Harry Potter, the Phoenix and the Serpent

CHAPTER 3: BACK IN THE BURROW

In the week that followed, Harry finished his Potions homework, started his History parchment, and mastered the wizarding Mahjong, which became a favorite pastime in between bouts of homework. Luckily, Dudley had not come to look and Harry had convinced the pieces that they should be quiet.

Saturday came, and Harry mentioned to Uncle Vernon that he was going to his friends' house at five. Dudley raced out of the room and hid, and Harry got a prompt scolding for mentioning this, but Harry could tell that they were glad he was going.

"Well, is this man coming through the chimney like last time?" Uncle Vernon asked in a huff.

"No, I'm going back by it though."

"Ah, hrmm," he grunted, thinking. "Well, I hope that he repairs the fireplace before he goes." And that was the end of it.

At five after five, Mr. Weasley Apparated into the Dursleys' living room. Dudley, who had been watching the television, squeaked and raced out of the room, holding his bottom. Aunt Petunia was hurriedly pulling the shades closed as Harry pulled his trunk and cage into the room.

The red-headed wizard looked tired, but he gave Harry a smile that was genuine. "It's good to see you again," he said slowly, and jumped a bit when Uncle Vernon grunted loudly. Mr. Weasley held out his hand for Harry's uncle to shake, but Vernon shrank back from it like it was a snake. Aunt Petunia hung back in the doorway to the room watching Mr. Weasley's every move.

"Well, Harry," the red-headed wizard said rather nervously, turning away from Vernon. "We'd best be going."

"I'll see you next year," Harry said to Uncle Vernon, who merely humphed in reply.

Mr. Weasley looked like he was about to say something in the direction of, "Aren't you going to say good bye?" but Harry had already been through this last year. They exchanged knowing looks and the older wizard nodded. "Well," he said again.

He moved the electric fireplace aside and Harry used a little of his Floo Powder on the empty fireplace. Harry tilted his luggage into the fireplace as it lit up with a green fire. Harry shouted, "The Burrow!" as he stepped into the fireplace and flew through the many Floo-connected fireplaces to the Weasley's home.

He stepped out of the fireplace this time, congratulating himself silently for keeping his balance. "Harry!" Mrs. Weasley cried, putting the lid back on a pot of some stew she was boiling. She hugged him, despite the soot covering his clothes, and Harry tried not to look too embarrassed. None of the Dursleys had ever tried to hug him, but then again, he didn't really want them to. This was a welcome change.

George entered the kitchen and sniffed, then glanced around and saw Harry and his mother, with her back to him, hugging. Before he said hello, though, he dropped something into the stew. "Oy, Harry! Nice to see you here again!" He glanced at the pot on the stove and said, "Ah, Mum, I think your soup is overflowing!"

She spun from Harry and pointed her wand at it.

"Accio!" she called, and the blob that George had put into the stew came flying out at her. The boiling subsided, and she looked suspiciously at the soggy item in her hand. "Would you care to explain this, George?"

"Er, well, no, I wouldn't," he replied and shot out of the kitchen. Mrs. Weasley was about to follow him when Ron and Ginny came hopping down the stairs.

"Yes! Harry, you made it!" Ron yelled, while Ginny just looked happily at him with a bit of a blush tinting her cheeks.

"Yeah, the Dursleys didn't put up as much of a fight as last time. They were mostly hiding from your dad."

Ginny smirked and said, "That should have made Dad pleased. No one around here hides from him..."

"Ginny!" Mrs. Weasley cut in. "Don't say such things."

'Sorry, Mum," Ginny replied, but didn't look the least bit sorry.

Harry glanced around. "Is Hermione here yet? She told me she'd come." Ron glared at him as if bringing her up was a bad idea, and then changed the look as Ginny glanced back and forth between the two boys.

"We're meeting her in Diagon Alley tomorrow," Mrs. Weasley supplied when neither child spoke up, but she too seemed nervous about the subject.

Ron's eyes beckoned him upstairs, and Ginny started walking up the stairs with Hedwig's cage in her arms.

Harry and Ron dragged his trunk up the stairs behind Ginny. Hedwig hooted at Harry when he entered Ron's room, Ginny holding the door for them. But when Ginny sank down on Ron's bed and Ron didn't kick her out of his room, Harry knew something was wrong.

"What is it, Ron?" He demanded.

Ron shut the door and said, "Hermione wrote me two days ago with Hedwig. She told me that she had a nasty scare in Spain by some Death Eaters. Thankfully, no one was hurt by them, but they were shouting that Mudbloods were no good. Got her really shook up, you know?"

Ginny nodded. "Her letter rambled on, and she spelled things wrong. Do you think You-Know-Who was behind this, or that they're just playing because their master is back and they are the rising bullies?"

Harry shrugged, setting down his trunk and sitting on it. "I haven't had any pains or strange dreams, if that's what you're asking. I really don't know what he's up to." He quickly explained the letter from Dumbledore, adding, "He said something about Snuffles but we'll talk about that with Hermione."

Ron furrowed his brow, but Ginny shuddered, reacting to his first statement. "Does your scar always tell you when You-Know-Who is thinking up some scheme?"

"So far it's never done me wrong. It hasn't hurt me lately, hardly at all this summer. Just once really bad, and maybe three smaller times."

Ron bit his lower lip, playing with a strand of reddish hair absently. "That means that He's planning something big soon." When they looked at him in confusion, he added, "Well, He's not exactly the type to sit around and twiddle his thumbs. He must be doing something."

"But what?" Ginny whispered, genuinely frightened.

Before they could launch into some endless debate, their mother called all three of them down to help set the table for supper.

As Ron clumped down the stairs, Harry grasped Ginny's hand, making her blush furiously. "It's okay, he can't get to you."

"He got to me once," she replied, eyes wide.

"He'd probably be after me more than you. I'm the one he just can't get rid of," he joked. Ginny didn't look too happy with his flippant response, but Harry couldn't say more because Ron had turned around at the bottom of the stairs and was waiting impatiently for them. Harry squeezed her hand to comfort her and let go, then hopped down the stairs.

* * *

He was standing on the sidewalk of an unfamiliar street, waiting for... someone. He wasn't sure who he was meeting, only that the confrontation would not be pleasant. His hands were shaking so hard he could barely hold his wand straight, his legs were cramping up, and his breath was coming in ragged gasps.

"Corey!" A whispered voice called from the shadows behind him.

He turned to look behind him and met a pair of green eyes much like his own staring out of a face cloaked in shadow. He backed up into the shadow to stand beside the and hissed, "Arle! You shouldn't be here!"

"I'm not leaving without you, Corey. You don't need to fight them now." She grasped his arm and looked pleadingly up at him with bright green eyes.

"No. I need to stand and fight. For Mum and Dad," he added, nervously turning and looking around the street. "Take Pat and go, you shouldn't be here!"

"Pat's dead," she replied softly, her eyes filled with tears, but he could see something strengthen within their emerald depths.

He pulled his sister into his arms as if to protect her, but they were sharing the loss of their parents and all they had ever known. They both jumped when a sudden noise echoed down the street.

"This is it," he said to her, pulling out his wand and rubbing at his eyes wistfully.

Arle glanced up at him, and he noticed within her emerald eyes a glint of a red flicker.

"You wouldn't," he said, appalled at what he saw.

"To protect you, I will," she replied defiantly, and the red flicker became a steady glow.

"He's one too... Besides, you're not trained," he protested, and a shadow congealed behind her. "Lumos," he muttered, pointing his wand towards the shadow.

The stooped figure crouching there stood up, framed in the glow of his wand.

"Eric..."

"You're dead, Corey. You and your sister will die just as your mother and father did," Eric sneered, holding his wand in front of him in defense. "The last of the Reed family, the last two with your little magic tricks."

"They're not weird," he snarled.

"They are. Thankfully, your sister there will never learn them."

"Then do those 'magic tricks' make you weird?" Corey spat, gripping his wand tighter and willing his arm to hold steady.

Eric had no response to this. He pointed his wand at Arle, and her brother glanced at Arle's eyes. The first sign of her magic is within the eyes...

They were almost glowing to contain her energy, but Eric didn't notice this. Corey knew the glazed look all too well; he had seen it in both his father and his elder brother's eyes. If they glow, you've gone too far...

"And you would fight to protect this?" Eric spat at him, motioning at Arle. "You can't possibly think she's got the Reed Power, can you?" Eric tilted his head, as if listening to something. "Ah, My Master says to kill you now. Which one first?" He laughed and pointed to Arle. "The sister dies first!

"Avada Kedavra!" Eric shouted, and Corey flung himself at Arle... A green light exploded all around him, and then just as suddenly, fire blossomed...

* * *

Harry sat up in his bed, groaning loudly and clutching at his throbbing scar. Ron woke up with a barely stifled curse, and then realized it was Harry.

"Harry!" Ron cried, then hushed his voice and whispered, "What's wrong? Is it your scar?"

Harry looked around dizzily, sight tinted with the fire and the green light. Ron crawled out of bed and crouched next to him on the floor. "Harry?"

He rocked a little, waiting for the pain to subside as the Dark Lord had his fill of the death that had just occurred. Who were they? Why did that Eric want to kill them? He struggled to catch his breath again.

His vision cleared after a long moment, and shortly thereafter, the pain decreased.

"Hey, Harry, do you want me to go get Mum?"

"No," he groaned. He glanced up at Ron, still holding his scar with both hands. "I've never seen this in first person," he added softly as the pain slowly seeped away. "I've always been watching as they die...Never been the one to die..."

"Harry?" Ron asked yet again, cocking an eyebrow.

"I was there," Harry explained, still speaking softly. "I saw someone die, only I was inside this person's mind. I could feel what he was feeling..."

"How is that possible?" Ron demanded, catching Harry's arm as he struggled to get up.

"I don't know," he grunted as he struggled to his feet, but he had his own idea that he was not saying to Ron. What if his connection to Voldemort was deepening...

Ron yawned widely, and covered it with his hand. "Sorry, Harry. But you disturbed my beauty sleep..."

"Ron, you can go back to sleep." He could tell Ron was about to object, but a yawn settled him.

He still tossed a worried look in Harry's direction before saying, "Okay... I'll see you in the morning." He pulled the sheets up to his head until all that could be seen was a tuft of orange-reddish hair.

Harry was glad Ron had decided against coming down to stay up with him; he couldn't sleep now, and he had to write to Dumbledore before he forgot everything...

He grabbed a blanket, his wand, and a quill and paper and walked down the narrow stairs. He slumped down on the couch, his left hand fingers playing against his scar as if by touching it he could somehow make the pain go away.

Professor Dumbledore,

I think that Voldemort is up to something... I had a dream where I was in someone else's mind, hearing their thoughts. It was a boy, older than me, but I can't remember his name. I think it started with a "C". He had a younger sister about my age, her name was Aryl, I think. They were running from a Death Eater named Eric, who had killed their family. Eric wanted to destroy something about the family line, some individual trait or unique magic. He caught up with them and he used Avada Kedavra on them, but I'm not sure who he got. There was a lot of fire there too, and that's when I woke up with my scar giving me pains.

What does it mean? Why would he want to go after them?

~Harry

He sat back and read it, trying to keep the facts straight within his mind, scar sending an unpleasant buzz through his head. He folded the letter and tucked it into his pocket, then shuffled over to the kitchen to get a drink. As he did so, he noticed the Weasley clock, which told where each of the Weasleys were. Six hands were pointing on home, Mr. Weasley's and Charlie's hands were pointing at Work and Away.

He sank back into the couch, feeling suddenly tired by the whole swarm of thoughts in his head. Some time before Mr. Weasley came home, he was asleep, curled up on the couch, one hand covering his scar protectively.

* * *

Harry sat up straight, blinking the sun out of his eyes. Had he really slept the entire night on the couch? Apparently he had, and he could hear some noises coming from the kitchen, showing the ever bustling Weasley house in full tilt, but everyone was steering clear of the living room. He glanced down at his wrist out of habit but he no longer had any watch to tell him the time; the last one had been waterlogged when he had taken it with him swimming in the lake.

He quickly hurried upstairs and dressed, scar pounding dully with each sharp move-ment he made. He glanced at his reflection in the mirror, and paused at the bright emerald eyes. The first sign of her magic is within the eyes...

He closed them for a moment as the realization hit him: the dream was clearer now than it had been last night. He wasn't sure whether this was good news or bad news.

He pulled the slightly crumpled letter out of his pocket and quickly replaced the name "Aryl" with the name Arle, and paused as he glanced at the "C" name he hadn't remembered last night. He could remember Arle's name, but not her brother's.

And all he could think of were her eyes, the emerald depths, and their spiraling red... Who were they? Why were they so important to Voldemort? Why?

* * *

Harry stepped out of the fireplace into the quaint little joke shop in Diagon Alley, to be confronted by a large hippo in a tutu, that promptly exploded and sent flowers raining down everywhere.

"Ah, Harry, you're the first?" A laughing face punctuated by red hair peeked through the shower of flowers.

"Rats," said the second Weasley twin, who Harry couldn't see. "We were hoping to get Percy with it..."

There was a coughing noise, and a startled exclamation as someone came through the fireplace behind him and roughly collided with him.

"Oy, Harry, move!" Ron yelped as they both tried to regain their balance. "Mum and Ginny are coming next!" They both tipped over and rolled onto the floor in a tangle of legs and arms.

Harry, on his knees in the mess of flowers, crawled through them in the nick of time; Ron was not so lucky. "Ouch, Mum! You're stepping on my fingers!"

"Sorry, Ron," Ginny's voice called.

"What are you doing on the floor..." Mrs. Weasley tutted. With a flick of her wand, the flowers still falling were redirected to a safer place, although they were piled ankle high at their feet.

With a grunt, Bill joined the situation through the fireplace, bumping into his mother. He tried to slip around her, but nearly got poked in the eye with her wand, and almost lost his balance.

Harry stood up, raising one eyebrow at the comical sight and trying to hold back laughter. Ron was half kneeling, half sitting in front of Mrs. Weasley, who had flowers draped in her hair, and Ginny was balancing on one foot, trying not to step on her brother.

Bill's feet were almost hopelessly tangled in Ron's robes, and as Ron struggled to get up, Bill lost his balance and toppled Ginny over with him. Ginny, who had grabbed at the mantle in her panic of being dragged down, had accidentally grabbed a bottle, which slipped from her fingers and spilled all over Ron, Ginny, and Bill, turning them into newts.

The proprietors of the little store were both laughing loudly at the scene; George buckled over holding his sides with laughter and Fred leaning up against the mantle of their fireplace, wiping away tears. "That was so good," he gasped between breaths.

Mrs. Weasley pointed her wand at her children, watching them squirm away from each other for a moment, and changed them back.

There was a tense moment as Mr. Weasley came through the fireplace, but it was avoided by some quick Apparating by Bill and Mrs. Weasley, who had moved to a safer portion of store.

"What...?" Mr. Weasley asked, glancing down at Ron and Ginny sprawled on the floor.

"Don't ask," Harry replied, helping Ron to his feet while Mr. Weasley helped Ginny.

A small white ferret wandered up to them, gazing at them with pleading eyes.

"Please tell me," murmured Mrs. Weasley to George and Fred, deadly serious, "That this isn't a student. A Hogwarts student?"

"Um, well..." George began.

"You see, Mum," Fred stammered when his brother faltered.

"Turn him back." She snapped, watching the little animal with narrowed eyes.

"Ah, well, Mum-" Fred began slowly.

"Turn him back." Her tone left no space for question.

"But Mum, I can't do magic! He'll change back in a minute," George pointed out. True to George's word, at that instant the ferret shicered and exploded up into...

"Neville?" Harry asked, grasping the smaller boy's arm and hauling him to his feet.

"They offered me a piece of candy...I should have known..." Neville stuttered, looking around anxiously for his grandmother.

Ron shuffled up to him and said, "All right, there, Neville?"

Mrs. Weasley rounded on the twins as soon as she was sure Neville was all right. "I only let you have this shop because some person had the foolish idea to give you money to start it. If I catch you doing this to any other student..."

"Mrs. Weasley?" Harry asked softly, trying to soften it up on the twins. After all, it had been he that had given them the money to start the shop in the first place... "What time were we supposed to meet Hermione?"

Neville squealed when he noticed his grandmother peering through the shop window, and with a rushed, "See you at school," he dashed outside.

"At eleven." With a quick consultation to her watch, she turned to George and Fred and said, "Don't let me catch you two doing it again," shaking her finger at them. "We've got to go find Hermione, so behave yourselves."

"Thanks, Harry," Fred murmured to Harry as he moved past him. "We owe you two now."

Harry smiled at him, watching out the window for Hermione. An owl fluttered past and landed on the sign reading "Gred and Forge's Joke Shop," as he and Ron exited the shop together, reminding Harry of Hedwig. He had sent her off with the revised letter right after he had showered. He hoped his mentor would be able to understand the dream better than he had.

Harry looked around, searching for Hermione's bushy head of brown hair, or Crookshank's bottle brush tail. Ron ran his hand through his red hair, almost knocking his elbow into Harry.

"I wonder if she's going to be okay," Ron muttered as they walked down Diagon Alley.

"Yeah, so do I," Harry replied. "I wonder if Malfoy will have heard of it by the time we get back to school."

Ron's eyes blazed and Harry knew he had said the wrong thing. Ron had a rather personal vendetta against Malfoy, due only partially to the fact that he was a Slytherin Pureblood. Draco Malfoy continually mocked Ron's family because they were "poor Muggle-loving freaks." He continually taunted Ron with that, and he had taken recently to taunting Hermione as well. Harry was another of Malfoy's favorite taunts, but he didn't normally let it sting. He and Hermione had a hard enough time trying to hold Ron back from attacking Malfoy that if he let himself get angry over words, things could turn out rather ugly.

"Yeah, well I'll show him this year," Ron snarled. "I'll make sure he won't laugh at us ever again."

"Ron, you'd just be goading him on, and you know it. He won't back down because you beat him up, and with Vol--You-Know-Who--rising..." He let the sentence hang, not wanting to say any more.

Ron's eyes went wide as he stopped and turned to face Harry squarely, saying, "I know exactly what Malfoy could call down upon us. You're a living example of that. I look at you--at your scar--and wonder how you could survive Vol--You-Know-Who's curse, and if you could survive it again. But I'm not going to cower beneath Malfoy any longer." He would have continued, but Ginny ran up and cried, "We've found Hermione, now we're going to Flourish and Blott's to get some books."

"Is she all right?" Harry asked, as he and Ron exchanged meaningful glances.

"Yeah, she looks all right, but she's quiet."

However, when they approached the cluster of Weasleys outside of the bookstore, Hermione was speaking rather vigorously to Mrs. Weasley.

She paused when she saw them, and raced toward them. He backed away a few steps almost involuntarily, but Hermione didn't notice this, or if she did, she wasn't reading into it.

"You have no idea how much I've missed both of you..." Hermione began, and her eyes glistened now as she pulled them into an awkward hug. It must have shaken her up a great deal more than she was letting on to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, Harry reflected.

"Come along, now," Mr. Weasley said, herding his troupe into the bookstore. "We'll catch up with you three later, in Fred and George's shop."

"Do you have the globe with you?" Hermione asked softly as the moved away from the Weasleys.

"No, it's at the Burrow," Harry replied, and Ron arced an eyebrow in confusion. "I got a globe from Snuffles for my birthday," Harry quickly explained.

"Do you know what it does?" Ron demanded. He was rather anxious about the globe, seeing how trouble always seemed to find them in unknown ways.

"No."

At Ron's disapproving stare, Hermione said, "Well, think about it, Ron. Snuffles wouldn't put Harry or us in danger. He must know what it is, or what it does..."

"I think we should show Dumbledore," Ron suggested.

"He might take it away from us," Hermione responded.

Harry looked at his two friends, and wondered when they had changed opinions. Hermione was always the Let's-stay-on-the-safe-side-of-things type, while Ron was more of the Let's-use-it-and-ask-what-it-is-later type. "Well, let's check it out tonight," Harry said, and led them to the ice-cream shop.

They sat down at a table outside to eat their ice cream, still guessing about what Harry's globe might be.

"If I didn't know any better, Harry," Ron joked, "I'd think you liked Hermione more than me. After all, you told her about the globe and 'forgot' to tell me..."

"Well, you're even now," Harry pointed out, "Because I haven't told Hermione about my dream."

Hermione looked at him for a moment curiously and said, "So are you going to spill it now?"

He quickly related the dream in full detail, surprised at how much he remembered of it. Hermione's eyes widened and Ron's narrowed as he recounted it.

"And you haven't forgotten it?" Ron asked once Harry had finished. At Harry's negative shake of his head, Ron continued, "Then it must not have been a dream..."

"Well, what else could it have been?" Hermione asked quite sensibly.

"I..." Harry began hesitantly, still not sure if he wanted to tell them what he thought of it. "I think it's my connection to Voldemort--" his friends winced, and he corrected himself, "--You-Know-Who getting stronger."

They stared at his forehead, like little first-years who had just realized who he is. Fortunately, Ron and Hermione didn't start babbling incomprehensible things like many of the firsties had.

"Are you sure?" Hermione asked softly, her fingers twitching as if she wanted to reach out and touch the lightning bolt down his forehead.

"No I'm not, but it's the only thing I can think of that would give me this sort of impression."

"But if that's true, why did he just show you his death? Why not do something more powerful?" Ron asked.

"It was enough. He's trying to taunt me into doing something stupid out of anger." Harry explained his theory.

Hermione added, "What stronger thing could he do to bring Harry down than show him exactly how the victims died?"

"He may not know he has this power over me... So let's keep it that way. Tell no one."

Hermione bit into her cone and said, "But didn't you already tell Dumbledore?"

"Yes, but he should know about this," Harry replied, finishing off his cone.

"Hermione, what is that on your sweater?" asked Ron, motioning to her collar. She unclipped it and held it out to Ron for inspection sheepishly. "When did you get named 'Prefect'?" He demanded coldly.

"In my letter last week."

"And you didn't tell us?"

"Ron!" She cried, narrowing her eyes. "You know I haven't been thinking about this the last week; I've been dreading another attack by Death Eaters! You're so insensitive," she scolded.

Ron looked down at the ground and Hermione turned her face to Harry, pleading with him to change the subject.

"Do you two want to go to Flourish and Blott's? I need to buy a few new books," said Harry, standing up and rubbing his scar a little self-consciously.

"So do I," Hermione said, and they walked off, Ron still eating his cone and staring at the floor.