus knows."

"Yes, understand that parts of this plan have been batted about for weeks," the Minister explained. "After the confusion with ... well, Mister Potter ... the hoax involving your ladyfriend," he tip-toed around that delicate subject, "we decided that our existing system was neither fast nor accurate enough. The Order suggested that we try a - compu-ter - system that had become popular at Hogwarts. We did, and it passed our preliminary tests...."

"As ... Alastor ... has pointed out," the Minister used Moody's given name with obvious distaste, "replacing our communications system will entail some risk no matter how we do it. We have decided to do it in one fell swoop, and in as much confidence as possible, to minimise that risk. We've selected New Years Eve, when much of the community is partying, to do this. Shortly after midnight a brief interruption in communication will occur as both the Order and the Ministry swap out their systems...."

"But unless yeh've changed somethin' lately, the Ministry's communication system is integrated. That'll take down other things as well," Mad-Eye critiqued.

"Indeed," the Minister acknowledged. "I was getting to that. We've been rejiggering things where possible. For example, the wards for both the Ministry building and the Salisbury Auror headquarters are now independent.... But you're right. Some larger systems must also be shut down - most notably the Floo Network and our Apparition monitoring."

"That's a damn lot goin' down t'gether," Mad-Eye pointed out the obvious. "And there's no way in hell Voldemort's spies won't know."

To his credit Scrimgeour neither flinched at nor objected to hearing the Dark Lord's name. Calmly he replied. "Undoubtedly, that's true. But I see risk either way. If we did it piecemeal, then we give the Deaters more opportunities."

"A thorough Ministry housecleaning would help," Harry commented.

"Of course ... that's ongoing," Scrimgeour answered unctuously. "Another reason for this overall arrangement. My pure-blood supporters think the ongoing investigations target them. Indeed, we're turning the changeover into an opportunity to expose more Deater sympathizers."

Mad-Eye's full attention followed. His magical eye fixed the Minister with an unblinking stare. "Oh, really? Just what do yeh have in the works?"

"I won't divulge details ... for security reasons," the Minister answered, yanking his long-time critic's chain a bit about his recent noisy resignation. "Suffice it to say that we've varied in certain aspects our internal announcements describing what will happen. We have spies, too. Depending on what details get leaked to the other side, we hope to discover who did it - or at least what unit's been compromised."

"Not a bad plan," Mad-Eye had to admit. "But it's still just makin' the best of a bad situation."

"Well there you are," Scrimgeour pronounced with finality. "Couldn't have said it better myself. The thought is to do it once, right, and be done with it. We'll cancel all Auror leaves and spread them over Britain, to keep watch and be ready to respond to any incidents. The same alert status will apply to all Ministry personnel who've passed the Civil Defence testing instituted after London. In addition, we're inviting general participation in anti-Apparition ward testing during the period of vulnerability. We announced that yesterday.... People are being encouraged to have their parties and stay over."

Harry could not help nodding his head as Scrimgeour ticked off the various precautions the Ministry was taking. He looked to his guardian for his reaction.

"Well, yeh do seem ta be atop it," Mad-Eye conceded grudgingly. "But I think the Portkey Office should distribute pre-prepared Portkeys just ta be on the safe side - in case yeh need Aurors ta get quickly ta places like the Ministry ... or Hogwarts, places like that...." Then the craggy old man turned his attention elsewhere. "Harry, what about the Château? We'll be pretty much on our own fer a bit, here in the remote country."

"Well, between you, me, Hermione, Tonks, a bunch of goblins, the wizard staff, and all the Château's warding, I think we can handle anything short of a full-scale Death Eater attack, don't you?" Harry calculated. "But if you think that's not enough...."

"I'll talk to the Order about reinforcements," Shak interjected. "Ordinarily, I'd say you'd be fine, but being who you are, I'd rather take the extra step... and we'll make some Portkeys."

"Remember ta set 'em so yeh can use 'em," Mad-Eye reminded. "Fer all these places. The Portkeys won't be able ta get through anti-Apparition wards, yeh know."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that," Harry said, frowning. "I once took a Portkey that, whilst not standard issue, went right through Hogwarts' wards."

That conversation never advanced very far.

"Very well, then," the Minister took his leave. "Unless I'm quite mistaken, we have general agreement that my Ministry's arrangements with professors Dumbledore and Shacklebolt are satisfactory. Let's see to working out the details, shall we...?"

* * * *

Luna Lovegood liked long walks. Rain or shine did not matter; she just liked walking, with naught but thoughts for company. With no structure to her time at the Château, she had many opportunities to indulge herself.

It was raining - not hard; just enough to draw mist from the cold ground so that the clouds and the air became one, grey and swirling. It resembled walking through a dream. That was exactly how she preferred it.

How she reached where she did, she could not say. Nor could she say how she returned, but she always did. It was like that, being an Empath.

Today, her walkabout led to a small stream, a crust of ice lingering along its edges. The nights brought hard frosts, and the daylight was neither long enough nor strong enough to melt everything away.

Real snow had only fallen once since their arrival, and it was almost all gone. A White Christmas was unlikely.

Luna turned and meandered downstream. More trees grew near its banks - the last remnants of a once-great forest that had been cleared for farming centuries ago.

Druids were a forest people. Very few forests were left in Britain, and very few Druids.

The remaining trees were tall, dark, misty - and mysterious - just like the Forbidden Forest would have been if only five metres wide.

She sat on the cold damp soil, and let herself feel the rain. It was no bother. If she started shivering, she could incant a Warming Charm easily enough.

Luna heard something, a short and sharp sound, in the distance. It might have been a gunshot, but then she had never heard a gunshot - except once - the time she had almost been killed, and her father had died.

Death had never been particularly frightened Luna. Both of her parents had died in her presence. If it were her time to die, then she would. Death was inevitable.

There it was again.

She pulled herself to her feet and wandered off in the direction of the sound. Luna was a fatalist, but was not foolish about it. She enhanced the mistiness of the day a bit so she would be hard to see, except about her face.

She had not moved far before she heard it again.

"BLAM!"

Luna continued, but she drew her wand. She might be loony, but not stupid.

As the stream devolved into a rivulet, the trees along the bank thinned at the base of a hill.

Luna reached the moss-covered trunk of a large, leafless elm. No sooner had her hand touched its soft, cool surface then it happened again. A blue jet of light shot out almost as if she had cast it herself.

At the receiving end, one of numerous stones scattered across the windswept meadow exploded with a loud report.

This time, however, Luna knew what had happened.

Soon it happened again. "Reducto!" incanted a familiar voice.

As another stone blew apart, Luna looked up and saw Jazzy's misty outline perched on a thick branch not quite ten metres overhead.

Luna rubbed her hands together. She Transfigured her shoes so that five-centimetre spikes emerged from the soles. Up the tree she climbed.

"BLAM!" Jazzy had just detonated another stone when Luna reached her level.

"Good afternoon," Luna intoned languidly. "Fancy meeting ... urgh...."

Jazzy had been in her own little world. She nearly fell out of the tree at the sound of a voice behind her. But her reflexes took over instantly. One hand grabbed at the intruder's robes. Her other hand clutched her wand.

Luna countered, and grabbed Jazzy's wrist in time to deflect any curse. The younger girl's raging emotions almost burned a hole in Luna's empathetic brain.

At the same moment Jazzy realised whom she was grappling with.

"Luna!"

"Jazzy, I do believe...."

"Sorry, but I'm not used to being surprised like that."

"...you are more upset than I could possibly have imagined."

Jazzy recoiled, "What? How could you be so bloody presumptuous?"

Shrugging her shoulders, Luna responded, as if commenting on the dreary weather, "I'm an Empath. I feel other people's emotions."

Jazzy scowled and was silent. So was Luna.

Finally, Jazzy grumbled, "This is all a fantasy."

"Yes, magic is like that," Luna replied vaguely.

"No, I meant this," Jazzy repeated, her hand waving from one horizon to the other. "It's just too good to be true. I'll be prepared for when it ends, however it ends."

"What if it doesn't end?" Luna inquired in her enigmatic voice.

"It always does," Jazzy scoffed. "At least I'm using my time to be as ready as I can be."

"Ready for what?" Luna reacted lazily to Jazzy's statement.

Luna had barely finished asking when Jazzy had her wand out again, "Reducto!" The spell flashed, and another stone down below was blown to bits. "Ready for my life," Jazzy answered. "I'm sorry, but it's not pretty. Not like this fantasy."

Luna conspicuously pinched herself. "Seems real to me," she commented.

"Hah!" Jazzy laughed bitterly. "So why, then? Why are we here anyway?"

Luna looked thoughtful. "Umm ... I suppose that's up to us.... My guess is we're put here to interact with the great forces of nature and magic, to try leaving the world in better shape when we're done than when we...."

"Oh, stop it with the meaning of life, already," Jazzy cut Luna off impatiently. "I meant why are we - you and me - here at this place? Harry and his girl, well that's obvious. And Longbottom's in his year and in his House. But what about us? We're the odd ones out...."

"Oh, I don't think that's a hard one," Luna replied unflappably.

"Then please enlighten this poor Paki over here," Jazzy snorted.

"Harry's an orphan, and in one way or another, so are you, me, and everyone else he's invited," Luna rambled. "I think that's what's at work here."

Jazzy scowled again, her already rather swarthy features darkening further. "Pity. That's what it is, pity. I don't care to be pitied."

"And you won't be," Luna pronounced as she put her arm on the younger girl's shoulder. She felt telltale vibrations of self-pity, surrounded by rage and hurt, "at least not by them. I prefer to view it as empathy rather than pity."

Luna sounded almost condescending, and Jazzy pulled away. "Pity ... empathy ... excuse me but I can't see much difference."

"One's a gift, the other must be earned," Luna said imperturbably.

"And gifts.... That'll be the last straw, won't it," Jazzy spat.

"I'm afraid I don't follow," Luna responded as a perplexed expression crossed her face.

"Christmas gift giving," Jazzy declared. "I know for sure that, despite what I've told them, Harry and Hermione will give me something outrageously expensive that I can't possibly match. Well, I won't stand for it!" Jazzy was seriously worked up now. "I'll leave if they do that!"

"And where would you go?" Luna asked sceptically. "I thought you said you didn't...."

"I'd sooner go back to my relatives' hell hole," Jazzy declared. "That's why I'm practicing.... Diffindo!" The Severing Charm struck a tree on the opposite side of the stony clearing. A large branch dropped noisily to the ground.

"Poor tree.... You could interview for a tree trimmer's position," Luna commented dryly. "We'll just have to see, I suppose."

"Yeah, I guess we'll see," Jazzy replied hotly, "whether there's any difference between empathy and pity after all."

* * * *

The Muggle inquiry into her father's activities lasted about as long as Hermione expected. That was not to say that it went as well as she had hoped. Leaving, her mind raced with possibilities she had not previously imagined.

How, in Merlin's name had that name come up?

How, in Merlin's name had she managed to keep a straight face when that name came up?

The inquiry's first three quarters were quite routine - fully as boring as Hermione had hoped. They conducted a rather thorough review of everything she knew about her father's activities as chair of the BDA's senior representative on the Dental Advisory Group, which was next to nothing. The expensively-retained silk acting for the Serious Fraud Office's committee of inquiry showed interest in respect of the odd jobs Hermione had performed at the old surgery. He was disappointed to learn that they concerned only patient records and inventory. Her father had an accountant, now a cooperating witness, keep his books.

So it went, with "I don't know" following "I don't know." At the end - just to be "thorough," the questioner said - Hermione was asked if she knew anyone on a list of names. Of the first ten, the only one she had ever heard of was Peter Brooke, which was hardly surprising, since he was the MP of their constituency and her father was a major Tory fundraiser.

Then, it happened.

"...Never heard of her either."

"Vernon Dursley."

"Beg pardon?" It was all Hermione could do to keep her wits about her. How could Harry's tosser of an uncle possibly have had anything to do with her father?

"Vernon Dursley," the interviewer repeated. "A known business associate of your father."

"The name ... it sounds familiar," Hermione answered carefully. "Could you provide a description? That might help."

Her questioner shared a rather pleased look with his assistant, who instantly plucked a folder from a cardboard box at their feet and shoved it in front of him.

"Absolutely ... glad to," responded the now very accommodating interrogator. "Mid-forties. A little under six foot. Frightfully overweight. Salt and pepper hair. Walrus moustache." Leafing through the contents of the folder he plucked something out and slid it across the conference table. "Here's a photo, if that might help."

That was definitely Harry's uncle.

Hermione had absolutely no idea how that man fit into her father's bizarre secret life, but she would be damned before involving Harry in all this - even tangentially. Still, she did not want to lie, and she had to know....

"I'm not sure that I've ever seen this man with my father, but the name is familiar," she answered as truthfully as she could. "Is he mixed up in all this?"

"We believe so," the would-be questioner answered. His exchange of glances with the aide convinced Hermione that the SFO suffered from a shortage of proof. "He's director of sales for Grunnings...."

So that was it. "Grunnings? The drill maker?"

"Yes, that's the one," her questioner quickly replied, his voice almost gleeful. "What can you tell me about Dursley and your father?"

"About him and my father, nothing, I'm afraid," Hermione answered truthfully as her interlocutor's expression deflated before her eyes. "But from the inventories I kept, and from cleaning the equipment, the surgery had many Grunnings drills. I don't think my father used anything else...."

It was not much, but at least it was something. "The inventory records you prepared, would they reflect the particulars of the transactions?"

"If I'm remembering correctly, yes," Hermione answered. "However, I believe all those records were burnt in the fire...."

More long-faced looks from the questioner. "Can you think of anything else concerning Dursley's dealings with your father ... anything at all?"

Hermione made a production of furrowing her brow and reviewing her memories closely. But the answer to that question was, and would always be, "No."

Her answers to other, unasked questions would have been anything but nugatory. Most saliently, Harry had a laptop stowed in his trunk with a Grunnings inventory tag on it. During her frequent rooting through Harry's belongings, she had noticed it on several occasions - most recently as she spirited from his trunk what she intended to make into Harry's Christmas present.

After the interview, Tonks instantly sensed Hermione's worry about something. The young Auror had the discretion to keep mum until they were out of Muggle earshot - not easy to do anywhere near Paddington Station.

"Okay, what is it?" Tonks asked once they were finally alone. "You always bite your lower lip when something's up."

"I'm not entirely sure," Hermione made a frustrated grimace. "But somehow Harry's dreadful uncle is involved with bribing my father - I'm sure of it."

"You mean the one what called me a hooligan and said I needed a bath?" Tonks goggled. "Bloody well deserves whatever he gets, that one does."

"That's him," Hermione readily agreed. Although this particular incident was news, it was entirely in character. "He deserves it, but Harry doesn't. The Muggles already have too much going on with him, and I won't complicate things further."

"So you didn't tell them?" Tonks guessed.

"That silk didn't exactly ask ... so I saw no reason to trouble him with that particular information," Hermione confirmed. "But they seemed so desperate for anything about Dursley..., I wonder...."

"That fat bastard better watch out," Tonks commented, seeing Hermione's expression harden.

"Quite," Hermione mumbled. Then she looked the other way. Her hand shot up, "Taxi!"

Once the black cab brought them to Lower Holloway - after an unsettling ride featuring the driver's speculation about the cause of the recent "great fire" - Hermione's shopping spree took less than an hour. Tonks had steeled herself for the difficult task of protecting her charge amongst hordes of holiday shoppers in Oxford and Regent Streets, but here they were off the Holloway Road, of all places.

However short, Hermione's trip was also unusual. A lot of her unusualness was going around.

"What are you planning to do with all this?" Tonks asked dubiously once the Muggles had carted the last of her purchases to a loading dock at the rear of a non-descript brick building.

"Why, enchant it, of course," Hermione replied evasively, as she looked around. "Tell me whether the Muggles inside have gone, will you?"

"You can buy all the books you want," Tonks reminded her. "Why start binding them, too?" She peered through the wee window in a door painted battleship grey. "They're gone."

"Reducio," Hermione spelled. A rather large pile instantly became rather small. She slipped everything she had bought into her beaded handbag. "Because the best gifts of all are homemade, that's why."

"It must be nice," Tonks remarked a couple minutes later, as they strolled to the Caledonian Road Tube stop, "not having to bother with Underage Magic restrictions any longer." On either side, a number of boulders rolled along of their own accord, just off the edge of the pavement.

"Oh, I've had an exemption for long enough, I hardly even think of that," Hermione brushed off the remark. "But, really, that's our next stop."

It took longer to reach the Ministry building by way of Muggle transport than for Hermione to obtain her Apparition Licence once she finally arrived.

During Hermione's test, Tonks twiddled her thumbs (dropping her wand in the process) whilst cooling her heels in the Level Six waiting room.

Bored with waiting, she Summoned a Ministry pamphlet from a display pocket on a nearby table. It was the same purple shade as the posters plastered all over Diagon Alley, and entitled "Make It A Night." After a few seconds' perusal, Tonks muttered to herself, "Oh blast, what's going on, now?"

Soon enough Hermione traipsed out the Apparition Test Centre's batwing swinging doors, all smiles for once and flashing a new Apparition Licence with her likeness (looking something like a hag) on it.

"Well, congratulations, my dear," Tonks welcomed her. "Not that I expected anything less...."

"Easy as pumpkin pie," a quite pleased Hermione remarked airily.

"Pumpkin pie isn't that easy," Tonks returned. "What address did you give for the licence?"

That was a bit of a problem.

"I debated using Hogwarts, but that's not really home," Hermione told her minder. "I wanted to use the Château, but not without Harry's approval. Imagine the brouhaha if a rag like Witch Weekly got their grubby paws on something like that. Eventually I picked Order Headquarters, since I used to live there. It's odd, but I guess you can call me homeless at the moment."

"Well, where to now, homeless one?" Tonks asked semi-sarcastically. "Homeless people should be so lucky. Back to that hundred-room castle that you don't call home?"

"No, just out - for now," Hermione directed, giving Tonks a 'let's not discuss that here' look.

Whilst waiting for the lift, Tonks handed Hermione the Ministry pamphlet. "What do you make of this?"

The arriving lift clattered to a halt. Hermione read the pamphlet as the lift rose to Level B, which included the entrance to Muggle London.

"Has the Floo Network Authority lost its collective mind?" Hermione let loose when they were alone. "I mean, this must be the most harebrained scheme imaginable - closing the Floo Network on New Years' Eve. I'm glad we're not going anywhere...."

"At least they're encouraging everyone to confirm their anti-Apparition wards are working," Tonks pointed out. "And the New Year is the worst night for Splinching, with so much the Firewhiskey and the like."

"Precisely what's so stupid about it," Hermione protested. "If they wanted to reduce Splinchings, the worst thing is to close the Floo Network and force everyone to Apparate with wards up everywhere."

They reached the street. The goblins somehow knew where Hermione was going almost before she did, because they were waiting for her.

"Okay, where next?" Tonks asked her charge. "More Christmas shopping?" She did not look forward to the West End and all the last-minute, pre-holiday madness.

Hermione looked at the Auror conspiratorially. "Actually not. We're doing something I've been considering for quite some time. Acting on the spur of the moment will avoid calling attention to ourselves.... I want to go to Grimmauld Place."

"Grimmauld? Why there...? The Order left nothing behind," Tonks went on, saying whatever popped into her head. "And besides, it's not secure, not after Narcissa and that traitorous house-elf. We can't be sure who might get in."

"Surely the Order watches the place," Hermione responded with a raised eyebrow. "I can't believe we wouldn't know if Death Eaters were frequenting Grimmauld."

"Someone makes the rounds at least weekly," Tonks had to admit. "We warded the inner perimeter with Intrusion Charms when we vacated."

"Has there ever been a problem?" Hermione persisted.

"Our sources tell us that the other side still watches Grimmauld occasionally," Tonks revealed. "One of the charms was tripped a couple of months ago, but we found nothing. The place is deteriorating. It was probably Doxies, or spiders, or some other infestation...."

"Well there you are," Hermione pronounced. "I want to go, then. There's what? Four goblins, in addition to the two of us.... And we'll have the advantage of surprise. The Order would turn this into a huge production that would surely be noticed...."

"But why, Hermione?" Tonks asked in exasperation. "Why now? What's the big deal?"

Hermione was hesitant.

"You're obviously hiding something," Tonks observed.

"I need to get a book that's there," Hermione admitted.

"I need a little more than that before I can go along with this," Tonks looked at her sternly. "I'm your assigned bodyguard, not just your friend. My job is to keep you from gallivanting off into possible danger. I let you once, when Harry was taken, and both of us nearly died."

"Then, danger wasn't possible, it was certain," Hermione began arguing, but knowing that Tonks would not budge, she had no choice but to reveal part of her plan. "All right, I've been told by someone very close to Dumbledore to keep this a secret. It involves what happened to Harry at the end of the Triwizard Tournament. I was reading a book...."

"How shocking," Tonks could not resist interjecting.

Hermione ignored her crack. She wanted to get this done.

"...Anyway, two summers ago, I was at Grimmauld, before the Order had fetched Harry," she ploughed ahead.

"But I thought it involved...."

"It does, but I didn't know it then. Now listen," she demanded curtly. "It was a Dark book. Somebody had left it out, I don't know who, maybe even Sirius himself. It was about death and magic. I only skimmed it because, well, I felt guilty even looking in it. Molly caught me and took it away. She screamed at Sirius and told him to keep it locked up. I never saw it again...."

"So what's the big deal?" Tonks asked, still not convinced.

"I only recently learnt what happened to Harry that night, and I remember that spell - which, if you don't know, I'm not telling. Thinking back, I'm sure it was described in that book. There were some very vivid parts...."

It was all true, just not the entire truth.

"And you're certain...?"

"As much as I can be," Hermione reiterated, unconsciously biting her lower lip. "And now I've a pass to all Black libraries. I know Grimmauld has a restricted one. Dumbledore once mentioned it to Snape.... He wasn't at all pleased I'd overheard."

"I can imagine," Tonks replied dryly.

"So will you help me do this?" Hermione returned to the main point. "I'm looking for a particular book. I don't recall the title, but I remember what it looked like. We'll be in and out very quickly - before anybody could have time to react."

"Oh, all right," Tonks gave in. "With the Deaters' manpower problems, it's not like they'd waste anyone naffing about Grimmauld on the off chance somebody interesting might show up. Let's discuss this with the goblins."

The goblins liked Hermione's idea even less than Tonks, probably due to lack of familiarity with the building. But given who Hermione was, they felt obligated to accede to her wishes.

And her mind was made up.

A few minutes later, Hermione's first trip as a licenced Apparator brought her and Tonks to a location near the Tufnell Park Tube stop, ironically not far from Holloway Road, where they had been not long ago. It was a short walk to Grimmauld Place, through a once genteel neighborhood now gone to seed.

Merely thinking about the dreary four-storey row house brought it fluttering into sight, magically shouldering aside Muggle-occupied (if occupied at all) dwellings on either side.

They hurried inside. Hermione raised the gas lights. A dull thud prompted Tonks' cursing and a loud clatter. A couple of old snake-handled brollies and the hollowed-out troll leg that had held them rolled across the hardwood floor.

Hermione might have laughed at the sight of her Auror bodyguard hopping on one foot whilst struggling to cast Episkey on the great toe of her other. In the background, Hermione heard a couple goblins sniggering.

But Hermione knew what would happen next - and did not have to wait long.

With a screech worse than a Hippogriff receiving a Bulbadox Powder enema, the voice of the black-clad, painted image of Walburga Black blasted through the ground floor.

"Not again! The most arrogant of Mudbloods! And that mutant freak of Mudblood miscarriage! But what's this? Filthy, bob-eared eternal enemies of all wizardkind! All sullying the ancestral abode of the Blacks...!"

Although the pugnacious portrait looked a bit worse for wear, she had lost none of her ability to spew unending streams of loathsome, bigoted bile.

Except this audience was not inclined to let the insults pass unavenged. As the screaming started, Hermione's goblin escort resumed their ordinary form - and four pairs of clawed hands reached for some very sharp steel.

"Will you just shut it!" Hermione screamed back at the portrait, pointing her wand.

Something unexpected happened. If not obeying, the obnoxious portrait at least responded.

"Oh, Merlin's mum! The Mudblood's got a Proprietor's pass! What is the world coming to!?! Toujours pur.... Toujours pur!"

Walburga Black burst into inconsolable (not that anyone tried) tears. Her emotional collapse allowed Tonks to yank the curtain shut - thankfully the vacating Order had left that in place. Hermione was surprised that the angry young Auror did so without ripping the curtain rods from the wall.

Even through the barrier, the old woman's wails bemoaning the fate of the Blacks remained audible. Hermione finished the job with an Imperturbable Charm on the curtain.

"Well so much for stealth," Tonks spat, annoyed at her own clumsiness. "That set off alarms, I'm sure.... Hurry on now, we'd at least like to keep the element of surprise."

"The library's most likely on the first floor," Hermione guessed as she headed for the stairs. "After Molly handed Sirius the book she took from me, we were in the drawing room, and he walked away from the staircase."

Two goblins, taking their cues from Hermione's movement, bolted in front of her and moved towards the landing above. The other two, chattering in high-pitched Gobbledegook, went storming down the entrance hall in pursuit of something - Hermione thought she had seen several dinner-plate sized spiders in that general direction.

The wallpaper the Order had so painstakingly installed in the first floor drawing room already showed signs of wear, water damage, and possibly vandalism. Puffskeins fled from Hermione and hid under the furniture. Doxies buzzed in the walls and behind heavy, tattered curtains.

Tonks followed right behind, her wand drawn. "All right genius girl ... where is it?" Her stage whisper carried the bite of sarcasm.

Hermione tried orienting herself - striving to remember the direction Sirius had disappeared almost two years ago.

"Dammit," she muttered. "I need Sirius's library."

At her words, a humming sound arose, something altogether different from Doxy buzz or the mewling of frightened Puffskiens. Hermione followed the sound down a side hallway to an archway she had never before seen.

An eerie, radium green glow outlined the archway.

Quickly, Hermione produced the Black library pass she had received, at Harry's direction, from the Château's staff. It glowed with the same colour.

"Bloody hell, what's that?" Tonks shouted the moment she entered the hallway, having trailed Hermione by several metres.

"I'm sure it's the Black library," Hermione a self-satisfied replied. "It's almost calling to me."

"Well you stand back, then," Tonks ordered. "This sure this wasn't here when the Order was. I'm going first."

"I reckon it was," Hermione replied, "only none of us - nobody save Sirius - could see it then." She stood aside to let Tonks pass. The Auror strode forward through the arch....

...And promptly plowed headlong into some sort of ward. Tonks bounced backwards with a shriek, lost her balance, and fell to the floor, her wand clattering away.

A deep, disembodied voice sounded from inside the archway, "Knave, stand back. None pass, save Black."

"Only I can go through, I suppose," Hermione told Tonks. "I guess your mum's disinheritance means you're not recognised."

"I don't like this at all," Tonks shot back, as she daubed at the bloody nose she received courtesy of the quite solid, if invisible, ward. "My crazy Auntie Bella could be back there."

"I doubt it," Hermione disagreed. "Surely our alarms would have detected someone like her." Before Tonks could stop her, Hermione walked through the archway.

"Lumos."

Surely enough, Bellatrix was absent. Nothing was there - save a rather small room, stuffed with books mostly bearing extremely dodgy titles.

"I'm all right, Tonks, and you too, Wydawayk," Hermione called to the Auror and the leader of her goblin guard. "Only books are in here."

Hermione's nostrils flared. The place smelt musty and old. The Order obviously had not touched to it. Its wards, effective against sentient beings, evidently did not repel vermin. An odour of animal urine, pungent but not overpowering, permeated the place. Her quick Air-Freshening Charm almost, but not quite, masked it.

First things first. Hermione glanced around the library.... Dumbledore had promised to return the Horcrux book, and when the Headmaster actually made a specific promise, he usually kept it.

The book was dark red, with a large gold cross on the spine, and it was called Crosses of Horror. Fortunately, these books were shelved alphabetically shelved....

There it was. Dumbledore had kept his word - which may be more than Hermione could say for herself. Granted, she had made no promises about the book, but Harry sounded like he had. Still, she had no intention whatever of learning how to create Horcruxes....

Hermione wanted to learn how to detect and locate them, rather than rely on Dumbledore - and those spells were definitely in this book.

Quickly, and quietly (Tonks might try to stop her, or else tell Dumbledore), she took the book and slipped it into her beaded bag.

Now, for the hard part.

The other book Hermione sought was larger, deep green, with the word "Death" somewhere in its title. Beyond that, she was on her own.

"Hermione, we need to get moving, if we don't want to meet somebody from the Order," Tonks called out, her voice sounding frustrated.

Hermione did not have much time. All the katzenjammer with the portrait downstairs must have set off the Order's intruder alarms.

Hermione's eyes flashed across the shelves. Titles like Sorcerers of Death's Construction and Magick Most Evile leered from all sides. Given what she remembered about that book, she was sure this was the right place.

She spotted a greenish book on a middle shelf. Wary of touching it - or anything unknown in this extremely dodgy room - Hermione cast a spell to scatter the sheen of dust and lint.

"Pulsus."

Wrong book - only Vadim Aspinwall's 1001 Tastiest Recipes for Poisonous Fungi.

Hermione's heart pounded faster. She was racing against time, and time was winning. Finally, she thought of something. With a couple of exceptions, none of these books had been disturbed, probably for decades. All were covered with dust.

And dust....

"Can you speed it up, Hermione?" Tonks called again.

She had encountered the spell in one of countless books she read whilst trying to rescue Harry from the Death Eaters. Then, she dismissed it as parlour-trick magic.

"Fluorescio!"

The white gleam of Hermione's wandtip instantly changed to deep purple. All about Hermione, in the ultraviolet light, dust-covered books on the shelves began glowing pale white.

With very few exceptions - less than a dozen.

Hermione hit paydirt on her fourth try. From an upper shelf, she could read gilt lettering that emitted a pinkish glow in the UV light - Life Unto Death & Death Unto Life: Adventures in Practical Necromancy, by Hecate Digitalis.

It was exactly as she remembered it.

And Sirius had, intentionally or otherwise, helped by shoving it into the shelves upside down.

This time, Hermione Summoned the book. She handled it gingerly, although two years ago it had no dangerous charms. Flopping into a chair, she placed the book on the adjacent reading table and opened it carefully. The black reading ribbon was still in place, so the spell must be before that point.

"If we don't leave in five minutes, we'll be explaining ourselves to Harry and Mad-Eye pretty damn soon," Tonks reminded her - rather loudly - from the hallway.

Hermione knew a page-flipping spell keyed to particular words but had never used it on multiple words simultaneously. With no other choice Hermione improvised, adding "red, "white," and "blue" to the same incantation.

The pages fluttered. The first occurrence was incorrect, as was the second.

But her third time was the charm. The page was entitled, "Horcrux-mediated spell to rejoin body and soul."

It matched both Hermione's recollection and Harry's description of how Voldemort had obtained a new body.

"Coming!" she yelled at Tonks. Hermione Transfigured her wand so, instead of being round, it resembled a Muggle ruler. With one hand flat against the opposite page, she firmly pressed the straightedge as close to the book's spine as possible.

She ripped out the two pages containing the evil spell. Although an awful crime for a bibliophile, it was not her first offence.

Hermione banished the book to its place - taking care that it was right side up. She was still folding the purloined pages as she passed back through the ward.

There she met a quite agitated Tonks, her ordinarily (at least recently) lifeless brown hair a forest of orange-tipped spikes.

"You certainly took your sweet time, Miss Granger," Tonks griped. "Now let's get out of here."

They rushed downstairs. Tonks used an Auror Track-Covering Charm to eliminate their footprints. As they stormed into the ground floor landing, Walburga Black began screaming at them again - having somehow thrown off Hermione's earlier spell. Angrily, Tonks produced a wand Hermione had never seen. Tonks' deftly placed Severing Charm separated all of the preserved house-elf heads from their mounts on the wall.

"Tonks! What are you doing?" Hermione upbraided her. "Just because those were house-elves doesn't justify desecrating them."

"More track covering," Tonks hissed back at her. "Now go! Apparate back to Diagon Alley. I'll catch up!"

For once, Hermione did as she was told.

* * * *

Back at the Château, Hermione made herself scarce, working on Harry's Christmas present. With Hermione otherwise occupied, Harry played five-on-five pickup Quidditch on the old pitch behind the Château. The goals had been sufficiently repaired to be passable.

He and Jazzy faced off as Seekers. Neville (reluctantly) played Beater for one team, and Luna (erratically) played Chaser for the other. Château staff filled the remaining slots. The game was inconclusive, given the North Country's brief winter daylight - and the pitch's lack of lighting. The score was 40-30, Jazzy's team in the lead, when everyone agreed to call it quits.

Harry wanted to talk to Hermione about his session with Shak and the Minister of Magic. She was not nearly as interested in telling him about her day. Hermione avoided describing much of anything before the group took dinner in the Château's version of the Great Hall.

The meal was accompanied, as usual, with some account - levity being attempted - of the days' events. Hermione contributed an account of how the unfortunate wizard ahead of her flunked his Apparition test. His Apparition was acceptable, but he had not mastered the apparel problem. On the first try, he left behind his hat. On his second, his shoes (blue suede, size thirteen). His nerves evidently worsened, because on his third (and last) try he left all his clothes behind.

A negative result was both preordained and appropriate.

Hermione finished with a blow-by-blow account of her own test.

Her friends followed.

Luna was concluding a hilarious, but fairly pointless, tale about an experiment she had conducted in the Château's back garden involving different species of swallows, coconuts, an airspeed detector, and a rather misdirected Supersensory Charm.

As the diners dissolved into laughter, a rather grim-faced Jerry McAllister strode in and whispered something into Harry's ear.

Harry's features paled, and his expression went as serious as death.

"I'll be back as soon as I can," Harry spoke to nobody in particular. Then he focussed on Hermione. "I need to talk to you when I get back." Harry and Jerry left together, talking in low tones.

Not long after, on that unsettling note, dinner broke up.

Hermione returned to the Proprietor's Suite to prepare for the remainder of the evening - and something special she had planned. If not so worried over the emergency absorbing Harry (had a Death Eater attack occurred?), Hermione might have been annoyed at playing the stereotypical role of woman waiting in the bedroom for her man.

Predictably, she found some reading material to distract her.

She did have other concerns.

After about half an hour Hermione heard Harry's distinctive cadence in the hallway, along with the pitter patter of considerably tinier feet.

"...Yes, Harry Potter sir, we's being on it right away," promised a familiar voice. "And I apologises for it's not being done before...."

"Now Dobby, no punishments," Harry insisted. "Not for you; not for any other elves. And make sure you use real volunteers. I don't want this to be a command from me. That won't send the right message."

"Absolutely, Harry Potter, sir."

Harry's form came into view just as Dobby vanished with a pop like an overripe Bubotuber pod.

"What's going on, Harry?" Hermione asked immediately, as she rose to greet him properly. "Nothing serious, I hope."

"We don't think so anymore," Harry calmed as he took her into his arms, "but we weren't sure for a while. It seems there was a break-in ... at Grimmauld Place."

"Oh dear," Hermione's hand went to her face, but she was certain that her cheeks' guilty flush would give her away.

Harry did not seem to notice.

"Unfortunately, Sirius' delegation of security to the Order was never changed after the Order moved out. And the Order wasn't exactly prompt in investigating the alarm, so whoever broke in made good their escape. Fortunately, nothing appears taken, and not much damaged...."

"Damaged? What happened?" Hermione had to know. She remembered Tonks hanging back and then being quite tightlipped about what she had done.

"Just petty vandalism," Harry explained with a half smile. "The intruders had an unpleasant experience with a most unpleasant portrait - I'm sure you remember.... In retaliation, they bombarded it with all those house-elf heads that had been mounted in the stairwell. Before anyone put a stop to it, the heads were almost smashed into mush, and dear Walburga was unconscious, beaten black and blue. Couldn't have happened to a nicer portrait. Anyway, we think it must have been mackers...."

"Mackers?" Hermione repeated questioningly.

"Yeah, I didn't know about them, either," Harry answered. "Seems to be the new thing for younger wizards with nothing better to do - to penetrate wards and other magical security measures on a lark - just to prove they can do it. I wonder how they got...?"

"It was us, Harry," Hermione confessed. She did not want Harry worrying over this. With the main mission accomplished, keeping it a secret - at least from Harry - was no longer very important.

She hated keeping secrets from him.

"What was us?" Harry responded absently, before carrying on his train of thought. "Anyway, we're back to where we were, and security will be getting a top-to-bottom overhaul. And I'm finally having it thoroughly...."

"Harry, that break-in," Hermione tried again. "Tonks and I, we did it."

"What?" Harry regarded her doubtfully. "I would never have guessed you in a million years.... What with the elf head trick, brilliant by the way, but why?"

"This is why," Hermione reached into her beaded bag. She removed the Horrible Crosses book.

"Hermione, why?" Harry echoed himself. "If you'd wanted to go there.... I could have arranged to go with you. You know about...."

"You and a full security detail, complete with Aurors and everything," Hermione reacted. "Just look at these, and you'll understand."

Harry did. "That's the book Dumbledore used when we discussed Horcruxes," he recalled. "I told him I wouldn't use it.... I don't think we should keep this."

Hermione protested. "We're not going to make Horcruxes, Harry, but we need to learn how to detect them. We might be someplace where we can't wait for Dumbledore."

"I don't know...."

"Harry, please!"

He paused, thinking. "Alright, Hermione, but I want you to make copies of just the spells you think we might need, so we can return the book itself to Grimmauld. I don't want it around here - I don't ever want to be tempted."

Hermione thought a bit. "I agree, Harry. If something ever happened to me, I wouldn't want you to be tempted either." Before Harry could say anything in response, she continued. "Now look at this," she pulled the pages from the other book out of her bag and held them under Harry's nose.

He took them and started reading.

His eyes went wide and his skin, if anything, attained even paler carborundum-paper shade than before, at the dinner table.

"This.... This is what he - Voldemort - tried to do to me, and to himself, at the old Riddle House," Harry spluttered.

"Right, and this is the specific spell. Remember how Professor McGonagall reacted when we breathed even a partially unguarded word about Necromancy? Well, that's this - a cross between Necromancy and Blood Magic. And it didn't work correctly - because you had to die to finalise the spell. Either that or sacrifice what sounds like a Horcrux."

Harry was beyond shocked. "And you knew you could find this at Grimmauld? How...."

"You're not thinking, Harry," Hermione pressed. "When you finally told me what happened that night, I must have told you that I remembered reading something Dark that described this spell. That was at Grimmauld - when I was there with Ron - before the Order collected you...."

"And you wanted to...."

Hermione immediately confirmed. "Ever since that moment, yes. This other book was extra.... I've been trying to figure out how to go to Grimmauld without creating a big security fuss, and alert everyone that something unusual was afoot. So today, Tonks, I, and a few goblins did it.... Element of surprise and all that...."

"So, Tonks knows," Harry deduced. "And you and she planned this...."

"Tonks knows only that I wanted something important from the Grimmauld library," Hermione explained. "The goblins know even less, since they don't tend to ask questions. I planned this myself. It's one reason I wanted that Proprietor's library pass, since I assumed, correctly, that it covered Grimmauld."

"But the Blacks ... a lot of them are Death Eaters," Harry replied, even more upset than before. "What if you'd...?"

"I didn't, Harry. Nobody was there at all," Hermione insisted. "Yes, I sacrificed a bit of security for a lot of secrecy. And it worked. Now we can learn how to find Horcruxes - and we know exactly what magic is holding Voldemort together. Nobody's the wiser...."

Harry's voice cracked as he interrupted. "But, you could have been taken.... I could have lost you...."

"You didn't, Harry," Hermione maintained. "And I took precautions. I had Tonks and four goblins."

"I-I have ... to make you understand," Harry's voice quavered. "If Lestrange had been there ... or Dolohov...," he shuddered. "I'm pretty good now, but that's the one thing that could still make me ... lose it."

"Harry," Hermione spoke more gently, taking his hand. "It's okay. Nothing happened."

"You have to be careful," Harry softly chided. He struggled a bit with his composure. "If not for your own sake, then for mine.... You being hurt ... being killed ... and I'm not there ... well, that still gives me nightmares...."

"Harry, it was a calculated risk," Hermione forced back some emotion of her own. "Almost everything we do is a calculated risk. The Ministry...."

"We went there together. Can't you take your risks with me ... please?" Harry pleaded with an intensity that belied his low tones. "You - I need you more than I need ... that...." He motioned towards the now discarded pages. "I can't lose you again.... Not like that. I love you so much, I honestly don't know what I'd do ... without you."

Her expression lightened from frankly concerned to transparently tender. "Oh, Harry, I'm sorry. I'll try not to do it again. Now, c'mere." She slithered onto the bed, bidding him to follow. "I know what I'd like to do with you.... Let's put all that love to work, doing something useful...."

After a good three quarters of an hour - very good, indeed - they emerged from their bedroom.

When they did, Hermione was Levitating several large tomes. They descended to the first floor and ensconced themselves in a sitting room just off the main hallway.

Cuddling together in a loveseat, Hermione asked Harry, "Okay, which do you want to see first, the letters or the photos?"

"I don't know," Harry predictably responded. "You want me to learn more about you, so whichever best accomplishes that, I guess."

"I'd say, start with the letters, then...."

For most of an hour, Hermione led Harry through her voluminous correspondence to (and also from) her parents. Shortly before everything with them had gone to hell, they had actually taken the trouble to compile them into a book.

Hermione had just shown Harry an exchange of third-year letters, mostly bemoaning her fights with Ron over Crookshanks, when she noticed a distinctive far away look in Harry's eyes.

"What is it, Harry? Is something wrong?" Hermione asked innocently, although she could guess what was going on.

Harry raked his hands through his already thoroughly mussed hair. "It's just.... Well, I don't know how much more I can take, all at one sitting. You were so close to your parents, and then along I came and ruined it...."

"You ruined nothing, Harry," she countered as her voice rose. "Drop the guilt. They're my past, but you're my future...."

"Assuming I have any...." Harry started, then stopped. He did now, he realised, and she was sitting right next to him. "No, that's not it," he shifted nervously. "I guess I'm ... well, jealous, actually...."

That was more like it.

"Well, I guess we could call a halt," Hermione acceded. "But you might want to read about Buckbeak's appeal. They even offered to engage counsel."

Harry could do without that, since even now his guilt meter rose whenever that topic came up. He could never live down that he basically left Hermione to fend for herself. Even Ron helped her more.

"Not tonight, I think," Harry mumbled. "What's in those?" He pointed to some other volumes Hermione had gathered.

"Muggle photos," she replied, "mostly of various trips."

"Let's look at those for a while."

Hermione started with the most recent volume. Soon they were leafing through pictures of her ill-fated trip to Hong Kong.

"...And look at this one," she pointed whilst flipping a page. "I was so depressed, and then ... so shocked at the sight, I almost ran across six lanes of traffic. But I didn't, so I had to make do with this picture...."

Their conversation halted as someone shuffled down the hallway in their direction, humming what sounded like "Birdhouse in Your Soul."

"Hi, Luna!" Hermione called out. "What has you wandering this way? Most of the fun stuff's in the other wing. Even Jazzy admits that the three-dimensional Quidditch pinball machines are cool."

"Maybe, but fun is what fun is." Luna waltzed over to sit on the arm of their loveseat. "You haven't by any chance seen a swallow flying by - European, that is? I think it got loose in the Château somewhere...."

"No, I can't say that we have," Harry answered.

"No worry then," Luna smiled as she craned her neck to see what the pair had been reading. "They feed on Bundimun, you know. Keeps infestations down. Oh goodie...!"

"Oh, goodie, what?" Hermione reacted. Sometimes Luna's unalloyed weirdness could be grating - like now, when Hermione was trying to focus on Harry.

"...You've found what the tattoo really is. So what is it?"

"So what is what?" Hermione answered impatiently.

"That right there," Luna pointed to the picture Hermione had just showed to Harry. "That's the same design as Cho's mysterious tattoo.... And isn't that ... Percival?"

They both cried out, "What!?" in unison. Hermione quickly Transfigured her empty pumpkin juice glass into a magnifying glass for a better look.

"I assumed it was some sort of mandala," Luna continued, whilst squinting at the intricate design on a Chinese-language sign just above the slightly out of focus image of Percy Weasley.

"I do believe you're right!" Hermione declared after another minute's study. "But why is it hanging over a door in Hong Kong? That doesn't make sense.... Do you have your Pocket Pensieve with you?"

"Nope," Luna shook her head. "That's one thing I didn't think I'd need. I didn't bring my entire trunk - not like some people."

"Wait a minute," Harry blurted as he stood up. "I've got an idea. Stay right here...."

He Disapparated. Proprietor's privilege. The anti-Apparition wards did not apply to him.

In a couple of minutes, Harry returned, popping back into existence. In his hand he held an oddly shaped, pastel-green box about three centimetres square by five times that long.

"What's that, Harry?" Hermione asked, as Luna simply stared.

"I'll show you." He pulled out a golden-yellow object shaped like a stick of butter. Harry pointed his wand at the thing, opened his mouth, but stopped. Slightly red-faced, he paused to read a small scrap of parchment from the box. "Vermilius," Harry incanted, and the rounded end of the block turned bright red-orange.

Pleased with himself for getting the spell right, Harry looked around. The two girls stared expectantly at him.

Oops, he had forgotten something rather basic. "Umm ... Hermione, could you Transfigure that serviette into a regular piece of parchment?"

Hermione obliged, and Harry immediately pressed the chop into it.

"There," he grunted. "Now, how does that compare to the other one?"

Hermione put her trusty magnifying glass to work, as Luna squinted over her shoulder. "Looks identical," was her judgment, "except for the colour, of course."

"What does it mean, Harry?" Luna questioned.

"Cho sent me this for my birthday," Harry explained as he brandished the chop in one hand and his wand in the other. "Why, I don't know. But her note says it's her family's sign. That means, first, that whatever building Percy's entering in this picture is run by the Changs, and second, supposing Luna's right, that makes Cho's tattoo some sort of family symbol - which fits with what that guy from New Zealand told us...."

"What guy from New Zealand?" Luna queried.

"Somebody who knew something about tattoos," Hermione answered. "I'm afraid I don't have any of the pictures, and there's no connectivity here...."

"That settles it," Harry declared. "I'm getting one of Dennis' stations for this place."

"Wait a minute!" Luna exclaimed. "I do have one of the photos ... if not the Pensieve!"

"Well, don't wait a minute!" Hermione urged. "Go get it!"

Luna ran off. Only then did Harry and Hermione notice that the girl's earrings emitted red and green flashes as they bounced around.

"What do you think?" Hermione asked urgently.

"If she's right ... and Luna usually is about such things, then we have to ask Lao Kung what this is all about," Harry replied, stony faced.

"But ... we've already tried to reach him; it's been almost a week; and Hedwig still isn't back," Hermione remarked in return. "I hope she's okay."

"I hope so, too, but this time I'm not thinking Hedwig," Harry let on. "At this point I'm thinking international fast owl."

Hermione immediately questioned him. "But we don't have.... Or do we...?"

"Hermione, one thing I'm learning is that the Château has lots of useful things."

"All right then," Hermione agreed. "You mean like the billiards room."

"I haven't been there yet," Harry admitted.

"Well, I have, and I challenge you to a frame or two."

"Umm ... I don't know, Hermione," Harry said coyly. "You're quite brilliant at that, as I remember."

"Well.... I thought we might wager a few articles of clothing, just to make it interesting," Hermione suggested.

"You're on...."

* * * *

The old house stood empty - again - for at least two hours. A large spider scuttled from a hole behind a kitchen cupboard where two stones, never an exact fit, had gradually separated. Behind it, from the same hole, came the tentative, sniffing nose of a rodent - a brown rat.

That alone was strange, because these dinner-plate spiders usually ate rats and other small mammals. But not this rat.

This rat had a silver paw - a paw that could snap off their legs, smash their exoskeletons, and turn predator into prey.

This rat had established itself at the top of the food chain in Grimmauld Place for some time.

Until today.

Today, for only the second time since a thoroughly disgusted Snape had banished him to Grimmauld Place "to stand watch and be a little less than useless," the house had seen visitors - wizard visitors.

The first time it had been Dumbledore, and the rat had hidden as far away as possible. This time was much different.

Whiskers quivering, the rat's exquisitely sensitive olfactory facilities processed many scents in the redolent air of the decrepit old house. Superimposed over the usual mélange of animal infestations and dead house-elf odours were a number of new ones, both frightening and fascinating.

The freshest scents belonged to two unknown wizards. They had presumably been searching for the others, since the previous visitors had used magic and triggered the house's magical alarms. The old house was under some sort of surveillance, even though no longer used for anything, as far as the rat could determine.

He knew that they - that is, whoever was watching the house - would come if the alarm went off. It had happened to him, once, shortly after starting this assignment.

It would not happen a second time. He was well hidden by the time those two arrived.

The rat skittered about the ground floor rooms, sniffing as he went.

From the pattern of their scents, those two gits left just as clueless as they arrived.

Now the first group ... they were different.

They had startled him - and the goblins with them had done worse.

Two of those strange-smelling creatures had charged down the main corridor straight at him. But luck was with him. He barely escaped into a nearby hole.

Credit more than just luck - during his sojourn, the rat had learnt the location of every rat hole and roach passage in the infested old building.

The goblins were not after him. The spiders he had been stalking when so rudely interrupted evidently doubled as goblin delicacies.

Whether goblins ate rats, he had no desire to find out.

Another scent was vaguely familiar - a witch he had encountered a couple of times during clashes between Death Eaters and the Order ... or was it the Aurors? That one had the unnerving ability to change her appearance at will. But he knew one important thing about her recent activities....

She often acted as bodyguard for the girl....

And the girl had been here. He knew her scent anywhere. He had first encountered it before the Dark Lord had returned - whilst still a pathetic pet in the Weasley household.

Her damn cat had tried to eat him more than once. She had also been present when Potter had saved his life. Potter was a fool.

She was Harry Potter's friend. Check that. She was now far more than a friend. The Dark Lord knew too, and was surprisingly paranoid about the girl. His Master had ordered him to kill her, and by sabotaging here broom, he very nearly had....

But he had failed, one of a string of failures that put him here - not entirely involuntarily - because he had failed in more ways than even his Master knew.

He knew that the girl was now the Boy Who Lived's fiancée. And he had not told the Dark Lord....

What brought her to Grimmauld?

Sniffing her scent intently, he followed her trail around the ground floor, past the stench of rotting house-elf flesh, and up the stairs to the first floor. Nose to the ancient carpet, he followed the scent more-or-less blindly until....

The rat let out a loud squeak as he smacked said nose, hard, against something invisible.

He encountered the ward to the Black's restricted library.

How had the girl managed to enter?

Another squeak - not in pain, this time, but in recognition.

She was engaged to the Proprietor of the Black Estate.

Whatever brought the girl to Grimmauld was behind that ward.

Peter Pettigrew was not a rat for nothing.

The rat scampered away, skirred around a corner, ducked into a mouldy bedroom that the Order had never cleaned up, slipped under the bed....

...and darted through a rat hole.

Rats had excellent night vision.

Frightened Doxies and mundane cockroaches alike scattered before the oncoming rodent. He charged this way and that through the maze of tunnels that vermin had created over the last dozen years.

Soon he slowed and cautiously poked his nose through a crack where, over time, the top of a bookcase had pulled a few centimeters away from the wall.

Her scent was strong here.

The rat wriggled behind the bookcase until he found the gnawed-through opening near the bottom. With a series of squeaky grunts, he pushed the book that blocked the hole forward until it fell to the floor.

Sniffing frantically, the rat dropped the remaining third of a metre to the floor.

Onto a chair he jumped. Yes, she had been here. Her scent was pronounced in the seat of the chair - he could smell just a bit of the boy, too. So, they were intimate.... He had expected no less. This generation did not know what it was to wait.

From the chair he leapt to the nearby table.

The musty odour meant she had been reading a book, but which one?

He raised his sensitive nose in the air.

The girl had handled several books, but the most distinct odour came from one of the shelves to his left, and fairly high up.

Rats were not built for climbing, but he struggled up the shelving anyway. He could not transform - not yet - because the human nose was far less acute.

He probably damaged a few books, but with claws, teeth, and tail, he clambered upwards.

Just when he doubted his ability, the rat reached a shelf where, at last, the girl's odour was no longer above him. He edged his way along the shelf until he sniffed out the book the girl had evidently been reading.

He climbed to the top of the tome. Grabbing the shelf above with his magical silver paw, he braced himself and kicked wildly at the book with his back paws.

Shredded bits of parchment filled the air as he slowly pushed the book outwards. Suddenly it began to tip. The rat lost his balance as both he and the book crashed to the floor.

Recovering quickly from the metre-plus fall, the rodent snuffled all about the large book. The girl's scent was strong, but more pronounced in some places than others. Using his nose and his paws, the rat turned pages this way and that until he stumbled upon the most intense odour.

A rat could go no further - as a rat.

He could not read. In his Animagus form, his less-complex rat brain lacked that capacity.

To return to his human form required magic.

Using magic would set off the alarm - something he had learnt from hard experience.

But for some reason, the girl who held the Boy Who Lived's heart had ventured all the way to this library to look at this book. That information might just redeem him in his Master's eyes. It was worth the risk.

He transformed. The magical alarm sounded.

Peter Pettigrew rapidly committed the name of the book to memory. Then he looked for the precise pages. He was surprised, but not shocked, to see two pages - four sides of print - had been removed.

"A priori," he incanted, returning the library to its prior state.

A shiver ran down his spine.

He could not remember which book he had pushed out to gain access to the room.

Wormtail started to panic.... Then he remembered that the passage could be accessed from the top of the rightmost bookshelf. Huffing and puffing, he hoisted himself to the top - or close enough to it.

He transformed.

Then he jumped into the narrow space behind the bookcase. He bashed and battered himself on the way down, but made good his escape.

If the Dark Lord had a copy of the same book, then he would be able to determine what the girl had been interested in.

The rat was confident that he did.

* * * *

Harry Potter nearly hit the ceiling when Mad-Eye brought word of the Order's latest proposal.

"Tomorrow...? You want us to attract the Deaters' attention deliberately?"

"Yeh got that right, son," Mad-Eye retorted. "Yeh're the one who just agreed ta help out the Ministry, after all...."

"And what, exactly, is their great plan?" Harry responded sarcastically.

"Last minute Christmas shoppin', fer starters - then playin' at being tourists fer the rest of the day," Mad-Eye told him. "The first's ta attract attention. The second's the real plan.... We've been tryin' ta get a look inta a few magical places in Glastonbury fer some time now, ta look fer whatever Voldemort's hidden in the area, but there's always been Deaters about. We're hoping they'll come fer a look at yeh. Then we can sneak in and check the area out...."

Harry thought for a bit. "This comes straight from Dumbledore, doesn't it?" he asked.

"Yep," Moody confirmed. "He's convinced there's somethin' about. Won't say what, so I figure it's important.... Says he's discussed it with yeh two, though, so I'm assumin' yeh know what this is all about."

"And you don't?" Harry asked his guardian.

"Nope," Mad-Eye growled back. "If it's on a need ta know basis and I don't need ta know. I can live with that.... Yeh should try it some time."

"Well ... okay, but just me, all right?" Harry reluctantly agreed. "I won't have Hermione used as bait for any reason."

"Fer the last time, okay?" Mad-Eye spat back. "Ain't nobody bein' used as bait. Yeh'll all be well guarded ... very well guarded ... too blasted well guarded, in fact. That's part of the deal ta attract everyone's attention. We're gonna stop traffic and everythin'. Yeh'll be more headache ta everybody than the bloody PM."

"If she agrees, then all right," Harry grudgingly went along. "But I'm not letting her out of my sight."

Mad-Eye snorted. "And how are yeh gonna Christmas shop fer each other, then?"

"I have her present," Harry maintained. "And she's mentioned that she has mine, too."

The aged Auror threw up his hands. "Oh, all right ... have it yer bloody way, then...."

"...And the others don't come unless they really want to," Harry added another condition.

"Oh, they will, Harry," Mad-Eye told him as he cracked his first, rather grotesque smile of the conversation. "I've already asked 'em ... not about the mission, exactly, but whether they'd fancy a visit ta civilisation. An' they do. Big as this place is ... it's so isolated that cabin fever's settin' in. Can't say I blame 'em...."

"Fine," Harry pronounced, rather annoyed that his guardian had to some degree gone behind his back. "Got everything planned, I see. I suppose you even know where Hermione is, then...."

His grin got so large as to expose all of Mad-Eye's teeth - not a pleasant sight. "As a matter of fact I do, my boy," he said gaily, or at least as close to gaily as the crusty old man ever came. "Just got done talkin' 'bout this with her. She told me she'd be in the billiard room, an' I should send yeh there when I'm done...."

"Well, you're done," Harry declared. Then he turned on his heel and left - in great hurry.

Mad-Eye could only smile as he reflected upon pocketing balls and chalking cues.

64

C:\Documents and Settings\Owner\My Documents\HP & The Fifth Element.ch51 Padfoot's legacy.doc 2/12/2017