Exile?

Plotting and Planning

The milk bottle was on the doorstep again when Harry arrived back, telling him the coast was clear, and he picked it up on his way inside.

“That you, Harry?” Sirius called softly, as he took his Cloak off.

“Yeah.”

He went down to the kitchen where he knew Sirius would be. Sirius' eyes widened at the sight of him.

“My, my. We have been getting a make over, haven't we.”

“Makes sense,” said Harry. “What are the Aurors going to be looking for – a scruffy teenage wizard on the run, or a smart yuppie?”

“Yeah, I take your point. You don't look like the teenager of last summer, and you certainly don't look as though you're two days out of Azkaban, that's for sure. Anyway, have a seat – we need to talk.”

Harry didn't like the sound of that, but, all the same, took a chair at the table.

“Everything go okay at the bank?”

“Amazing – no problems. That bloke they have – is he a wizard?”

“Squib.”

Harry had guessed right then. “Here's your money.” He put the envelope down onto the table.

Sirius frowned. “You don't have to pay me back just yet.”

“No, I don't, but there it is.”

Sirius recognised the tone of finality in Harry's voice and didn't argue. He left the envelope lying where Harry had put it.

“Something else,” Harry went on. “I've rented a flat.”

Sirius' eyebrows went up. “That's quick work. Where?”

“Sorry, but ...”

“That's okay,” Sirius said stiffly.

But Harry could see that it wasn't.

“Look, I'm not telling anyone, right? Anyone at all – and I'm sorry, but that includes you too. I want a base of my own which no one, but no one, knows about. Remember my parents?” Harry knew that one was a bit below the belt, and pressed on. “In fact, I'd like to make it Unplottable, too, if possible.”

“Not easy, that.”

“And it's a place where I can be by myself. I need that at the moment.”

“Okay, okay.” Sirius sighed. “You'll have Hedwig?” Harry nodded. “Fair enough.”

“Look, Sirius, I'm sorry ...”

“If I were in your place, I might be paranoid myself. Not that I'm not paranoid enough already. Anyway, enough of that for the moment.” Sirius paused. “It's been a madhouse here today, what with the escapes and you being at large somewhere. Those lunatics from Azkaban being on the loose might have the advantage of taking the heat off you, though.”

Harry nodded. “You mean the Aurors will be too busy?”

“Exactly. But there was something else.” Harry could detect an odd note in Sirius' voice. “Dumbledore took me aside for a chat. Apparently there's something urgent he needs to tell you – something about you and Voldemort.”

“I'm not talking to Dumbledore!” Harry's voice was sharper than he had intended.

“From what I can gather – he won't even tell me the full story – it's not a question of whether you want to or whether you ought to – you MUST talk to him. It's something you really do need to know.”

“Yeah. Maybe.”

“Not maybe.” Harry could hear the frustration in Sirius' voice.

“I'll think about it.”

Sirius stared at him for a long minute, and finally sighed. “Okay. I'll tell Dumbledore I owled you when Hedwig came with a message. Means you'll have to write some sort of reply in the morning for me to show him. Then I can tell Dumbledore I wrote you a reply. How about that? It'll keep them off the scent. You can think of something. Sleep on it tonight.”

“I'll do that.” Harry yawned. “In fact, I'll go up to bed now. It's been a long day.”

Sirius nodded. “Right. Well, I'll see you in the morning, and we can have another talk then.”

Harry slept very soundly that night. No visions, no dreams that he remembered. Perhaps Voldemort was too busy at the moment. He woke early, feeling much better, and wrote two notes for Sirius. The first was the one that could be passed to Dumbledore. The second was more difficult.

'Sorry, Sirius, but I'm going to disappear for a couple of days. I'll be back soon for Hedwig and some books. Just for the moment I want to be by myself. I know I'm being ungrateful, but there it is. I'll be again back soon to catch up on things. Until then – Harry.'

He crept downstairs and left both notes on the kitchen table, then headed off into the early morning light to catch the Tube to Docklands. At ten, he met the Muggle estate agent again, who showed him over the flat once more – not that there was really anything he couldn't have worked out for himself. He knew the estate agent hadn't figured him out yet. What would a young man like Harry, with no apparent job, want with an expensive flat in the Docklands? Quite apart from the fact that he wasn't a young man either, but really a fifteen year old boy. Harry didn't fit any of the usual profiles – City worker, drug dealer ... too well off to be a student. The man was obviously baffled. But, after all, he'd made a quick sale. And given the size of the deposit he'd demanded, he was safe enough if Harry did a runner, or trashed the place.

After the man had left, Harry moved towards the window and gazed out across the London skyline. Now he was alone in more senses than one. But hadn't he been alone ever since the trial? He remembered what he'd said to Sirius: he was tired of being told what to do by everyone. Look where it had got him. Well, now he had a plan of his own, and it was time to set things into motion.

First, though, there were more mundane matters to deal with. He'd have to go out and buy some bedclothes, towels, more clothes, and some food. Apart from that, his time was his own. By evening, he had lugged parcel after parcel up to the flat, having got most of what he had needed from some local shops, and was ready for what he wanted to do next; something he'd been thinking about ever since he'd been released.

He lay on the bed, back against the wall, and closed his eyes. He wanted to find out if he could summon up that mysterious place in the Ministry once again, but without having to fall asleep. He cleared his mind as best he could, remembering how he'd done it in Azkaban, remembering how to free his mind from all thought, then slowly recollecting that corridor, recreating in his mind its its feel, its smell, its texture. It gradually solidified around him, and he found, just as in his dreams, he could walk down to the wooden door at the end. He raised his hand to it, just as he had done in the past. This time, it didn't open for him. Try again. He retraced his steps along the corridor, and willed the door to open for him. Now it swung wide as it had done before, revealing that glowing circular room. More confident now, he walked through, and along to that other room – the one Voldemort was so interested in, the one with all the small glass spheres. He walked up and down aisle after aisle, wondering what was special about this room. But something was impelling him to one particular aisle – why? He scanned label after label on the dusty glass orbs, until something written on one of the labels caught his eye – and he gasped.

The shock was sufficient to jolt him upright out of his trance. He blinked as the room in Docklands swam back into focus. Now he knew what this was all about. Now he knew why Voldemort had been sending him there! Whatever was in that sphere, Voldemort wanted it very much. Very much indeed. And now he thought he knew why – or, at least, had a good idea why.

He wandered back into the sitting room, and gazed out of the window at the lights of London. Was this what Dumbledore had wanted to talk about? And why did Voldemort want the little glass globe so much? How could Harry turn this to his advantage? He had to think the whole thing through very carefully. He had to think of what he was going to do next. And he was going to think it through without the likes of Dumbledore breathing down his neck.

The next morning, he went out to explore the surrounding area. Apart from anything else, he needed the exercise, and he also thought it would be a good idea if he knew the area better than anyone who might be after him – and this time he knew he wasn't being paranoid. The Aurors might be busy now, but they wouldn't always be busy. It was hardly a neighbourhood, however – most of it was either office or apartment blocks, but there were a few small malls in the blocks, most of them filled with shops he thought he would never ever want to go into. One did catch his eye, however; one with a sign over it: 'THE MAN SHOP'. Intrigued, he looked into the window to find it filled with male cosmetics – and this gave him an idea. He pushed the door open and found a rather aesthetic looking young man behind the counter.

“Can I help?”

What he was going to ask about was, for Harry at least, rather embarrassing. “Yeah.” He walked up to the counter. He could smell a variety of scents which presumably the shop stocked, although he couldn't ever imagine buying them for himself. He pushed his fringe of hair back. “I've got this scar here.”

“Oh, so you have!”

“I was wondering if you had some sort of cream that I could put over it – that would cover it up, if you see what I mean.”

“I do indeed. Yes – you want a cream to put over it. Now, let's see. Hmm – you do have a rather pale skin tone ... yes, we might have something that would suit.”

The young man came back with a jar and dipped his finger in. Harry realised that the young man intended applying it himself, and rather firmly reached for the jar.

“You only need to put on a very small amount, and then you rub gently over the area you want to cover – here's a mirror.”

Harry gazed at his reflection, and smoothed a little of the cream onto his forehead. The scar didn't become invisible, but it became a good deal less conspicuous.

“I think that's the best you're going to do,” said the young man regretfully.

“Well, it does hide it a bit.”

“Oh, yes.”

“Okay. I'll have a jar, please.”

“Righto.”

He slipped a jar into a bag and asked what Harry thought was an outrageous price – but quite possibly a price worth paying. Harry handed over the notes and wondered if he'd be able to get out without being asked for a date. He could imagine Ron's reaction to the shop.

As he closed the shop door behind him, he realised that that was probably the first time he'd thought of Ron in the last three months. He was suddenly gripped with a fierce sense of loss – for the loss of Ron, Hermione, and all that he had enjoyed so much at Hogwarts. His hatred for Fudge, and what he'd done, surged that little bit higher.

As he walked along the river embankment, he realised if he was to have any chance of getting back into that world, he had to discredit Fudge completely, and preferably in the public and most humiliating fashion possible. Fudge had had him locked away for spreading stories about Voldemort. Very well, then, Harry knew he had to produce Voldemort in public for all to see. But how could he do that? Easier said than done. But more ideas were beginning to turn over in Harry's mind.

That evening he went back to Grimmauld Place to collect Hedwig and a bag of books from the Black library.

“Sorry about slinking out this morning like that,” he said apologetically to Sirius.

“I don't blame you. You're keeping your head down?”

“I am. Any more news on events?”

“Yes, indeed. Exhibit A. Look at this.” Sirius opened the day's copy of the Prophet at page five.

Harry looked at it – there seemed to be some fairly routine articles, about this and that, but nothing special caught his eye. Sirius pointed to one headline.

'MINISTER FUDGE TO INSPECT SECURITY AT AZKABAN'

“So?”

“The item next to it.”

This was very short – just a few lines – but its headline was: 'MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE OF HARRY POTTER'.

'Harry Potter, The Boy Who Lived, seems to have disappeared in rather mysterious circumstances. He did not arrive at Hogwarts School at the beginning of the year, and last known sightings of him were in August.'

That was all. Harry frowned. It was certainly brief enough. He looked up at Sirius and lifted his eyebrows.

“It's the first time you've been mentioned in the Prophet since August. Someone at the paper must have slipped this in. They probably only got away with it because it was on page five. But the other interesting thing,” Sirius went on, “is that the headline is right next to one saying 'Fudge' and 'Azkaban'.”

Harry pondered this. “Why has it taken so long?”

“Because Fudge has managed to keep the lid on it. And he's leant on the Prophet very heavily. But now he has half the Auror department looking for you, instead of going after the Death Eaters, things are beginning to leak out.”

“Didn't people at Hogwarts say anything?”

“What could they say? Your being sent to Azkaban was never made public. Only a few in the Ministry and those in the Order know. Ron and Hermione know, of course. But who'd believe them?

“And I gather they've a rather nasty new Defence Against The Dark Arts teacher this term. She was sent in by the Ministry. They're trying to undermine Dumbledore, you see. Anyone who mentions your name gets into big trouble. The official story is that you've just disappeared. Your friend Ron got some very nasty detentions from that woman for even mentioning the trial.”

“But everyone must know about the trial!”

Sirius shook his head. “It never made it into the papers, and the transcript has been sealed. Only people from the Minister's private office can see it. Kingsley tried, but got nowhere. But with this -” Sirius tapped the paper “- he's going to suggest to Madam Bones that she takes another look at it – and at the sentence.”

Harry remembered that Madam Bones had been one of the few people that had voted him not guilty.

“What can she do about it?”

“It's a tricky area. Not quite her department. But Fudge would have to have a very good reason for keeping the fact that you'd been sent to Azkaban from the head of the Magical Law Enforcement Office.”

Sirius could see the conflicting emotions clearly written on Harry's face.

“Not everyone has forgotten you, you know,” he went on. “Apparently all the Gryffindor fifth years are keeping a seat empty in every class, and if any of the teachers ask why, they say: 'That's Harrys' seat'.”

Half of Harry wanted to choke up, and the other half was trying to say that he didn't give a damn what people at Hogwarts were doing.

Sirius pressed on. “Fudge has been working on a massive cover up, but it's slowly beginning to unravel. And when people find out what really happened to you – there'll be hell to pay.”

“Meanwhile I'm still a fugitive,” said Harry sourly.

“Tell me about it.”

That brought Harry up sharply. He'd been in hiding for only a few days – but for Sirius, it had been more than a year.

“Something else too,” said Sirius. “People are going to ask: why has Fudge done this? Does he know something we don't? Why was Harry Potter locked away like this, and in such a vindictive way too? Could Fudge be hiding something? What does Potter know? You'll never get a better chance to tell your side of the story.”

Harry sighed. “I hear what you're saying. But after what's happened – it wasn't just Fudge, you know. It wouldn't have worked if his minions hadn't followed orders and done exactly what they told to do. They were in it just as much as he was.”

“True. And what better chance to sweep them all away?”

Harry knew what Sirius was saying was right, but that didn't make it any the easier to accept it. “Okay – you guys get on with things. Just leave me out of it, that's all I ask.”

Sirius knew better than to press the issue. “Okay. You said you wanted to get some books?”

“Yeah. There's a pretty good collection of Dark Arts stuff on your bookshelves I want to read up on.” Sirius raised an eyebrow, and Harry went on impatiently, “Look, I'm not going to start using it, right? But it helps if I knew what it's all about.”

“Fair enough. And I'll see if I can dig out something about how to make your place Unplottable.”

“Thanks.”

After half an hour, Harry had enough to be going on with, and shrunk the books down to fit in his back pack. He released Hedwig – she'd be able to find him easily enough, shrunk her cage too, and headed back.

Harry spent the next day sitting by the window in his flat, reading through the books he'd borrowed. Sirius would have been more wary if he'd seen some of the titles – Harry had shown a few of the books to Sirius, but not all of them. At the end of the afternoon, Harry thought he had a pretty clear idea of what was in those glass spheres. All he had to do now was to work out what came next.

He had a plan. It was certainly a dangerous plan – that is, if sticking your finger in the eyes of Fudge and of Voldemort at the same time could be described as dangerous. He had to think the details through very carefully. One small mistake, and he'd be dead, or back in Azkaban – which amounted to the same thing. He didn't fancy either option. Finally, he got a piece of paper, and with a Muggle biro, began to sketch an outline of his plan. After an hour or so he thought he'd worked out all the wrinkles, but he knew he'd have to come back to it a few more times to make sure that there was nothing he might have overlooked. Gazing out of his window across at the lights of London, he wondered whether he was doing the best thing. What was it Dumbledore wanted to tell him? Ten to one, it was about that small glass sphere. Well, he'd worked out what it was by himself, without any help from his headmaster, thank you very much. No, Dumbledore wasn't his headmaster, since he wasn't a pupil at Hogwarts any more. He owed Dumbledore nothing.

The next question was: when to do it? The sooner the better, in many ways - but not tomorrow, he thought. He'd give himself a day off. He thought he'd earned it. And he needed time to look at the plan, think it out from as many angles as he could. He also needed to practice some wandwork, even though the plan didn't call for much magic. What he might have to do was defend himself, but there was no one he could practice duelling with. He know that after his enforced break, he was very much out of practice. But there was nothing he could do about that. He wasn't going to ask Sirius for help – he didn't want to arouse any suspicions about what he might be up to. Besides, the sort of skills he need to brush up on would take more time that he'd got.

The next day he spent either walking round the area, or practising spells of one sort and another. The walks helped clear his mind – and he'd need a clear mind – as well as giving him some exercise. He needed the exercise – he still hadn't recovered fully from the affects of Azkaban. He went to bed early that evening, and rose late the next morning. No visions.

He looked across the London skyline as he sipped his morning cup of tea. He'd do it tomorrow, he decided. Tomorrow would be the day. There was nothing else he needed now. He was as ready as he'd ever be.

He spent the morning practising various charms and spells again, more to get back into the habit of using his wand than anything else. Later in the afternoon he went through the ritual of sitting on his bed, blanking his mind, and walking down that corridor again. He was able to get to where he wanted without any problem. So that side of things worked. Now he knew where he was supposed to be going – and what it was he'd be fetching.

He rose late again the next morning. He knew he wasn't yet as physically fit as he should be, and he was certainly out of practice with his magical skills, but today would have to be the day. He turned the plan over and over in his mind during his midday walk, then went back to the flat to practice some more wandwork. He knew too that he wouldn't be getting much sleep that night, so lay down on his bed to doze as best he could for an hour or two.

He had a bite to eat around ten that evening – he was too much on edge to have any real appetite - then put the few things he'd need into his backpack before heading out to the Underground. He sat in the carriage, just another anonymous youth in jeans, trainers, and teeshirt, with a small backpack. The Muggle around him, however, would certainly have been surprised with the contents of his pack, with his wand and Invisibility Cloak hidden beneath more teeshirts.

Once clear of the station at the other end, he ducked down a side street, slipped his Cloak from out of the backpack, and covered himself. He took a deep breath. Soon there'd be no turning back.

He found the broken down phone box, opened the door, and, as he'd seen Mr Weasley do, dialled the number.

“Welcome to the Ministry of Magic. How can I help?” said the cool voice.

“Edgar Hornby. Visiting the Ministry.”

An anonymous, meaningless, invented name. The visitor's badge slid out, and he put it into his pack, even though he wouldn't be needing it. The phone box began to descend, and it juddered its way slowly down to the atrium, where he slid the door back. A bored looking wizard was sitting behind the desk in the distance, looking to see who might be calling at this time of night. Harry moved quickly and quietly away from the lift, as the man stood up and strolled over. Harry smiled to himself as he saw the man's perplexed face, as first he looked inside the lift, then around the atrium. No one in sight. He looked again. Still no one in sight. He shrugged, and then began to amble back to his desk. Harry breathed a sigh of relief. So far, so good.

Rather than risk the lifts again, Harry took the stairs down to the bottom level. He had time enough - he could go as slowly and quietly as he wanted. He was wearing rubbersoled trainers - on the stone floors of the Ministry, they made no sound at all. He'd tested them out earlier to make sure they didn't squeak. He stopped at the bottom of the last flight of stairs to retrieve his wand from the backpack. Now for the door.

He walked slowly down the familiar corridor, just as he had in his sleep on countless nights. He reached the door and put up a hand. With a breath of excitement, he felt it move beneath his touch. Quickly, he opened it and slipped inside – although as he closed it again, he was sure he heard a noise of some sort from behind him, from back in the corridor. But he had seen no one there. Perhaps, he thought, there was an alarm system of some sort. He waited in the middle of the circular room for someone to come looking – but no one did. He was there. He'd done it!